Ghostbusters to go animated in big movie news thanks to Sony Animation and Netflix

It’s early days but there's some great news just out about a new animated Ghostbusters movie. That’s in addition to an animated series already in the plan. from Sony Animation and Netflix. That’s nice news as a Christmas present for everyone.

The Ghostbusters franchise has always been popular and had a real boost in recent years with two new films. Both Ghostbusters: Afterlife and this year’s Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire were huge successes. Now as Deadline reports, Sony Animation and Netflix are again joining forces to work on plans for an animated movie. It is early days, though, and information remains quite limited so far. 

The report indicates Kris Pearn will be directing the animated movie. He has a strong background in both Netflix and animation. He was behind The award-winning The Willoughbys comedy from 2020. He also co-directed Cloudy With Meatballs 2 with Cody Cameron. Peran looks to be a great name to have onboard.

Let‘s get animated for Ghostbusters

What that all means for the live-action Ghostbusters movie remains to be seen. The investment in the Ghostbusters brand can only help create interest across all ages. Gil Kenan, who has director, writer, and executive producer roles at times on the live-action films has indicated previously that another could follow. You'd hope the animated movie news doesn't change anything in that respect. 

In the meantime, of course, we’ll have the animated series to look forward to. That's been worked on since 2022 and got the green light this summer to progress. That series has Elliott Kalan as writer, showrunner, and executive producer. Kenan from the live-action films is linked alongside Jason Reitman as co-producers. Reitman was involved in the last two Ghostbuster movies, as director and writer on Afterlife and as writer and producer on Frozen Empire. A strong pairing for the series.

The series is being lined up at Sony as part of their kid's programming. The live-action movies have moved from having more adult themes in the early films to being much more family and kids in the latter two. It would seem likely that any new animated movie would be in that same style, but it’s another unknown point that we’ll have to wait for more news on. 

You can see the way this is all building up with Sony Animation and Netflix. It's going to be quite a set of collaborations. With a series, and now a movie on the animation books, it’ll be interesting to see what else comes up for animated and live-action Ghostbusters in the future.

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