Ghostbusters is just a silly little comedy about why the EPA is actually the villain. Come hear Ash and Jon from Horror Vanguard podcast say why this is flawed and so much more.

Horror Vanguard

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Track 1: Hello and welcome to Left of the Projector. I'm your host, Evan,

Track 1: back again with another film discussion from the left.

Track 1: You can follow the show at leftoftheprojector.com and wherever you're listening,

Track 1: you can click, rate, subscribe, and all those fancy internet things.

Track 1: This week on the show, I'm dialing it back to my childhood and maybe the most

Track 1: catchy film theme song ever made.

Track 1: And by that, I'm referring to 1984's Ghostbusters with me to discuss.

Track 1: I have Ash and john of the horror vanguard podcast thank you for joining me today thank.

Track 2: You for having us.

Track 3: Thank you so much for having us on yeah.

Track 1: Of course and i'm glad that we've uh alleviated our

Track 1: technical difficulties and we can dive into this very iconic film but for maybe

Track 1: the few people who who don't know or haven't heard of horror vanguard first

Track 1: they should you know undo that but would you like to let everyone know how they

Track 1: can or not how i guess everyone knows how they can listen to podcasts.

Track 1: That's pretty simple. It's what they might listen to if they were to dial into Horror Vanguard.

Track 2: In a nutshell, we do episodes that cover the intersection of horror movies and

Track 2: kind of left political theory.

Track 2: So if you like one or ideally both of those things, you're going to like our show.

Track 1: Yeah.

Track 2: Which if you're listening to this, you probably already like those things.

Track 3: I would think so.

Track 1: Yeah. I'm hoping that people already

Track 1: know of Horror Vanguard because it is a similar intersection

Track 1: but yeah with the horror focused it's uh lots

Track 1: of films i have actually hundreds of films i haven't covered

Track 1: on this podcast so you should check out check out that and

Track 1: yeah and i think i told john this when we had talked before is that

Track 1: the episode that i had found initially was that was the one on uh beetlejuice

Track 1: and so that one was always uh you know maybe it's because the first one i listened

Track 1: to it's like my favorite one just because of just my my love of beetlejuice

Track 1: and left theory and movies so i just would uh wanted to reiterate that one yeah.

Track 2: That was such a fun episode too it's it's really it's really glad to hear that

Track 2: one that that one has love out there.

Track 1: Yeah, I'm a huge fan of that one. But so when we came to decide on this one,

Track 1: I send you, you know, a list of films.

Track 1: And I think pretty quickly you chose Ghostbusters.

Track 1: So like, what made you think of it? Like, what makes it maybe an interesting

Track 1: topic in, you know, 2025 to revisit it?

Track 2: I think Ghostbusters as a film and as,

Track 2: you know, to use the contemporary business parlance as an intellectual property

Track 2: in a franchise is so ripe for left political discussion,

Track 2: both in the original film and in how that film spawns a litany of media deeply

Track 2: related to our contemporary political context.

Track 2: Uh it's also like kind of

Track 2: critically underexamined still i i would argue like there's so much conversation

Track 2: on ghostbusters but most of that is limited to kind of like the noise of pop

Track 2: culture fandom discussions and and less so like real tangible grappling with

Track 2: with ghostbusters so that's that's kind of what keeps drawing me back to this movie.

Track 3: Yeah i think that's i think that's very true actually

Track 3: and i think it serves as so there's

Track 3: so many reasons why ghostbusters is important it was it was one of the uh first

Track 3: proper blockbusters of the 1980s it's been immensely culturally impactful um

Track 3: but it's also become uh symptomatic i think of a particular mode of cultural

Track 3: production under kind of contemporary modernity where,

Track 3: It started out as like one thing and has become this multi-billion dollar franchise,

Track 3: basically reiterating upon certain comedic, structural, formal,

Track 3: artistic themes, which like we still live in the long 1980s in so many ways.

Track 3: So I think like you can't get away from that.

Track 1: Yeah, that's a that's a good point. And like to what you think,

Track 1: Ash, I actually I was, you know, usually anytime I'm doing a film,

Track 1: I'm like curious what other conservative media might have said about it or liberal media.

Track 1: And there is very, very limited, you know, just articles or any discussion of

Track 1: this film from any kind of even like mildly political lens.

Track 1: Like, the only one I really found was calling it was the greatest movie ever

Track 1: made about Republican economic policy, which I think is an interesting thing to discuss.

Track 1: But, like, there's nothing really else out there. And it's kind of surprising,

Track 1: you know, as opposed to that, they're just, you know, is new Ghostbusters woke

Track 1: is like the article that you find when you search like Ghostbusters.

Track 2: No, I completely agree. Like, I think Ghostbusters 2016 really forced the issue.

Track 2: It forced a lot of political discussions. you know you had like you know

Track 2: feige openly discussing gamer gate and stuff like

Track 2: that like you know that that movie jumped in front of a bunch of bullets that

Track 2: i'm not sure it was knowing it was jumping in front of but the rest of the ghostbusters

Track 2: movies try to try to slide under the political radar as best they can even though

Track 2: they like make the epa the bad guy in the first movie which is like that's like

Track 2: a screaming political choice i don't know how we can ignore that yeah.

Track 3: I mean uh reitman's who wrote the screenplay described himself as a conservative slash libertarian.

Track 2: Um i would never have guessed yeah.

Track 3: Yeah there's an amazing moment where walter pack visits um one of them goes

Track 3: this is this is private property um and you're like.

Track 2: Oh he's.

Track 3: Making like a sovereign citizen argument it's so funny yeah.

Track 1: The the politics of to say it's not,

Track 1: political is is it's it's comical in

Track 1: a sense you know it's uh i think even in like the

Track 1: wikipedia page which is like you know we're not talking about

Track 1: like deep level analysis but even they have a section on it

Track 1: about you know private industry capitalism and all these things like there it's

Track 1: it seems like people are starting to maybe examine it from more of a understanding

Track 1: of 1980s politics and before we were recording uh john you mentioned you know

Track 1: how it's hard to separate this from the savings and loans crisis of the 1980s.

Track 1: And then, you know, I guess ending in the mid 1990s as like,

Track 1: uh, you know, a backdrop for this and especially not,

Track 1: you know, not leaving off the fact that they received the loan with what 19%

Track 1: interest to, uh, to, uh, to open their

Track 1: Ghostbusters, uh, you know, franchise or whatever you want to call it.

Track 1: And I don't know if you have any like further thoughts on how that kind of frames

Track 1: the film you know in the time that it was that it came out.

Track 3: Yeah it's um it's a it's a finance movie right

Track 3: what is what is what is it about it's about

Track 3: um you know this is that this is

Track 3: why this is why contemporary conservatives um actually

Track 3: kind of liked the movie i think because they go well it's a pro

Track 3: business movie um you get your startup

Track 3: you get your startup capital um and you

Track 3: have the private sector solving problems that the incompetent city bureaucrats

Track 3: don't know how to deal with uh there's the incredibly revealing line of uh i've

Track 3: worked in the private sector they demand results where you go oh yeah this is

Track 3: a comedy because in the 1980s no they didn't,

Track 3: no they didn't they demanded what they demanded was like

Track 3: can you find a way of monetizing your rent extraction um

Track 3: like that's that's what it was about yeah it's

Track 3: it's it in in a way in a way that the the film is essentially it's a it's a

Track 3: workplace sitcom right as essentially but the the ideological underpinning of

Track 3: it comes from this um this space of kind of reagan era economic policy.

Track 1: I'm glad you brought up that line about the, you know, the private sector and all that.

Track 1: And like the backdrop of that too, is you have, you know, three,

Track 1: three people who are, you know, receiving grants from Columbia university,

Track 1: you know, a high end Ivy league institution, which,

Track 1: you know, we could probably talk more about Columbia itself and,

Track 1: you know, where they, where they sit today, but they're funding them.

Track 1: And then they eventually pulled their funding because of the,

Track 1: you know, they don't deem what they're doing as, you know, actually valuable,

Track 1: you know, uh, valuable work.

Track 1: And, uh, they're not really following protocols of, you know,

Track 1: of, uh, research and all of these things and their methods are terrible.

Track 1: And perhaps they were because that opening scene with, uh, Dr.

Track 1: Venkman, uh, Bill Murray is, uh, pretty, um, uh, as I watched that again,

Track 1: now I laugh kind of at the, his motive in his, uh,

Track 1: pretty much just sleeping with the, uh, the students and not actually doing

Track 1: any real work as you know.

Track 1: And so like the, just like the whole idea of the, of the university being unable

Track 1: to, uh, to do this through this, uh, funding, you know, governmental funding

Track 1: or grant funding, wherever it's coming from.

Track 1: And then going to the private sector, it's pretty comical just because of how

Track 1: many innovations that were created by the public good and the government that

Track 1: were then stolen by private sector to profit off them as you said.

Track 2: Yeah absolutely i i think i think this is like such a

Track 2: strong way to lead into the movie is really unpacking like

Track 2: the base political context of like who the

Track 2: ghostbusters are where they come from and what they wind up

Track 2: doing you know and i think i think it like it kind

Track 2: of like gets glossed over a lot

Track 2: in the conversation that like like the business model that

Track 2: the ghostbusters create you know they refer to themselves as

Track 2: like pest control in air quotes but like the

Track 2: the ghosts in this aren't like cockroaches or

Track 2: something in that language like listeners if you're if

Track 2: you're familiar with like carceral state and fascistic political

Track 2: discourse like talking about like sentient beings as if they were pests and

Track 2: cockroaches you start to get familiar but like the ghostbusters create a private

Track 2: policing and private prison force yeah like yeah it's it's a it's a private

Track 2: carceral state for ghosts is what they wind up making as like their fun times business model.

Track 2: And I think that like, you know, like when, you know, sorry to keep bringing up Ghostbusters 2016.

Track 2: I know that's like ringing some giant evil bell that's going to call darkness upon us all. But like.

Track 2: You know, like everybody was talking about, you know, like when I say everybody,

Track 2: like the reactionary right commentary, we're talking about Ghostbusters 2016

Track 2: as if it stuffed politics down the throat of the Ghostbusters movies,

Track 2: which were just like a wholesome comedy something.

Track 2: They were just the state puff marshmallow man exploded all over them.

Track 2: But like you go back and you look at the original one and it's like libertarian,

Track 2: proto-fascist police force for the dead.

Track 2: Yeah, I don't know. It's hard for me to watch the original Ghostbusters now

Track 2: and not be like, oh, this is an extremely political movie that really has something

Track 2: that's trying to get across.

Track 3: Yeah, and what that is, is worth interrogating.

Track 3: I mean, everyone goes, oh, oh, when you watch it, you realize that actually

Track 3: the EPA are the villains.

Track 3: And I'm like, I hate to be that person, but like, Walter Peck is correct.

Track 3: Isn't this a thing that we all kind of gloss over where he comes and he's like, hey,

Track 3: this seems really dangerous and they're like and then bill murray says that

Track 3: he's dickless and it's like that's that's the joke but it turns out he's completely

Track 3: right that their their storage facility is dangerous it does cause an explosion

Track 3: and it's like we we all just kind of gloss over that bit.

Track 1: Yeah it's yeah i mean it's you're just ignoring i

Track 1: mean again it makes sense that the people who wrote this film

Track 1: or you know as you said have like libertarian leanings where

Track 1: they want to deregulate and they want it so the epa allows

Track 1: you to you know put a bunch of like nuclear

Track 1: ghosts in your wall of your like uh crummy whatever

Track 1: uh firehouse that they they have and it's it's not safe in any way they they

Track 1: basically say multiple times how they've never tested it like we're just using

Track 1: these like proton packs that have like nuclear you know who knows what's in

Track 1: there and they're just shooting them around in hotels in front of people you

Track 1: know who cares and you're supposed to view the EPA as like,

Track 1: maybe that's a bad idea as like the villain is just...

Track 1: It's uh it is honestly really glossed over it's like it's pull it's it's it's

Track 1: it's so drawn up with like for that comedic effect of the guy being this you

Track 1: know complete tool that you're just uh assuming that he actually is bad.

Track 2: And i i find like his status as a complete tool

Track 2: to be really interesting too because he is right like

Track 2: like he does seem like a jerk but like when you kind of take

Track 2: a step back from and like kind of like look at the broader context like

Track 2: i don't know like like my last watch of this movie you

Track 2: know like a couple a couple days ago i like i was thinking

Track 2: about like his condition and i'm trying to imagine myself

Track 2: as like a middle level epa bureaucrat who's

Track 2: been tasked to go like double check on what's going on with this weird new york

Track 2: city tech startup and then i go in there and i find out that they have like

Track 2: uh in the movies where it's unlicensed nuclear accelerators lying around and

Track 2: they've been running around the city just kind of irradiating square blocks,

Track 2: and that they have like a facility with no security whatsoever that has a single

Track 2: switch that blows up part of New York City,

Track 2: I too would be instantly transformed into the worst dick you've ever dealt with.

Track 1: Yeah, and like the biggest mistake too is like, so the first time he comes,

Track 1: like, okay, maybe he's acting kind of like a jerk to do it, but he has like

Track 1: completely valid reasons.

Track 1: And then when he returns again with like the con ed guy and like

Track 1: one single police officer and like the the

Track 1: con ed guy i guess or maybe they don't actually say it's con ed but

Track 1: like that's the power you know in new york and it's like hey yeah just turn

Track 1: off this turn off this weird button he's like i don't know if that's a great

Track 1: idea but like do you have any better ideas like maybe we should bring in a team

Track 1: to investigate do something else so like they're clearly making the epa also

Track 1: seem toothless and like incompetent at the same time of them also being like the villain yeah.

Track 3: I mean and this is what i mean when i say that we live in the long 1980s

Track 3: right where it's seen

Track 3: as you go people get annoyed when you

Track 3: bring this up and talking about ghostbusters but i but i think this is broadly

Track 3: because uh so much of the contemporary blockbuster which ghostbusters is one

Track 3: of the kind of earliest examples of is deeply culturally conservative um,

Track 3: And, you know, this conception that actually maybe you can't have the government

Track 3: being the one which is actually correct about things. Or if they're correct,

Track 3: they have to be annoying about it.

Track 3: Yeah, it's a dream movie for the right, which explains in some ways the response

Track 3: to Ghostbusters 2016, right?

Track 3: Where the problem isn't that, oh no, they've made Ghostbusters again.

Track 3: It's like, oh, no, they've made Ghostbusters in a way that we don't like and

Track 3: that detracts from the overall and maybe even questions in the mildest possible

Track 3: sense, the overall cultural conservatism of the present moment.

Track 2: I mean, I mean, like, yeah, like I think like looking at Venkman's character,

Track 2: I think is really interesting for this, like Bill Murray.

Track 2: You know, like we have such like a cultural love affair with Bill Murray in

Track 2: the world of cinema. He brings like such a I don't know, it's always a delight to see him on screen.

Track 2: And I find that really interesting, too, when, like, you know,

Track 2: like, considering Venkman as a character, right?

Track 2: Because as we were talking about earlier in the episode, one of the first things

Track 2: we learn about Venkman is that he's, like, a lecherous creep as a professor.

Track 2: You know, like, his interest is in maybe manipulating his students into,

Track 2: like, sexual situations rather than being an educator or a researcher.

Track 2: Yeah. And then, like, he spends most of the movie, like, harassing Dana,

Track 2: whose great crime is being a single mother in the eyes of this movie.

Track 2: Even even in the world of gozer her great crime is

Track 2: being without a male consort and so like

Track 2: you've got like this film which is like partially architectured on like

Track 2: being entirely uncritical about feminism and

Track 2: about the kind of misogynistic attitudes it's reproducing it's

Track 2: kind of no shock to me that you have a ghostbusters movie

Track 2: that has like all women in

Track 2: leading roles and kind of grapples with some like

Track 2: oh it's the basement incel weirdo who's actually the real bad guy like it's

Track 2: no wonder to me that the the kind of popular in quotes audience that is the

Track 2: ghostbusters core fandom was like driven insane by that yeah it was a look in

Track 2: the mirror they weren't ready for i.

Track 3: Actually think this is why it's important to have a sense of the cultural politics of nostalgia.

Track 2: Yes yes because.

Track 3: Like that's that like nostalgia is not just a kind of subjective relation to

Track 3: a sort of cultural, a lost cultural object or a lost cultural ideal.

Track 3: Nostalgia now is a,

Track 3: is a mechanism or an ideological structure by which

Track 3: you are induced to relate to

Track 3: cultural objects in a certain way right nostalgia is

Track 3: um in other words like nostalgia is

Track 3: very good marketing um and it's it's very

Track 3: like uh like the

Track 3: big failure of ghostbusters 2016 is not

Track 3: that it's woke it's that it's just not very good or very

Track 3: or very funny uh in my opinion but

Track 3: and i'm like but nostalgia and like playing

Track 3: off your nostalgic relation to kind of

Track 3: original text is very good for the marketing of

Track 3: it and and to to position a contemporary product in relation to the products

Track 3: that it it it's that you remember is like that's the whole point of advertising

Track 3: right it's nostalgia is the way in which your relationship to art is turned

Track 3: into a marketable commodity yeah.

Track 1: And that some of the irony there too is when you

Track 1: look at the film like even just watching

Track 1: the original film i don't think they probably knew how popular

Track 1: it was going to be i mean it was a pretty low budget 25 30 million

Track 1: made almost 400 million i think it was the second

Track 1: highest grossing film that year i believe

Track 1: i think beverly hills cops is the only one that was higher but you

Track 1: see in the film like the idea of that commodification of

Track 1: ghostbusters like in real time where people are

Track 1: like wearing shirts they're on every front page of magazines like they're almost

Track 1: creating the nostalgia like in the during the actual events of the film which

Track 1: then has now been used to also sell millions of toys and you know spawned now

Track 1: what three films in the last decade so it's uh.

Track 3: Yeah and i think i think this is certainly worth i think this is certainly worth

Track 3: kind of trying to pick at if you're a leftist who enjoys visual culture because I,

Track 3: I watched this movie a whole bunch when I was a kid. I loved the real Ghostbusters.

Track 3: You know, that show is awesome. And I think it's very important to recognize

Track 3: the degree to which mainstream cultural production depends upon the creation

Track 3: of a certain ideological relationship to a text that you...

Track 3: Like, it wasn't even a kid in the 80s.

Track 3: I saw this 15 years after it came out.

Track 3: But it's like nostalgia has its own set of cultural politics that's important

Track 3: for us to be aware of and the ways in which your own subjective emotional responses,

Track 3: your desires, your own...

Track 3: Well, I guess what I'm getting at is that libidinal economy is still an economy,

Track 3: right? It's still deeply profitable.

Track 3: And to be honest, it's still the dominant way that we recognize cultural history,

Track 3: right? Like Ghostbusters creates an image of what the 1980s was like.

Track 3: And I think the great modern example is probably something like Stranger Things, right?

Track 3: Where you go, what you sell an image of a certain kind of cultural history.

Track 3: That becomes accepted as in some way much more true than the actual messy wrestling

Track 3: with cultural history, you know?

Track 1: Yeah, in some way they're channeling that. When you watch a show like Stranger Things,

Track 1: you're saying in a way that your brain may tell you this is a throwback to Ghostbusters,

Track 1: but it decidedly ignores all of the social implications,

Track 1: especially in the political implications of it, and just kind of repackages

Track 1: it for you in a way that's palatable in a modern sense.

Track 1: And that's not to say there's some of the questionable aspects of Stranger Things,

Track 1: which we don't have to get into here.

Track 2: Definitely. I think that does, like, some people often talk about the Ghostbusters,

Track 2: the first Ghostbusters movie as if it's this kind of sacred emblem in horror

Track 2: cinema. It's one of those movies where you just can't critique it.

Track 2: You know, it's too baked into our nostalgia.

Track 2: It's too laden with all of this cultural history.

Track 2: But again like I think like you know we look at Ghostbusters and like it kind

Track 2: of mirrors exactly what John's been saying as a text itself right because Ghostbusters

Track 2: 2 comes out and then like rather than kind of grappling with like,

Track 2: Like, there is so much rich storytelling potential in a world where,

Track 2: like, imagine five years ago, a group of three chuckleheads who left an Ivy

Track 2: League institution, discovered ghosts were real, and you could put them in prison.

Track 3: Yeah.

Track 2: Like, you just fundamentally rewrote every world religion, chunks of the human

Track 2: history, how we relate to ourselves, to our family, industry as a whole.

Track 2: You know like everything is now fundamentally different

Track 2: in a way that like there there is no comparison to

Track 2: that that would make that would make fire or the

Track 2: internet look like i don't know like a furby just

Track 2: like a flash in the pan little pop culture phenomenon and

Track 2: then what does the second movie do everybody just kind of forgets that

Track 2: the afterlife is real and that ghosts are real and that the ghostbusters saved

Track 2: the city it's just kind of like yeah let's just let's pretend like none of that

Track 2: ever happened and reset everything entirely you know so so here we have all

Track 2: the way back to the first sequel of the ghostbusters the pattern that we're

Track 2: stuck into this day still continues yeah.

Track 3: Because the the the the ultimate response this is the bit which does feel ideologically

Track 3: honest about the first ghostbusters movie and to the response to those questions

Track 3: of like of of existence of of religion is how do we monetize this.

Track 1: Yeah and like isn't the it's been a while since i've seen the

Track 1: second one i mean i i know sort of like the the you know

Track 1: the villain in that like the the uh the

Track 1: picture or the the you know vigo i think

Track 1: was his name right like the whole thing they're like isn't don't

Track 1: they also set up like a framework where essentially they've lost all the money

Track 1: that they made from that they may have made from like the original you know

Track 1: starting of the ghostbusters and now they have like a a bookstore or something

Track 1: isn't that right it's been a while maybe i'm just remembering it.

Track 2: That sounds right i know i know the bookstore isn't the bookstore in the cartoon too i.

Track 1: Think so it's also the cartoon.

Track 2: Or is or is the bookstore also part of the second phase of ghostbusters reboots

Track 2: afterlife and the other one yeah.

Track 1: It might be i saw afterlife but it's like kind of fuzzy kind of.

Track 2: I think i think that's like an important bit of cultural analysis like in and

Track 2: of itself too like my memories of the first ghostbusters movie are really clear

Track 2: my ability to generate memories of subsequent ghostbusters entries become increasingly

Track 2: fuzzy and difficult because it's like,

Track 2: undifferentiatable ghostbusters slop and less like i i don't know so something

Track 2: with like an aura or a sense of authenticity yeah.

Track 3: Get the merch get the merch you you do you remember do you remember the ghostbusters

Track 3: wasn't that cool so why don't you take your kids to see it now like that's.

Track 2: That's what.

Track 3: They feel like.

Track 2: Do you remember Harold Ramis who used to be alive and a person well I've got news for you laughing.

Track 1: Yeah in like the note in like the newest version of it maybe not the newest

Track 1: one i think they they refer to him or they like reference him if i again like

Track 1: as you're saying like all of these kind of slopped together is just kind of

Track 1: like they're about ghostbusters but like what are they actually about at this point anyway.

Track 2: Yeah yeah and i think like like that's that's that's

Track 2: a super important thing to flag up like what what they're about is about

Track 2: making money for the stakeholders in in ghostbusters

Track 2: the studio executives the investors you know

Track 2: like the the toy company people down the line and that's

Track 2: and that's why after harold ramis's death uh cgi effects

Track 2: company recreates him and makes him a character acting in the movie acting in

Track 2: quotes can a prop act can a dead man be a prop like this is you know as i was

Track 2: talking earlier about how like one of the overlooked aspects of the first ghostbusters

Track 2: movie is they create a prison for your soul and monetize it And then here in

Track 2: Ghostbusters Afterlife,

Track 2: Harold Ramis is unconsenting acting from the grave,

Track 2: you know, in a way recreating the initial precept of Ghostbusters.

Track 1: Just reminded me of what you're talking about as like this ghost for,

Track 1: you know, for, oh, sorry, this prison for ghosts and souls is it's like...

Track 1: It's not that, I mean, especially given the 1980s, it's sort of like a microcosm

Track 1: or like a, I don't know, that's not really the right word, but like the same

Track 1: way you would look at all the things that Ronald Reagan is doing,

Track 1: which this is, I think, the start of his second term, 1984, when it came out.

Track 1: And we're now seeing the you know massive weight

Track 1: you know wealth inequality is like skyrocketing you know

Track 1: all these different things that are happening and you're also now

Track 1: becoming the same you know prisoner i guess maybe in

Track 1: like quotes of all of these things that are now

Track 1: happening to you know the economy and society

Track 1: and everything i mean not that you weren't already that way under a

Track 1: capitalist system but it's like now magnified and

Track 1: it's only going to get worse as the you know the 90s and

Track 1: you know today when more ghostbusters are out you're just you're a prison to

Track 1: these things and rather than thinking like oh maybe we should uh decide uh you

Track 1: know have the epa come in and decide like this is let's try to fix this instead

Track 1: just like nah we're not going to do that we're just going to keep storing the

Track 1: ghosts or something yeah i mean i mean i.

Track 3: Think i think the the i think the big the big um political idea that we have

Track 3: to talk about here is it's uh neoliberalism,

Track 3: this collapse of you know

Track 3: the post-war consensus the idea that there was actually

Track 3: an important role for the state being replaced

Track 3: with the idea that actually all things are essentially reducible to market relations

Track 3: and therefore the the only way of managing any kind of like social field properly

Track 3: is to subordinate it to the logic of the market, right?

Track 3: If you can privatize something, not only do you reduce the capacity of the state

Track 3: to do things, but also you've created a new asset category.

Track 3: Right they like they charge they charge the the the nice hotel that they go

Track 3: to a huge amount of money um private prisons have always been very profitable.

Track 1: Yeah well and i saw

Track 1: something in the uh and like it's i mean it came where i read it but it was

Track 1: talking about the uh i think it was an article maybe like the washington examiner

Track 1: or something about this you know uh talking about and saying saying that the

Track 1: the movie is like an example of this like american free thinker kind of thing

Track 1: and like fighting government overreach.

Track 1: You know, if it weren't for the government's, you know, hand over me,

Track 1: I'd be able to innovate like super cool stuff.

Track 1: And like, I can't help but think about like in direct relation to 2025,

Track 1: you have this, you know, Elon Musk and his like stupid cars and Teslas and all these things.

Track 1: And like, you know, if only we can just get in there, I mean,

Track 1: and, you know, make the government less effective and be able to do these things.

Track 1: Like we'd have like double Teslas or something, like something even better that

Track 1: would make everyone great and you know in this movie it's like the proton packs

Track 1: and these just wild technology like if only the epa was get off our back we'd be able to you know,

Track 1: create proton packs that could actually you know not just for ghosts but for

Track 1: humans or something who knows like the like the i'm like i'm thinking even of like the,

Track 1: the expansion of privatized you know defense contractors in the 1980s you know

Track 1: with uh of course like star wars and all these things that they're building

Track 1: to you know fight the the evil soviets and so it's like this added component

Track 1: to it i know that's exactly what you were saying um john but.

Track 3: Yeah the most unrealistic part of this film is that they don't immediately get

Track 3: a massive contract from the department of.

Track 1: Defense like that's.

Track 3: That's the most unrealistic bit.

Track 1: Right yeah as they're sitting on the steps of the uh of columbia's library you

Track 1: know sipping on a bottle of like uh you know cheap i don't know what kind of

Track 1: liquor they had and they don't get a call you know in their office saying it's

Track 1: the uh it's the defense department they want to hire you to uh build a like

Track 1: a international soviet ghost trapping system or something yeah.

Track 2: Yeah a way to interrogate soviet ghosts.

Track 1: Yes that's exactly uh gosh like it almost would make even be funnier if it was

Track 1: had been like a satire of these things as opposed to being like a celebration

Track 1: of them like that would be an interesting you know film at that time but that's not what we got.

Track 2: Yeah i must feel like ghostbusters there's

Track 2: a struggle at the heart of this movie and it's and

Track 2: it's you know horror horror in the gothic more broadly is is a genre or our

Track 2: genres rather founded on so much ambiguity right it's really it's it's really

Track 2: hard to have square and easily fit discussions about anything spooky just because

Track 2: of the nature of what encountering the horrific.

Track 1: Is right.

Track 2: Right the horrific is always something on the periphery

Track 2: it's always something that's connected to the other and the monstrous even

Track 2: even in the context of a horror comedy right like to a much lesser extent sure

Track 2: but you still wind up going there and and i think in this movie like like i

Track 2: still like watching ghostbusters right like you know like owing to the nature

Track 2: of the kind of criticism we do you know like i come off as a scold all the time

Track 2: it's not like i dislike this stuff,

Track 2: Like, I talk about it because it's, like, the only thing that gets stuck in

Track 2: my head because I got lucky and that's how my brain works, I guess.

Track 2: Lucky and big ghosty quotes there.

Track 2: But, no, like, I think there is potential within Ghostbusters to find,

Track 2: like, alternate readings and stuff.

Track 2: Like, you know, like, you get the amazing line where, like, Louis Tully,

Track 2: who is now the key master, Vince Clortho, I think, is talking to a horse. Yeah.

Track 1: Oh, yeah.

Track 2: You know, and he, like, looks at the horse and he's like, wait for the sign. then

Track 2: our prisoners will be released and then he like scampers off into the

Track 2: darkness and like like even as a kid like i really really

Track 2: liked that scene like that's one of the scenes in the movie that just like

Track 2: really stuck with me and like i didn't you know like like watching this movie

Track 2: as a kid and then like watching it you know like later as someone who had been

Track 2: to academia and then left academia like you know like you know there is always

Track 2: this connection to the ghostbusters themselves but for me like i i was way more

Track 2: interested in like slimer and the ghosts and

Track 2: kind of all of that stuff right this space where we can talk about and talk

Track 2: a bit more freely about like the

Track 2: condition of the other what it's like to depict people who are you know,

Track 2: alienated and marginalized by the societies in which they find themselves yeah.

Track 3: It's it's a very Nietzschean moment right and it's like what is it that Nietzsche

Track 3: apparently says to the horse it's like I understand you um.

Track 2: Yeah this idea you know Lewis Tully is Nietzsche yeah.

Track 3: Yeah he is you He is the man driven mad by God. It's done out of this,

Track 3: sense of his own insufficiency i actually think a nietzschean reading of lewis's

Track 3: uh tolia is very it's very reasonable.

Track 2: God god is gozer dressed in bubble wrap i i think.

Track 3: That's the case you know isn't that how the film ends god is dead and we have

Track 3: exploded him with our proton if.

Track 1: They ask if you're a god you say

Track 1: yes like that was always

Track 1: like as a as a kid like that was always like the like

Track 1: one of the one of like the main go-to lines of

Track 1: the of the film but like obviously i'm not thinking about it

Track 1: at that time as a you know like a little kid of you know what does that actually

Track 1: mean the idea of like god in this film and the you know the as you're saying

Track 1: the implication of like destroying him or destroying a version of him or something

Track 1: it's uh i don't even believe i don't even i don't have the uh the capability

Track 1: to even analyze that now i don't think.

Track 2: Oh yeah and And just to be clear about my earlier statement,

Track 2: like I liked that Lewis Tully line, not because like, I don't know,

Track 2: five-year-old me or whatever had some like, you know, prescient Marxist insight,

Track 2: but because five-year-old me liked the goofy guy talking to a horse.

Track 1: Oh, that's funny.

Track 2: It was much less sophisticated than it's become.

Track 1: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That would be quite something if you were watching that,

Track 1: be like, oh, that's Nietzsche right there. I get it.

Track 2: Yeah, yeah. What a wonderful childhood that would have been.

Track 2: All my friends are like, oh, have you seen the new Charizard card?

Track 2: And I'd be like, you know, actually, the new Charizard card reminds me of the Will to Power.

Track 2: I would have had so many friends on the playground.

Track 3: Yeah, but like, that's what you like now.

Track 1: Well, I guess it's a little more acceptable on the...

Track 1: Amongst your uh amongst your peers perhaps to uh to have that nuanced uh conversation and uh like.

Track 3: What does what does Slimer.

Track 1: Mean to you now I also yeah like loved uh lived and died with Slimer as a kid oh yeah I mean Slimer.

Track 2: Is Slimer rips.

Track 3: Maybe we should talk about Slimer though like

Track 3: maybe uh yes as a

Track 3: left symbol right what is Slimer is

Track 3: uh an an illegalist uh doesn't

Track 3: care about privatized property rights um but

Track 3: it's also like this this utopian excess you

Track 3: know he's because he's eating not because he

Track 3: needs to right but because there's this kind

Track 3: of like libidinal joy in it um

Track 3: in a space where where food is so often like deeply commodified and it's become

Track 3: this kind of exclusive thing that only money will give you access to um isn't

Track 3: that isn't that why they they call the the ghost police on him yeah.

Track 1: The stories in private property and uh drinking all the booze and the food.

Track 3: Yeah yeah yeah.

Track 2: Like what was slimer before.

Track 1: Like what was his.

Track 2: What was.

Track 1: He in that in the in human form what was his uh you know i don't know.

Track 2: And i'm sure i'm sure there's like an answer in the comic books or something

Track 2: i'm sure we've got the the slimer origin story comic or whatever.

Track 3: Yeah yeah there's there's like three people listening to this yelling at their

Track 3: phone screens right now yes.

Track 2: His name was john john slime man and he liked.

Track 3: Eating hot dogs in his life and then he became.

Track 2: Slime really goes to something silly but but no like like i i totally agree

Track 2: with this this reading and i think it's really exciting to kind of like follow

Track 2: this path more broadly too because like you know like like now looking at slimer

Track 2: like yeah this this is like the kind of utopian excess. This is the release...

Track 2: He is like the spirit of cathexis for the pent-up libidinal anxieties of the working poor.

Track 2: What if you could just eat the hot dogs? What if you could just go to the hotel and party?

Track 2: What if you didn't have to worry about money? What if you could just walk through

Track 2: the damn walls and take the stuff that was yours to begin with?

Track 2: You know, Slimer represents all of that stuff. and

Track 2: there's something like kind of about his freedom and his

Track 2: kind of like this like this like like i don't know like

Track 2: almost nihilistic glee that he represents that's just

Track 2: like exciting to like we what if we took the same

Track 2: lens and applied it to the rest of the ghosts and ghostbusters you know what

Track 2: if we give them the same grace that we were giving slimer you know like like

Track 2: what does it mean to like look at them look at all the other ghosts as we've

Track 2: been like kind of you know negatively looking at uh the ghostbusters themselves

Track 2: and you know instead give like a positive credence to these spirits.

Track 1: Well yeah absolutely well as i say you don't

Track 1: get any other than i guess like the librarian at

Track 1: the beginning you know in the basement of the library you don't really get any

Track 1: visions of any of the other ghosts you just kind of

Track 1: have the montage of them like strutting through the streets holding

Track 1: their little uh you know their little um traps with

Track 1: their like smoking nuclear fission something

Track 1: or others like you know that's all you really get you don't actually there is

Track 1: no they're like very much dehumanized in like a very deep way in the way that

Track 1: they're depicted not just like being put into this prison in the wall of the

Track 1: of this building just treated as uh you know i think you either you may have

Track 1: said ash like othering them in a way that's kind of completely ignored yeah.

Track 3: I mean this is this is uh we talked about i think we absolutely have to talk

Track 3: about walter benjamin as well uh famously wrote the theses on the philosophy

Track 3: of history benjamin says something so interesting which is like writing in a

Track 3: time of fascism, which is that not even,

Track 3: Not even the dead will be safe if the opponents of a communist revolution win.

Track 3: Fascism will dig up the bones of the dead and co-opt the dead into their struggles.

Track 3: And I'm like, oh, this is what the Ghostbusters is.

Track 3: No, you don't get to be at peace. You don't get to be even a revenant of a different

Track 3: kind of possibility if you're a ghost. what you get is you get incarcerated.

Track 2: And especially too like we can kind of like do the

Track 2: inverse reading and and like but what if we look at the

Track 2: kind of soviet cosmism of what the ghostbusters could have

Track 2: been of what it would mean to like redeem

Track 2: and liberate the dead from the terrors that they've experienced like

Track 2: what if we could really save everybody you know

Track 2: and like there's there's something about that in the ghostbusters we're

Track 2: like kind of you know confronting think exactly what you're

Track 2: saying john like almost implies or

Track 2: forces the thought and the the kind of contravening direction you know

Track 2: like because i was thinking like you know you mentioned the librarian

Track 2: and like the only other ghost i can think of unless it's gozer

Track 2: a ghost i don't think there's a ghost the ghost is ghost ghost type

Track 2: gozer's a ghost type pokemon i don't know what the subtype

Track 2: of gozer is um but like

Track 2: the only other ghost i could think of that had like a real solid identity

Track 2: was like the taxicab driver skeleton yeah yeah

Track 2: yeah and like even even this vision of the ghosts like

Track 2: so many people like you know you come back from the dead and now you're at you're

Track 2: you're still a taxicab driver you know like you're still kind of like the job

Track 2: that you had in life you work again in death with the sole exception of slimer

Track 2: and he winds up becoming the one that's like friends with the ghostbusters or

Track 2: at least tolerated by them in a weird way yeah.

Track 3: Sort of a mascot and i actually do think this is an important thing about like

Track 3: being someone who is politically left-wing which is that,

Track 3: The whole point of being oriented towards a kind of revolutionary situation

Track 3: is not that you're just trying to make the present better.

Track 3: Because the present is the cumulative work of multiple failed revolutionary struggles.

Track 3: And so this is the Benjaminian point, which is that if you count yourself as

Track 3: revolutionary in the present, you're not just trying to redeem the present.

Track 3: You're trying to redeem the past as well, right?

Track 3: The dead are unquiet in their graves.

Track 3: And the entire point is, are you going to allow not just the current political

Track 3: situation to enact a kind of closure, but are you going to allow history itself to be papered over?

Track 3: And, you know, the fact that the ghosts, what is it the ghosts want?

Track 3: They want to break free of what they were and what they have become, which is imprisoned.

Track 2: And I'm just right now thinking of a lot of the scenes we see of the ghosts,

Track 2: you know, like what we see them kind of materially doing.

Track 2: And a lot of them are kind of just like flying around and reveling.

Track 3: Yeah.

Track 2: You know, like, and visually that's expressing some kind of,

Track 2: like, boundless freedom.

Track 2: There's a kind of joy in these ghosts that, you know, like, because if you can't

Track 2: rent-seek on someone, you have

Track 2: to incarcerate them in order to create the context for that rent-seeking.

Track 2: And I'm just like, oh, like, the mirrors to broader political context are so grim.

Track 3: Yeah.

Track 1: Like if you're talking about the ghost as kind of just

Track 1: they're just trying to live their they're just not live their life

Track 1: i guess but like really that's all they're trying to do they're just kind of they're

Track 1: just trying to exist in this space of just like freedom

Track 1: from all the things that they once had to maybe deal with

Track 1: and then then being re-incarcerated again is

Track 1: just just a real kick in the you

Track 1: know it's uh and

Track 1: and actually so do you do you both want to know what the backstory the

Track 1: non-canonical backstory of of slammer is

Track 1: or do we want to leave it oh yeah yeah i need to

Track 1: know okay so there's so there's two so the in the comic book

Track 1: apparently it explains that he was king remilis an

Track 1: obese king who died of heart failure failure and then

Track 1: in the film the 2016 which they deleted from the from the film was he was a

Track 1: gangster who was killed who killed a restaurant waiter that got his order incorrect

Track 1: resulting his imprisonment and execution and then after his death they encounter

Track 1: him haunting that same restaurant over and over again so oh okay.

Track 1: Yeah both are our reasons i guess both are

Track 1: things that's fine i suppose yeah nothing that seems

Track 1: quite cool yeah that's a little that's interesting you know

Track 1: i guess but to me that like takes away from

Track 1: what it is in the actual film which does have like political you know implications

Track 1: of him just trying to be this this uh thing or whatever this uh phantasm that's

Track 1: uh just trying to he's trying to enjoy something and they're just trying to

Track 1: shoot at him with ray guns.

Track 2: Yeah yeah slimer much like you know philosopher shlavoj zizek enjoys eating a lot of hot.

Track 1: Dogs yeah.

Track 2: I i don't think this is some kind of crime absolutely i think,

Track 2: oh go on go on i'm.

Track 3: Just gonna say if you see somebody enjoying a massive plate of cakes no you

Track 3: didn't like it's it's fine.

Track 2: Yeah see see something spectral say nothing that's that's the line but no like

Track 2: i i think i think that kind of those backstories are really you know like like

Track 2: now that we're hearing them they're interesting for like a discursive standpoint

Track 2: too like if you want to have some fun with them like you know like like both

Track 2: of those imply that slimer's state in the afterlife is carceral.

Track 2: You know, that his kind of gluttonous nature is some kind of like divine punishment

Track 2: or rectification for the sins of his life.

Track 2: Whether he was the kind of gluttonous king that dies of heart failure,

Track 2: or he's the mob boss who kills a restaurateur, you know, he's being appropriately

Track 2: punished by his status as Slimer.

Track 2: Although neither of those really answer the slime question, which I think is

Track 2: the definitive factor here, but I'm going to leave that aside.

Track 3: No, I knew you were going to bring up the slime. I need you to talk to us about

Track 3: why is it important that he gets slimed.

Track 2: Okay, sorry, we could totally derail everything I was just saying because John's

Track 2: making me talk about slime.

Track 2: You're twisting my arm here. So I think, because obviously we get all the slime

Track 2: stuff in Ghostbusters because it's heavily influenced by turn-of-the-century spiritualism.

Track 2: Which invents things like ectoplasm and ectoplasm photography and stuff like

Track 2: that, mediums using ectoplasm.

Track 2: You know, that's why Ghostbusters has all of this kind of like effugence in slime.

Track 2: But I think like from kind of like a weird left perspective,

Track 2: you know, we can get really like sticky with this, you know?

Track 2: Like what is slime if not kind of this unacknowledged and boundless potential,

Track 2: right? You know, like, like it's, it's kind of like a grand unifying substance.

Track 2: All, all humanity comes from some protoplasmic slime.

Track 2: When we go back far enough in time, we're all reduced to some element of slime.

Track 2: At some point in our life, our bodies are always erupting with these uncomfortable

Track 2: slimes and Ghostbusters externalizes that, right?

Track 2: Ghostbusters is constantly dumping buckets of slime on people, you know?

Track 2: And like, this is coming out within the same like rough decade

Track 2: where we get like the gunge train in the

Track 2: uk and we get like nickelodeon dumping gack on on contestants and tv shows we're

Track 2: seeing like like this 90s return to slime that that's about to come that's like

Track 2: kicking off here in the ghostbusters and it never really goes away i mean like

Track 2: today we've got people play with it i think like there's this unbreakable fixation

Track 2: we have with something that is like,

Track 2: protoplasmic and free form something that kind of resists,

Track 2: Like, you know, like even when we look at like, you know, you buy prepackaged

Track 2: slime at stores, but like half the success of like these slime influencers are

Track 2: the fact that you could just like order Elmer's glue and make it yourself.

Track 2: There's like a DIY component to this as there was with spiritualism.

Track 2: And I don't know really where I'm taking this. If somebody wants to like jump

Track 2: in the slime bucket with me, I'm kind of just rambling at this point.

Track 1: Well, like, but how does that like square?

Track 1: I mean i don't know but like the the the

Track 1: idea that like is it meant to also be seen as like

Track 1: some kind of like magic substance where it's what it's

Track 1: what allows the ghost i guess to make it so that humans in our you know our

Track 1: version of reality or dimension are able to like see it you know is it this

Track 1: like uh magic force and i can't also help but think about like the goo and the

Track 1: like the invasion of the body snatchers like from.

Track 2: The yeah like the.

Track 1: Second film especially like this extraterrestrial like goo that comes which

Track 1: also has an interesting like i don't know you could probably talk about how

Track 1: it might compare to that film in in some way but that's like the first thing

Track 1: that i i couldn't stop thinking about when i was watching it also on my favorite film so.

Track 2: I i think the blob is such a good place to go to too right

Track 2: there's oh yeah there's there there is

Track 2: this kind of like e slime is often used

Track 2: in cinema to like encode like this inherent fear of

Track 2: like communistic attitudes you know like it's it's

Track 2: it's no wonder that the libertarians of the ghostbusters are

Track 2: made natural enemies to the the slime of the

Track 2: spirit world you know and then like in the blob right it's

Track 2: this kind of like faceless all digesting you know

Track 2: mass versus the brave individualistic

Track 2: americans um and i think

Track 2: like you know like ectoplasm is is the medium it's

Track 2: you know like to to speak to like spiritualism and how this context enters

Track 2: ghostbusters it's it's the medium through which the

Track 2: the spirit realm intersects the the realm

Track 2: of the living right it's the medium by which ghosts are realized on

Track 2: the mortal plane and and i think like like

Track 2: if we were to like spin this in a left direction and like to take

Track 2: this conversation there right like this does this does like

Track 2: ground us back to like materialistic conversations that

Track 2: even like one thing i appreciate about the ghostbusters is that

Track 2: like no matter how libertarian it gets no matter how like you're like oh wait

Track 2: they're it's this misogynistic sex pest who hates the epa is our hero like question

Track 2: mark like we are constantly like hit in the face with material conditions you

Track 2: know like like these ghosts have day jobs.

Track 2: Right like the you know like these people are like able to acquire

Track 2: unregulated nuclear fissile materials or

Track 2: something but also the bank is screwing them over for

Track 2: like the triple mortgage they have to get or something right it's like like

Track 2: we're we're kind of never it's and it's weird to say this about ghostbusters

Track 2: but we're never like blindsided by a bunch of movie magic and a bunch of stuff

Track 2: is swept under the rug you know the movie is like very open about the weird

Track 2: material conditions going on yeah.

Track 3: I mean that's that's uh ernie hudson's role right in in the entire film you

Track 3: know just to just to be the the guy who needs a job um and things have got they've

Track 3: gotten so successful at what they do it seems to be a pretty seems to be a pretty good gig now.

Track 1: Apparently they were supposed to include backstory for

Track 1: that character where he was formerly like in the military but then

Track 1: they scrapped it and didn't you know didn't include it i don't know if it

Track 1: ever i don't know maybe it was just like in the production of the movie that

Track 1: was what they're going to go with and that's why he might show up but i think

Track 1: it's much better this way where he's not former military and he's just simply

Track 1: he's like i'll believe in what i don't remember the exact line i'll believe

Track 1: in you know whatever if you know as long as it pets a paycheck yeah so,

Track 1: it's it's like the perfect encapsulation of of that time of uh you know he's

Track 1: looking through the wanted ads and like the only option is like to work for

Track 1: the ghostbusters like like you have to tell your like your mom later like yeah

Track 1: what's your interview about it's like i'm gonna go work for some ghostbusters

Track 1: and they just like laugh at you for half for half hour well.

Track 3: I'm gonna go work in private security.

Track 1: Yes there you go private ghost security we just incarcerate you know uh you

Track 1: know spectral whatever specters like.

Track 2: Dude there's there there's a lot of pathos to that character too like you feel a lot of like,

Track 2: Like the weight of class politics hangs heavy on the shoulders of Ernie Hudson,

Track 2: you know, because like you really feel for somebody living in like a city as expensive as New York.

Track 3: Yeah.

Track 2: To trying to make it. And then like, you know, the only thing that's hiring

Track 2: is private security. And in this case, what's even worse, a private security startup.

Track 3: Yeah. You know, like.

Track 1: Hey, he could get in on that early stock options.

Track 2: Yeah, early stock options. Get the Ghostbusters stock options.

Track 3: Yeah leverage it into like an associate position at palantia or.

Track 1: Something right.

Track 3: At least you get benefits right.

Track 1: You also don't really other than like dana you

Track 1: don't ever get to see like the conditions of the others but

Track 1: they also all are living because they have to

Track 1: be on call at the as ghostbusters you know presumably as professors or no i

Track 1: guess they're not even well i guess they're you know working at columbia they

Track 1: get a decent enough stipend to be living you know living in new york city and

Track 1: now they're they're stuck sleeping in a room uh you know the three of them together

Track 1: and or i guess four of them after the ernie joins i.

Track 2: Think that that too plays into like is something

Track 2: that's been central to like capitalist myth

Track 2: making is that like the ghostbusters lift themselves up by their bootstraps

Track 2: they do this from the ground up they they quit their stable jobs they they start

Track 2: an independent business and yeah they have to rough it for a while and the man

Track 2: tries to shut them down but ultimately they're heroes and everyone loves them for it, you know?

Track 2: And then, like, you know, when the sequel wasn't planned, it's easy to close

Track 2: your eyes at the end of the movie and imagine them as, like,

Track 2: you know, CEOs and presidents and the kind of classic mythology of, like, oh, Bill Clinton,

Track 2: you know, grew up in nowhere, Kansas, and lifted himself up by the bootstraps

Track 2: so hard he became president.

Track 2: Or Arkansas or wherever Clinton is from, I don't remember. It does not matter.

Track 2: Clinton is not a character in the Ghostbusters, which means he is canonically

Track 2: unimportant in this conversation.

Track 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Track 1: Well, he too probably would have been trying to go after Dana,

Track 1: you know, Sigourney Weaver. Trying to trick her into doing something.

Track 1: Which we didn't even, like, really talk about her character or her in this.

Track 1: And, you know, I, I, again, like Sigourney Weaver in the eighties,

Track 1: like as an icon of like alien and this and all this, like, it's such a,

Track 1: like, I think I joke, like, you know, uh, she, you know, she's,

Track 1: you know, beautiful. And like, also it's so, also is her home.

Track 1: I don't know. Like she lives in this like beautiful apartment and like this,

Track 1: I mean, great that she's a musician and, you know, presumably like a very good.

Track 1: And, you know, she's playing at a Lincoln center, I guess she has a,

Track 1: they don't ever say what exactly does she say?

Track 1: What instrument she plays? this is like pointless but did they say i.

Track 2: Do not know.

Track 1: She just says.

Track 3: Carrying a cane or something.

Track 1: A violin uh.

Track 3: Yeah yeah i thought it was a string instrument right yeah.

Track 1: I guess it had to be.

Track 3: And it's a good example that like the 80s were

Track 3: a good time for the right like it was a very

Track 3: successful class war right the middle classes did very well

Track 3: um the the the those who

Track 3: were involved in sort of finance did it even better well until

Track 3: you reach the the crisis of the late 80s and

Track 3: and it's it's interesting that so much of this revolves around possession and

Track 3: it all starts in that beautiful kitchen you know the great that amazing 1980s

Track 3: uh refrigerator uh yeah what do you what do you both think about that i think

Track 3: there's some interesting things here about,

Track 3: domesticity and property particularly.

Track 1: And they also very clearly have, you know, the Rick Moran as Lewis character

Track 1: who also works in finance, kind of, he's an accountant.

Track 1: So he lives down the hall and they're like, he's constantly trying to go after her.

Track 1: And you have this, you know, single man, single woman in the building,

Track 1: like, shouldn't they just get together and have more money and have a bigger apartment or whatever?

Track 1: I don't know. It's, it's very much like almost demonizing this idea of a single

Track 1: woman. I think you mentioned earlier.

Track 2: John, like a.

Track 1: Single you know a single mom or something like i think it's very much like a

Track 1: demonization of this you know like you should be with a ghostbuster or the accountant

Track 1: like those are your choices yeah yeah.

Track 2: And i mean like especially like when we like do

Track 2: a little compare and contrast here with sigourney weaver's character

Track 2: in alien versus her character in ghostbusters it is

Track 2: you know like it's such stark relief

Track 2: to have like the the the

Track 2: badass independent in charge queer coated ripply contrasted

Track 2: with like the dana who's just almost

Track 2: very nearly a lampshade and there's just something something

Track 2: for bill mary's character to oogle after and

Track 2: then eventually get turned into some kind of sexy ghost and like

Track 2: the issue of domesticity is also really important here too

Track 2: because like it's it's her a whole central part of

Track 2: the conflict is about her agency over a domestic space right

Track 2: it's and it's about her role in relation to that domesticity right does she

Track 2: own the apartment uh as dana or does the apartment kind of own her as the gatekeeper

Track 2: you know is is her status as a single woman who owns her own apartment such

Track 2: an affront that like you know not only do like the you know like,

Track 2: two two contrasting male characters of this have to constantly be like well

Track 2: why are you single you know woman living alone yeah but that the very the very

Track 2: spiritual realm has to render her a functionary part of that domestic landscape

Track 2: rather than an agent inside of it.

Track 3: Yeah because it's a built it's an antenna right you know it's that's it's it's

Track 3: a designed space that is there to to kind of serve a function beyond the commodification's property.

Track 1: But what do you make it that that they were that she it becomes like the gatekeeper

Track 1: of you know of gozer like specifically do you think as this and then i guess

Track 1: the the the accountant you know is the the key master.

Track 2: As these like separate.

Track 1: Like it seems like a very like it almost seems like a sexual um like reference

Track 1: to in some way maybe maybe i'm over thinking it.

Track 2: Yeah i think that's i think that's like the oh there's so much to unpack with

Track 2: her becoming the gatekeeper like and And I think it has such a weird valence

Track 2: to it when you consider like the kind of backlash against the 2016 Ghostbusters

Track 2: that like the leading woman of the first one is the gatekeeper in quotes,

Track 2: you know, like so much so much is kind of foretold in this movie that like the

Track 2: the sniveling spineless nerd guy winds up, you know, being the guy who's forever

Track 2: frustrated over the status of the gatekeeper,

Track 2: unable to access her and crawling around the bushes talking to horses.

Track 2: Um no it's so much is foretold in this moment but

Track 2: but i think like a thing like it's

Track 2: almost really tragic what what becomes of

Track 2: dana's character right like she she is never really

Track 2: allowed by this movie to have her express her own agency you

Track 2: know she she's always kind of like a functionary mechanism in in the plot of

Track 2: someone else yeah and and that that is that's kind of like you know like her

Track 2: and ernie hudson there's like a there's like a real tragic sense of pathos to

Track 2: a lot of these characters that's like just under the surface of the comedy here well.

Track 3: I think the thing that comes into this then is class relationships as well i

Track 3: mean it's it's very notable that you brought up ripley uh.

Track 2: You again.

Track 3: Very quick hooded but also quite obviously working class.

Track 2: Yes yes and.

Track 3: Dana is not right dana if you are if you've got if you've got that gorgeous

Track 3: apartment in i'm assuming it is in manhattan right yeah.

Track 1: She lives like right along central park which is like a very fancy place.

Track 3: Yeah that's like central park i'm sorry central park west.

Track 2: That is that.

Track 3: Is not a working class neighborhood.

Track 1: No like the building that they actually the exterior building shot is actually

Track 1: it's multiple buildings like conglomerate but the building that they actually

Track 1: shoot on the outside like david dacovny lives there and like in real life yeah.

Track 2: Whereas whereas.

Track 3: Like uh wilfred or any hudson is is probably coming in from like brooklyn right Yeah, for sure.

Track 3: This goes all the way back to Ellen Moore's famous book on literary women from the 1970s,

Track 3: which pointed out that what she termed the female gothic is about this relationship

Track 3: of essentially a middle-class protagonist to the domestic sphere.

Track 3: It's the space which is both paradoxically the thing which imprisons you,

Track 3: but it's the area in which you can exercise agency.

Track 3: It's something that's a work in Dana's character, right? then it doesn't really

Track 3: need to or get to have agency beyond being the catalyst for like the restoration

Track 3: of of normality at the end of things right.

Track 1: And it almost gets even worse when you

Track 1: look at her character in the sequel which she

Track 1: again also has no agency they've really treat her almost worse i think in the

Track 1: second one she's divorced and has like the small child but it's not the child

Track 1: of peter bankman and like they also weren't married i don't believe maybe at

Track 1: the end they get can't even remember but then like she's then you know as this

Track 1: you know um prize of vigo the like,

Track 1: malevolent painting spirit or whatever so she again is like the same like lusted

Track 1: upon and used as some kind of tool as like the gatekeeper and all these things

Track 1: and not actually as you said like given any kind of agency or free will of any kind well.

Track 2: This is this is like a really good uh like point to talk about like sylvia federici's

Track 2: caliban and the witch and like bring in.

Track 1: Bring in some.

Track 2: Other kind of like elements of left discourse too because like you know

Track 2: like you you were talking about like the the key master and

Track 2: the gatekeeper being you know like like it's like a sex metaphor

Track 2: and like i think that's like really important politically on top of like the

Track 2: the kind of the kind of like you know like oh it's the joke like like do you

Track 2: get the joke do you get the joke everyone in the audience please clap um but

Track 2: like you know dana's value has kind of reduced to her reproductive capacity.

Track 2: You know, as the gatekeeper, she means nothing unless unified with the key master.

Track 2: You know, and like the kind of scenes we get with Dana are her like orgasmically

Track 2: writhing in bed, whereas the key master gets to go have this funny little adventure.

Track 2: You know, he gets to go scamper and talk to horses while she just gets to be sexy and tied up.

Track 2: And then, you know, you can trace this to the second movie and like her value

Track 2: still doesn't matter. It's now only her reproductive capacity.

Track 2: You know, she's not a person. She's a mom.

Track 2: Is kind of the attitude of the second movie. What she wants and needs really doesn't matter.

Track 2: What matters is that her baby took an evil bubble bath and that's her fault for being single.

Track 2: Or something like, these movies have very confused and reactionary politics

Track 2: towards women in general.

Track 1: Yeah.

Track 2: Which, like, if we extend that to our contemporary political moment,

Track 2: like, it's really important to look at all these intersecting forms of oppression, right?

Track 2: Because, like, you throw somebody under the bus and then, like,

Track 2: your capacity to continue throwing people under the bus never ends.

Track 2: Like, look at Columbia. Yeah, it's a great example. Now they've got ICE agents

Track 2: deporting students for the crime of, I don't know, protesting on campus,

Track 2: question mark, for thought crime.

Track 2: You know, so it's like the capacity for, you know, sliding towards the right

Track 2: is something that like the kind of business institutions represented by the

Track 2: libertarian Ghostbusters don't have a backstop for.

Track 2: And we see that play out over the course of all three of these movies,

Track 2: because by like by like the time we get to Afterlife or was it Frozen?

Track 2: Ghostbusters meets Elsa, whatever the other one was.

Track 3: Yeah.

Track 2: Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Track 1: Yeah.

Track 2: Do you want to build a Venkman? Yeah, I remember that song. It was really good.

Track 2: Um, but like by that time, like they're like appropriating the ghost of Harold

Track 2: Ramis just for like, you know, if you listen to the people who made it,

Track 2: they're like, oh, we're doing a send up and this is in his honor and his memory.

Track 2: And it's like, or on the other hand, it's going to make a lot of money.

Track 2: This is about making money. This is about corporations. This isn't about celebrating

Track 2: the lifetime achievement of an actor.

Track 1: Yeah, I was about to say, they said that while they like held like a,

Track 1: you know, a bag of money behind their back, like getting ready to make whatever.

Track 1: I don't know how much, let's see how much that one made. That one made,

Track 1: they all made, it made 200 million.

Track 1: That's still on the hundred billion dollar budget. That's successful.

Track 2: Yeah, yeah. And that too, like, that's not just about like, oh,

Track 2: we're just doing this this one time for Harold Ramis.

Track 2: And it's appropriate because it's Ghostbusters and he's a ghost and whatever.

Track 2: Like, it starts here. And eventually it becomes like, oh, no,

Track 2: they've mo-capped every, like, martial artist that works in Hollywood.

Track 2: And now you don't need the martial artist because you have all their mo-capped maneuvers.

Track 2: And you could just CG map those onto whatever actor you want.

Track 2: And to be honest you don't really need the actors because we have full 3d body

Track 2: scans of them all so so we can kind of just plug and play with whoever you want you.

Track 3: Want keanu.

Track 2: Reeves and chris farley to star in a space adventure sure whatever we can make

Track 2: the robots make this for us now you know it's like like this is this is kind

Track 2: of like the long trajectory of removing human agency from the ability to be creative yeah.

Track 1: And some of these actors like bruce willis is actually already given basically

Track 1: his rights the rights of his like like this.

Track 2: To do.

Track 1: Whatever they want like you know like bill murray dies in five ten years they'll make another.

Track 3: Ghostbusters with him too it

Track 3: won't matter i i mean i think this is

Track 3: there's a there is this common thread between um

Track 3: you know uh this ai empowered

Track 3: technology that will literally you know

Track 3: resurrect the dead to be this uncanny

Track 3: valley puppet that is danced around the screen

Track 3: on the one hand and a direct link

Track 3: with that technology to police institutions

Track 3: which are coming through social media posts to find

Track 3: mentions of palestine um and cross-referencing that with student enrollment

Track 3: records at private universities which are going to do nothing to protect the

Track 3: students that they collect money from i mean uh this is what when they they

Track 3: were in the the media saying this the other day that like If you're not an American student,

Track 3: you probably shouldn't say anything about Palestine anymore because no one will

Track 3: protect you. Those two things are not

Track 3: Those two things are not different phenomenon, right? They have their roots

Track 3: in exactly this 80s ethos that the only solution to kind of societal problems

Track 3: is that you actually reduce the capacity of political forces to interfere with

Track 3: the effective functioning of capitalism.

Track 1: And then you unleash like unknown technologies onto the public to try and improve

Track 1: things when really you're just, you know, like in Ghostbusters,

Track 1: you're using these proton packs and God knows what.

Track 1: And now, you know, which were developed by Columbia, which I think also is,

Track 1: you know, comical in that sense.

Track 1: And then now Columbia is using AI to, as you said, to like police its students

Track 1: and ensure that there's a safe, you know, in big air quotes,

Track 1: a safe environment on campus for their students, which they could give two shits about.

Track 1: It's purely, again, also about the profit motive, too. That's also why it wasn't

Track 1: profitable to have, you know, Venkman at your university because it might detract

Track 1: actual people who could bring them profit from the university.

Track 3: Mm-hmm.

Track 3: Yeah but those those two things those that ash pointed out those two things

Track 3: are not separate those are those are two sides of the same coin as it were.

Track 1: Yeah absolutely uh this is this is completely less uh uh just because we're

Track 1: talking about the ai and the effects like what do you this is maybe not a political

Track 1: question at all but what do you think of like the effects in the film like just

Track 1: has like a you know standing the test of time of like you know stay put marshmallow man and.

Track 2: Some of the things.

Track 1: Like you know it's it's not too bad given you know some of the films of the era i think anyway.

Track 2: I i mean i i think these effects are great yeah and i think like like i mean

Track 2: like part of that is like you know obviously like i i drank from the poison

Track 2: font of nostalgia right so i can only ever see ghostbusters in a certain way

Track 2: a critic lod's movie they saw at formative year should be the headline there um but like,

Track 2: we were talking on hv recently i forget the movie we're talking about

Track 2: um it's probably a horror movie um we were

Track 2: talking about how like special effects i think there's a magic to practical

Track 2: effects that not and my god this sounds this is most like hollywood critic i

Track 2: have ever sounded but like i think there's a magic to special effects that makes

Track 2: it immune to aging poorly,

Track 2: uh because the worst a special effect can ever be

Track 2: is a bad special effect you know i've never like

Track 2: seen a practical effect and been

Track 2: so terribly discharged but i've seen like a lot of practical effects that

Track 2: fail and are bad and don't look right

Track 2: you know but but i'm i'm able to kind of accept those as like a certain layer

Track 2: of stage magic where i think a lot of like cg stuff hits the uncanny valley

Track 2: really quickly right it doesn't quite feel right and like when you know when

Track 2: i'm watching the kind of like new ghostbuster reboots like there's a lot that just kind of feels,

Track 2: off it just feels kind of wrongly placed.

Track 2: And I think like, you know, like this, this is kind of a political question

Track 2: in a way too, because like the move away from special effects was,

Track 2: was both an exploration of how can new technologies create art,

Track 2: which is something that we kind of just do as a species.

Track 2: We invent a new technology and we see how we can make art out of it for better

Track 2: and for worse, you know, but also it is a way to strip Hollywood of,

Track 2: of working class talent, right?

Track 2: It's a way to move working-class talent into capital and into funding apparati.

Track 2: Because if you don't need practical effects artists, you could just kind of

Track 2: like hire some CG art farm in some place where you don't know anyone to kind

Track 2: of jam out whatever effects you want.

Track 2: And then now that the kind of machine learning

Track 2: graphics are are slowly improving we're

Track 2: getting to a point where like you don't really need to farm out

Track 2: to these cg factories anymore you can kind of

Track 2: just contract out to a single like machine learning slash ai company to do it

Track 2: for you but yeah the effects in the first ghostbusters movies are at the very

Track 2: least really interesting to look at and at the best are immersive and stylistic

Track 2: and interesting and create and character in and of themselves for the ghosts especially.

Track 1: The like sort of the opening effects you get in the in the library in the basement with the.

Track 2: Cards and the slime.

Track 1: All around like that is like that moment is like it looks really good and i

Track 1: think it makes you really do you really do get a sense of like the feeling of

Track 1: the movie and the ghosts and you know all of that so for me it's uh hard to

Track 1: separate the nostalgia too.

Track 2: No and i think like that scene is really good dimension too because Like if

Track 2: you try to do that with CG,

Track 2: like what you what you have to do is, you know, you have your actors like the

Track 2: scene is we have actors who are testing out new dangerous ghost hunting technology

Track 2: and they're about to encounter their first spirit and they are they are tensely

Track 2: stalking the underused storage halls of a library.

Track 2: And then you would have to give them a cue. The director would be like,

Track 2: okay, and turn around and react to the call card drawer popping out and react

Track 2: to the card spraying out or something.

Track 2: You know, and you've been covered in slime. React to being covered in slime.

Track 2: Okay, okay. You have to mimic it in a certain way in order for the CG art to hit you right.

Track 2: You know, and then you're doing it against a green screen background on top of that.

Track 2: So you're an actor in a green void and someone has a tennis ball on a stick

Track 2: and they're like, that's the ghost.

Track 2: You're scared of the ghost. Look at the ghost. Whereas like with practical effects,

Track 2: there's something there for the actor to respond to.

Track 2: When they deliver their dialogue, when they look at something,

Track 2: when they move through and around things, they have a physical component to respond to and with.

Track 2: And it does kind of fundamentally change how acting is done as a job.

Track 2: Job and i think like you know like with acting like it's really easy to like

Track 2: we were talking about dana as like you know is she working class is she not

Track 2: working class because she's like.

Track 2: The most white collar a job can be she's a musician

Track 2: that's so successful that she could buy a penthouse suite like you

Track 2: can't get more like okay this is really blurring the lines between do

Track 2: you work for your money or is your money making you money but like

Track 2: most most actors are like they're they're jobbing they're just

Track 2: like regular people with day jobs you know

Track 2: who have to like like i think about uh bruce campbell a lot in

Track 2: this context too from from his book if chins could kill

Track 2: you know because we see him as like a big horror movie star and he talks

Track 2: about in the book where he's like yeah i'd be doing really successful movies

Track 2: and then next year i'd be like you know sending resumes to office jobs because

Track 2: i was unemployed again and it's like you know i think it's it's kind of important

Track 2: to you know like focalize the working context here sorry it's kind of rambly yeah.

Track 3: I agree I think special effects you are essentially talking about a labor issue.

Track 2: And the material.

Track 3: Conditions under which a film is made real if you will,

Track 3: you know you talk about Bruce Campbell and I was thinking about Tom Savini who

Track 3: was a who was a wolf photographer film uh before coming back to make horror.

Track 2: Movies um i'm like yeah that's appropriate yeah.

Track 3: That's entirely appropriate there is there is a material history

Track 3: to um how uh

Track 3: how a film becomes a real thing

Track 3: and it becomes this object that we get to engage with and

Track 3: yeah i think obviously the effects are great and i think incredibly um like

Track 3: hold up incredibly well do not seem to have aged and put you into the world

Track 3: but i also think that it's um it's important not to let the like i hate the

Track 3: term movie magic because you go.

Track 2: Actually that's not magic it's.

Track 3: Not it's not magic at all.

Track 2: Right yeah.

Track 3: These are things which were made to achieve specific effects and the fact that

Track 3: you get to see that effect on the screen is the product of like countless people's hard work yeah.

Track 2: You can visibly see it,

Track 2: Weirdly, one of the things that's made me think about is architecture.

Track 2: Because you hear a phrase like, oh, why don't people make buildings like they

Track 2: used to? There used to be so many decorative elements.

Track 2: Like whenever you go to an old house or maybe a hotel or historic building,

Track 2: you'll notice that the doorknobs and the plates covering the doorknobs are ornate

Track 2: and detailed and the moldings all have their own style to them and all of these things.

Track 2: And that's because those were made by artisans who eventually got fired by factory,

Track 2: not fired, but they got their livelihoods stolen by the factory.

Track 2: Their labor displaced by the machine.

Track 2: And then now we look at movies and people go like, oh, why don't movies look

Track 2: the way they used to? Why don't the effects aren't as good? Why are the actors so plastic?

Track 2: And it's like, oh, well, look at the machine.

Track 2: Again, it is like the factory context stealing from the laborer.

Track 1: Yeah, but if you're a libertarian making a film,

Track 1: then, you know, that's just wasted resources when, you know,

Track 1: they could just make a box for people to be imprisoned or to be imprisoned literally

Track 1: as prisoners, you know, or incarcerated or.

Track 1: Sorry, sorry. That's the movie magic.

Track 1: Oh but yeah i mean that's like the the yeah i i i was gonna say something else

Track 1: but i forgot what it was i was thinking about tom savini oh.

Track 3: Tom savini uh any any any final any final thoughts that we want to bring up.

Track 1: I think that's i don't have any anything left or any what about either of you yeah.

Track 2: I'm i'm i'm content i'm content if this is where we want to wrap things.

Track 1: Yeah talk.

Track 2: About ghostbusters all day but there's only so many podcast listening hours in the.

Track 1: Day listeners uh the.

Track 3: Only thing the only thing i would add is um uh the ghosts um have civil rights uh yes yes they do.

Track 1: Oh yeah.

Track 2: The other magazine headline or whatever.

Track 1: Oh that's right those yeah those i tried to find out like a still of all those

Track 1: because there are some pretty spectacular headlines what was the one that was

Track 1: really good oh i think one of them oh no i don't know i can't find anyway,

Track 1: That's a good place to leave it if I can't think of any follow-ups on that.

Track 1: But John and Ash, thank you both for coming on and talking about Ghostbusters.

Track 2: Yeah, thank you so much for having us. This has been a really good conversation.

Track 2: Always here to talk about horror movies. And you should pop over on Horror Vanguard

Track 2: sometime. We'd love to have you on.

Track 1: Oh, that'd be great. Yeah, I'm happy to do it.

Track 1: This was a lot of fun. and i know i think i mentioned in our last uh episode

Track 1: or when when john and i had discussed the host do you want to remind everyone

Track 1: too about your about your great book that people should also read in case they

Track 1: didn't they didn't remember or they didn't buy it last time uh.

Track 3: Yes you can you can get capitalism horror story from wherever you get your books

Track 3: from uh preferably your local leftist bookshop i'm sure they have a copy if

Track 3: you ask nicely um but you can and then yeah please do

Track 3: check out horror vanguard you can get that at all local podcasting outlets um

Track 3: we're on blue sky we're on tiktok we're on instagram um yeah come say hi.

Track 1: And don't listen on amazon podcasts perhaps maybe well i guess that's the words in your mouth.

Track 2: Oh yeah i mean don't.

Track 1: Yeah i i was actually not aware that i guess it's like audible podcast which

Track 1: i didn't know was a thing but.

Track 2: No i did not know podcast aggregator.

Track 3: I don't actually think you can get us on Amazon podcast.

Track 1: Oh, really?

Track 3: They might be wrong about that.

Track 1: Listen on the good podcasting platforms, not the bad podcasting platforms.

Track 1: It was a pleasure to have you both on, and we'll catch you all next time.