Posts tagged #ghostbusters

Now Available: The Real Ghostbusters - A Visual History!

Years and years in the making, the day has finally come… The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History is now available for purchase in your physical or digital bookseller of choice!

It seems like decades ago (even though it was only the spring of 2022) that Craig came to me wanting to pick my brain about a new project. That project, which eventually became this book, was his lifelong ambition of putting together a love letter to the Kenner Real Ghostbusters line that had influenced so many of our childhoods. Craig and I have long been friends thanks to this crazy life we lead in the world of Ghostbusters, and I could tell just how much this meant to him. It wasn’t just a “hey wouldn’t it be cool if” kind of project to him. It was a “hey, I’m doing this and either tie yourself to this wagon now or risk feeling like you missed out on the adventure later” kind of project.

In lightning speed, I helped Craig put together a packet, and started testing the waters with the amazing people at Ghost Corps, Sony, and Dark Horse.

After revisions and tooling and a whole lot of thinking the plane would never get off the ground, in February of 2023, Dark Horse told us they’d love to do the book, but would like to open it up to detail the development and production of the series itself as well. The book should be 50% making of the show, and 50% the amazing Kenner toys. Admittedly, I had been worried about how much I could contribute to a book that focused on the toys alone. That collecting world has a vernacular and expectation that I didn’t quite have a grasp on. But as soon as it became a behind the scenes book, I knew exactly how I could help Craig and the project. It was music to my ears. And thankfully Craig didn’t mind me stepping up and taking a bigger role than just helping him out. In fact, it was graciously at his insistence that I took the first author byline above him. Which felt like sacrilege knowing that this was and had been his baby.

Honestly, I feel like I had a lot to prove on this book. Both to myself and to my fellow fans. To myself, I felt like this is the book that I’d been working my way up to completing. Ever since the first Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Declassified book, the goal was always to replicate my heroes: people like JW Rinzler, Don Shay and Jody Duncan, who had written the making of tomes that I’ve read cover to cover countless times and have been such an invaluable resource to myself and many others. When I was doing DVD behind the scenes documentaries, there were a few of us that looked at what we did as the written record in history of how a film was made. Much like an issue of Cinefex, twenty years from now someone will want to know if that alien creature was a rod puppet, CG character, or a guy in a rubber suit. Sadly, it’s a resource that is dwindling in this disposable age of “content.” Acclaimed filmmakers and artists are sitting down to interviews for their film and answering if a tennis shoe looks like cake or not, instead of giving us an oral history of their work.

And it’s a shame, because the best time to record those thoughts and processes are in the moment. Which is one of the greatest difficulties we had on the Real Ghostbusters book. Development on the series began in earnest in 1985… forty years ago from me sitting here writing this. We’ve lost far too many of the people involved in The Real Ghostbusters who needed to tell the story, some were difficult to track down — and even when we did, some were hesitant to talk to us because it had been so long ago. But those that gave us their time, opened their Rolodexes, and even risked going into the deep recesses of their storage units to find us materials meant the world to us. I cannot express how thankful I am to several of the people mentioned in the extensive thanks in the back of the book for really making this project where it could have been broken. One interviewee, who had passed on talking to us, was reluctantly coaxed into talking to us later on, having heard from a colleague whom we’d spoken to that we were okay people.

Each and every one of the people we talked to on this book is a talented, overwhelmingly creative, and most importantly good human. I cannot believe how warm and gracious everyone we spoke to was on this project. And I think it’s because they all worked their asses off forty years ago and they’re still proud of all the blood sweat and tears. I hope that really comes across in the book. There are still some people we were chasing that I wish we’d been able to have gotten for the book, each and every account helped exponentially. We tried to lean on archival interviews from other sources as sparingly as needed, but in some instances those were the only ways we could have those voices heard.

And then to the fans, I felt an enormous responsibility for this book to not only have a lot of great things to look at, but to tell a great story. Because through our research and through our interviews, it became clear that the making of The Real Ghostbusters series AND the toys were both incredible stories. Filled with creative people who were passionate and wanted to make amazing things. And both were met with hardship and obstacles that were far beyond their control, ultimately leading to their premature endings. If someone were to be writing a Ghostbusters book for me, I threw everything in there that I would have wanted. I wanted this to be the book I’d be counting down the days to buy. Hopefully that ends up being the case for all my fellow Ghostbusters nerds.

It was a lot of work. Craig and I were one part archeologists trying to track down assets long lost to time. We were another part investigative journalists trying to track down people and follow leads down rabbit holes that we couldn’t have imagined. And on top it all, we had to become archivists. Taking in all of the materials that people had generously contributed to the cause to create what I can safely say is the biggest archive of Real Ghostbusters production and development material which resides permanently with the good folks at Ghost Corps for the future. And all of this while I was also taking care of two kids, which Craig was immeasurably patient with especially in moments like this, when we were just trying to get shit done on a deadline.

Anyway, I know this is a lot longer than my usual blurb when a new book comes out. And not saying the other books I’ve done to this point weren’t, but this one was extremely special. This is the one the eight-year old me looks into the crystal ball and sees his future self doing and absolutely can’t believe that’s his lot in life.

Most importantly, I hope this is the book that twenty or thirty years from now, scholars of animation, historians of Saturday Mornings and television, even the next couple generations of Ghostbusters fans who I know will exist will be able to pour over and enjoy.

Now Streaming/VOD "Cleanin' Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters"

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At long last, the definitive documentary on the making of the original Ghostbusters film, “Cleanin’ Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters” is slowly starting to roll out to audiences around the globe. Kickstarter backers have started receiving their digital codes and folks in the UK and Canada can now purchase or stream via their VOD platform of choice.

I was honored to be even a small part of the documentary, helping the Buenos chase down some archival from the famed USC and Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences libraries, chiming in on cuts from time to time, and getting to say hello once or twice when they were in the States. This has been a long labor of love filled with enough peaks and valleys for them that could merit its own documentary, so it’s fantastic to see the final product out there being viewed by audiences.

For more information, and to find where you can screen the film, check out the Bueno Productions shiny new website at:

https://buenoproductions.com/films/cleanin-up-the-town-remembering-ghostbusters/

Ghostbusters 35th Anniversary Commentary Coming June 11th

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Entertainment Weekly exclusively revealed this morning that a new Ghostbusters 35th Anniversary edition steelbook is on the way this June… and there’s a familiar name amid the special features that will be on the disc! Indeed, I was fortunate enough to be asked along with my Ghostbusters Interdimensional Crossrip co-host Chris Stewart to join Eric Reich, Sean Bishop, and Ashley Victoria Robinson on a fan commentary track to play under the first movie!

We really did our best to focus on fun trivia facts both among the production and the lore of the series, point out tiny details in the corners of frames that we’ve always admired, and took advantage of having Ghost Corps’ Eric Reich with us to confirm or debunk some long-standing Ghostbusters urban legends behind the production. It’s a fun track and we hope that you all will enjoy it!

Here’s the rest of the details on the release, a visit to EW will give you a glimpse at a never before seen distributor pitch reel featuring Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd in costume talking to theater owners!

GHOSTBUSTERS

6 Rare & Newly Unearthed Deleted Scenes, including the long-requested Fort Detmerring scenes!

Raw takes for the Central Park bums sequence

1984 ShoWest Exhibitor Reel, featuring Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd pitching an early reel of footage to theatrical exhibitors.

Full Ghostbusters TV Commercial from the film

Ghostbusters TV Commercial Outtakes

“A Moment With the Stars” – original press kit featurette

Original Domestic Teaser Trailer

Original Stereo Audio for the Feature (Blu-ray only)

Fan Commentary featuring Troy Benjamin and Chris Stewart (Interdimensional Crossrippodcast),Ashley Victoria Robinson (Geek History Lesson podcast) and Sean Bishop (Ghostbusters prop replica expert), moderated by Ghost Corps’ Eric Reich

GHOSTBUSTERS II

Commentary featuring Director Ivan Reitman, Star/Co-Writer Dan Aykroyd and Executive Producer Joe Medjuck

“The Oprah Winfrey Show: Cast of Ghostbusters II” – June 1989

Full Ghostbusters II Theatrical EPK

Rare Unfinished Teaser Trailer – featuring the full commercial from the film!

Original Stereo Audio for the Feature (Blu-ray only)

Enter the Time Vortex

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My parents insist that after the birth of a child, time speeds up. And, in part, I think they’re right. It seems like it’s been the blink of an eye since the meeting my daughter in the fall of 2017 to her walking, talking, and spinning around like Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman in the living room.

On the other hand, I also have non-scientific belief that we are caught in a time vortex. One where the laws of time and space have completely been defied. Time, as we perceive it, has been forever altered because of the current landscape of popular culture and how we’re consuming media as a whole.

In short, binge-watching culture has put us into timey-wimey-wibbly-wabbly territory that would make even The Doctor’s head spin.

Here’s why:

In August of 2014, on this very blog, I laid out all of the pop culture goodness that was to come from 2015 through the year 2020. Much of that has been shuffled around, cancelled, finally defined or did indeed happen. In fact, I had no idea at the writing of that particular article that a new Ghostbusters film was right around the corner in 2016. Let alone that a second Ghostbusters film would be entering pre-production as I write this now. Both of which would have been shocking revelations to that schedule.

But what I didn’t anticipate was what an abundance of riches would do to my consumption of popular culture. Not only that, but how I would perceive the passage of time. Let me take a few steps back. Sitting here in March of 2019, it’s difficult to believe that Marvel Studios released Black Panther just over a little than a year ago. It’s even more difficult to recollect that Thanos snapped half of the MCU out of existence a little less than a year ago in Avengers: Infinity War. Further still, Ant-Man and the Wasp feels like it was released ages ago. When in reality, it’s only been about seven months ago. Three movies in the same serialized storyline released in the same year was absolutely unheard of. I remember as a kid sitting and calculating the time between Tim Burton’s Batman in 1989 and Batman Returns in 1992 and hypothesizing that it would be at least another three to four years before we’d find out what happened to Batman in a third film. And it turned out, I was right. As, for better or worse, Batman Forever was released in 1995.

That was seemingly the norm for what felt like my entire childhood and adolescence. Movie comes out. Wait a few years, follow-up movie may or may not be behind it.

That’s completely changed.

Captain Marvel hits theaters this Friday. Avengers: Endgame is a little over a month away from being released. Though it’s felt like forever since the cliffhanger last year, the wait has relatively been small. Hell, I feel like the wait for the next chapter in the Skywalker Saga, Episode IX has been excruciatingly long. But, as I mentioned at the top of this article, Star Wars: The Last Jedi was released just a month after my daughter was born. Remember how I said that felt like the blink of an eye?

We’re living in a renaissance age that would have blown ten-year-old Troy’s mind. Marvel, Star Wars, Ghostbusters movies hitting one right after the other. The time in between films and television shows (not to mention streaming media where you get ten episodes plus at a time) has been reduced to nearly microscopic levels. In the scheme of things, waiting five years from 1984’s release of the original Ghostbusters to 1989’s release of Ghostbusters II didn’t feel like that much time at all. But having to wait a whole year from the announcement of Jason Reitman’s new film since having just seen a Ghostbusters film in 2016 feels like an eternity. We want everything. And we want it now.

If we’re not in some sort of time warp, it means we’ve all transformed into Violet Beauregarde. And I’m not sure I’m cool with that.

Posted on March 5, 2019 and filed under Movies, TV.