Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire Trailer is Perfectly Fine
Power up your proton packs because the Ghostbusters are back. Today, Sony released a trailer for Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (which is a lousy title, but still much better than The Dial of Destiny), the follow-up to 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife and sequel to some 80s movie or other. This time, Egon’s daughter, grandchildren, and Paul Rudd move to New York City to team up with the remaining Ghostbusters and start up the business again. No points for guessing if there’s something strange in the neighborhood. Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Ernie Hudson reunite with Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Logan Kim, Celeste O’Connor, Carrie Coon, and Rudd; Patton Oswalt and Kumail Nanjiani join them. Jason Reitman and Gil Kenan return to write the script, but this time, Kenan is directing. Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire is supposed to open on March 29, 2024, but the trailer only lists it as “coming soon,” so that date could very well change. You can check out the trailer below:
What surprises me most about the Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire trailer is how present the original Ghostbusters are. They’re being set up as the co-leads with the newbies, or at least as significant supporting characters. That’s enticing, but I find it a little hard to believe; maybe they’ll be around longer than in Afterlife, which they were barely in, but did Bill Murray really sign on to be in the bulk of another Ghostbusters sequel? My guess is that they’re in maybe twenty minutes total and act as background mentor figures. The plot seems okay; they’re going with an ice theme, with the villain feeding off people’s fear and using it to kill them, which manifests in freezing them. (This happens during July, which is neat, but it means this probably should’ve been a summer movie.) It’ll be fine if they don’t try to make it too similar to the pink slime in Ghostbusters II; one of the worst things about Afterlife was that it re-used so much from the first Ghostbusters. I liked that last visual of the villain in shadows; it looks creepy and menacing, and juxtaposing that with a goofy reaction from Paul Rudd is in keeping with the early films. I’m not thrilled with some of the special effects, though; I love the idea of the lions from the New York Public Library coming to life, but unless they clean up the CGI before the film is released, the execution is bad. Some of the ice spears that pop up look too cartoony as well. Overall… I don’t know. I’ll give it a try, but I thought Afterlife was mediocre, and I’m not exactly thrilled for a new Ghostbusters series.
Comments (4)
Thank you, I appreciate that. A lot of people loved Afterlife. I get it, and there are things about it I liked. I didn’t see the 2016 remakebootwhatever, but I’m sure it’s much better than that, if only because it actually respects the universe and the Ghostbusters movies.
I passed on Afterlife and don’t think much of the kids from Stranger Things. This franchise used to be red hot. Why is it such a challenge to tell stories about hauntings and ghosts? You would think writers could have a field day with all the things out there, like I remember Styxhexenhammer did a state by state account of various spooks and haunted places. I could not get into the new Goosebumps either.
I think ghost stories (and horror in general, but especially these) come down to atmosphere, and it’s something I find a lot of modern movies don’t bother with. Like in the first Ghostbusters, the opening scene in the library works so well because of those initial moments of the books slowly hovering as they change shelves while that creepy music plays. That the librarian doesn’t see it but we do makes it even spookier, and it creates tension because we want to warn her. Even the ghosts had a haunting look about them in that movie, with a creepy translucence that the newer ones can’t replicate with the CGI; they look goofy rather than scary.
I respect your opinion highly but personally, I really enjoyed Afterlife!