Ghostbusters

If you haven’t been paying attention: Leslie Jones endured a barrage of disgusting racist and misogynist attacks that ultimately forced her to take a leave of absence from Twitter. The culprits? The very vocal contingency of Ghostbusters fans (aka Ghostbros) who have been decrying Paul Feig’s reboot because it features an all-female cast. Original Ghostbusters star Dan Aykroyd has come out in support of Jones, and he’s got some seriously harsh words for all the haters.

Over the weekend, I saw Ghostbusters. I loved it, but I’m not here to review it. Obviously one of the things that everyone has talked about is the female cast. There’s been a lot of backlash against it, and a lot of people defending the choice, and a plenty saying it shouldn’t matter. But honestly, I think it does matter, and I’m all in favor of it. In fact, I want to see more women-dominated reboots of previously male-dominated properties. Here’s the thing: We need more movies with woman-led casts, and that makes a movie like this even more exciting, but there’s more to it than that. Changing up the cast automatically gives the movie a freshness it wouldn’t have had with men.

When Paul Feig’s Ghostbusters hit theaters over the weekend, a couple of things happened: It did fairly well at the box office — landing in second place just below The Secret Life of Pets — and no one’s childhood was destroyed. A $46 million opening isn’t mind-blowing, but it looks like it will be enough to justify a sequel to the reboot. The big question now is whether or not Feig and the whole cast will return for it.

How much does the new Ghostbusters need to make if it wants to be a bonafide, genuine hit? The opening weekend for director Paul Feig’s reboot of the beloved franchise raises more questions than answers and the second and third weekend will ultimately prove more telling. However, here’s what we can say right now: it opened with solid numbers in second place behind last week’s massive champion, The Secret Life of Pets.

If you got the feeling of deja vu watching Paul Feig’s Ghostbusters reboot, it wasn’t just something strange in your neighborhood. The new movie is loaded, from one end to the next with references and homages to Ivan Reitman’s 1984 original. It’s haunted, you might say. (And I did, in my review of the film.)

We published our spoiler-free review of Ghostbusters earlier this week, but there’s only so much you can discuss without touching on the fine points. Now that Ghostbusters is out in theaters everywhere, it’s time to go deeper, with ScreenCrush’s SPOILER-filled discussion of Paul Feig’s new reboot.

Movies and video games don’t exactly have the most pleasant working relationship. Films based on hit games are usually terrible (seriously, have you ever seen a good movie based on one?), and games based on movies aren’t always stellar, either. An official tie-in video game isn’t really a requirement, but if the film in question is a big budget blockbuster based on a popular existing brand, it presents an opportunity to cross revenue streams for an easy cash-in. Unfortunately, the trailer for the new Ghostbusters video game feels like a perfunctory afterthought — as if Sony suddenly snapped awake one morning and thought, “Oh, right, we should probably do that.”

Since I was a kid, nary a day has gone by that the dream of being an actual, for real Ghostbuster hasn't crossed my mind. Growing up with the franchise, my household was a treasure trove of almost all the Ghostbusters goods you could imagine. Never got that Firehouse playset, but I did have that sweet role-play proton pack, trap and Ecto goggles. I don't quite fit into those anymore though, so it's a little hard for me to pretend without investing the time and effort into building my own proton back and kit as a number of similarly aged Ghostbusters fans have already done. Until now, that was pretty much the only way to indulge the fantasy. Then The Void came along with its new hyper reality experience. Teaming with Sony and Madame Tussaud's, The Void opened up Ghostbusters Dimensions as part of the new Ghostbusters Experience at the Times Square location of the wax museum franchise. While virtual reality is breaking through in a large way this year, Void ramps things up by completely immersing you in not just a visual experience, but a completely interactive one. Once you suit up with your headset, backpack and blaster, you are in the world of the Ghostbusters, and it's up to you to explore the space and eliminate the spectral menaces inside. All those hours of running around my neighborhood blasting phantoms was finally going to pay off.

Dear Ghostbusters haters, are you still angry about Paul Feig‘s female reboot? Are your hands tired from typing one vile, misogynistic comment after the next on YouTube? Are you praying the new movie will bomb at the box office so your precious childhood will never be threatened again? Well, too bad.

The very last line of Paul Feig’s Ghostbusters is “That isn’t terrible at all,” dialogue that can only be interpreted as a final nod to a fanbase that has worked itself into a lather fretting about this reboot’s tone, special effects, and particularly its female-centric cast. It feels sort of like when the doctor gives you a pep talk after a shot you’ve been dreading: That wasn’t so bad now, was it?

I have a dream job. What could be better than watching and talking about movies for a living? Nothing; the answer is nothing. But lately my job has been a lot less fun than normal, because the movies themselves have been a lot less fun. Quite frankly, this summer sucks.

That TV spot for Paul Feig’s Ghostbusters is called “The Slimers.” And if you watch through to the end, you see Slimer driving a car (ghosts can drive?) with a female Slimer. I guess that makes her a Slimette? I don’t know. Either way, she has hair and bright lipstick. Ghosts have hair? And lips?