Get ready to return to the Ghostbusters firehouse as Sony has announced a release date for their followup to this past fall’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife. The new film is targeted to arrive in theaters on December 20, 2023.
Jason Reitman, who directed and co-wrote Ghostbusters: Afterlife, will be doing the same duties on the upcoming sequel.
Development on the sequel was first reported on back in April of this year but it was only officially confirmed by Reitman earlier this month during the studio sponsored Ghostbusters Day event. At that time, Reitman stated that the film was being developed under the code name Firehouse, though it is unknown if that will be the feature’s final title.
The film was made for a modest $75 million budget and pulled in $197 million at the worldwide box office, with ancillary streaming and home video revenue pushing it further into the black. The film reunited original Ghostbusters stars Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts with newcomers Mckenna Grace, Paul Rudd, Finn Wolfhard, and Carrie Coon.
Ghostbusters has been a high priority for the studio since they established the Ghost Corps production banner in-house to develop the franchise. Since then, Ghost Corps has overseen the 2016 Paul Feig-directed Ghostbusters reboot which starred Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones as the four paranormal removal experts in a story that took place in a separate continuity from the original first Ghostbusters films and Afterlife. Other projects have have been rumored to be in development by Ghost Corps including a male-led franchise reboot and an animated feature film and an Aykroyd-penned prequel film. The status of those projects is unknown, though it is possible that one or more than one of them may be dead.
