Great news, Brett Ratner fans! Eddie Murphy has apparently gone back on Monday's promise that he would retire from movies rather than star in another legacy-befouling Beverly Hills Cop sequel: "[Don't] just leave Axel with his thumb up his ass from the last movie," Murphy told MTV yesterday. "Whatever happened to Axel Foley? He's sitting in Detroit with his thumb up his ass since Beverly Hills Cop III. Let's take those thumbs out and make a great movie!"

Weirdly, he'd told Extra only hours before that BHC4 "wasn't ready to be done," which seemingly torpedoed Brett Ratner's planned PG-rated continuation of the Axel Foley saga. "The third one was horrible, so I didn't want to do another one," he said, indicating that he'd only done BHC3 for the paycheck ("I said, 'Let's go shoot it! I don't care if the script ain't right'"). But a Murphy rep apparently confirmed to MTV that "Eddie is not retiring. Beverly Hills Cop IV is in development." So, while we may never know exactly how much money Paramount offered him yesterday morning, we can guess that it was probably a lot. Let the farting commence!

Eddie Murphy Quashes Retirement Rumors, Talks 'Beverly Hills Cop IV' [MTV]

Earlier: Eddie Murphy Would Rather Retire Than Work With Brett Ratner
Vulture Exclusive! Brett Ratner’s Script for ‘Beverly Hills Cop 4’ Revealed!