Friday, September 4, 2015

A Male-Centric "Ghostbuster" Movie in 2017

Ghostbusters
Boys will soon have another group of heroes to worship after Sony has (according to Mike Fleming of Deadline) announced a second new "Ghostbusters" film, one explicitly male-centric and involving at least tangentially creative input from Ivan Reitman.

The actual report states that Joe and Anthony Russo ("Captain America: The Winter Soldier" and "Captain America: Civil War") and writer Drew Pearce ("Iron Man 3" and "Mission: Impossible 5") have been put in charge of crafting a new boy-centric "Ghostbusters" movie that will (theoretically) star Channing Tatum (who will produce) as one of the new Ghostbusters.

It will allegedly shoot next year for a 2017 release date, meaning it will exist alongside Paul Feig’s much-discussed all-female "Ghostbusters" reboot, which is to star Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Leslie Jones, and Kate McKinnon as the new busters-of-ghosts and will drop on 22 July 2016.

The official plan is for Sony to turn "Ghostbusters" into an expanded universe type deal, under the leadership of Reitman and Dan Aykroyd with various films, television shows, and related spin-offs. Later updates via Devin Faraci of BadAss Digest clarified that the film would be merely one of hopefully many "Ghostbusters" films, one which was born out of Tatum’s apparent friendship with Chris Pratt, and that Sony is also considering a would-be prequel and an eventually team-up film with the boys and the girls going all Fast Five to battle a mutual threat.

What this means this early is that, the future film might undermine what the all-lady Ghostbusters film, which early indications suggest could be a flop.

For the record, the Russos and Mr. Pearce are wickedly good at what they do. They may-well end up with a solid "Ghostbusters" movie, and the idea of a franchise of loosely connected supernatural comedies under the "Ghostbusters" banner is an interesting one. But, fair or not, the female-centric version do not have a solid fan base. All it is trying to do is promote women's rights and show how powerful they could be to nobody.

That may be an unfairly harsh reaction, but that’s how it reads and how it will read to those most angry about Feig’s first new "Ghostbusters" movie. “Don’t worry, ye young lesbians and women's rights activists who wants to dominate big budget franchises even if they cannot generate enough audience to sustain its blockbuster run, we'll make sure that you get a token recognition, but don't prevent us from trying to recover our losses when we invested in your lost cause!"

More importantly, this move completely ensures the financial legitimacy of the "Ghostbusters" franchise. By making a second male-centric "Ghostbusters" on top of Feig’s reboot, Sony is certain that the female-centric Ghostbusters will not create enough buzz to attract followers, while the later male-centric version (especially considering the participation of Reitman and possibly Aykroyd) is the Real "Ghostbusters" in terms of generating profit.

The presence of this gender-divided "Ghostbusters" franchise, with basically competing films, makes it less likely that the female-centric one will do better while concurrently meeting the company's commitment to be gender balance. Female movie goers (and male movie goers who like movies with women in them) can still enjoy the first one knowing that they have a second one to fall back on in vcase it doesn't pan out or meet their expectations.

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