With the Star Wars movies currently on a much-needed break and Jurassic World probably getting frozen in amber for the foreseeable future, Hollywood needs to divert its attention to a different legacy franchise that can weaponize nostalgia into making people care about new movies. Ghostbusters: Afterlife, or whatever we’re going to call the sequel series that spins out of it, seems like the perfect candidate: The first movie survived middling reviews to make good money at the box office, and Sony announced a sequel so quickly that it must have a lot of faith in the further adventures of Muncher, Podcast, and the other characters that were not named Muncher or Podcast.
Today (via Variety), Sony announced exactly when the continued expansion of the Ghostbusters brand will happen, with the sequel—which we’re just going to call Afterlife 2—being set to come out on December 20, 2023. We heard earlier this month that the sequel would take the Spengler family back to New York, the place where Ghostbusters movies are supposed to happen, with the movie operating under the codename “Firehouse” as a specific nod to, you know, the thing from the original movies. (We would question the wisdom in announcing the codename of your movie so far in advance, which seems to defeat the purpose, but it’s not like anyone who sees Podcast and Muncher filming in Manhattan wouldn’t know what movie they’re making.)
Afterlife 2 will be directed by Jason Reitman, son of original Ghostbusters director Ivan Reitman, who died earlier this year (just a few months after the previous movie, which he produced, came out). Will this movie be a fawning tribute to the elder Reitman? That might be a little unnecessary, since Afterlife was so slavishly dedicated to the importance of Ghostbusters, but going back to New York seems like a perfect setup for even more Ghostbusters nostalgia.
Then again, maybe Afterlife 2 will follow the Last Jedi model and follow a movie that’s all about the old movies with one that deconstructs the mythology of Ghostbusters in a way that actually deepens what came before. We could have Dr. Venkman’s faith in bustin’ ghosts shaken, which freaks out the old fans so much that they don’t even notice when the end of the movie beautifully captures and celebrates the fact that bustin’ makes him feel good. Or maybe it’ll be a hollow celebration of fan service and they’ll get the Statue Of Liberty walking around again. That would be fun.