In a recent tweet, director Jason Reitman announced that the upcoming fifth entry to the Ghostbusters franchise is working under the codename Firehouse.
Firehouse is a reference to how the fifth movie will bring the story back to Manhattan in New York City, the location of the first two films; in these films, the titular Ghostbusters operated out of an abandoned firehouse.
Last year we saw the release of Ghostbusters: Afterlife, the fourth film in the franchise and the third of the original series (Answer the Call is considered a reboot or spinoff.) This refocused the story of the franchise on the Spengler family after original Ghostbuster Egon Spengler went missing trying to prevent a paranormal apocalypse.
Afterlife was considered a success after the ill-fated 2016 reboot and original Ghostbusters stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and more made return appearances of their characters from the original films.
The franchise has seen a resurgence of interest ever since 2016’s Answer the Call managed to get people talking about Ghostbusters again (even if not all of it was positive.) Meanwhile, 2021’s Afterlife managed to appease the fans that felt alienated by the reboot and bring the sort of success producers were expecting from 2016.
Details are currently sparse about project Firehouse, but with the franchise’s focus on generational bridges and the Spengler family, most fans are anticipating a direct sequel to Afterlife.
Despite a movie industry suppressed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Afterlife managed to earn a spot as the tenth highest grossing film of the year on its 75 million dollar budget.
