Transcript

Intro Clip

Well, you could believe Mr. Pecker. My name is Peck. Or you could accept the fact that this city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportion. What do you mean biblical? What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor. Real wrath of God type stuff. Exactly. Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies. Rivers and seas boiling. 40 years of darkness. Earthquakes, volcanoes. The dead rising from the grave. Human sacrifice. Dogs and cats living together. Mass hysteria. Enough! I get the point. What if you're wrong? If I'm wrong, nothing happens. We go to jail peacefully, quietly. We'll enjoy it. But if I'm right and we can stop this thing, Lenny, you will have saved the lives of millions of registered voters. I don't believe you're seriously considering listening to these men. Get him out of here. Bye. I'll fix you, Venkman. I'm gonna fix you. I'm gonna get you a nice fruit basket. I'm gonna miss him. We got work to do. Now, what do you need from me?

Steve

It's Two Dads, One Movie. It's the podcast where two middle-aged dads sit around and shoot the shit about the movies of the '80s and '90s. Here are your hosts, Steve Paulo and Nic Briana. Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of Two Dads, One Movie. I'm Steve.

Nic

And I'm Nic.

Steve

And today we are talking about the 1984 comedy, fantasy, maybe sci-fi-ish. I'm not really sure, I think, but like absolute blockbuster classic. You know it, I know it, Nic knows it, everybody knows it and loves it. Ghostbusters. Love this movie. Cannot wait to talk about this movie. This was my pick for our Two Dads, Two Decades run for 1984.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And I just, just to get into it, like I kind of mentioned at the end of last week's episode, like this for a long time of my life, this was my favorite movie of all time. I have watched this movie. I'm not exaggerating. It has been— I have seen it well over 100 times. There were points in my life where I was watching this movie on a weekly basis through high school into college, you know, even before that to some extent. But yeah, there were— I love this movie. I love Ghostbusters 2 as well. A lot of people who loved Ghostbusters were not fans of the sequel. I love them both. I have not seen the more recent ones, the Paul Rudd stuff and whatever. I haven't seen any of that. I don't know if it's good or not, but like these two original Ghostbusters movies, um, I'm just—

Nic

original cast.

Steve

Yeah, the original cast, the original time frame, all the '80s, you know, this kind of thing. Absolutely adore these movies. Cannot wait to get into this, uh, with you, Nic. So what's your experience and kind of history with Ghostbusters?

Nic

Yeah, so I definitely saw this when I was younger, but as a no VCR, no cable guy, I didn't see it for a long time after this. So I liked it, but I wasn't like really into it, into it. Um, and I think probably rediscovered it around high school when we're passing tapes around and quoting stuff back and forth and everything.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

Uh, and watched it a handful of times. So I've seen it over the years a bunch, but I always had a fondness for the movie.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

And I mean, it's pretty bulletproof as far as the cast and like just everything involved.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

So, uh, really looking forward to talking about this one.

Steve

Yeah. This is one that we had in my house. We had a LaserDisc player. I've mentioned it a few times before, before we even had VCRs in the house. And this was definitely a LaserDisc that we had. Yeah. So like, I mean, I think I probably was taken to the theater to see this. PG, would've been 4 years old. I would, same year I saw Gremlins. So it's like not that crazy. And you know, if not in the theater, would've been shortly after my dad would've gotten the LaserDisc. And that's when I started watching it constantly. 'Cause you know, there's definitely scary elements, but it is a pretty solid PG. This probably would've been a, this could've been a PG-13 depending on how it played out time-wise. I don't remember exactly when the first PG-13 movie was released, but like this would've been on the borderline just because of the sort of visual.

Nic

It's a harder PG than our previous movie, Strange Brew.

Steve

Fair, for sure. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, like I said, hundreds of times, can't, you know, I, like I mentioned at the last end of last episode, I still have the autographed photo of Ramis, Aykroyd, and Murray in their Ghostbusters outfits autographed hanging on my wall.

Nic

So that's so awesome.

Steve

Big, big, big fan. All right. Let's jump into the facts on Ghostbusters. There's a lot of good, there's a lot of good stuff in here. All right. The movie Ghostbusters was released on June 8th, 1984 with a PG rating and a running time of 105 minutes. It was directed by Ivan Reitman. Written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis and starring Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Sigourney Weaver. Scores, really high scores, a 95% fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes. So critics with almost nothing bad to say about it. This is the— that would make it the 4th highest Rotten Tomatoes score we've seen on our podcast. Airplane earned a 97. Both The Fugitive and This Is Spinal Tap got 96. Okay. So right up there with them is Ghostbusters. On IMDb, a 7.8, very respectable score.

Nic

Really strong.

Steve

When you get up over 8.0, you're in the top 100 total movies movies at all on IMDb at that point, pretty much. So, so very high score for Ghostbusters. And the, the, uh, critics Siskel and Ebert, a pair of thumbs ups. Thank you, boys. On the awards tip, um, lots of nominations. One pretty significant win to mention, uh, at the 1985 Saturn Awards, did win Best Fantasy Film.

Nic

Okay.

Steve

And then a series of like high-profile nominations but not wins. Uh, two nominations at the 1985 Academy Awards, uh, for Best Song for the Ghostbusters theme song for Ray Parker Jr. and for Best Visual Effects. Didn't win either of those. And at the Golden Globes, a bunch of nominations actually for Best Comedy Picture. Bill Murray was nominated for Best Lead Actor in a Comedy, and Ray Parker Jr. also got nominated for Best Original Song. And then the Grammys actually nominated the Best Original Score Album, uh, this score, this album here. On a budget of $30 million, which, man, 1984, big budget, big, big budget. Although it shows up on the screen, some of these effects still look real good.

Nic

We'll get into the details, but very smart with how they did really great stuff.

Steve

And so, um, $30 million budget pulled in $296 million at the box office in 1984. Uh, that is just shy of 10 times what it cost to make. So crazy, a massive blockbuster hit. And we got a little kind of extra fact on this one. I want to throw this in there. So in 1984, Huey Lewis sued Ray Parker Jr., claiming that the Ghostbusters theme song plagiarized the Huey Lewis and the News song I Want a New Drug, which was released the year before. And if you listen to I Want a New Drug, it's pretty unmistakable. Like, the melody and the bass line are like basically exactly note for note. Yeah, between the two songs, very close.

Nic

Who you gonna call, your drug dealer?

Steve

Right. They settled out of court almost 10 years later in 1995. They finally settled it. The settlement, though, included a confidentiality agreement. And then later on, after a 2001 VH1 Behind the Music interview in which Huey Lewis discussed details of the settlement, Parker sued Lewis and won. Apparently for a total of $30,000. But Parker did successfully sue Huey Lewis for breaking the confidentiality agreement that they originally had in their settlement. Now, this is the interesting part, I thought. In a 2004 interview, Ivan Reitman admitted that "I Want a New Drug" was used as a temporary track in some scenes just to put a music bed on it. They just literally randomly picked— it was never going to be in the movie, whatever. Yeah, they did ask. They offered the theme song rights, like, come make our theme song for this movie to Huey Lewis and the News, and the band passed. Supposedly when the early scenes were given to Ray Parker to give him what the vibe of the movie is so that he could write the theme song, "I Want a New Drug" was still in the background of those scenes.

Nic

So he just like had it in his head.

Steve

When Parker first saw scenes of Ghostbusters, "I Want a New Drug" was playing in the background of those scenes. So he may not have intentionally done it, but the idea that he definitely was inspired by the Huey Lewis the News song, unmistakably true.

Nic

Like for sure.

Steve

Oh my God.

Nic

So very interesting stuff kind of all came about So he had it like subliminally planted in his brain.

Steve

I guess something like that. Not even all that subliminal. It was just there in the music. And then when he went to go write his song, it was kind of there. It's entirely possible that at the time Parker had no idea that that was a popular song. He may not have been familiar with Huey Lewis and the News' music or with that song in particular and thought, oh, this is part of a score they're doing. I'll make sure to utilize that element of the score in my song. That's entirely possible. That's still plagiarism, but it's certainly, It paints Parker in a better light, I guess, right? Totally. Yeah, less of a thief, more of a victim of circumstance.

Nic

So, well, I mean, and this was all borne out by history because Ray Parker had a million hits after this, so his career would be fine without the Ghostbusters theme.

Steve

Absolutely.

Nic

Um, yeah, wow, that's awesome. I love that stuff. Every time we're talking Parker and Lewis, we can't lose.

Steve

Love it. Good call. It's actually funny too, Huey Lewis is like one of the very first concerts I ever went to with my parents was a Huey Lewis and the News show. Oh yeah, I was like in high school, whatever. They were huge Huey Lewis fans. So yeah, we had a lot of, you know, I grew up with a lot of those songs, you know, Hip to Be Square and Power of Love and I Wanna Do Drugs. So yeah, funny stuff.

Nic

I started a cover band during COVID that allowed people to come to the concert if they hadn't been vaccinated. It was called Huey Lewis and the Fake News.

Steve

Oh, rock on. Don't leave us comments, people. Huey Lewis and the False News. Oh, that's even better.

Nic

Oh, shit.

Steve

Don't leave us comments on Spotify about that, people. He's joking. Get a sense of humor. Okay, let's kick off this movie. We do get a cold open. Love a cold open. We get one here. Just scanning down on the New York Public Library, a very beautiful building, big lion statues out front. I'm assuming this is the real New York Public Library.

Nic

I love where it shows up. It shows up in a lot of movies. I always like to see it.

Steve

And so we are following a librarian. She's taking a stack of books towards, you know, like the whatever. She kind of goes down into like the basement, I guess, basically. And it looks like she's trying to put books away. But as she goes by, a bunch of books behind her kind of float from one shelf across the walkway to the other. And you know, I'll be honest, I didn't see a string. Like they did a good job, whatever they're doing to hide it. Yeah, totally. She walks a little farther past those old card catalogs. You remember looking for books in like the school library and those card catalog things? Oh yeah. Insane. So glad it's computerized now, but like trying to try the Dewey Decimal System and all that.

Nic

Well, it felt hella good knowing that. Like it was like a skill you felt accomplished. Yeah, and then 10 years later it's irrelevant.

Steve

Completely irrelevant. But as she's walking by, a bunch of the drawers from the card catalogs start opening And these cards start flying up into the air. And this is one of the reasons I think the visual effects in this movie are so good. I wanna start with this very opening scene. There's a lot of elements in this movie that are imposed upon the scene, visual elements, the ghosts, different things, like whatever. But there's so much practical effects going on. There's so many practical effects and things where clearly these card catalog things were built in a way to launch these cards up, right? For the production of the film, they were very unique. Probably made completely from scratch. These are probably completely made up for the movie. And they're really cool. And they give this amazing effect of this raining little paper cards. They fly up fast and then they sort of fall down slow. And it looks amazing.

Nic

And the sound was great.

Steve

Yeah. The little flicking up. The little flicking noise. Oh my God. Of course, the librarian freaks out and just starts hauling her ass through the different stacks of books. And she's running and running and we're just getting the tense music and stuff. And then she turns a corner. And while we are still looking at her face, You know, her face lights up, wind is clearly blowing at her, and she screams bloody murder. And then we get the title card. So this is the cold open to Ghostbusters.

Nic

Great, really good, uh, great logo. Yes, oh, classic logo. Ray Parker, whether, you know, it was all original thought or not, one of the best movie theme songs of all time. I mean, the best, like, because probably— and it really beefs up those weak-ass Halloween playlists where you have like no Halloween songs to put on a playlist.

Steve

I feel like it really, uh, I feel like this This, Monster Mash, and Werewolves of London. That's your starting point for every single Halloween.

Nic

Get a little Oingo Boingo, Dead Man's Party. There you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're rounding this thing out.

Steve

Exactly. Um, but yeah, yeah, exactly. Like, the whole Huey Lewis Parker whatever thing aside, this song is an absolute banger. Yeah, an absolute slap. Like, the, the, the Ghostbusters theme song is amazing, and it does—

Nic

and it ages perfectly, and it hammers the title of the movie home so well. Oh my God. So like, where it's not— it doesn't feel for— I don't know, it's just really Really great.

Steve

It feels like the perfect blending of commerce and art. Like, it does its job as the, like, as the harbinger of the film, and it's also a banger song, you know? And it's like, so yeah, absolutely good stuff.

Nic

So now we're kind of with Bill Murray here, who's some kind of psychology professor.

Steve

He has degrees in parapsychology and psychology.

Nic

Okay. And he's doing this ESP testing to a couple volunteer students, one kind of, you know, dorky looking dude and one very attractive pretty blonde. And we find out pretty soon that he's asking him what's on this card. You know, there's an image or some kind of symbol shape on there, and you know, if you guess wrong, I'm gonna shock you, right? And this guy keeps getting it wrong.

Steve

He's shocking him.

Nic

The woman's guessing it wrong, and he's saying, oh my God, yeah, correct. So he's like flirting with her. It's really good Bill Murray.

Steve

It's absolutely fantastic. And he is showing the guy that you're wrong, right? So it's like he's holding up like a star, and the guy says like square, and he turns, it's like, no, it's a star, right? And like the next was a square, and he goes, oh, it's a circle. And he turns and goes, oh, close, but definitely wrong. Like, you know, that's not it's not a circle. So it's shocking. But every time the woman is guessing incorrectly, he doesn't show either of them that card. He just puts it down, right? Because she's wrong. But he doesn't want to shock her until the guy's getting frustrated. He's getting frustrated. And then finally he's like, he's chewing gum and he's getting all frustrated. And Murray, you know, Venkman, Peter Venkman goes, okay, what about this one? He goes, I don't know. It's a couple of wavy lines. And sure enough, it's like 3 wavy lines. And he doesn't show him and he puts it and goes, today is just not your day.

Nic

It's the best guess too, because everything else like star, square, circle and then a couple of wavy lines for that to be the thing that he says. It's so, so funny. It's really great. And the guy storms off. He's like, forget it, I'm done with this, you know, keep the 5 bucks. Did you ever in college do any of those psych experiments? They always offered those. I did a couple of them where they give you like 10 or 15 bucks to—

Steve

I don't know, I was far too busy playing EverQuest and not getting laid to do that.

Nic

So yeah, I was super busy not getting laid too, but I managed. Um, Yeah, it was always fun to show up for that stuff because you didn't quite know what was going on. Yeah, but hey, that $10, there you go.

Steve

Uh, that gets you a lot back. I mean, when I was in Chico in 2002, that would have bought a lot of beer.

Nic

So, uh, so Ray and Egon now have gotten the news basically of the library incident. Yes. And they come in to tell Ray—

Steve

busts in. You got something, buddy? But Ray busts in, and, you know, Venkman's like been trying to kind of close with this student.

Nic

He wants to date her, and he's so pissed, and it's so mad, and it's this this incredible breakthrough in this very specialized field that the three of them are incredibly interested in, and all he can think about is, 'You fucked this up for me.' He does such a funny jump slap where he's like, 'I'm right in the middle of something,' right? And jumps and slaps him at the same time. His physicality is—

Steve

ah, this really is— this movie is, I think, especially for Murray and Aykroyd, is like peak for the two of them. It really is just— they are, they are firing on all cylinders in their particular motifs, like the way they are funny, they are doing it perfectly in this. You know, Ramis is great too, but like I always thought Ramis was better as a writer and a director than as an actor. But this is like Murray and Aykroyd killing it in this movie. And it starts off right from the beginning. And yeah, sure enough, it's like, so they go to the library, they go and Egon's already there, whatever. And I love because where they walk in and Ray goes, you know, basically Venkman is the skeptic-ish of the group, right? So there's Egon Spengler, Harold Ramis, and Ray Stantz. Dan Aykroyd, and they are true believers. They believe that, you know, they can touch the etheric plane and whatever, you know, they believe in this kind of stuff. And it feels like Venkman is like, "Yeah, okay, I'll go along." Like, he's not a doubter per se, but he's like pretty skeptical, he's a little skeptical, right? Because Ray is telling him, he's like, "You know, Peter, you forget I was present for an underwater mass sponge migration." And he goes, "Oh, Ray, the sponges migrated about a foot and a half." And it's just like funny little dismissive kind of stuff. But basically they, meet up with Egon and they're chatting with kind of like maybe like the head librarian or the manager of the library. And he's like, oh, you know, the woman, you know, she's over here, you can talk to her. And so they're sitting down and they're talking to the poor librarian who got scared, you know, witless or whatever. And Venkman's asking her some questions, you know, and one of the first ones he asks is, has anyone in your family ever been, you know, declared mentally incompetent or whatever? And she goes, well, my uncle thought he was St. Jerome. He goes, I'd call that a big yes. And then I love too, they finish this off with, "And are you, Alice, menstruating right now?" And the manager guy goes, "What's that got to do with it?" Venkman just goes, "Back off, man. I'm a scientist." And like, those for some reason, those two lines, I call that a big yes and "Back off, man, I'm a scientist," like, they've stuck with me for my life.

Nic

Yeah, his arrogance. It is funny about his kind of arrogance about his position as a scientist in a field that most people dismiss as even being a real thing.

Steve

It's not even, yeah, parapsychology, what?

Nic

Yeah, so they go downstairs to where the woman had the encounter there, and we see that the cards are all slimy now. It's become the gooey decimal system.

Steve

Hey!

Nic

And they encounter an apparition. They call it a full torso apparition. One thing that Ackroyd does better than anyone is just fast talking, big words, like ultra technical stuff, which is maybe why Ramis doesn't shine as much in this because he's kind of the same function. Yeah, uh, in a little bit of a way, there is an element.

Steve

So Ackroyd and Ramos wrote the story together, but there is an element where the Rey Stantz and Egon Spengler characters occupy a similar position within the dynamic, right? Like Venkman is his own thing, right, for sure. And later on in the movie, Winston Zeddemore has to come in as the outsider, and he brings different perspective. But in a lot of ways, Egon's just an even nerdier Rey. Like, in a lot of ways, you know, So there's an element of that. And again, Ramis is a great guy, rest in peace, like whatever, fantastic, was never the actor that either Aykroyd or Murray are, have been. So there's an element of that. But yeah, basically like they see this, you know, the free, they call it like a free-floating torso, full torso apparition. There you go. And, you know, so then Fingert's like, so what do we do? What do we do? And they're both just like, uh, and like Egon starts typing something on his calculator. And then it's like, he's like, well, one of us should probably talk to it. And they both look at Venkman because he's clearly like, among humans anyway, the communicator of the group. He's the least nerdy. Yep. I love that he asks.

Nic

He's the River Phoenix.

Steve

Yeah, there you go. Exactly. But I love that he asks, where are you from originally? Because that's, I love that line because it's a lot, it's one of the lines in this movie that I thought was funny as a kid. And I realized is more funny than I thought it was as an adult. Because as a kid, all I picked up, I picked up on the idea that like, well, this is a dead creature, whatever, like a ghost. So they're from the other side, but he's asking like, where were you from when you were alive? Yeah, but it's also just a very common line, especially if you live in a big city like New York or LA or San Francisco, when you're, when you're hitting somebody up at the bar or something or at a club to ask where you're from originally. It's like a totally normal thing, and it's like very dating-coded, right? And that's the element of the joke that I didn't get as a kid, but like it's extra layer.

Nic

And his approach to every female that he interacts with in this entire movie is like that. It's like that aside from Janine. Who we mean.

Steve

That's true, actually.

Nic

That's a good point. Um, yeah, so yeah, so he's, he's trying to approach and she turns to him and shushes him, you know, librarian ghost. That's right. And then their big, uh, solution is get her.

Steve

Yeah, right. Yeah, Rey's like, I've got an idea, I've got to follow me, stay close, stay close, and then get her. And then we get the same kind of— it's clearly, uh, the ghost turns into this really scary looking thing and kind of comes at them. And it's clearly what happened to librarian because the same wind and light and everything, and they both— they all three of them just freak out and run, you know, out. Uh, and I love it.

Nic

Great music during this scene. Oh, the whole school—

Steve

memorable. Like, the Ray Parker song is fantastic, but the whole score is good. Like, really, the music throughout this movie is really, really solid. Um, and, and the manager of the library or whatever is like following them out, like, what was it? Did you see it? Is it going— it's like, oh, we'll get back to you. Like, they have no idea what to do, right? And so there's that. But, uh, on their walk back to the NYU offices, um, they're chatting, and Egon's been doing some calculations, and he says like, if, if these calculations are correct, like, I think we the idea we could hold, capture and hold one of these things indefinitely. It would be possible. And then I think, and then Ray's like, "Oh, if the ionization rate is constant, we could really bust some heads." In a spiritual sense, of course. But like I said, it's one of those points where he's quickly telling us really scientific sounding words.

Nic

And it just sounds, you just go, "Yeah, okay, of course, if the ionization rate is constant." Or, "Yeah, of course, yeah." He has the correct confidence that even if he's playing someone who's all the way full of shit, he could, he could pull that off.

Steve

He's like the mental version of walking into a place with a clipboard and just being there. Exactly. Yeah.

Nic

All right. So they get back to the university that they work at and all their stuff is being boxed up.

Steve

Right.

Nic

And they're told that their funding is cut, their grant is suspended or whatever it is.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

So they're out of work. They, and they're kind of the funny scene of them talking about, I like academia. You don't have to produce anything.

Steve

Exactly.

Nic

You know, you're out in the real world. You have to actually do something.

Steve

Exactly. And Ray mentions that he's worked in the private sector and they expect results, you know? And Venkman's got this little sing-song thing he does that is another thing that just stuck with me for my whole life. And I find myself like saying for some reason, if I ever hear someone say the words, for whatever reason, if that phrase comes out of somebody's mouth, just for whatever reason, in my head I hear, for whatever reason, Ray, call it fate, call it luck, call it karma, I believe we were destined to be thrown out of this dump. And it's just like, that has stuck with me forever. And it's this little thing, but they basically decide like, Let's go into business for ourselves. Like, this is, you know, we've got this whole thing, this whole concept of capturing a ghost, and like, this will be something we can do. But Ray's got a concern. He's like, hey, this is going to take a ton of money to like build all this stuff. Like, we know how to do it. Like, I think the idea here is like, hey, we feel like we know what we need to do, right? But to actually do it, it's going to take a ton of money. Where are we going to get the money? And then it's a hard cut to them coming out of like First Manhattan Bank.

Nic

With Ray all upset. And he's like, my parents left me that house. I grew up in that house, you know? So he's taken out a loan and a third loan apparently.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

Third mortgage. Third mortgage that they say is at 19% interest. And they said, you know, in years 1 through 5, that's $95,000 of interest. So $100,000 loan that he took out. Wow. And it's very expensive. Gets you a nice piece of property though in New York.

Steve

I don't know about nice. Because yeah, the next cut is they're looking at this firehouse. We're not sure exactly what part of Manhattan they're in, but apparently not. But it's busted.

Nic

And this is like cheap New York days. Yes, this isn't like 2000 to 2015, pre-Giuliani, whatever. This was like, there are very shitty areas of New York that are near—

Steve

even of Manhattan, like, which now is like all pretty much not super shitty, I guess. I don't know. But like, it— I think later on we hear them talk about how we do things downtown when they're clearly in Central Park West. So I feel like it's just downtown somewhere is where their firehouse is. But Egon is not impressed with this place. He is like, this is not—

Nic

it needs a ton of work. I mean, it's, it's very far from ideal. It's not a turnkey property in any way, but it's Ray's money and Ray is psyched about it. So they hit Egon and Peter downstairs with the realtor, kind of, or with the realtor, kind of like, I, yeah, this sucks, this is terrible, we're gonna have to fix this and this. And then Ray from upstairs, hey, does this pole still work? And he slides down the pole, he's like, this is perfect, hey, we should, we should sleep over here tonight. And he's all excited. I love, I love his, uh, enthusiasm.

Steve

Oh yeah, absolutely. And so the, uh, Then they turn to the realtor like, okay, we'll take it. And she's like, good. Like she knew, you know, like once Ray was excited, she's like, no, no, no, you're good. Yeah. But Egon thinks the building should be condemned. Oh well. So the next thing we cut to is our first view of Dana Barrett played by Sigourney Weaver. She's coming home. She's taking a cab back to her palatial Central Park West apartment. I don't know. I don't know what it pays to be a concert violinist player.

Nic

I don't know what it is.

Steve

Cello or violinist? I'm not sure what. Some large stringed instrument, not a violin, much larger than that with strings. That's all I know for sure. It's like a cello, I guess, probably, you know. But to be a concert cellist in New York City must pay pretty well because her apartment is big and gorgeous and has a view of the park.

Nic

Yeah, it's nuts. It's pretty incredible. Yeah, it seems like Dana probably had some family money or something to make that work. Although, I don't know, good for her. I hope it— I hope being a cellist pays enough for that apartment.

Steve

They deserve it. But I also think maybe there was just, uh, less care paid to like, uh, somebody's, uh, uh, profession and what they're living in, because we also meet her neighbor Louis Tully, played by Rick Moranis, who is a CPA. I know one of those. Um, and apparently that pays pretty damn well too, or at least did in New York City at the time, because he's got a gorgeous place as well. Yeah, he doesn't have a view of the park though. He's on the other side of the hall, so he's looking, you know, downtown or something, maybe off to the river or something, but he's not looking at the park.

Nic

You know what he says? He says, uh, I'm having a party to celebrate my 4th anniversary as an accountant.

Steve

4th. That's early, right?

Nic

Early, right? So I think it's probably one of those things that— no, I've been an accountant for a long time, I've been a CPA for— but nobody knows what that is, so we just have it say accountant. Like in the movie The Accountant, the Ben Affleck movie— we're gonna go in CPA corner here real quick— he has like a plaque on his desk that has his name and then it just says accountant. Okay. Nobody uses that designation.

Steve

Okay.

Nic

So it would say tax preparer or EA or CPA or whatever. Yeah. So I think that was to make it easy. But yeah, Lewis Louis Tully. Yes, one of the funniest side characters ever. Absolutely. We love Rick Moranis. We're big Moranis heads here.

Steve

And it's so funny because we just watched Strange Brew last week. Yeah, it's obviously tons of Rick Moranis in that. He's, you know, one of the stars of that movie. And his Bob McKenzie voice and the way he holds his mouth when he makes words as Bob McKenzie is only a slightly more exaggerated version of Louis Tully. Louis Tully is like a slightly—

Nic

let's pull—

Steve

let's take Bob McKenzie, pull him back into reality just a bit, but still make him a little goofy. Not so much on the A-hoser's takeoff, like Canadianisms, right? But like when you look at the way he says things and the way he holds his mouth when he talks, it's like very much like Bob McKenzie. Yeah, I hadn't— I'd never watched these two movies close together in time from each other. So seeing it this way, I went, oh my God, this is basically like more realistic Bob McKenzie is kind of the Lewis Tully character. But he's wonderful. And he, you know, is obviously super enamored with Dana, who she—

Nic

and she has no interest.

Steve

Well, she's like 6'1", gorgeous, you know, and like— and he's this, you know, nerdy little shrinky-dink guy.

Nic

She's a professional artist.

Steve

Yeah, exactly.

Nic

You know, all this stuff. And he's—

Steve

yeah, yeah. So, so he invites her to her— to his, uh, party later in the week, and she says, oh, I'll try to stop by or whatever. Um, so she kind of finally gets out of the way, and he mentions, oh, you know, you shouldn't leave your TV on. Like, her TV got left on, which is strange. You know, she didn't intentionally do that. Um, but she goes in, she's bringing home groceries, so she goes into the kitchen, put some groceries down, he's starting to put stuff away, and we get a nice little tight zoom in on a dozen eggs, and the lid of the egg carton pops open and it's not like the eggs jump out, but it's like the eggshells crack and the interior of the eggs start popping out onto the counter and cooking, which is like, that's not a stovetop, that's just her counter. So she noticed, she hears it and notices and like turns around, is very, you know, she kind of jumps every time it happens. Like it's obviously kind of terrifying. It's like, what the fuck's going on? And then she hears a very deep growl coming from her refrigerator. Gorgeous fridge, by the way. Enormous, very wide, very large.

Nic

For a single person, once again. And yeah, we'll get a look inside it later. It is like, this is too much stuff for your fridge for you living alone.

Steve

By yourself. But she opens up the— or actually, wait, real quick, I should say, before she does that, we do— she did see on her television an ad for the Ghostbusters ad. They did their first TV ad, "We're ready to believe you," the whole thing.

Nic

That's a really funny slogan. I do love that because you are fishing for literally anyone. Like, we're open to crazy people is basically what they're saying, right?

Steve

Everybody who's going to be a customer of ours has already been told they're crazy by somebody else, right? Like, like some other exterminator maybe. So, so she's seen that. That's a little context. But she goes to open the fridge and it isn't a fridge. It's like, you know, there are 100 yards of space or something, or 50 yards of space all of a sudden. And this like pyramid with stairs. And there's this— I've always called them the demon dogs. I don't know what else to refer to these things as.

Nic

Gargoyle or something.

Steve

Yeah, it's like a gargoyle thing. But everybody else kind of talks about it as a dog. I mean, it's referred to as a bear and a, I think a cougar as well at some point. But But basically it's this, you know, horned dog-ish looking demon thing, and it's— and it faces her and it opens its mouth, and it's— first of all, its mouth is glowing, which I always thought was scary as a kid. That's a very scary thing. And you hear it say the name Zuul, uh, you know, like that whole thing.

Nic

So I never picked that up clearly. Oh, really? I mean, I knew what they said because they talk about it later in the movie, but every time I watch this, I'm like, I'm gonna listen really hard and see if I would ever guess that it said Zuul, like, just hearing it.

Steve

It sounds like zoo. I hear Z, and I hear the ooh vowel sound, but that's all, that's all I hear. So yeah, yeah.

Nic

Um, oh yeah, so on Dana's counter, and again, another effect that was just excellent and so memorable, the eggs frying on the counter locked into everybody's memory who's ever seen this. Right next to the eggs was a bag of marshmallows. Oh yeah, um, Stay Puft brand marshmallows. No logo on it, I swear. I gotta go back and look, but it didn't have a picture of the guy. Okay, I swear it just said like Stay Puft in black. Um, what is she doing with those marshmallows?

Steve

It is with the groceries we see her bring home. Single person. Yeah, she has like 2 heads of lettuce, a dozen eggs, and the biggest bag of marshmallows you've ever seen in your life.

Nic

Like, I don't know what— it's not a solo item, really. Most of the time marshmallow goes with something.

Steve

Yeah, you're gonna bake with it, which is usually the smaller ones. Then those ones that are— those are the big ones, they're good for s'mores, right? Right.

Nic

You know, but she's smoring. Oh no, no, I mean, you need to put it in there, but I was a little like, where's the guy on the bag?

Steve

It's funny, it's a good point. Um, so after Dana's horrible fridge experience, we cut back to the firehouse that is now the Ghostbusters headquarters. Um, they're putting a sign up on it, kind of a, kind of a temporary sign, but putting a sign up. And this old, old-looking ambulance, almost hearse-like, you know, old ambulance, comes driving up, and Venkman's like, you can't park here. This is Ecto-1. This is the car that they're going to have as their like vehicle. And I love when Ray gets out. He's like, okay, I got the car. No big deal. It just needs a little bit of work. And he lists like everything a car could need down to wiring, which is like, oh dude, that is a lot of work. And then Venkman asks him how much. He goes, only $4,800. And I'm thinking to myself, if I were to buy that car with that much work necessary today, I'd expect to pay about $4,800. Yeah. 43 years ago, 42 years ago, That'd be like paying $15 grand. Like, that's crazy.

Nic

Like, um, yeah, so every— but they— it is funny that they have to go along with whatever Ray decides because he's the money guy, even though he's probably the craziest amongst them and the most enthusiastic about this project. Um, but he's gonna make weird decisions that don't make sense to them.

Steve

He's the truest of the true believers, for sure.

Nic

Uh, the way they have the firehouse set up, yeah, so they're sitting there having, um having some Chinese food and they're talking about like, oh, I need some cash, maybe from petty cash. He's like, well, this lovely feast we have here represents the last of our petty cash. They have arcade games in there. Yes, they have the pole. They have old confessional booths, I think, that they use as lockers.

Steve

What it looks like— I think they're just lockers, but they do look like confessional booths.

Nic

All-time man cave, this place. I really, really like it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so, uh, so, so we get a call.

Steve

Yeah, so, well, our first—

Nic

well, we get a walk-in.

Steve

Yeah, so our first thing is we meet Janine, uh, Janine Melnitz, right? So, uh, uh, played by Annie Potts. And, you know, she's like the receptionist, whatever. Um, Venkman makes a comment about her bug eyes and then apologizes for it. But like, Dana walks in and is basically like, you know, is this— am I in the right place? Is this the Ghostbusters? And Venkman does— I've always loved this little jump he does. He doesn't— he's got like this, uh, little swinging gate, right? Almost like you'd see in a courthouse, right? Where there's like, you know, the side with the plaintiff or whatever, and then the other side. And he kind of hops over it and is just like chatting with her. He's like, oh yeah, all day, all day we get this. It's always crazy stuff around here. No problem. And it's like they haven't had anybody come in or talk to them or anything, but they hook her up to some different monitors and sensors and Egon's asking her questions. And basically she explains to them what happened. And Egon's comment is sort of like, well, she's telling the truth, or at least she thinks she is. She's not making this up. And basically, you know, Venkman's like, okay, well, I'll go. You guys go check out, uh, you know, uh, look, look of the name Zuul. Try and find. And Egon and Ray are like, yeah, I'll look in the space catalog. Tobin's Spirit Guide. I spent my entire life hoping those things were real, looking for them. They're not real things. Okay. They're not real. There's another one they mentioned later too, and none of the publications they talk about are real.

Nic

That came up to me in the movie, just thinking, oh, those would be kind of neat books to have, right?

Steve

If there was some book that talked about all these old evil spirits, you know, I guess in some sense there are reference books, there are references, or there are books like that, right? I mean, basically any, any Any book on the mythology of Sumer or Babylonia, right? Babylon rather, would be kind of in this basic milieu, right? Because that's kind of what we're talking about, an old Sumerian god or whatever. But yeah, so they're going to go look for that up and Peter's going to take Dana back to her apartment and check her out. I mean, check out Dana's apartment. So they go and they're walking around the apartment and the gist is there's really nothing. There, right? There's nothing to find. Venkman doesn't find anything. He's got a little machine he's using to try to take readings.

Nic

I love how silly his machine looks. It's just like a little bulb and he's just blasting air out in different directions out of this wand.

Steve

Really crazy.

Nic

It seems so fake. And, uh, Dana asks something to him. She's like, oh, what is that? He's like, it's technical.

Steve

It's one of our little toys. Yeah. It's like, are you sure you're using it right? Well, I, I think I am, but I know there's no ghosts here. So yeah, yeah. So, so he even checks the fridge and basically nothing there, but he hits on her and is kind of like, you know, trying to go and basically tells her, because she's like, no, you can go, dude. Like, I'm not interested, basically. And he tells her, look, uh, I'm gonna solve your little problem. You're gonna see how good a guy I am and this is all gonna work out. And she's like, okay, fine, you go solve my problem, and kicks him out. Um, and then that is when we get the, the, uh, the Chinese, the whole Chinese food thing you mentioned, like, kind of happens at this point. Okay, because that's what he says, like, oh, we should take her out to dinner and keep our only client because he wants the company to pay for him to take her out. And that's when Ray tells him we're out of money. Luckily for them, yes, Janine actually gets a call, you know, oh yeah, they'll be totally discreet, you know, like the whole deal. And it's, you know, she slams this like alarm thing and screams, we got one! Yeah, great little montage of them kind of getting ready, going on the pole, get all their stuff and driving off. And they end up at a place called the Sedgwick Hotel, and they are immediately met by like, you know, in the street entrance, they burst through the doors like, all right, we got some ghosts, whatever he says.

Nic

It's just the exact opposite of what they would want. Yeah, this hotel manager is funny.

Steve

He's very funny. He's basically like, oh, the staff knows about the 12th floor and the disturbances, but it's never been this bad. Like, please, you know, take care of this. And they're like, all right, we'll go check it out. And I love— there's a scene where they're waiting for the elevator to come up, and of course they've got, you know, the proton packs are huge. There's big backpacks with these sticks on them and all these wires and cables and things. They've got the whole, you know, they look like exterminators. They got the jumpsuits and everything else and the elbow and knee pads and whatever. And there's this guy standing there at the elevator and he goes Goes, what are you, some kind of cosmonaut? No, exterminators. Somebody saw a roach up on 12. That's got to be some cockroach. And they go up and he goes, you coming up? He goes, I'll take the next one. Yeah, I just love that. That's got to be some cockroach.

Nic

Yeah, they make mention of, uh, you know, I'm a little uncomfortable, I have an unlicensed nuclear accelerator on my back.

Steve

Yes.

Nic

Uh, and I think they have, uh, Egon says, or, uh, whatever. They power one of them up. Yes. And the other two guys like scoot, you know, the 5 inches that they have to move to the other side of the elevator.

Steve

Just the sound it makes, the kind of hum it makes, you know, there's just a lot of power happening there. But sure enough, they start walking around the 12th floor and they've got their, their pro— the proton packs, they got the sticks out, whatever. And they hear a noise and they turn and just blast. I think at least Ray and Eon do. And they almost destroy this poor maid who's like trying to do like replace the toilet paper or whatever in the hotel rooms. Oh my God.

Nic

And there's little bits of the toilet paper that are on fire, and it shows her in the background trying to spray it out with the Windex bottle, like just trying to spray Windex on this little fire. Uh, it was a nice detail. Um, Ray, when he first— uh, so they're all kind of split up going down the halls and everything, and Ray, I swear they have him smoke just for this effect. I love it of having the cigarette hanging all the way off of his lip and then slowly dropping. It's really, really good.

Steve

He opens it because he sees Slimer, the first kind of ghost we're really encountering since the library, and And yeah, he like, his jaw drops basically. And yeah, the cigarette like hangs on his lower lip for like way longer than you think it should. I've always known that's something I've always loved too for some reason. Yeah, there's that. And so he goes to try to shoot Slimer to grab him or to, I guess the idea is the proton packs, right? They're supposed to be like lassos.

Nic

It's like a rope.

Steve

Yeah. Yeah, like a rope, right? So it's like a containment kind of thing. He tries, but he misses. They're clearly not particularly easy to aim. You see the way that they wiggle, the little lasers wiggle real bad. And this is the thing I want to say. This, I think, is a really great example of how these effects are still good. Both the effect of the proton pack blast and the effect of Slimer as a free-floating phantasm or whatever they call him, right? They are very cartoonish, but it's okay because they have so much of an effect on the real world around them that it works. So like Slimer is picking up a real plate of real food and throwing it into his mouth. Mouth, right? And when the, and when the proton pack shoots the wall, it carves this like huge gash in the wall that burns and it's actually on fire. So by, by only making—

Nic

so they have a realistic effect on the environment, even if they don't look realistic in a vacuum.

Steve

Yeah, exactly. And that's why they hold up, because even though they are a bit cartoonish, they— yeah, I think it's because they were having such an effect on the real world around them that it's like, we can buy it. There's one effect later in the movie that I don't think still holds up. It's got to do with the dogs and they start running.

Nic

That's the only thing that doesn't—

Steve

it's the only— doesn't look good. Everything else is fantastic. And look, I think you're benefited by the fact that they're ghosts. You can make them look like whatever you want. They can be see-through. They can be what— you know what I mean? It's like there's a lot of leeway. We don't know ahead of time what these are, quote, supposed to look like. Yeah, right. But with the dogs at the end, or the demons, whatever, we kind of know what a four-legged animal should look like when it runs, and it doesn't look right. Yeah, you know, so it's like there's— that's an element. But all these things, they made so many great choices about how much effect these guys would have on the physical sets, and it really pays off, and it really keeps them holding up.

Nic

Yeah, watching the stuff fly around, and they end up, they end up chasing Slimer.

Steve

Yeah, he reappears down in this ballroom. Yes. So in this ballroom is all set up for an event that's imminent. Yeah, there's the person, the organizer outside, just being like, you know, what's going on? I gotta get in there. Yeah.

Nic

So to have all these dishes and tables and chandeliers to be able to be destroyed by the proton, like, that makes it so it works so good.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

Um, this scene is great. You know, they're having some trouble hitting Slimer and they realize, okay, well, we gotta make some space for our trap.

Steve

And they've already been stuffed up this room so bad, they're just flipping tables. So you're just hearing dishes break and everything. And then when it seems like they're about done, Venkman says, hold on, I've always wanted to try this. And he tries to do that pull the, uh, tablecloth out from under the dishes thing and breaks a whole bunch more dishes, except the flowers are still standing. I also love there's an Yeah. Watching the stuff fly around and they end up.

Nic

They end up chasing Slimer. He reappears down in this ballroom.

Steve

Yes.

Nic

So in this ballroom is all set up for an event that's imminent.

Steve

I mean, there's the person, the organizer outside just being like, you know, what's going on? I gotta get in there. So to have all these dishes and tables and chandeliers to be able to be destroyed by the proton, like, that makes it so good. Yeah, younger kid who tends to like miss the toilet a little bit, that's a nice shoot-and-text type of situation. Um, but yeah, but they are able to get their little, uh, I can't remember what they call it, the, the little trap basically, right? You know, and they roll it in and they're able to grab Slimer and get him into the trap. The thing is smoking. I always thought they cut— they carry them by the wires, which seems like a bad place to carry that thing from, but I wonder if it's supposed to carry anything by the way.

Nic

Not generally. Yeah, the cord, the cable, not a good idea. But it's also not hot because later they hand them to Winston and he just carries them. So, but anyway, But the way it looks, yeah, you can't tell is it ultra cold or ultra hot or what's going on, right? But basically they bust out of this thing. They've destroyed this ballroom.

Steve

This event that's gonna happen cannot happen, but they have captured the ghost. So they bust through. We came, we saw, we kicked its ass. Like, you know, they're super excited. I love this part where Venkman's talking to the manager about the bill and Egon is signaling him with his hands on his face, like 4 fingers. That'll be $4,000. And then And then for containment, we're running a special this month. And he kind of taps his nose with one finger for another $1,000. So they're able to like signal like what it should cost or whatever, because they apparently didn't discuss that. I totally missed that. Okay. That's, that adds a lot to it. So they were doing kind of like the, the bribery signaling that we saw in Thief a couple weeks ago. Same idea. Um, and, and he says, you know, $5,000 and the guy's like, $5,000, I won't pay it. You know? And they're like, okay, well fine. We'll just let this guy go. We're going to put him right back where we found him. That's fine. It's like, you're kind of screwed there, buddy. But this then kicks off a pretty big montage sequence. Great. We start off with some great little TV news elements. There's like newspaper covers and magazine covers and they're capturing things. We see them at a bunch of different locations. Clearly there's businesses booming, right? This is the idea we're getting. The Ghostbusters business is booming. We even get a great little Casey Kasem cameo here. You know, like, you know, the boys in gray dance the night away with the lovely ladies that experience the phenomenon.

Nic

Now back to the countdown.

Steve

Like, you know, the whole thing. That's great stuff there. Oh, and then the The least kid-friendly part of the entire movie is during this montage. Yeah.

Nic

And I'd forgotten that this happens, that clearly Rey dreams this rather than claiming this is something that happened to Rey.

Steve

Okay.

Nic

Because it shows the three of them asleep in bed in the hotel, and then we cut to Rey not there, laying in a bed and like seeing a ghost woman, and then she disappears, but his fly opens or whatever, and his eyes roll in the back of his head.

Steve

So he's getting a ghost blowjob. But then we cut back to the three of them laying in the beds that they actually are in, and he just rolls, like falls off his bed like he's dreaming or something. Oh, so it's a dream, but he's dreaming about getting a blowjob from a ghost in a kids movie, which doesn't— isn't great. He's— I mean, I guess, yeah. I mean, if it's not showing anything— no, it doesn't show anything. The scene, it is, it is very funny. And it is funny to think of a, you know, what, 27-year-old Dan Aykroyd writing this movie and being like, oh, and then a ghost sucks my dick. Write that down. Write that down. Herald, Harold, put this in there, put this in there. I want to get it. I want to get a ghost blowjob at some point. Can I get it? No, no, no, it's mine. It's gotta be mine. For me, my ghost BJ. I thought of it first. So yeah, so as the montage sort of ends, we have somebody being interviewed by Janine there in the headquarters. This is Winston Zeddemore, played by Ernie Hudson. And she's asking him, you know, do you believe in it? She lists a ton. I don't remember all, but it's like, you know, ESP, astral projection, blah, blah, all this kind of different stuff, the Loch Ness Monster or whatever.

Nic

And he goes, if there's a steady paycheck in it, I'll believe anything you say. And they're just like, they need help. So then that's when, I think it's Venkman and Ray show up and it's like they're tired and they're clearly been busting ghosts all night. And then you're like, this is Winston Zeddemore, he's applying for the job. He goes, great, you're hired. Come help me with this thing. I love that idea of this being, you're hired on the spot and now get to work. I think that it's such a good idea for this movie to have— you have this team of academics. Yeah. And then you bring in just like a regular working guy to be with them. Like it— and he doesn't, you know, split up.

Steve

There's a lot of stars. There's a lot of shit happening. He doesn't get a ton of screen time. No, he has good lines though. And I think he adds a very interesting element to the crew because otherwise it's just, you know, 3 nerds or whatever. And then you get someone who's kind of a skeptic, more so than Venkman, a non-believer who has to be a part of it. Yeah, and I think it's— I think you're right. And he just adds a great little element. You're right, he's not in a ton of it. He doesn't have a ton of lines, but he's got some really important ones. And I think— and one of the things that he will do later in the movie is kind of ground the experience that the Ghostbusters are having with people who don't understand it the way that he doesn't understand it. So all the kind of laypeople who just, you know, or whatever, they're going to get it, right? Because of him talking about it. So yeah, so Winston is hired. There are now 4 Ghostbusters. We cut quickly to outside the symphony hall where Dana does her works basically, and is in her orchestra. She's walking out with an orchestra mate of hers, and who's out there waiting but Peter Venkman. All he really has to tell her is that they found the name Zuul, and he explains, you know, this was a— Zuul was the minion of Gozer, which is this, you know, god of Sumeria. He says Sumeria, I think Sumer is actually what you called that civilization. But basically just like, you know, what was he doing in my fridge? I don't know, I'm still gonna figure this out. But they make a date basically for Thursday night and it's okay, I'll see you Thursday, whatever. And then, you know, he's pretty happy, but she goes off and we cut then back to the headquarters and everybody's least favorite person in the entire movie shows up for the first time. This is Walter Peck, played by William Atherton, who we've seen already in a couple other movies. I think at least one other. He was Thornburg in Die Hard, the shithead journalist who was also the shithead EPA guy in this movie. Movie. Not sure that I love vilifying the Environmental Protection Agency necessarily, but he's a piece of shit.

Nic

So yeah, no, I mean, yeah, I mean, I think the same thing, but you always need a boogeyman and it always has to be overregulation. Like if there was a movie about how it turned out the EPA was right, it would have to take place over like a 50-year timeline. You're like, see, this thing didn't deteriorate because we saved. But yeah, it's a little, it's a little cheesy. But, you know, big bureaucracy. Everyone hates red tape, don't they?

Steve

I mean, I think if you're gonna say, if you're gonna have some kind of like government entity being the thing that really sticks in their craw, the EPA makes sense, right? 'Cause he comes, he talks about like toxic chemicals and, you know, like hallucinations, like all this kind of stuff. So it works, you know?

Nic

Totally. And I will also say, and you know, we know this is an incredible like power draw and stuff. If there was something happening next door to me where they're like, yeah, they're storing ghosts and they have these nuclear reactors and stuff. I'd be on team Peck, at least initially.

Steve

100%. But he is an asshole. And so he goes and he talks to Venkman. One of the things I don't like about this, and I kind of wish Venkman had said something about this, because he introduces himself, he asks, "What do you do, Mr. Venkman?" He goes, "It's Dr. Venkman." "Oh, what are you a doctor of?" Whatever. And he goes, "I have PhDs in parapsychology and psychology." And Peck, for the rest of the conversation, refers to him as Mr. Venkman. And as a husband of a doctor, Let me tell you, they don't like that very much. My wife is not Mrs. Paulo, she's Dr. Paulo, because that's what she fucking earned, you know what I mean? Yeah. So it's like, it's very disrespectful to continue to refer to him as Mr. Venkman, and it's one of the earliest signs that this guy's a piece of shit. Like, you know what I mean? Like, it's, it's, it's not good.

Nic

But he basically is saying, but it is fun to like, uh, misdoctor a doctor to piss them off. Well, that is effective. So it is fun to do.

Steve

It is very effective. But that's kind of why I almost wish Peter had like recognized it and like said something about it, but he doesn't even clock it. Or he— if he clocks it, it doesn't bother him, which maybe that's more the Venkman way, is just to not be bothered by it, you know. Um, but it's always something where I'm sitting there watching him every time he says Mr. Venkman, that's Dr. Venkman, that's Dr. Venkman. Um, but basically he says, come back with a court order. Like, you're not going to see anything, we're not going to show you anything, we're not going to take you anywhere. You get a court order and I'll sue your ass for wrongful prosecution. Not really how that works, Dr. Venkman, but that's okay.

Nic

There's a lot of, like, in the '80s, a lot of good, like, I'll sue your ass for— as if it's just some an easy process where you just show up to the court and say, hey, I'm suing this guy. Right. Uh, no, no cash layout involved before lawyers' fees, retainers and all that.

Steve

Um, yeah.

Nic

Um, so we see that these gargoyles that are on the roof of Dana and Lewis's building are these, you know, dog creatures, whatever we want to call them.

Steve

They look more like gargoyles when they're stone. Yeah. They look more like some kind of—

Nic

It's an easy time to call it a gargoyle when it's like is being one. Um, but But the statue starts to crack and we see something's like emerging from it, you know, so the arm busts out and the eyeball busts out.

Steve

Glowing red eye. It's really creepy.

Nic

Yes. Um, Louis is having his party as Dana's coming home, right? And he's trying to tell her, hey, hey, Dana, you want to come into my party? Yeah, yeah, you know, I got a lot of people. I invited, uh, clients instead of friends. That way it's a big tax write-off. And the other recurring theme is Louis gets locked out of his apartment every time he comes out into the hall. Uh, it's like the lock of horniness. It's like you got too horny and this, this lock has punished you. Um, but yeah, so Dana, you know, maybe later she walks by because that's the night she's supposed to meet Venkman, right?

Steve

And so she says, oh, actually I have a date. And he goes, you made a date on the night of my party? And she's like, I'm sorry, I forgot. Like, he's like, okay, you can bring him too. And then I love, he goes, we're gonna play some Twister, do some breakdancing. Yeah. Um, but she goes in and she gets a phone rings, it's a call from her mom. So she's like sitting on her on a little easy chair in her kind of living room. She's talking to her mom, telling her she's got a date tonight. Yes, to go with the Ghostbusters. Yes, those guys from TV, like the whole deal. When she hangs up, we see from the side of her, like, like where her kitchen is, it's glowing big time. The door is like glowing, and it's like, you know, she kind of notices, and then the whole chair turns, and like these, the kind of demon dog looking hand things all come out, like grab her arm, grab her, all the variety of animal limbs come out.

Nic

That is really cool.

Steve

Thing. One covers her mouth to keep her from screaming, and then basically the door opens and it's one of these demon dog gargoyles there. I probably should just call them gargoyles. I was always calling them demon dogs as a kid. But like, this gargoyle's there and it, you know, the chair flies towards it and we cut away from her. Yeah, right. But it's like something bad has happened to Dana, that's obvious. Um, and so then we cut over to, uh, to the party, to Lewis's party. He's chatting with people, like he's talking about how it's a write-off.

Nic

Yeah, smoked salmon. Yeah, that's 17.99 a pound, but it only cost me $11.99 a pound after the tax write-off. It's like, so— oh, I— and that's— it's such a short part, but it's very memorable for me. Well, his, his going through there. Oh, one other thing I just want to point out, yeah, is visually this movie is very vibrant and bright. I really like the colors of it. Like, it looks very good. Yeah, you know, it's old, but it, it doesn't look shitty in an old way. It's just like, man, there was thought put into all these scenes. Like, there's A lot of attention to that. So I like that.

Steve

Lewis's outfits are amazing. He's got this little, little cravat, the little like whatever neck dickie thing he's got on. It's hilarious. Um, one thing I wanted to ask you as an accountant, as a CPA yourself, my friend, when his, uh, clients Ted and Annette show up, right, he's introducing them around to the party and he's going into detail about having like a carpet cleaner company and receivership, and she's drawing a, a delayed pension or something, whatever. So, and they've only— they won't— they they only own $15,000 on their house. They're okay. I'm like, nobody— you can't—

Nic

no, it's like never, never.

Steve

It's like a client privilege thing, right?

Nic

Like, when I saw that, uh, yeah, when I saw that, I was like, Lewis, everyone should fire you now.

Steve

Right, exactly. It's like nobody's gonna still have him as their accountant.

Nic

It would be one thing to just say, hey, they have this company, this is what they do for work. But to be like, okay, they have this building that's underwater and they have liens against their property.

Steve

And, um, yeah, it was pretty wild. I was like, that is like way too much detail.

Nic

Really Funny though, how enthusiastic he is about the financial details of everybody's life. It is true. Like, that's the— that's what's significant about them, right? Exactly.

Steve

Balance sheet. Yeah, well, because it's what matters to him, I guess, the most. Yeah. Um, so he takes their coats and he kind of tosses them into the bedrooms, or the bed, you know, just the coats. And of course there's a gargoyle in there, and the coats kind of land on— kind of funny. And actually, these are one of the better looking gargoyles. When they're stationary and they're puppets, they look fantastic. Yeah, good, good rubber puppets. They look great, they move good. The whole deal, the puppetry is fantastic. So it tosses it in and then it growls after closing. Lovey goes, okay, who brought the dog? And it busts out. And this is where the effects aren't as good, right? When it's busting through the doors and whatever.

Nic

Yeah, anytime it's moving, it's looking a little dated.

Steve

Yeah, but that's okay. It basically chases him out of the apartment and, you know, he goes down the elevator and everything else. And then he gets out and I love it. He's running out the door of his apartment building across the street to Central Park. Park, and he's just screaming almost incoherently. But the doorman is like standing there and somebody walks over.

Nic

What do you say?

Steve

He's like, oh, something about somebody brought a bear to a party or something like that. And then the gargoyle runs past them and like knocks the guy over and it's chasing Louis down. And it's really great. And then he gets—

Nic

Can other people see it?

Steve

I was wondering about that too, because we— he gets to this. Okay, first of all, in the party, definitely, right? People reacted. Yeah. In his apartment, people reacted to this thing for sure. But then, and then, and then it knocks over the doorman. So I guess if they're invisible, but they're blowing open the door, maybe people just reacted to that. And maybe the doorman got knocked over and didn't know by what, because Lewis runs to a restaurant. Big, big, big windows in the middle of Central Park.

Nic

Very Trading Places, like outside the restaurant, a guy named Lewis.

Steve

You know, that's a good point. Yeah. And so, so he, you know, runs up to this and speaks like, hey, let me in, trying to get into this place. And a bunch of people see him. They look at him. And then he turns around and kind of slides down the window as he like falls to the ground. And the dog, the gargoyle, whatever is there and like attacks him. And everybody, everybody in that restaurant is looking like the music's not playing. Yeah. And then he kind of goes out of sight and they just go back to their food. So clearly they didn't see anything, right? They couldn't have seen the gargoyle and not reacted at all. So I'm not sure exactly. Yeah. As far as the canon lore of like are these things visible to like everyone?

Nic

Like, would Peter Venkman have been able to see it?

Steve

Because they definitely see them later, right? So yeah, I don't know.

Nic

But yeah, hey, if you're a ghost, uh, hit up, uh, the show at twodads1movie.com.

Steve

Exactly. Oh man. So, um, so then we get, uh, Venkman shows up at Dana's, right? And she answers the door and she's got this ridiculous outfit on. I don't know where this, this this chiffon and sort of silk dress came from, but whatever. And she answers the door and he's kind of like, whoa. And she's like, are you the key master? And he's like, no. So she shuts the door. So he knocks again. Are you the key master? And he's like, yes. And he walks in. He's a friend of mine. He said I should come for, you know, you can see, you'll be here later, whatever. And so basically she introduces herself as Zul the gatekeeper. And this was one of those jokes, I gotta be honest. So I love the key master gatekeeper thing. I probably understood this joke younger than I should have. Like, I feel like the whole, ah, the man has the key and the woman has the lock kind of thing. You know, like, I think I knew like at like 9 or something, I'm like, oh, that's a sex thing, I think. Like, not that I understood the details, but like that kind of clicked or whatever. And I feel like it's a pretty risqué kind of joke for kids. Like, you know what I mean? It's not a kids movie per se, but it's obviously a movie that many, many kids would see 'cause it's PG. But like, I always kind of thought that was funny that like, like that. I don't know, like that always tickled me, the whole Keymaster Gatekeeper thing. It's a little, it's a little, it's like so on the nose. I find it funny.

Nic

But you have, yeah, and you have to be like, as a kid it probably goes over your head for the most part, right?

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

But, um, anyway, yeah, so, so he's like trying to get through to her. Yeah, yeah. He's like, Dana, is Dana in there? And she says, there is no Dana, only Zul. Couple times she repeats it back. Great line. We've definitely, uh, repeated that one.

Steve

I was gonna say, I, I can do it if we—

Nic

oh yeah, Absolutely, folks, here's your treat.

Steve

There is no Dana, only Zul.

Nic

Fuck yeah, that's good. Um, yeah, but her freak out, you know, and, and she's laying down on the bed and she starts floating over the bed. First she's trying to kind of seduce Venkman and being very like handsy with him and she's breathing really heavy and, and, uh starts floating up in the bed. Cool scene. I mean, pretty cool looking effect.

Steve

Another cool effect. Again, like, not super obvious wires. She actually turns over while she's raised up, so like, it's not a simple wire effect. There's obviously something else going on there, maybe some kind of an old blue screen or something. I don't know exactly, but, but it works. It really, it really holds up. Um, and it's not like, uh, Hosehead in Strange Brew where it's clearly sitting on something, you know, because like the way her clothing moves is more natural than if she were like on a platform or a blue screen. So So very cool effect.

Nic

That extra $26 million budget will do it for you.

Steve

It does make a big difference. Um, so after that little event, and now, and now, you know, Venkman obviously understands this is a huge problem. Dana's been possessed, essentially. He even says something about, I don't get— I have a rule not to get involved with possessed people.

Nic

She says— this is another good Risky Joke— she says, uh, I want you inside me. And he's like, uh, maybe later, sounds like it's pretty full in there right now.

Steve

Exactly, you've got at least 2 people in there right now. Um, so then we But back to Central Park, and running out of Central Park is our buddy Louis Tully, who introduces himself as Vince Clortho to a horse, I believe, is who he first introduces himself to. But he is the Keymaster. So this is the whole, like, just to kind of sum it up, right? The two gargoyles come to life and then possess a woman and a man to be the new embodiments of Zuul and Vince Clortho, the minions of Gozer, essentially. Not sure why Vince gets a last name and Zuul doesn't, but hey. Hey, it is what it is.

Nic

Yeah, it's kind of like a Prince thing. You just— your name's just Zool. Um, I do love Vince talking to this horse, and then the, the driver of the carriage is like, hey, if you want to ride, you got to talk to me. And then he gives him like the Teen Wolf keg of beer eyes, like the glowing red, like, and scares him and runs off.

Steve

Yeah, exactly.

Nic

Um, God, Vince Clortho. Yeah, so he ends up, uh, getting picked up by the cops somewhere, and they, they bring him to the Ghostbusters because they're like—

Steve

which, I don't know, Janine's line when she answers opens the door to the cops is one of the funniest lines to me in the movie. When she sees it's a cop and kind of looks him up and now just goes, dropping off or picking up? And he goes, dropping off. Okay. But it's like, she knows, you know what I mean? It's, I just love that line so much. Like, are you here? You're here to arrest somebody or you bringing us somebody? Dropping off or picking up? Dropping off. So yeah, so they basically, you know, they bring him in and this is interesting too, because they put the same little sensors they put on Dana when she first came, you know, to the headquarters to talk to them about her fridge and stuff. And we saw the sort of outline of her head in this monitor, the screen, and it looked like her, like it looked exactly like her. Now Vince Clortho is hooked up, Lewis is, with these little sensors, and on that screen it's shaped like the gargoyle. It's actually not his head, it's the horns and the gargoyle. Yeah, it's shaped like the gargoyle, and that's what Egon kind of notices. And, you know, he's basically like, okay, well, this is crazy. And Vince has given him all kinds of crazy stuff about the coming of the Voldari or something, and in the the third reparation of the— this— I mean, it's like, I don't know any of it, but it's so incredible.

Nic

You know who did know it? And I'm going to shout out our friend Todd Toffoli, who we went to school with. He did an excellent impression of that back then, and I bet he'd still bust it out today. So Todd did a hell of a Clortho back in the—

Steve

there was a— there is a line about many somethings knew what it's like to be roasted in the belly of the Slor that day, I can tell you. Yeah, that's a good part of it. But basically Venkman calls at this point. Yeah. And Egon's like, you know, where are you? What's going on? He goes, well, I just met Zuul, uh, I just met the gatekeeper. And he goes, oh, I've got the keymaster. He's like, we got to get these two together. And he goes, that would be extraordinarily bad. But one thing that I want to say about this is that Venkman— so Dana's basically asleep on her bed now, right? And Venkman tells Egon that he, you know, shot her up with 300 cc's of Thorazine. So now we have to understand that Peter Venkman went on a date with 300 cc of Thorazine in a syringe in his pocket. Why did he have that with him?

Nic

Part of my everyday carry, you know. I got a pack of Tic Tacs, I got my Thorazine.

Steve

Also, he's not a medical doctor, so where's he getting the Thorazine? Like, this is wild that he just has Thorazine on him.

Nic

You know what, that is, that is definitely a Mr. Venkman style move.

Steve

That's a Mr. Venkman move.

Nic

Yeah. Uh, So Mr. Walter Peck is back. Oh God, yes, he's back at the Ghostbusters station with the cops and someone from the utility company. Yeah, saying, hey, I'm here to shut this down. Here, I have a— I have an envelope, and I assure you that inside this is a piece of paper that allows me to do this.

Steve

Yes, a court order, as Venkman told him, come back with a court order, you know. Um, so yes, they go down to the basement, and basically he's saying, shut all this off, shut all these off. And Egon's like, that would be like a bomb. Like, you can't do it. It'll be like a bomb dropping on the city. And they argue back and forth. And Venkman comes back because he's back from Dana's, and he, you know, is like, you know, hey, I'd love to cooperate, whatever. And, you know, Pack's like, you had your chance, you know, that's— this is it, kind of thing. And, uh, and they, they do, they shut it off. And the whole thing, the alarms start going, oh my God, it's crazy. And we get another kind of quick montage of, um, you know, what's happening around the city, right? So the, the roof of their firehouse explodes, and this huge light column comes flying out. Again, this is another element where I think all these effects hold up really great because they're just, they're kind of meant to be.

Nic

It's just like a transparency of something that you can film. Exactly. Somebody, so really smart to do it that way.

Steve

We get, we get ghosts popping out of subway stations. We get Slimer in a hot dog cart. We get like all kinds of crazy people. Just, you know, there's like a really cool looking puppet of like a still fleshy skeleton driving a cab. Like there's all kinds of great little elements.

Nic

And then I immediately crashes the cab.

Steve

Exactly right. So we get back to the thing. And now of course there's now hydrants have gone off and there's water flying everywhere. So everybody's kind of soaking wet too, which has got an interesting thing. But like basically Peck is like, arrest these men, they did this, like whatever, to like the cops. And I love it. It's like, will you shut up? And Egon, the one time Egon gets pissed is he goes like, like you're, this was your fault. And he goes, your mother, and like attacks Peck. And Harold Ramis yelling your mother is so funny.

Nic

Oh yeah. Oh my God. Uh, yeah, now our heroes end up in jail.

Steve

They are in jail.

Nic

Uh, they're getting a good amount of respect in jail. I wonder if the prisoners recognize them as the Ghostbusters. These guys, they've been on famous— the COVID of The Atlantic, uh, according to the montage.

Steve

Well, but also like, like what, a USA Today? And like, you know, these are— these are— these guys are famous certainly within New York at this time, right? These guys are pretty, pretty well known. So it's not surprising.

Nic

Don Mattingly and the Ghostbusters. That was it.

Steve

There you go. Keith Hernandez, um, a little later. But no, uh, so they've got this blueprint though. I'm not sure why they're allowed to bring their blueprint into the holding cell, but they have a blueprint of Dana and Lewis's building. Yeah. And so Egon's kind of talking them through like why this is weird. Egon and Ray are kind of talking about why this is so strange. And I love— there's a point where, you know, so they mentioned this guy Ivo Shandor, who, uh, you know, was the— you know, basically was like this, this cultist who, who was the architect of the building. And all this stuff. And he, and after World War I, he decided that humanity was too sick to survive. And so he started like bringing, you know, doing all these like rituals on the roof to try to bring about the end of the world. And so, you know, there's a very funny line where Winston is talking to Egon and he says something like, so you're telling me that a moldy, I'm gonna go in front of a federal judge and explain that a moldy Babylonian god is the reason this all has happened? And he goes, Sumerian, not Babylonian. And I love that that's the correction that he makes. Sumerian, not Babylonian. But now the keymaster and the gatekeeper have found each other, and so they connect. And, you know, we can only assume that that's bad, but they basically walk together up to the roof. Yeah, through Dana's corner penthouse, apparently. The cellist with the corner penthouse.

Nic

Seriously, I really— I want a financial analysis on a lot of this stuff.

Steve

Some forensic accounting here.

Nic

But, but good for, uh, good for Moranis to like be willing to stay in character and be with somebody who's so much less attractive than him, you know, for the sake of the film.

Steve

Real, real— yeah, real struggle. The struggle is real for guys like Moranis having to be with Sigourney Weaver. Oh man.

Nic

Um, so yeah, so, um, our boys are back in the mayor's house.

Steve

Yes, they've been taking— the mayor wants to see them because the whole island's going crazy, we're told.

Nic

One of the— one of the best scenes in the film here.

Steve

Absolutely. We get there and it's a bunch of— you got the fire chief, you got the police chief, you got the mayor, you got all these people are here. And then the Ghostbusters are brought in and Walter Peck is there and he's basically telling them how everything, you know, it's like these guys are— this is all fake. Basically Peck's argument is these guys use noxious chemicals and toxins and gases to like make people hallucinate that they're seeing things. And then they put on a light show and they claim they fix the problem. They charge them thousands of dollars. That's his claim, right? And somebody points out, well, the walls of the 3rd Precinct are bleeding. How do you 'How do you explain that?' Right? You know, kind of thing. And then one of my favorite moments in this is when the cardinal shows up, right? So this is like the cardinal of the Diocese of New York City comes in and, you know, the mayor's like, 'Oh, Your Eminence.' He goes, 'Hi, Lenny. You know, how you doing?' He goes, 'I'm in a real pickle, Mike.' And he kind of slaps his cheek. And I've always loved the familiarity, like, moment of like, 'I'm in a real pickle, Mike. Like, I don't know what to do here.' And he says, he tells him, like, you know, 'The church is not going to take sides on this.' This is— we're not gonna make an official statement.

Nic

We're in official no comment.

Steve

Yeah, exactly. But like, dude, do something about it. Yeah. Um, and then that's when, uh, Winston steps up and says, look, Mayor, I, I know you don't believe any of this stuff, but like, I didn't believe any of this when I started. And I, I love his line. He goes, since I started here a few weeks ago, I've seen shit that'll turn you white. Yeah. And everybody kind of goes, oh, that's a weird way to put that.

Nic

I love that. I love that.

Steve

Um, but yeah, great, great lines from from Venkman and Stantz and Egon talking about, you know, what is happening. These are biblical, you know, sort of ramifications, right? Yeah. And Peck is like, you're not going to really believe these guys, are you?

Nic

Like, but they say, uh, they say, you know, none of this wouldn't have happened if Dickless here didn't shut the power off. And then he says they caused an explosion. And the, and the judge, or the mayor, looks at Venkman, he's like, is this true? He goes, it's true, this man has no dick. Great, perfect, great line. Yeah, excellent, excellent.

Steve

Yeah, but so basically the mayor sides with, with the Ghostbusters after Venkman reminds him, you know, hey, if I'm wrong about all this, we'll go to jail, we'll enjoy it, whatever. But if I'm right, Lenny, you will have saved the lives of millions of registered voters. At which point, at which point they dismiss Mr. Peck and they decide to let the Ghostbusters save the day.

Nic

Uh, and then we get another montage here. Is the song called Saving the Day? It must be.

Steve

It was. It's a great song.

Nic

Yeah, so yeah, I like that, getting suited up and everything. Yeah, um, they have to take the stairs, uh, up to the roof of Dana's building, which just looks like the most impossibly endless staircase. It's, it's shot from underneath in one of those classic square stairwells.

Steve

Oh my God, I was almost surprised. I thought 22 is like— 22, this 22nd floor is where they're going to. Yeah, for some reason I thought like that doesn't It seems like the building would be bigger than that. But then I mean, 22, that's a tall, tall-ass building. So, you know, and you can see from when they're on the roof, you're looking out across like the park to like further downtown in New York. And there's far, far taller buildings. So it's not like it's the biggest building in town or anything. So, but yeah, they have to haul ass and they're again carrying their unlicensed nuclear accelerators on their backs, you know, all the way up 22 flights of stairs. That's pretty insane. I love it too. It's like, where are we? Somewhere in the low teens. Tell me when we get to 20. I'm going to throw up. But yeah, so they find their way up the stairs and they find Dana and Lewis on the roof. But as they are watching, the two of them morph into these gargoyles again and are taking position within this sort of like temple thing. There's like, yeah, the laser like hits the two of them as they're turning into the dogs and opens up this door. And it wasn't obvious that it was a door. It looked like just kind of like some kind of motif, like some kind of, you know, alfresco or something, whatever. And, and, but it opens, and then, and then just like in Dana's fridge, there's this wide space and then this pyramid and whatever, um, over there. And the boys, uh, you know, look at it, and then there's this really strange looking woman. She's got short hair, red eyes, dressed in like this kind of gossamer fabric or something, whatever it is.

Nic

Yeah, it's kind of like an evil Pat Benatar, a little bit something.

Steve

Yeah, she looks very new wave, very kind of, you know, like very music of our time.

Nic

Ziggy Stardust.

Steve

Oh, that's actually, yes. That's kind of, without the star on the eye, it looks a lot like a brunette Ziggy Stardust for sure. But they're kind of like, what do we do? And so it's like, oh, Ray, you can try, right? And he says something about like, as a duly appointed representative of the city, county, and state of New York, I request that you go back to where you came from or the nearest parallel dimension. Like he's trying to be all like, whatever. And this is a great line. Gozer, this is Gozer, They realize, goes, are you a god? And he kind of goes, no. Then die, right? Like, like very, uh, Emperor Palpatine, laser fingers kind of thing, you know, knocks him down. At which point, after they recovered a bit, Winston goes, Rey, when somebody asks if you're a god, you say yes. That's so good.

Nic

Oh man. Uh, so they're lined up now with their proton packs and they're trying to get her, and she's too nimble. She's jumping out of the way. They can't get her. Bruce Lee. And she, you know, Gozer says something like, it's up to you to choose the form of the destructor.

Steve

Yes, choose the form. You know, the destructor has arrived, choose the form of your destruction. And they realize, Peter kind of quickly realizes, whoa, okay, so whatever we think of, that's what— so we think of J. Edgar Hoover, J. Edgar Hoover will come and destroy us. So let's keep— close your mind, close your minds, don't think about anything. We only got one shot at this. And as he's saying that, we hear Gozer's voice again. Choice is made or whatever. It's like, whoa, no, no, no, we didn't choose anything. But Ray is looking rather sheepish. Yeah. He's like, and he goes, I just, I thought of something, you know, wholesome and safe that could never hurt us and thought back to camping as a kid and making s'mores with Stay Puft marshmallows. And like, and that's when they realize, they look down, you know, Fifth Avenue or whatever it is, and there is a 100-foot-tall Stay Puft Marshmallow Man walking down the street. Oh my God.

Nic

And I think, is this where Venkman says, uh, mother puss bucket?

Steve

Mother puss bucket.

Nic

Like, I gotta say, I would rather be called a fucker than a puss bucket.

Steve

It's pretty gross. A thousand times. Yeah, it's, uh, this was clearly— I feel like this— I feel like PG-13 was not available to them. Yeah. And that if they'd left motherfucker, because it's clear that should have been motherfucker, sure, that would have been an R. And they were like, ah, it'll kill our— you know, they gotta have that four quadrant, make a lot of money kind of thing going on. Yeah, you can't be an R. So that's when they changed it to Motherfucker Bucket.

Nic

Uh, yeah, a good, good way to like make it still, uh, sound bad. Yes, exactly. That's absolutely true. Uh, so they kind of realize with this Marshmallow Man that, yeah, they, they can't do too much to them. They shoot at it and it's not doing much.

Steve

It doesn't even slow them down. Like, the guy keeps walking to— they're hitting with the four streams or whatever And they're not even really, it kind of lights on fire, but doesn't seem to stop them at all. So they have to jump out of the fire. And this is when Egon goes, there is one choice. We could cross the streams. And then it was like, well, what would that do? Cross the streams? Like, well, we would like reverse the protons back through the gateway. I mean, again, there's another sort of like explanation of like weird stuff, but he's like, lovey goes, there is definitely a very real small possibility that we could survive. It's like, okay. Um, but yeah, sure enough, they, they kind of press their little, you know, they kind of aim their whatever— I don't want to call the streams, whatever they are— towards each other at the temple back through the, the gateway, right? Like, so they're—

Nic

because it does seem like, you know, so they're trying to reverse the effect of this, like, letting things in from that dimension. It's trying to push it back, blow it up, push everything back.

Steve

Yeah. So yeah, so it definitely— they do that, and sure enough, man, it makes the whole thing explode. The Marshmallow Man has now reached the roof, right? It's climbing over, but he then is then caught up in the explosion and it destroys him as well. And everything is covered. I mean, this falling marshmallow is falling down on the people on the street below. Yeah. And all this—

Nic

Winston was right about something turning you white. He was literally turned white along with the other guys who were covered in marshmallow fluff.

Steve

That's funny. It's actually funny they're not all covered in marshmallow fluff. For whatever reason, Venkman is like almost unshaved.

Nic

Yeah, well, because they know he has to like reconcile with Dana at the end, so you get stuff all over.

Steve

She has to recognize him right away. Yeah, you know, you don't want him covered in stuff, you know. Who's this?

Nic

Like, you know, um, uh, and is it him or Egon says, I feel like the floor of a taxi cab? Yeah, whether they're out of there, uh, yeah, so great, great explosion. You know, for how much I remember the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, I would have thought he had 18 solid minutes of screen time, but it's very brief, very quick. And later in the cartoons, a lot of these things became a bigger deal, like Slimer and the Marshmallow Man.

Steve

I mean, Slimer became like their little pet.

Nic

Yeah, he was like I guess, uh, Orko.

Steve

Yeah, that's right, man. Um, oh yep, but that's, that's pretty much it after this is just sort of celebrating. And Winston, this is something that I, I've always thought in my head whenever I'm somewhere that I'm having a good time or I see something reminds me especially of liking the place where I live. Yeah, I think to myself, I love this town, the way he says it.

Nic

And that's his reaction is really good. So they get Dana, they get Dana and Lewis out of these gargoyles. Yeah. Um, so they, you know, who are you guys? Uh, or Louis, like, who are you guys? We're the Ghostbusters. Who does your taxes? I think that might be the actual last line in the movie.

Steve

It could be, actually. Yeah, because the rest of it's sort of celebrating and the song playing and like whatever. Great.

Nic

Yeah, a movie just ending when it ends. Yeah, in the moment it ends. It doesn't flash to one month later. It's just like, we're still covered in the shit and we're celebrating on the streets with these people who just saw the craziest thing happen of all time, and we're just getting down.

Steve

No epilogue at all.

Nic

Very, very, very fun.

Steve

That is Ghostbusters, man. That is such a fun movie. Oh, man. Okay, well, this was my pick. Yeah, I'm going to give my breakdown first. And this was one of those movies that, like I said at the beginning, for a significant period of my life, this was, quote, my favorite movie of all time. And it's not there anymore. It's not— it's not— it doesn't currently hold that title for me. But for a long time it was. And it's still something that just— I, at a time in my life, I could have recited this movie beginning to end. And without any prompting, I even thought to myself, I could do this episode with you this week without having watched it. I could have, but then I thought to myself, why would I not take the opportunity to watch it though? I have a good reason to watch it.

Nic

Let's watch a new feature that we have though. It's just one guy raw dogs the movie, doesn't watch it.

Steve

We're too old to use raw dog that way.

Nic

That's true. It's actually, it's the only way we can use it.

Steve

That's fair. No, but so just love this movie and I, and it was, and it held up. Like one of the main things for me is that it all held up. There's nothing in couple of special effects that don't quite look as good as they did before, but most of the effects in this movie are fantastic. Yeah, still hold up, still look great. Like 99% of these effects are fantastic. The humor is great. There's nothing really objectionable in any of the jokes or the way that they like formed any of the laughs. This is a really, really great movie, and I have nothing to say about it. No notes to give to Ghostbusters. I am a 5 out of 5, easiest 5 I've I've given this entire time.

Nic

All right, well, yeah, I mean, again, holds up very well. I don't care about the effects that don't work. And, you know, I like it a lot better that they didn't do a remaster where they like made the dog thing look good, because I don't— I like things to be a snapshot of a point in time, you know. Um, but then, you know, being a snapshot of a point in time, a lot of times we have very problematic humor and everything. And there were plenty of opportunities for this movie to take a swing at that kind of stuff, and they did not do it. Yeah, there's not a single reference to the fact really that Winston is Black other than his like, this will turn you white thing, or what, you know. But there's— there, there were opportunities for cheap jokes that were not taken. Yeah. And I think overall that makes this movie hold up so well because the characters are very memorable. Um, all the action of it, I really do love this. And it spawned a whole ton of other shit, some of which was good and some of which shouldn't have. But who cares? It's not— it's not those movies' fault, you know? Yeah, you can't blame this movie for them. Um, but, uh, this was like just shy because there was a couple parts of it. And like I said, I don't have quite the nostalgia of this movie, but this is a 4.5 out of 5 for me. I love this. Um, definitely watch it. Definitely watch it with your kids. It holds up. Ghost blowjob aside, uh, this movie is a 4.5 out of 5. I thought it was fantastic.

Steve

Fantastic. That's awesome. So 9.5 out of 10, uh, from the two dads on Ghostbusters. Absolutely well earned. That's a score I'm happy with for sure. And, uh, we're going to continue our march through Two Dads, Two Decades with 1985. And Nic, your pick for us for '85, what are we watching next?

Nic

Yeah, so for 1985, we're going to change pace a little. We've had a couple comedies in a row, and this movie, uh, coming up is— I don't know, I mean, there's parts of it that are comedic, but it's more just like a drama, like a high school age drama. We're gonna see some people that we haven't seen yet, um, that were young actors at the time, a great ensemble cast. This is a very, very, uh, popular, well-known movie, um, so we'll have to dig deep and find some interesting things to say about it. But we're gonna go to 1985 and we're spending the day in Saturday School. Oh, and, uh, we're gonna, we're gonna hang Hang out with The Breakfast Club.

Steve

Love it. That's fantastic. Yes. Fun. John Hughes. We've seen some John Hughes stuff already. Such an important filmmaker for the era. We've seen Paul Gleason already as the principal here, and that's going to be a lot of fun. But yeah, a lot of these actors, really important. Emilio Estevez, Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy, even Judd, whatever his name is.

Nic

Judd Nelson.

Steve

Thank you, Judd Nelson.

Nic

But I don't think we've seen any of them yet.

Steve

I don't think so. This is a shame, actually. But hey, like, this is going to be great. Cool. So 1985, next week, The Breakfast Club. I love that pick. That's fantastic. Oh, yeah. That's a wrap. So if you like what you hear, please consider heading over to Apple or Spotify and leaving us a 5-star review. It helps new folks find the show. Be sure to check out our website at twodads1movie.com. That's the number 2 and the number 1. There you can explore the movies we've covered, sign up for our newsletter, The Rewind, and even get sneak previews of upcoming episodes. We'd also love it if you followed us on Instagram @twodads1movie. Once again, this has been Ghostbusters, another episode of Two Dads, One Movie. I'm Steve.

Nic

And I'm Nic.

Steve

Thank you so much for listening, and we'll catch you next week. Thanks, everyone.