Hello again, Dear Audience. In lieu of focusing on a softer, safer topic, today we are going to dive into the minefield that is the upcoming Ghostbusters film. I hear you say it now: 'Why now, Scholar? The trailer was released a week ago, surely the time for discussion on this has come and gone and we can resume normal operations until the next time something comes up for this film?'. And you would be well within your rights to believe that, and I did intend for this go up sooner than today. However, it is not so much the trailer itself, but the swirling miasma of absolute shit surrounding it that has prevented me from finishing this post. The more it went on, the more research I wanted to do and the more time I needed just to see some of these outcomes before I thought I could legitimately make a post concerning this topic without adding an addendum every few hours as something new came up. I wanted to make the most comprehensive post I could regarding my thoughts not only on the trailer itself, but on the reaction around it in one fell swoop, rather than in increments (as it is, this will be in two parts). But it has been a week. And the post needs to go up. So whatever I have is whatever I will use. I warn you all now, you might want to settle in, because this might be a long one.
To begin, let's talk about the actual trailer in question. Upon seeing this trailer, and repeated viewings since, what I want to discuss breaks down into three catagories: Things I Liked, Things I Didn't Like, and Things I Noticed. Let us start with the things I noticed, but that did not affect my views on the film either positively or negatively.
Perhaps it seems disingenuous, but the trailer itself was neutral. While it had elements that I liked and disliked, overall it did not change my opinion of the film. After seeing it I was neither more or less excited for its existence and was not swayed into seeing/boycotting it.
The second Thing I Noticed, and as many others have already pointed out ahead of me, is all the callbacks to the original materials. This is surprisingly evident in the film's cast, despite the 'gender swap' that has occurred and the fact that this film has been touted as 'it's own thing' and apart from the original Ghostbusters universe.
The top image above is one of the first released of the new film's cast. As any Ghostbuster fan has likely already done, one can easily distinguish which of the new cast corresponds to each member of the original. The trailer further cements these ideas thusly:
Patty Tolan (Leslie Jones) is Winston Zeddmore- Other than being a POC, Patty represents the 'everyman' in the same way Winston did. This character is the non-scientist of the group (more on that later), and comes from a 'regular' or blue collar background. They are the stand-in for the audience and the one that translates the 'science stuff' into layman's terms.
Abby Yates (Melissa McCarthy) is Ray Stantz- There were three instances in the trailer that cemented this theory for me. First, the ghostly technobabble right at the beginning. Not quite a 'four-fold cross-rip' or a 'Tunguska blast of 1908', but it's headed in the right direction. Second, it is her character that is the go-getter, that says 'we can help', etc. about the problem, reminiscent in a way of 'we can really bust some heads. In a spiritual sense, of course'. Third, we see her become possessed in the trailer, which Ray has become at least twice (in both Ghostbusters 2, and the Ghostbusters 2009 video game).
Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) is Peter Venkman- This one is a little more difficult, as you don't get as much from the character in the trailer. She definitely seems to be more of a serious scientist than Peter, but perhaps shares some of his skepticism of the whole idea. The biggest indicator with her is in the beginning of the trailer, when she is the one who tries to speak with the (new) library ghost, and is the one who gets slimed. The 'it was in every crack' fits with Peter's complaints about being slimed.
Jillian Holtzmann (Kate McKinnon) is Egon Spengler- This one was obvious from the first released image and only reinforced in the trailer. Though her personality seems much less 'hardcore nerd' than Egon, she is the one who appears to build the Ghosbuster's equipment (or at least a majority of it). And on the first point about being 'the nerd', in the part where she's goofing off with the hat and wig, her delivery is that similar deadpan that one would expect from Egon. This character is still a bit of a wildcard, but one I am interested to see, as Egon is my personal favorite Ghostbuster.
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| There is also this |
Other references which appeared but require more context: Slimer, the logo, Ecto-1, a librarian ghost, the firehouse, and the Giant Twinkie billboard (at 1:37, left hand side).
Things I Liked: While this may be controversial, there were things I legitimately enjoyed about the trailer. And overall, it did not paint as dismal of a picture of this reboot as I feared. So in a way, I was relieved for no other reason than that it wasn't as bad as it could have been. That is at least according to this trailer.
The first thing I liked that was, despite how close the characters are to the originals, they aren't complete carbon copies. These women come from different scientific backgrounds from their male counterparts, and I am interested to see how that affects how they approach the task of ghost busting. I'm very open to see new equipment and techniques tailored from their respective strengths that still pays respect to the old.
In the same vein, I am glad to see that these women are scientists without being 'Women Scientists'. Now, let me clarify what I mean by that. One fear I had was that because the new team was all women that it was going to be utilized as a gimmick, and that the humor and the basis of their personalities would be based on that fact. So far, it seems as though they are actual characters and their characters traits are not solely based on their sex.
My next point deals with the humor. While I only had one real laugh in the whole thing (more on that below), I was relieved by what I saw. I will admit, I am not terribly familiar with Paul Feig's work, and perhaps that was part of the issue. Another problem was that I dislike the direction of many modern comedies and the type of humor that is used therein. So I was glad to see, that while I didn't laugh necessarily, that it was not filled with gross-out or shocking humor that is there merely to shock or gross-out. It was also not filled with 'female' humor, which would encompass both of these ideas but with a 'feminine twist' as it were. To put it bluntly women 'jokes' (menstrual, blonde, kitchen-based, etc.) wear thin very quickly and to make it a theme would be fatal to my opinion of the film. So to not see it made me very happy.
In keeping with my above point, another positive from this trailer was the look of the cast. There is no over-sexualization of anyone in what we have seen. The uniforms are regular, functional coveralls, only differentiated by a slight color variation and the addition of some striping. There seems to be no room for the 'sexy Ghostbuster' here, and I applaud that. In fact, the franchise has done an excellent job so far of that (see Janine, Kylie, Bridget, and Melanie) and I am glad that that has not changed.
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| Costume manufacturers seem to have missed the memo on that fact. |
There is another side to that coin, as well. That is of course Kevin, the secretary played by Chris Hemsworth. The trailer gave no indication of his character being treated or regarded as a sex object either, and I think that is also important. It would be understandable to make a singular joke or gag regarding his looks upon his introduction (let's not kid ourselves, the man is almost unfathomably attractive), provided it isn't gross or crude. Then leave it, let him be a character in his own right. I for one think it would be fun to see him as just a little Janine-like in attitude, that little bit of snark on the edge of his words. We of course don't know if that's the direction they're going, as he had no lines in the trailer, so we shall have to see.
One other really positive thing to mention here, is the effects in regards to the ghosts. I watched a video (here) where it was mentioned that the human ghosts are not merely CGI, and talk about the library ghost specifically. She was portrayed by an actual actress, actually there with the other actors, and was wearing LEDs and later enhanced and made to look more ghost-like. I thought it was worth noting; I love practical effects and so that was a definite point in the film's favor.
And finally, we have to talk about The Things I Didn't Like. Given the overall attitude towards this trailer, this is the part we were all waiting for, wasn't it? And I will admit, I had my issues as well, there's no denying it. They are as follows:
As I stated earlier, I only got one genuine laugh. For a comedy, that doesn't bode well. However, I can only hope that this simply indicates that we won't already have heard all the good jokes before we have even seen the movie. That tends to lead to disappointment (as I frown in the direction of Zombieland) when watching the full film. I knew the comedy would be different than the original movies, but I hope Feig and co. have keep at least a hint of it. Ghostbusters (at least the movies) have such a dorky sense of humor that hinges greatly on the interactions of the main characters. There is not way to replicate that, but to at least have the spirit of that? That would be wonderful.
You may wonder, so what was that one laugh that I got? Well, it was actually at the very end, where Patty actually slaps the possession out of Abby. To be honest, I felt bad for laughing at a clearly stereotypical Angry/Sassy Black Woman. Perhaps you think I exaggerate on that definition? The article on TV Tropes for that particular character type mentions this trailer explicitly. I want to talk more about this particular issue in Part 2 of this post, so I will leave it at that for now.
What else can we discuss here? Again, a point I brought up earlier, the references and nods to the original material. This trailer starts by telling us that 30 years ago, four scientists did this exact same thing and now there's a new team. But if this film is in a different universe/is it's own thing/has nothing to do with the originals, why even mention that? Why bait us with the idea, if even briefly, that is tied in anyway to those films in anything but name and premise? Why make it sound suspiciously sequel-like if that isn't the intention? To jump off from that, the rest of the trailer tries exhaustively to show how much this film pays homage to the source material. It is pandering hard to those of us that grew up on Ghostbusters, and it hits every nostalgia button it can. From the opening piano version of the theme, then the firehouse and logo in quick succession? And then after that to go straight to confronting a library ghost and slime? If this were anymore wink-wink-nudge-nudge, 'remember how good those originals were?', even Jurassic World would be telling this movie to tone it down.
And to be perfectly honest, that covers all my points. I stated at the beginning of this post that this trailer did not either fully sell me or fully turn me off from this film. It was in what could be classified as 'meh'. The positives and the negatives seemed to balance each other and I remain in a state of apprehensive optimism. Will I go see this movie? Yes, I will. Truth be told, I hope this movie is good. I want this movie to be good. I don't wish a bad movie upon anyone or any franchise, and certainly not one that has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. It is entirely possible this will be bad, it's also entirely possible it will be good. As such, I can only reserve judgement until we have seen more, perhaps until July when we can see the film in it's entirety. As much as there are worrying signs, I see potential here, and I hope they capitalize on that and make it work. This Ghostbusters fan would welcome it.
Now, before I go, there's been a lot of controversy and other, less savory things happening in relation to this trailer. I have been watching it for the last week and in Part 2, I want to address them. Though it seems akin to playing hot potato with a hand grenade, I hope you'll join me here again within the next couple of days as I try to bring a voice of reason to this shitstorm and look at some of these issues. As always, I thank you for your support (especially if you have slogged through to the end of this post) and I will see you again.
Respectfully yours,
The Scholar
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