Leslie Jones Slams Ghostbusters: Afterlife Director For Comments About 2016 Reboot

The Ghostbusters franchise headed down a new path in 2016, with Paul Feig's film telling a female-fronted story separate from the canon of the previous films. The Ghostbusters reboot, which was led by Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, and Leslie Jones, became the subject of a massive amount of vitriol on the Internet, with a segment of fans upset that the franchise was now starring women. In her newly-published memoir, Leslie F*cking Jones, Jones reflects on the reaction to the Ghostbusters reboot, as well as the "unforgivable" comments that Ghostbusters: Afterlife director Jason Reitman made about the film. While Reitman later apologized for telling Bill Burr's Monday Morning Podcast that Afterlife would "go back to original technique and hand the movie back to the fans," Jones argued that the damage was already done.

"Bringing up the idea of giving the movie 'back to the fans' was a pretty clear shout-out to all those losers who went after us for making an all-female [movie]," Jones writes in part, adding, "Why are people being so evil to each other? How can you sit and type 'I want to kill you.' Who does that? Sad keyboard warriors living in their mother's basements hated the fact that this hallowed work of perfect art now featured — gasp! horror! — women in the lead roles. Worst of all, of course, was that one of the lead characters was a Black woman. For some men this was the final straw."

Will There Be a Ghostbusters: Afterlife Sequel?

A sequel to Ghostbusters: Afterlife was confirmed to be in the works in 2022, with the film currently scheduled to be released in March of 2024. The currently-untitled blockbuster will be directed by Gil Kenan with a script from Kenan and Reitman. Returning cast members from previous films will include Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Logan Kim, Celeste O'Connor, Carrie Coon, Paul Rudd, Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts, and William Atherton.

"I did read a version," Hudson revealed to ComicBook.com in an interview late last year. "I'm pretty sure they committed to doing another one. I'm very happy with it, but I also know this is early on. Jason has been incredible, and I really just love and appreciate him. I'm so thankful to be able to work with him. So, I'm excited about but... I haven't and I never assume anything. I am happy, though, to have Ghostbusters in my filmography. And I'm just really delighted when I see little kids, two and three years old, singing the song and being happy about it."

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