Sony is rebooting Ghostbusters with an all-female group of 'Busters helmed by Paul Feig. It's not set in continuity with the original film, and will function as a new origin story.
Not content to leave it at that, Sony is hell-bent on building an entire universe out of the Ghostbusters brand. Additional movies, new TV shows and merchandise will be included as part of this new enterprise functioning under an umbrella Sony calls "Ghostcorps."
Joe and Anthony Russo, directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier (and who just signed on to direct Avengers: Infinity War), will helm another Ghostbusters film with a different cast, this one with a stronger focus on action instead of comedy.
It's a bold plan, and one that not everyone is thrilled about. Rebooting the Ghostbusters universe means that the first two films will not be part of the larger Ghostbusters canon. It's like they're erasing it from the brand, which is a true sacrilege.
The original Ghostbusters flick is a comedy classic, and it holds up as well today, 30 years later, as it did when it first came out. Fans are fiercely attached to the original quartet of Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, Egon Spengler, and Winston Zedemore.
One such fan is filmmaker Max Landis. Geeks will remember Landis as the screenwriter behind Josh Trank's Chronicle and the hilarious short film The Death and Return of Superman. That little gem skewered DC Comics' infamous 1992 storyline that saw Superman killed by the monstrous Doomsday, pointing out the stunning amount of flaws and nonsense present in that story.
Landis is apparently a big Ghostbusters fan, because when rumors circulated a few years ago about him possibly taking on the long-awaited (and delayed, and then canceled) Ghostbusters 3, he put pen to paper and came up with the story he would use to write and direct such a film. Although he confesses that he was never actually approached by Sony to take on the movie, Landis was inspired enough by the notion to cook up a story.
Now that we know of Sony's intentions to ditch the original cast and reboot the entire franchise, Landis has posted his treatment for Ghostbusters 3 online, just for fun. It's a little under 5,000 words of what's essentially fan fiction, describing the action that you would see on the screen. There's only one problem:
It's perfect.
Landis' take on Ghostbusters 3 is a genius threequel. He revisits the mythology and themes of the first movie, turning the franchise into a true trilogy in a way that honors the original while propelling the series into the future. It smartly takes into account things like the absence of Harold Ramis, who played Egon Spengler (Ramis passed away last year) and Bill Murray's repeated ambivalence toward doing a third movie, incorporating both into the story.
Instead of the original crew, Landis' film would have focused on a new crew of Ghostbusters, a "next generation" group who have yet to prove their mettle — one of them is Spengler's daughter! — while Dan Aykroyd (Ray) and Ernie Hudson (Winston) get plenty of screentime. Aykroyd even gets a satisfying, emotional character arc.
I can't encourage you enough to read Landis' take on a third film. It's bigger, badder and bolder than the first two films while amplifying them with respect and intelligence, and it's loaded with clever throwbacks to old characters and jokes without ever feeling derivative. And emotionally speaking, it provides the perfect closure for the first two movies — with the noteworthy exception of Murray's Peter Venkman.
A few spoilers:
• Aside from Rick Moranis (who's retired from acting) and Sigourney Weaver (whose Dana Barrett could easily appear in Murray's cameo), every supporting player from the first movie is back, and most of them in ways you won't see coming.
• Slimer gets a backstory!
• Landis includes (and embeds in his post) a use of Ellan Henderson's song "Ghost" that's guaranteed to give you all the feels.
Whatever Sony comes up with for its shiny new connected universe/franchise thing, it can't top this. Max Landis has cooked up the Ghostbusters 3 that fans always dreamed of. It's almost a crime that he'll never get to make it.
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