Bill Murray is officially done with the Ghostbusters franchise. Dan Aykroyd has confirmed that his fellow SNL compadre won’t reprise his role as Peter Venkman in the upcoming sequel.

In a recent interview, Aykroyd confirmed that Ghostbusters 3 will definitely be happening, without Mr. Murray:

“He won’t be involved. It’s sad but we’re passing it on to a new generation. Ghostbusters 3 can be a successful movie without Bill. My preference would be to have him involved but at this point he doesn’t seem to be coming and we have to move on. It’s time to make the third one.”

This doesn’t come as a total surprise since Murray publicly stated on David Letterman’s show that the sequel’s script wasn’t very good. He had been dropping hints here and there about the progress of Ghostbusters 3, never officially abandoning the project, but he also not looking too eager about returning.

Aykroyd, though, is dead serious about this sequel. He recently hired Men In Black 3 writer Etan Cohen to pen a better script and has promised that production will start very soon.

“We’ve got a brilliant new writer on it and we’ll be passing the torch on to a new generation. We’re working on it to make it just right to satisfy our fans. I’m confident we’ll be in production in the next year… my character’s eyesight is shot, I got a bad knee, a bad hip–I can’t drive that caddy anymore or lift that Psychotron Accelerator anymore, it’s too heavy. We need young legs, new minds–new Ghostbusters; so I’m in essence passing the torch to the new regime, and you know what? That’s totally okay with me.”

This might be okay with Aykroyd, but do fans really want another Ghostbusters without the original cast together? A Ghostbusters without Murray just wouldn’t feel right.

SOURCE: Metro