Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast

Deep Thoughts about Ghostbusters

• Tracie Guy-Decker & Emily Guy Birken • Episode 4

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We tried to think of the most harmless thing. Something we loved from our childhood. Something that could never ever possibly destroy us. Ghostbusters!

Tracie brings a beloved “comfort food” movie to the analyzing table, and the sisters dig in. From the banality of the anti-heroism of Peter Venkman (Bill Murray) to the regressive treatment of the beautiful, and, we’re told talented, Dana Barret (Sigourney Weaver) to the conservative capitalism of the anti-EPA Reagan years to the racism and supremacy that see Winston Zedemore (Ernie Hudson) take a backseat (if there’s a seat for him at all!), there’s a lot lurking under the nostalgia of quotable lines and goofy slapstick. 

Join us! We have the tools and we have the talent to help you (and also us) know what’s hiding in the shadows of pop culture. 

Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Learn more about Tracie and Emily (including our other projects), join the Guy Girls' family, secure exclusive access to bonus episodes, video versions, and early access to Deep Thoughts by visiting us on Patreon.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

I'm Tracy Guy-Dekker and you're listening to Deep Thoughts about Stupid Shit, because pop culture is still culture, and shouldn't you know what's in your head? Today, I'll be sharing my deep thoughts about Ghostbusters the original with my sister, emily Guy-Burken, and with you, so let's dive in.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Have you ever had something you love dismissed because it's just pop culture, what others might deem stupid shit? You know matters, you know it's worth talking and thinking about, and so do we Come over, think with us as we delve into our deep thoughts about stupid shit.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

All right, em. So I know you've seen Ghostbusters. Tell me a little about, like, what you remember about Ghostbusters and sort of like how you first encountered it and, you know, give me the Ghostbusters download.

Emily Guy Birken:

So our dad took us to see Ghostbusters in the theater. It was 1984. I was five, you were eight. I remember being a little frightened about going because I, well in, I was scared of scary movies because of the poltergeist incident from just the year or two years before. Oh my gosh, I still have nightmares about that movie, I know so.

Emily Guy Birken:

This was back when, you know, hbo and Cinemax and all of that were on and if you didn't have a TV guide, you didn't know it was on TV. For you, young and through listening, really and truly there was no way of knowing what was on the big shiny box. And so we had turned on the TV on HBO, I guess it was and didn't know what we were watching. But there was a little girl in it and you know this. I would have been like three or four, tracy would have been what? Six or seven, and so we were like, oh, like show about a little girl like us. And then by the time we realized it was a scary movie, that it was poltergeist, both you and I were too afraid to leave the room and dad was invested so he could throw the movie off, which, like stellar parenting dad. Way to go.

Emily Guy Birken:

Way to go, because I would not go into any room by myself for an entire month afterwards and that includes an atheroom, like people had to come in with me Scary.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Okay, okay, so back to go Spudger. So, patrick, you were a little bit movie shy because of poltergeist.

Emily Guy Birken:

Little movie shy because of poltergeist. I don't really remember much about seeing it in the theater, except Slimer having the the hot dogs in his mouth, because I felt like they looked like fingers. And then the only ghost that actually scared me was the one that's driving the taxi cab. That looks like a kind of like a juicy skeleton.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, yes, so I do recall. I remember the experience of seeing it in the theater, but that's. That's about all I recall about it From there. I remember watching it at sleepovers as I got older and there were certain lines that I really liked. I also can remember really liking when Venkman was on screen because he was funny, but also being a little uncomfortable with him because of that early scene where he's flirting with the pretty girl who's doing the psychic test and he's shocking the guy who's chewing the gum. And I remember because that felt so wrong to me Because it was.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and so I was uncomfortable with with his character, even as I liked his character best, so that that felt a little weird, and so it was just kind of like a, you know, the standard 80s kid starter pack movie for me. And it wasn't until I think we were in college that I realized how much you loved it. Like I knew that you liked it, but you didn't rewatch it over and over again like I did with Princess Bride. It was something that you had kind of an undercover obsession with it. And then it also became something, I think, because it is so beloved and there are so many products out there that are like geared towards the nostalgia for that movie, that it became a go-to gift for you, and so that that's kind of how, how I focus on it.

Emily Guy Birken:

So there's, there's all of those things. And then there's the quotability, because there are certain things like Ray, when someone asks you if you are God, you say yes. You wouldn't be surprised how often that that that quote is needed in everyday life, it's true. So that's kind of my background with Ghostbusters. It's a. It's a movie that I really like and like to revisit, although it has given me some when I've revisited it in recent years.

Emily Guy Birken:

So to me why has this been a beloved movie for you and why are we talking about it today?

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah, so it's. It's actually it's true that it was undercover, because it was when I was in college that I almost like rediscovered the movie Now as a teenager. A baby sat remember the kids a couple doors away at Dad's house, so I babysat them and they were really into the animated show the Real Ghostbusters.

Emily Guy Birken:

I remember that show, yes.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So I watched that with them a lot and then at some point in college it was like Ghostbusters and it was like. It was like I had like rediscovered my childhood, like security blanket or something. Yes, when I found it again and like I had it I had it on VHS and I would just it was just like it was comfort food. It was like for those that sort of like late teens through mid 20s. For me it really was like comfort food, comfort viewing, I guess, and and and and. I I've seen it so many times I'd memorize the dialogue so that when I was in graduate school and I was taking German and I was like really struggling and wanting to practice my German, I bought a DVD of it, dubbed into German, to help me with my German, because I know that the dialogue is so well in English kind of backfired, although I did learn how to say Airhop Schleicht.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

He slimed me, which is, you know, pretty great. Okay, I love that.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, I know how to say. Do you see what happens? Do you see what happens when some, when you fuck a stranger in the ass in French for similar reasons? That's from the big Lebowski, so go ahead, okay.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So so it had, it had this sort of comfort food kind of placement in my life, and so much so that, like, as you say, it was a go to gift for you. Others in my life, like I have an original movie poster framed in my house of Ghostbusters. I have like the like Japanese stuff I don't know what to call it like Japanese material merch for the movie from 84, like in Kanji, which I don't read, but I have friends who do and they tell me it says gosto bosto, which also I just think is pretty cool. That's delightful, isn't it? Yeah, so it occupies sort of a big place in the in, like the makeup in the, in the way the furniture is arranged in my brain, and so anything that takes up that much space. I kind of want to take some time to really like examine it and see, like, like our tagline says like what actually is in my head. So I'll give you you know it, but for our, our listeners, just in case there's somebody who's listening who hasn't seen it or hasn't seen it in a while. I'm talking about the original 1984 Ghostbusters. I am not talking about the rest of the franchise. Maybe we'll come back to those. I don't have a whole lot to say about Ghostbusters too, to be honest, but maybe we'll come back to those or like the more recent ones, or maybe even that animated series that I mentioned, but the original right.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So we see these three guys Dan Ackroyd, bill Murray and Harold Ramis. They work in a university. Well, we first meet them, that scene that you described. Bill Murray is conducting an experiment to see the effect of negative reinforcement on ESP ability. But he's a total charlatan and in fact, in the commentary on the DVD, harold Ramis and Ivan Reitman talk about the fact that they actually base that scene on that experiment, that famous experiment where everyday people are asked to give shock to others that they can't see for making mistakes in like word lists, and the experiment was actually to see how how much pain the subject of the test would give to the other, to the unseen victim.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So there, ramis said that this experiment was to see, like, how much of a jerk they could make their hero and have the audience still accept him as their hero, which is very odd. That's very odd. Well, it's got me thinking about anti-heroes in general, but it's like it's an anti-hero like. So Bill Murray is Peter Vinkman from this get go is an anti-hero, completely banal anti-hero. It's not like Black Adam, who's an anti-hero because he had a horrible trauma.

Emily Guy Birken:

Or even Walter White from Breaking Bad, where he's an anti-hero because he I mean he gets into cooking and dealing meth to pay for his cancer treatments and then finds he likes it, he likes being a drug kingpin, right, but it was like, really like there's, there's circumstances there's circumstance, the untentable circumstances and trauma that sort of pushed those anti-heroes into their anti-hero status here.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Beckman's just a charlatan, yeah, and like the and and actually like a couple scenes later we see their deep. Sorry, I was giving the lowdown of how this movie works and then I just got distracted by that very specific scene deep thoughts, y'all. That's how it goes. So let me come back to the nutshell. So these three do's the other two guys, dan Ackroyd and Harold Ramis's characters are legitimately like they care about the science. Bill Murray's character doesn't. So they get kicked out of the university and they decide to go into business for themselves as ghost hunters. So we actually sort of see the full development of that. Like going to the bank and getting the money. They put a third mortgage on Dan Ackroyd's house childhood home at like a huge interest rate to get the money to start this thing. They get an old fire station as their headquarters and it's not going particularly well for them.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Until Sigourney Weaver's character, dana Barrett, who is a musician, has something like a ghost. A weird paranormal thing happened in her kitchen. So she comes and then all of a sudden like like they're getting business, so there are ghosts and we see this. It's through a montage. There are ghosts everywhere and they're catching them. So we get a fourth ghostbuster, ernie Hudson. He's a black guy and he, in storytelling arc, he actually serves as the role as the audience proxy. So we can get a bunch of like downloads of like expository stuff of how this all works, where they do a whole bunch of pseudoscience and then there's, like it builds up to a big boss where they have to defeat this like giant monster who happens to be a marsh made of marshmallow.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Meanwhile there's a, a human villain who works for the epa. So so that's the like a little bit of meandering, but that's the nutshell of what happens in this movie. So some of the things that I want to like dissect and examine with UM are I want to talk about gender, because we have we always have to talk about gender, especially in these things that from our childhood we didn't have a whole lot of representation I want to talk about. I do actually want to come back to the antihero status of Bill Murray's Peter Venkman, because I, in some ways, you as a five year old, were more aware of the subtlety and nuance and problem problematics of that character than I was, you know as a 20 year old when I watched it. So I want to come back to that and I also want to talk about the fact that the villain is the EPA guy. I know that bothers me so much.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

This feels deeply prophetic to me. It's especially in the 80s. 80s, yeah, yeah, because at that point actually, if we had made, if we the writ large not you and me, because we were children but if American society, if the West, if the global community had made different choices starting in 1984, then we wouldn't be, you know, living in this current global climate change hellscape that we're living in. So I want to come back to that, and I'm sure other things will come up as we talk, because they always do so. I think I'll start with Bill Murray's Peter Venkman, though, because that's where I like, that's where my energy was, so I'll start there. So, from the very beginning, self-consciously on the part of the movie makers, like this guy's shady right but also charming, as your, as five year old Emily saw right Like he, he's very likable and also a dick right, like Sigourney Weaver's character says, you know, you're more like a game show host than a scientist.

Emily Guy Birken:

You know, I have thought about this when, when I was a teenager, I remember our mom saying she worries that I would end up with a serial killer if he made me laugh, because to me someone being funny is like like the. What I prize most and you know, some of that, I think is is who I am. But a lot of it is how I was socialized by things like Ghostbusters where, like, I can forgive Peter Venkman for shocking a guy who was getting things right. So it wasn't even just the last one, he gets right.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

The last one, he gets right. What actually that's what's really interesting, if we overthink it is that whatever hypothesis he had about negative reinforcement on ESP ability, it seemed to be working, because that kid get it wrong and get it wrong and then it gets a right. Yeah, couple of wavy lines.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and who cares, doesn't matter, pretty girls there and so. But that that's an aspect of it that that has me like really wondering, like like why? Why are we so willing to forgive someone who can make us laugh? Yeah, so, but I just wanted to jump in with that because that there is that aspect of it that's. You know, I do. I don't know if you remember mom saying that when I was a teenager.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

No, I don't, but oh boy, yeah, it sounds like something she would say. Yeah, so I watched. I rewatched the DVD with a commentary in order to prep for our conversation and like some of the things that and maybe this actually like feeds into your kind of dilemma there. Like these guys worked together before on like SCTV, which was just like a sketch comedy thing out of Canada, but also like their first movie was Animal House which is a little before our time.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

It's a 1978 film, so like I don't have any like strong memories, but it's like it's a frat house movie.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

You know it's about sort of some of the shenanigans and there's always objectification in frat house movies, I'm sorry, there just is objectification of women and I think that's that is also true of Animal House and and that's where you know, that's sort of the comedy scene out of which these guys were coming in and the camaraderie between them, between Agaritan and Bill Murray and Dan Ackroyd, like the camaraderie between the three characters, feels authentic because it is because those actors have known each other a long time and have been working together for a long time at the stage at which they they made this movie. But I think it's an interesting sort of moment in thinking, like for us as this this time capsule where the comedy was moving from that like just kind of gross, like guys club stuff, toward the contemporary moment and that was like sort of an in between moment where they had the sort of sort of pseudo science aspect of it which Dan Ackroyd apparently is like the mastermind of and just adored and that's like his thing. And if he would, in fact, in the commentary that I was listening to, ramos said that Ackroyd would write these like long monologues that had all this like pseudo scientific stuff for other people to live, to deliver and they, just like other actors, would just like not be able to do it and Ackroyd would be like what's the problem? He'd come and deliver the like, like the mass fund migration of 19 or whatever it is Anyway.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So I think that's sort of an interesting thing to think about in a meta way, in the sort of the culture, the culture of comedy, and how that moves, and in fact, one of the things that on the commentary that they talked about, that I feel like maybe you and I've talked about not on deep thoughts, but maybe we did talk about it on like bringers, they talked about sort of the domino theory of realism. So you start with things that the audience could totally believe in and then you take incremental steps toward the outlandish, which is what this movie does. It starts with these guys getting kind of, you know, losing their jobs and like going into business for this is a weird business, but going into business for themselves and then you know you work in incremental steps up to a hundred foot marshmallow man stepping on a church in Manhattan, and I think that's also sort of you know how we get from animal house to sort of now what you know the mid 20s and where comedy is today. I don't know what I'm going with this.

Emily Guy Birken:

So something interesting I think also just in talking about what that background is and the kind of fratty kind of comedy, the dream sequence in the middle of the movie where Ray Stantz Dan Ackroyd's character has a dream that a ghost comes and basically goes down on him. I didn't understand what I was seeing when I saw that as a child, but I knew it was something adult and I don't. I couldn't tell you when it came to me where I was. Just like why is this in the movie? But that question like came relatively early. Like this was not something I wondered in my 30s when I was watching it. I remember wondering it like why is this in the movie? What is, what does this do? And it's that same sort of thing where like it is titillating simply for the point of titillating. Well, I think it's a good question.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Well, yes, exactly, and I think it's they talk about it in the commentary that it actually was a much longer scene. You end up with only a very brief piece of it, but it originally was a much longer scene and I think that is evidence of this group's like sort of animal house background, like that's part of what they. I mean there's and there's. There are other sort of sexual moments or at least implications in the movie.

Emily Guy Birken:

I when I rewatched it. So we watched it recently twice. Once, about three or four years ago, I showed it to a friend who is about seven years younger than me who had never seen it, and then I also recently watched it with the kids and seeing it, it was post me to, when I saw it recently, the fact that Dana Barrett and Louis Tully, who's played by Rick Moranis, have sex while they're each possessed by the gay master and the key no, the key master and the gatekeeper, yeah, is so gross, so gross, it is so gross and it is played for laughs.

Emily Guy Birken:

And Louis Tully's obsession with her is played for laughs and in some ways I mean, like Rick Moranis is is a charming actor, he manages to make himself seem harmless, yep, even as he's annoying. Yeah, and some of it has to do with the height difference, because Sigourney Weaver is you know, towers over him, amazon, gorgeous proportions.

Emily Guy Birken:

And then I think Rick Moranis is the same height as me, is five, four, yeah, and so some of it is that, you know, honestly, like a woman having to tip toe past her neighbor's door every time she comes home. That's grim. And then the movie rewards his obsession with her, even though neither of them will remember it. But that that's, mm. That is very unpleasant, yeah, and something I didn't understand. I didn't understand that it happened, I think, until I watched it recently. Yeah, but it is in my 20s.

Emily Guy Birken:

I even pointed out yeah, I pointed out to my spouse when we watched it with our friend and he's like it's not what happened. I'm like wow, I'm like look, he's like master gatekeeper especially the way in Well had any doubt.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

The way that Dana, when she's possessed, interacts with Peter makes that clear. I want you inside me. Sub creature.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and then the also the when they're on the bench. It's, it's, it's post-coital, I mean, it's very clearly post-coital. So, like I rewound and showed him that scene again, he's like okay, yeah, I got that, but it's, it's that, it's nostalgia. My spouse has nostalgia for this movie and doesn't want to believe that it's a part of this culture that we've been grappling with so strongly since 2017.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Speaking of that scene where Venkman comes over to Dana's apartment for a date which I mean yeah, I guess she calls it the date. So it is a date and she's been possessed, and you know he knows she's possessed, he says so and she's like do is trying to have sex with the key master who he has said he is, and he's kind of like I make, I make it a, I make it a policy never to get involved with possessed people and like, but he and he's like, she says take me now. She says lots and lots of things. There are multiple lines where she invites him to have sex with her and he's like sure, no, you know he has like, he says yes and then he says no, like and he doesn't. But it's like we're supposed to reward him. I don't know. And then, and then, why does he have 300 seasons?

Emily Guy Birken:

of the war zine with him on a date. So I had not realized the connection to Animal House until you just mentioned it. But there's a scene very much like this in Animal House. Do you remember, have you? I?

Tracie Guy-Decker:

don't know if I've ever seen it. If I have, I don't remember any of it.

Emily Guy Birken:

I didn't see it until I think I was in college and I was horrified. But there's a scene where one of the frat brothers has a teenage girl who has come to the party, who has drank so much she's passed out, and he has an angel and a devil here on his shoulder and the devil is like go on fuck her.

Emily Guy Birken:

And the angel is like no, no, and he doesn't. And even in like 1998, when I was watching it, I was sitting there going like how is this okay? Like why are we supposed to see this as like, wow, what a good guy, yeah.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So conscious woman.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and not just woman underage girl. She's a high school kid. Who's? Not gay. And some of that is just that is our culture.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

It totally is, because in the commentary and I know I couldn't tell that there were there were three guys in that who do the commentary on the DVD. It was like the 30th anniversary edition it was so it was Harold Ramey's and Ivan Ritman. I'm not sure who the third person was, but one of them was like this is one of my favorite scenes in the whole movie. About the scene with Peter Venkman and Dana. When Dana is all, I was like gross. I mean I think part of what they were saying they liked was like that they did a lot of work to do the physical, the special effects, because this was like pre CGI. So they actually had Sigourney Weaver in this, like full body casts that could hold her wait. For when she like levitates off the bed and spins, and so she's, they're actually there together with her levitating off the bed, and so Bill Murray is able to like kind of like sneak under and like look at her, and then she like crackles an eminy and that's all actually happening, and so there's an authenticity to it.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

That is that is very cool Technically right, yes, but in terms of like what's happening when we, if we do what we do, this, this, like thinking about the societal implications, like Yuck, I wish that weren't a part of my like, the mental furniture of my psyche.

Emily Guy Birken:

That's really a really unpleasant Okay, so I will tell you. You know how I mentioned during Princess Bride episode that I'm very literal and you know I thought true love was a thing, so I thought there was something sexy about sleeping on top of your covers.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Because they say I find her interesting because she sleeps above her covers, for above her covers.

Emily Guy Birken:

I was just like okay, so is that a thing? It's like okay, sexy women.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

I mean put it on top of their covers. That is so funny. That is so funny, oh man.

Emily Guy Birken:

So just you know, I suspect that as you listen to deep thoughts, you're gonna like skip through the fields of my misunderstanding of things as a literal child. Yeah, speaking of the mental furniture in our heads, all right, so let's talk about gender.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yes, well, I mean we're already talking about gender a little bit, but a little bit more. I'm gonna bring up the Bechdel test again, which is really interesting. I just read an interview with Alison Bechdel I think I said it to you where Alison Bechdel is like I wish this weren't a thing. I wish this weren't the thing I were known for. It was a joke in her comic.

Emily Guy Birken:

It's like to watch out for.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

And she like she didn't intend it to be an actual thing that, like, scholars use. Sorry, alison, it's awesome, it's useful, it's really useful.

Emily Guy Birken:

It is so useful. It's one of those things where, like, I totally comprehend why she wishes this wasn't the thing she's known for, since she's such a talented writer and cartoonist, but at the same time, she has given a name to something that we needed a name for. Yeah, exactly Exactly, and so like yeah.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So to reiterate, alison Bechdel's test is are there at least two female characters? Do they both have names? Do they talk to one another about something other than a man or a boy? And Ghostbusters may be barely kind of squeaks by Kind. We definitely have at least two female characters with names, because we've got Dana and we've got Janine, the anypopsist receptionist, and the two of them speak to one another very briefly. When Dana comes into the firehouse to get help and she says, is this Ghostbusters? And for Janine he says yes, may I help you? And then Dana Barrett says her name and Bill Murray's Peter and Magnum comes running from the back and that's the extent of their conversation.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

No-transcript. I guess it bests is the test, since it is sort of a yes-no, but it's like if it were a spectrum It'd be like way down on the bottom right. Yeah, it's pretty. Yeah, it's not much of an interaction between those two. And and built, you know Peter Beckman like interrupts it and Neither of these women are fully fleshed out characters. They're both relatively two-dimensional right. So Dana does have, she has more of a Like a character than Janine does, and and she is an accomplished person. She's a musician who plays a professional you know, professional cellist, and we do see a little bit of her internal life, but very little. And Janine I mean Annie Potts is Great, she's very funny.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Her delivery is very funny, but it's a caricature. You know, she's sort of a character of this, you know New York person and even even the when she's, she sort of there's, there's this kind of it never quite gels, but there's kind of a romantic interest between Janine and Egon Ivan excuse me, harold Ramis. Harold Ramis character, it never quite gels and it's, it's just played for a laugh. You know, even her interest in him is played for a laugh, so something.

Emily Guy Birken:

I have noticed Particularly about movies from that time frame, but it still exists. Is that's like I was thinking about that when you're saying, like when, when Venkman comes, like he vaults over the the railing to come Talk to Dana? The highest level that a woman can accomplish in a lot of these stories is to be beautiful, and so women who are not beautiful are played for laughs. And so Dana is virtuous because she's beautiful and people are like, interested in her, like Peter and and Louis Tully and and all of that. And we see this again and again where, like, the only thing that matters is that this person is beautiful. The only other name character in the in the movie is Janine, who honestly, like any pots, is lovely. Yes, she's a good looking one. Yeah, she's playing a caricature and they give her the very glass this is, but those were.

Emily Guy Birken:

Those were popular in the 80s. I mean, that's what kind of glasses you wore. And so her interest in Egon is Humorous, in the same way that Louis Tully's interest in Dana is humorous. It's just like why. You know it's less of a mismatch because Egon's not handsome or not played to be handsome, it's awesome.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

A mismatch too, because I feel like there's a this, this social awkwardness that's part of what like like Rick Moranis is Louis Tully is is not particularly attractive, but I think the mismatch is in his total social awkwardness. You know, like invited clients instead of friends. There's almost like a. I think the movie makers wanted us to believe there was actually a bit of a match between a possible spark between them, janine and Egon, which I don't, because because she says, like you know, some of my friends say I'm too intellectual but I think it's a wonderful way to spend your time and then like so she sort of puts on the nerdy and then he has to one up her because she says what do you know? What would you have any hobbies? And he says I collect spores, molds and fungus. Like it's similarly ridiculous, but for different reasons.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, so well, I also. I think it's also important to bring up the other two female characters we see, which is the librarian at the beginning, who is kind of when I was old enough to understand what menstruation was, because I wasn't when I first watched this I Remember being like, isn't she too old to have her period? And there's this sense of like, you know, and the way that Venkman treats her, it is, she is an object of ridicule in when he is interviewing her. Yeah, and like, how dare this woman have gray hair? And then there's the real estate agent who, you know, we don't really get much from her, except that she, like she knows when she's got them, she knows, like, like you got just cheerful yeah.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah where were you going with her?

Emily Guy Birken:

But she also, she's cheerful, but she also is sharp in that, like the minute Danakroids, characters like this place, that's great. She's like alright, so you're gonna be taking it right and and is Kind of I don't know if that's supposed to be about real estate agents, if that's supposed to be about women, if that's, or what. But there's this sense of like I've got you over a barrel and we're going with. I actually didn't receive.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

I didn't get that from her so much. I mean it was more like because when she sees the situation that like acroyd wants the place and it's actually his money and but, but I I don't think you're wrong, I just I didn't read it like that. There is one other one to Jennifer, very big. Oh, you're no food, jennifer.

Emily Guy Birken:

And and, honestly, the thing that actually really bothered me as a kid Was not so much the way Peter Venkman was acting. Although it bothered me, it was when Jennifer was feeling sympathy and like worried for this guy who's about to get shocked, and Venkman like winks at her and smiles and so she, she, relaxes, like oh, it's okay. That really bothered me, so I'm like why? Why is she okay with it? Because he's flirting with her, so, and that that kind of gets into the same sort of thing where, like, being a beautiful woman is kind of like the highest level, even to the point where, like you know, I was just about to say eight o'clock, you know, like you do have ESP and she's willing to believe it. It's murky, whatever it is that I'm trying to describe as murky, because you know it's not as if the writers like came at this, like we hate women and we're gonna do this.

Emily Guy Birken:

It's not I mean, you know it's. It's not that kind of Misogyny or sexism, it's just the culture we swim in, where we prize youth and beauty in women.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

We don't necessarily prize experience or Competence well to your point in this movie, in particular the one moment when Um Peter actually praises Dana for her skill, because he went, he listened to her rehearsal. He says you're the best one in your row, you. And she says, oh, you're good. Most people can't hear me with a whole orchestra playing around me, so she actually like like shuts it down and she shuts down the compliment, which I guess is ridiculous. I don't know, but he was actually talking about something other than how she looks, true, and she shut it down.

Emily Guy Birken:

I will say, though that's the kind of compliment where, like, I don't think it is possible to hear her. And so she knows he's being disingenuous, right.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Though it also he came to hear a rehearsal. I don't know, it's complicated, true. I mean, you're right, it's a come online and she knows it and she shuts down the come online. So, and you know, I don't know, I feel like Dana actually is, in part because I think Sigourney Weaver is a good actress and she brings a level of like gravitas to the part that could have been just a throwaway, but she brings sort of some part to it. Dana, my icebox yeah, exactly, Exactly.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Are you sure you're using that thing correctly? Like so she just brings a certain level of something to it. Actually, I'm going to come back to the icebox that I really admire and sort of believe, even like what we see her doing in her home, which is way too big for one person to be able to afford. I don't know what a cellist makes, but I don't think it's enough to afford that apartment. Nope In 1984.

Emily Guy Birken:

I will say I give large spaces a pass in film and TV because of the practical needs for cameras. Yeah, the demands of filming, absolutely the demands of filming means I'm okay with friends having a giant apartment.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah, I don't know, but the two they were like there's just like a corner of windows, it's like a big corner Anyway, but the icebox, the fact that you brought up the icebox, my German experiment actually backfired, because I and this is interesting like the translator's dilemma right, like she says that and that's sort of like an arcane, even in 84, like people didn't say that, right, icebox is not what we call our fridge and so, but in German that's the word for your refrigerator, so.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So, in order to kind of get that about her character, the point where he comes in he like opens the closet door and she's like that's just the closet. In the German translation, in the dubbing, he says she says like that's the comma or something like that, the word comma, which is K-A-M-M-E-R, which is apparently like an old fashioned word for closet. So I tried to use that word with my German teacher and he was like what are you saying? And I think the translators use this archaic word for closet because icebox is not, they couldn't, they couldn't for a fridge. I love that, love it so funny.

Emily Guy Birken:

Let's and I'd love to get to to Ernie Hudson Agreed, yes, but let's talk about the EPA, yeah, yeah, and how very conservative this movie is.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah, you know, it's really interesting because I feel like what they really wanted to lambast was bureaucracy, right, and it was sort of like the gatekeeper right, like the way that we get the way the Walter Atherton plays excuse me, william Atherton plays Walter Peck is as just a gatekeeper bureaucrat, like he's annoyed that he wasn't consulting and that is annoying, like that, the kind of gatekeeping like in fact you and I had a conversation about before we came on about somebody in your hometown who is like that, who makes it makes life difficult for everyone because he can, yeah, and that deserves to be lambasted. The fact that they made it the environmental protection agency that was that sort of Kafka-esque bureaucrat who has no idea what he's actually doing was a choice. That was a choice. That was a choice.

Emily Guy Birken:

And the movie proves Walter Peck right, because, well, he says like you've got this unlicensed thing and how do we know? It's not going to create a catastrophe Now. It creates a catastrophe when it does because that he brings someone to shut it off. But no system is completely fail safe. So even if he hadn't shut it off, he's not going to be able to do that. He's completely fail safe. So even if he hadn't shut it off A blackout, a brown out, five years or 10 years or something something would have happened, like what was the plan for the Ghostbusters when they sold the business, when they ended the business, when they had to move because that building was you?

Tracie Guy-Decker:

know whatever. Imagine it a good thing, like they're ready to retire, or the storage facility gets full, or whatever.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, that's a good point and so like. The thing about Walter Peck is that he has proven absolutely correct, even though it's through his own actions. But there's a reason why you shouldn't carry a nuclear reactor on your back and you shouldn't have a containment system that you have not gotten the proper permits for, like you couldn't put a giant septic tank under a building in New York City without getting proper permits.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Well, like I don't know that the permit exists for the Ghost Containment System, like I don't know that it's the permitting that actually is. I think permits in general serve a purpose that they are not in and of themselves. That would be worth not so well. They're not in themselves worth much.

Emily Guy Birken:

I'm using the word permit because the way that I read this film is like very anti-regulation, because I read this film as very pro-capitalism, pro-business, anti-regulation, because regulations they just screw things up, they get in the way. And so when I say permits, it's not so much that I think that you know, like, yes, I'm going to go down to City Hall and get a Ghostbusting permit. It's more that there are permits, there are regulations, there are things you have to ask permission for, specifically because you don't live here by yourself, specifically because these things are going to affect other people. And even when the Ghostbusters are successful, when they catch the first catch Slimer and and that's how the Satchel and the Hotel.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, they cause so much damage. So much damage and so that they're not insured, they're not licensed, and like this is I know I've reducted you out of the Serbdom Like this is getting really like. If you're thinking about this, like why would you need that? But I am reminded of how Uber has replaced taxi cabs. Taxi cabs, you have to have a medallion which requires like bonding, licensure and insurance, all of these things, and it is super like each one costs like $50,000.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, so I'm like more, more, and my spouse's uncle owned something like 35 medallions in Boston, so I know a little bit about it background-wise. And the thing is, being a taxi cab driver is very dangerous. This uncle was held at gunpoint like more times than you can count on one hand in the 30 years he did this and that's terrible. They carry a lot of money all of that. So Uber fixed that in some ways because, like with the app, you can get that. But it superseded all the regulations and requirements and it put both the drivers and the passengers and everyone else on the road at risk, and it's because it is disrupting the taxi cab system.

Emily Guy Birken:

But there's a reason why the system was the way that it was. So in my day job I write about money, so I have strong opinions about things like insurance. I have strong opinions about things like regulation Because they affect more than just the person who is trying to get, you know, a new small business off the ground. And there's a reason they mortgaged Dan Akroyd's family home rather than going to the small business administration, like there's a reason they couldn't do that and it's because it wasn't a proven business model. And it wasn't a proven business model in part because it was dangerous. So I will get off my soapbox now.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

That's an interesting point.

Emily Guy Birken:

I thought a lot about money as a child, without knowing that that's like there's a reason why I went into what I do. I'm a money nerd and multiple Dan Akroyd movies actually kind of gave me some of the framework for thinking about money. This one I didn't really recognize as a child. But the way that we look at capitalism, the way that we look at money, the way that we look at investing, the way that we look at all of these different things is shaped by the stories that we tell about it. So even the fact that you know Ray is going like I was born in that home, my parents left me that home when they died and Egon is just like you know, at 19% interest.

Emily Guy Birken:

It's going to be you know this just in it and we are conditioned to see that like what they made, the right choice because they got the Ghostbusters out of it and some of that storytelling like you got to take risks in order to have a story. But over and over and over again, movies show us that unreasonable financial risks are worth it because they pan out for the hero, and that's something that's I really wish we had a way of dealing with, while still respecting the importance of risk and story because it, over and over again, makes people think like, oh, no, no, no, it'll work out if I mortgage the family home, it'll work out if I buy a lottery ticket instead of it'll work out if I, if I put everything on this, this risky thing, because I will, I will win, because I'm the main character. Yeah.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

I don't want to let you go until we talk about Ernie Hudson. Yes, actually, because now I know I said I was only going to talk about the original, but actually the, the reboot, with the women, with Leslie Jones in that role, maybe look with a more critical eye back at the 1984. And, like I said, I have the movie poster from 84. Something that I find really interesting not in a good way is Ernie Hudson's erasure from the promotional materials, right? So the poster that I have in my home says they're here to save the world and it's the three, the three white Ghostbusters, like looking up, like with the like pointing the proton packs up, and Ernie Hudson's not in the poster and he's not in, like, he's not in a lot of the promotional things. Now they fixed that in the DVD I have is like the 30 year anniversary edition from 10 years ago, and it does have Ernie Hudson in the image.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

So at some point somebody was like, wait, why did we erase the black guy? Which is good that that was caught, but interesting that it wasn't at the time, especially because, though it's true, he joins at the end or not at the end, he joins midway through. He's an essential piece of the storytelling and New Yorkers. This is one of the great like New York movies, that people like New Yorkers really love this movie because of the way it portrays the city and in fact they knew that at the time. One of the last lines in the movie is Ernie Hudson, like covered in the shaving cream that's supposed to be marshmallow arms outstretched. I love this town and that they gave that to Ernie Hudson. They gave that to Winston.

Emily Guy Birken:

Winston.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

They gave that to Winston to say that wasn't like it easily could have been any of them to say that. But Winston can have that line. But the racism, the supremacy, you know, it's just, it's like so baked in. You know, I even like I just rewatched it and then I'll let you say I just rewatched it before we, like I said before, we hopped on and in the scene at the very end, when they're about to go into the building to face the big baddie. Winston is there, but he's sort of behind one of them, so the three, so you can't see him. I was like where is he? Because he climbs up out when they fall down in the, in the fault in the street, he climbs up out. But he was standing behind. So they framed the shot with him behind, intentional. That's a choice. I cannot believe that that wasn't a choice because I know they didn't get it in one take. It's not like he was like oops, he was standing behind an asteroid and like wow, what were you going to?

Emily Guy Birken:

say so. Something I find interesting is that so he's and this is like a convergence of Ernie Hudson and Winston Zedmore so Ernie Hudson is removed from the promotional materials, but when the four of them are arrested he's in just as much trouble as the other three. So like he doesn't get the, the plot it's, but he does get the consequences. And again, this is like I'm conflating the character and the actor, but that that to me, like feels very true to life. Now he like he I. One of the things I love about Winston is he is very pragmatic. He's like you know, if there's a steady paycheck in it, anything you say. And then when he says, like I'm getting my own lawyer, good for you, yeah, that's exactly what you need to do. And then, even when he's, he's like I have seen shit that will turn you white.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah, like so he's trying to convince the mayor. So in that scene they're in the mayor's office and the guys are just like you know, the mayor's like what's happening? And Walter Peck is saying like this isn't real. And you know so. Winston steps forward and says I've only been those these men, for a few weeks, but since I joined them I've seen shit that will turn you white. It's one of the most one of the many quotable lines in this movie.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and Ernie Hudson gets a lot of really good lines yeah, he gets when somebody asks you if you're a God, you say yes, that's, that's Winston.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yes. He also says well, and it's the like we had the tools, we had the talent.

Emily Guy Birken:

Yeah, and that's, and I think that that speaks to he is a. For the short amount of time he's in the film, I feel like he's relatively well realized, in part because you do see him as this person who is pragmatic, who you know he's, he's just in it for a job but he's, you know he's, he's like happy to work really hard. I mean, there's there's there's a lot in there that and some of it is just Ernie Hudson he's. He's a charming actor and I really wish that he had had the kind of career arc that Bill Murray and Dan Ackroyd and Harold Ramis did after this. In any case, it's so frustrating that you have all of this and he gets.

Emily Guy Birken:

He gets erased in the, in the promotional stuff and he also got a smaller part. I read that he they had originally written him to have a larger part and he was like a former Marine or something like that or an Air Force, I don't remember, and they cut, cut it down and he was pissed about it. But he's like the job. It's a job. So to bring up the, the reboot with the, with the four women. It was very frustrating that Leslie Jones and I love Leslie Jones and she did a fantastic job, like all four of the actresses, I think, did the best they could with not great material, but why did they make her someone who just worked in New York instead of one of the one of the parapsychologists?

Tracie Guy-Decker:

It was such a cliche that she was the street smart black lady who joined them and brought her street smarts to their book smarts.

Emily Guy Birken:

It was just such a cliche.

Emily Guy Birken:

So frustrating. So it's there are a lot of remakes and reboots and and that there have been from the beginning, like because Dan Ackroyd has always wanted this to be a franchise and you know we had the, the real Ghostbusters animated show, we had the, you know, ghostbusters 2. There's, there's been a bunch. I really wish we didn't, honestly, because I think that this film is what it is it's a film and it's not a franchise. But I do wish that we could, like, kind of go back and correct some of the things.

Emily Guy Birken:

And I had this thought when Gozer says choose and choose, and Patrish yes, and Ray is, like I tried to think of something that would never harm us, something for my childhood, and I had this realization. I was like that's Ghostbusters. So now, in 2023, when you know you want to look back on something that gives you nostalgia, that makes it feels good, that would never harm you, you go like, ah, great movie for my childhood. But then it arrives and you're like there's, there's, there's rape, there's, there's really weird gendered stuff, there's racism, there's, there's very, very regressive conservative politics, and so, like I was just like, wow, this marshmallow man is.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Ghostbusters, tuss bucket. Oh man, all right, I think you're right. I think that's a beautiful, beautiful metaphor. So we've been talking for a long minute this is longer than we usually talk, so let me, let me see if I can synthesize and you fill in right. So you just did pretty nicely. Actually, in the analogy there's, there's messed up, not there's just regressive gender roles, there's very unsavory sexual politics and sexual activity Very unsavory. There's racism, there's sort of the rewarding of extreme risk taking in terms of finance that you, that you brought up, and there's also this like and it's not just the conservative politics of anti-regulation. They also made it about the Environmental Protection Agency in 1984. And also really, really quotable movie.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

You made a date with Splat and Knight.

Emily Guy Birken:

The walls and the precinct were bleeding. How do you explain that? Cats and cats living together, mass hysteria. So that's quite a few deep thoughts about stupid shit. Yeah, yeah, although, by the way, I would love for any any listeners to comment your favorite quotes from from Ghostbusters.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Yeah, good call If you've missed any Good call, so next time then.

Emily Guy Birken:

Next time we are going to have a guest, dr Julian Womble, who is going to be talking to us about Harry Potter. Yeah, I'm super excited. His TikToks are amazing. His TikToks are fantastic. Yeah, if you haven't seen them, you should check them out. Yeah, he brings light to things that I never even thought on in the Harry Potter franchise.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

He's so smart, so smart, can't wait to sit down with him. Thanks for listening. Our theme music is Professor Umlaut by Kevin MacLeod from Incompetekcom. Find full music credits in the show notes. Deep thoughts is a labor of love, but that doesn't make it free to produce. You can help keep us overthinking. Support us through our Patreon. With a link in the show notes. We have a positive review so others can find us and share the show with your people.

Tracie Guy-Decker:

Until next time, remember pop culture is still culture, and shouldn't you know what's in your head?