Ghostbusters Should Have Never Been A Whole Franchise
Ghostbusters, released in 1984, is a comedy classic. The film, starring Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Sigourney Weaver, and Ernie Hudson, was one of the most popular films of the 1980s. With a box-office gross of nearly $300 million in 1984 money and enough positive reviews to propel it to a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, its reputation is sterling. Why, then, has no one been able to make a successful followup since?
With a direct sequel released in 1989, a reboot in 2016, and another direct sequel in 2021, Hollywood keeps trying to reach the same level of magic it did with the 1984 original. While the first sequel garnered more than its fair share of groans from critics worldwide, it did manage to gross $215 million at the time of its release. The 2016 reboot, however, was a massive box-office failure, reaching only $229 million on a $144 million budget.
RELATED: 10 Best Ghostbusters Games, Ranked
Ghostbusters: Afterlife, a sequel/reboot that was released just last year, was also a bomb and grossed less than $200 million off of its more modest $75 million budget. Considering the star power in front of the camera and the immense talent behind it for all of these later projects, why hasn’t the world been down to bust ghosts since 1989?
It might be easy to forget, but the first Ghostbusters film was first and foremost a laugh-a-minute comedy. Fresh off of hits like Meatballs, Stripes, and Caddyshack, Bill Murray was one of the most lauded comedy actors of the early 1980s. The production team behind the original Ghostbusters wisely hired him on as the lead and placed him on-screen with other comedy maestros of the time like Dan Aykroyd, Rick Moranis, and Harold Ramis for the purpose of creating a high concept
Read more on gamerant.com
