There was a brief Ant-Man news scramble over the weekend, as people jumped to report that Adam McKay (Anchorman) was in talks to take over from Edgar Wright. They were then forced to rather quickly update those stories with the news that McKay's discussions had ended already, but an intriguing news nugget has still come out of the whole palava. According to The Wrap, another rumoured Ant-Man contender, Ruben "Zombieland" Fleischer, is also talking to Sony about directing **Ghostbusters 3.
Fleischer and Ghostbusters make a certain amount of sense, since he has a previous supernatural comedy (with a Bill Murray cameo) under his belt. Zombieland and his subsequent 30 Minutes Or Fewer Less both had homes at Sony, where Ghostbusters 3 resides, and the director could do with a high-profile and (more or less) surefire hit after the disappointment of his Gangster Squad at Warner Bros. Doth the prodigal son return home?
The Wrap also believe there are personal reasons why Fleischer might opt for Ghostbusters over Ant-Man. He and his wife just had a baby, and while Ant-Man needs to begin shooting right now, Ghostbusters 3 is still far enough away to allow some paternity leave.
The pieces of the puzzle definitely fit, then, but we're nevertheless still in rumour territory for the time being. What's certain is that the director of the previous two Ghostbusters, Ivan Reitman, backed away from the gig in the wake of the sad death of Harold Ramis in February. His potential successors, Phil Lord and Chris Miller of The Lego Movie and 21 Jump Street, also bowed out in April.
Last we heard, the latest draft of the screenplay was by Etan Cohen (Men In Black 3, Tropic Thunder), following attempts by the US Office team of Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky. Dan Aykroyd remains upbeat about the project, as do Ernie Hudson and the studio. Bill Murray... not so much{