Sony announced that they've given the green light to Ghostbusters 5. The Ghostbusters franchise began in 1984 with the release of the surprise mega-hit Ghostbusters, which was directed by Ivan Reitman and starred Bill Murray, Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd, and Ernie Hudson as four men who start up a business helping New Yorkers get rid of ghosts. The film spawned a massive multimedia franchise that included a 1989 sequel, two animated series, and plenty of tie-in toys, comics, and video games. The franchise seemed to have mostly gone dormant until 2016, when Paul Feig mounted a reboot starring Melissa McCarthy and SNL alums Leslie Jones, Kate McKinnon, and Kristen Wiig.
Although that film performed reasonably well at the box office, it couldn't quite overcome its massive budget and the misogynistic outcry from online commenters. Sony revamped the franchise yet again with Ghostbusters: Afterlife, which cast Finn Wolfhard and Mckenna Grace as the grandchildren of Ramis' character Egon Spengler. The more Stranger Things-inflected adventure film, which also starred Carrie Coon and Paul Rudd, made $30 million less than the 2016 film, but given that it had a budget of at least a quarter of that project's, it was considered a much surer success, especially in the depressed pandemic era box office arena.
Summarily, it now seems like the franchise is picking up steam yet again. The industry event CinemaCon, which is run by the National Association of Theatre Owners, is currently taking place in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Sony CinemaCon panel has been the source of heaps of exciting news, but the latest is the announcement that they will be moving forward on another, currently untitled, Ghostbusters film. Ghostbusters 5 is in development, but no release date has been set.
Though the promise of another installment is exciting, Sony has not confirmed if any cast members will be returning for Ghostbusters 5. The same goes for the crew, which includes director Jason Reitman, whose father directed the original film. Although he is in pre-production as a producer on a Diablo Cody project with HBO, he does not currently have any officially announced directorial features in progress, so he will more than likely jump on board soon if he is interested.
Despite the lack of details regarding the film overall, it’s easy to speculate the shape this film may take. Because of how quickly this green light was given, it is probable that Ghostbusters 5 will be a direct follow-up to Afterlife, which ended with a stinger scene teasing that the Ghostbusters’ ecto-containment unit is experiencing a breach of some kind. The young cast will likely return alongside the surviving original Ghostbusters in an adventure that may return the franchise to the familiar streets of New York City. For now, more details about Ghostbusters 5 remain to be seen.
Source: Sony