Twenty-six years after the Statue of Liberty walked down the streets of Manhattan in “Ghostbusters II,” the much discussed Paul Feig-helmed and female-led reboot of the beloved comedy series is set to start shooting in Boston this week. Collider has noticed a few pieces of information from the Boston Herald that should be of great interest to “Ghostbusters” fans.
First things first, we apparently now have our first look at the film’s plot synopsis: stars Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy “play a pair of unheralded authors who write a book positing that ghosts are real. Flash forward a few years and Wiig lands a prestigious teaching position at Colombia U. Which is pretty sweet, until her book resurfaces and she is laughed out of academia. Wiig reunites with McCarthy and the other two proton-packing phantom wranglers, and she gets some sweet revenge when ghosts invade Manhattan and she and her team have to save the world.”
If this sounds familiar, well it would seem that Dan Aykroyd’s basic story idea he had been pushing for "Ghostbusters 3" is still being used. Back in 2013 he told Larry King that his sequel is "based on new research that’s being done in particle physics by the young men and women at Columbia University." He added, "Basically, there’s research being done that I can say that the world or the dimension that we live in, our four planes of existence, length, height, width and time, become threatened by some of the research that’s being done. Ghostbusters — new Ghostbusters — have to come and solve the problem."
The slight parallels are interesting if only because Feig recently said he turned down opportunities to helm the original "Ghostbusters" reboot and said the script he read "felt sweaty to me, it felt like a wheel was off the cart." So maybe he took Aykroyd’s basic idea and made it his own? It looks that way.
Overall, it seems that Feig’s reboot will be only slightly tweaking the basic engine of the “Ghostbusters” story, which will also end up including the obligatory “epic ghost invasion of Manhattan.” An invasion that is so epic it will take the production team a few nights to shoot it, and that may even include a familiar spectral face. Everyone’s favorite ghost, Slimer, will be returning from retirement to grace the silver screen but it’s unclear if he’ll remain the sole connection to the original two films.
Feig’s currently-untitled “Ghostbusters” reboot will open on July 22, 2016.
