First Ghostbusters: Afterlife trailer kicks off a mystery tied to the original movie

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We finally have the first Ghostbusters: Afterlife trailer. And while it doesn’t exactly feature fire and brimstone coming down from the skies or the rivers and seas boiling, it does have plenty of ghosts waiting to be busted.

This latest iteration of Ghostbusters is directed by Jason Reitman (Juno, Young Adult), who happens to be the son of original Ghostbusters director, Ivan Reitman. The younger Reitman has said in the past that this new film would be a direct sequel to the original film and its sequel Ghostbusters II. Thanks to the trailer for Afterlife, we finally know what that means.

The film centers on a family, played by Carrie Coon, Mckenna Grace, and Finn Wolfhard, who move to a small town and discover its hidden secrets. Whatever, probably ghostly, discoveries the family makes lead them directly to some old recognizable artifacts of the original Ghostbusters, and apparently the original busters themselves. Several of the original movie’s cast members are set to reprise their roles in this sequel including Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Ernie Hudson. Paul Rudd pays a teacher who’s is hype for the original team (a “fan,” if you will). And one of the kids looks exactly like the late Harold Ramis’ Egon, so you can probably tell where this is going.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife is the fourth movie in the Ghostbusters franchise, and the second recent release. The last movie, Ghostbusters (2016), was an all-female reboot of the series that Ivan Reitman now says takes place in a different storytelling universe. The film was the target of numerous online troll campaigns, and wound up with middling reviews and box office results.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife hits theaters on July 10, 2020.