Following the recent death of star Harold Ramis, Ghostbusters director Ivan Reitman has officially dropped out of directing the long delayed third installment in the franchise. Although he will reportedly stay involved with the project as a producer, helping determined studio Sony find a suitable replacement. The studio remains seemingly committed to begin filming the new film early next year.

Explaining the news the director spoke of attending the recent funeral for Ramis and revealed “It was really moving and it made me think about a lot of things”. Ramis had been one of the stars and major creative forces behind the first two films and his death leaves yet another noticeable absence for the reboot of the beloved 1980s franchise.  Bill Murray won’t feature in the new film either having publicly expressed his firm reluctance to reprise his sardonic star turn as Dr Perter Venkman.

Acknowledging the painful ongoing  re-writing process, Reitman has confirmed that the current draft will only feature any of the original Ghostbusters “in a  very minor role” but asserted that they do at least  “now have a draft that is very good, that the studio is very excited about.” Tropic Thunder writer Etan Cohen and Dan Aykroyd are the ones responsible for that latest draft.

Only time will tell if we will finally have someone to call if there’s something strange and it don’t look good…