Ghostbusters 2016 director Paul Feig ready to unleash 3.5 hour cut

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

The GHOSTBUSTERS franchise is slated to return to the big-screen with GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE, a direct sequel to the original two films which takes place third years later and follows a family who moves to a small town where they discover their connection to the original Ghostbusters and their grandfather's secret legacy. However, this is not the first time that the franchise has made a return, as Paul Feig's GHOSTBUSTERS: ANSWER THE CALL was released in 2016. That film served as less of a sequel and more of a reboot as it starred Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Leslie Jones, and Kate McKinnon as an all-new Ghostbuster team.

It's probably safe to say that GHOSTBUSTERS: ANSWER THE CALL wasn't loved by everyone, but the film certainly has its fans, who might be interested to know that Ghostbusters 2016 director Paul Feig has a much longer director's cut of the film just waiting in the wings. In response to the recent announcement of Zack Snyder's JUSTICE LEAGUE, Feig revealed that he's got a 3.5 hour director's cut of GHOSTBUSTERS: ANSWER THE CALL that he'd be happy to share.

The theatrical cut of GHOSTBUSTERS: ANSWER THE CALL was just under 2 hours, with an extended Blu-ray cut pushing the film over the 2 hour mark, but 3.5 hours is an entirely different beast. Paul Feig had spoken of the existence of this cut while talking with Collider prior to the release of the film. "The editor’s first cut was 4 hours and 15 minutes, and I trimmed that down to a slim 3 and a half hours," Feig said with a laugh. "We generate a lot of stuff and I always wanna have all the underpinnings of a big, emotional story, and because of that it just added a lot of extra scenes that as you’re going through, you know you have to make a lot of choices because I knew I had to bring this down under two hours. You just start weeding and saying, ‘What do people want to delve deeper into and what do we wanna just kind of skirt through and get to the fun parts?'" Anyone down for more of Feig's GHOSTBUSTERS?

The official synopsis for GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE:

From director Jason Reitman and producer Ivan Reitman, comes the next chapter in the original Ghostbusters universe. In Ghostbusters: Afterlife, when a single mom and her two kids arrive in a small town, they begin to discover their connection to the original ghostbusters and the secret legacy their grandfather left behind.

GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE is slated to hit theaters on March 5, 2021.