Paul Feig Defends His Ghostbusters Reboot

Director Paul Feig has sought to allay the fears of ‘Ghostbusters’ fans who might not think that bringing the brief but eminent movie franchise out of retirement is a good idea.

The ‘Bridesmaids’ helmsman, who has signed up to create a latter day sequel to Ivan Reitman’s movies, added that there would be ‘fun nods’ to the original film.

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“A lot of people ask why I didn’t create my own thing, but ‘Ghostbusters’ never ran out of steam, it’s such a great idea,” he told Empire.

“It’s such a fun franchise so why not bring it to a new generation? The old movie is never going to not exist.

“It’s not my plan to erase every copy! Hopefully they can all live together.”

He went on to broach those planned references to the world of Reitman, Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray and Ernie Hudson.

“We’re not recreating the old movie, but we want to do just enough fun nods that the fans will go, ‘Oh, okay, they’re acknowledging that the other movie existed’,” he said, seeming not to acknowledge that ‘Ghostbusters II’ existed.

“I like to watch parodies, but I don’t want to do them because they’re too referential.

“Comedy that’s too referential has such a short shelf life, whereas comedy that’s based around characters will be relatable 2000 years from now because people won’t change that much.”

Feig’s decision to cast an all-female Ghostbusting team has been picked apart since his appointment to the director’s chair last year.

But thus far there’s no word on casting.

According to reports, the likes of Melissa McCarthy, Rebel Wilson, Jennifer Lawrence, Kristen Wiig, Emma Stone and Linda Carderlini have all been rumoured.

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Image credits: Rex Features