Ghostbusters in Limbo
I consider this Lame with a capital L. Variety reported yesterday the Ghostbusters video game set for release this October may never reach stores due to merger of Activision and Vivendi Games, now called Activision Blizzard. Someone’s not happy and it’s not just the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
Activision Blizzard announced they would only continue to publish a small number of games that were already in production by Vivendi’s console publisher Sierra such as Ice Age, based on the film, and Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon titles.
There has been no actual comment as to why Ghostbusters was not one of the games chosen to continue. Just this past weekend the game was promoted at the San Diego Comic Con. Videogamer.com spoke with a representative of Activision who said, “As far as I know everything was going to plan. We haven’t been given any reasoning for it.”
But from what I’ve been reading, we’ll still be getting the game, just not when we expected to. Destructoid.com has quoted Sierra’s PR team as saying, “It is not canceled and it will not be canceled.” Now Sony Pictures Entertainment is looking for a new publisher for a 2009 release, which just so happens to coincide with the movies 25th anniversary.
Should we be calling Shenanigans?
All of this comes on the heels of rumors of a new Ghostbusters movie. Coming from a “very reliable source” (take that for what it’s worth) DreadCentral.com says all four original Ghostbusters have agreed to return to the franchise. Wait, there’s more. They’re saying the guys would be “handing over their proton packs to Seth Rogan and the crew from 40 Year Old Virgin!” That means Rogan, Steve Carell, Romany Malco and Paul Rudd would be our new Ghostbusters.
All-in-all those guys wouldn’t be a terrible choice as replacements but haven’t we learned to leave well-enough alone yet?
Hmm I didn’t remember that actually but here’s a link for everyone:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extreme_Ghostbusters
what about Ghostbusters Extreme? that continued the story and was pretty good to boot. Anyone rememebr that?
Ahh, so something was canceled. From what I heard there was still stuff going on about it at comic con. Maybe it was non-panel related.
Dammit! guess that explains why the Ghostbusters panel was cancelled at Comic Con…
I’m not against handing off the proton packs to the Apatow crowd – and I’d rather have a natural progression than a complete reboot.
Well, I don’t think you actually need to do a one-for-one replacement of the old crew with new actors. Since the original actors are still alive, why not just carry on the storyline with fresh Ghostbusters for the 21st century, then work in cameos of one or more of the original cast? Hell, the originals could even be ghosts themselves at this point.
i love that ghost busters 3 cast. the 40 year old virgin crew is perfect. i’d also be all fore sandler/vince vaughn in murray role, jack black as akroyd, /owen wilson/ben stiller as harold ramis, dokes from dexter as ernie hudson
Yeah, I don’t quite believe it yet either Randy.
Isn’t Murray always the holdout? Haha.
Yeah, GB you’re right, it’s sort of like going into the same situation with these guys as with the old.
That lineup actually doesn’t sound bad. After all, part of the reason the original Ghostbusters worked was because you took these guys who were funny in normal comedies, and put them in a horror/action movie.
The Rogan/Apatow formula is on the verge of getting stale over the next couple of years (if it hasn’t already for some people), but if they can branch out into genre movies like this, they might be able to keep themselves alive for a long time to come.
Seth Rogan wisecracking about a hot chick = amusing, but getting overdone
Seth Rogan wisecracking about a ghost demon chasing him = fresh and funny
While things are never set in stone regarding Hollywood, during the my interview with Ernie Hudson (just a few months ago) He said Bill Murry was the holdout. And they would not do it without him. So who knows?
You should know by now….Hollywood doesn’t know HOW to leave well enough alone.
They’re bringing 90210 back for crying out loud!!!
Like you said though, if Seth Rogen, Steve Carrell are involved, it’ll be in good hands.
I don’t believe it yet though.