I fear using the actual logo...so I will sidestep (thanks scavengeinc.com)
So, I have an idea...
I would have done this in an open letter format, but I fear Dan Aykroyd and Bill Murray would have been too self-serving to read it (Harold Ramis is too busy slaving over a MacBook Pro generating some other tax-paying script for Ivan's son). So I am just going to do it this way.
Granted, I have a couple of belts in me while Comedy Central serves up "Ghostbusters II" after last call, but whatever. Side note: Jenny McCarthy selling e-cigs...how the mighty have fallen(?). But hear me out...or don't, because this format facilitates that option.
So, as we know, the original "Ghostbusters" was the combination of wit, culture, humor and city life that made a movie that was good great. Add signature performances from Aykroyd, Ramis, Rick Moranis and that dick bad guy from "Real Genius"...with clever writing, and you have a classic. As most sequels are, it was a marketing money-grab that anything with that stupid ghost imposed with the "say no to drugs" circle-crossed-out turned into a payday for the principles. But we can't hate the players, we must hate the game.
Sure, you rattle off a sub-par sequel, but at least the writing was better than Jackie Mason's meshugganah lameness of Caddyshack 2. But the one thing they did not consider when creating a part two is trying to connect the dots when creating and executing a part three. Yeah, yeah, the rumors are there. But good luck trying to synthesize a feasible part three when all the principles are at odds.
So, I have an idea...
"Ghostbusters II" was still as serviceable as "The Borne Supremacy" to link the next logical step. Dana's son, Oscar, kinda just showed up as a secondary (if not tertiary) character to add the humanity to Dr. Venkman adding to the comical sexual tension of Peter and Dana. Yeah, yeah, Oscar is generated like a virgin-born son--the movie makes zero attempt to make the newborn-to-toddler an allegory. But I digress.
So, I have an idea...
The second "Ghostbusters" movie was released in 1989. With the suspension of disbelief, we can assume that Oscar is about six months old. I mean, the kiddo was just a nodding baby when it came to any action in the film. Which is fine for my reboot of this once-proud franchise. My simple addition, the kiddo that is Oscar is now out of college (hopefully NYU for the sake of continuity). Tack on 25 years to the release of "Ghostbusters II" and you have a kiddo that is almost 26 at 2014.
Stay with me here, because I have an idea...
Instead of the original writers, creators, producers and creative conglomeration complaining about a certain CHARACTER or ACTOR being available for a certain role...why not do what a bunch of divorced or widowed men do with their female companions...go younger? Oscar is the perfect template of young child dealing with trauma that shapes the rest of his life. Sure, he may have been too young, but the headlines in the New York Post alone would make him a temporary media darling with the "Where Are They Now" story every five or so years. But then again, with the local government and the communication control of their administration, they may want to hush the fact that a small child was about to be possessed by a painting.
So, instead of focusing on what the hell Stantz and Spengler have been doing for a quarter of a century while Manhattan has changed and suffered and changed and strived, why not focus on a young, cunning, hungry and passionate youth tracking down the one thing that scarred him at a very early age...ghosts? Ivan Reitman and the whole "Ghostbuster" creative collective already minted a perfect origin story in part II without event trying (as it was a story arc that didn't collect itself until the final act).
So, here's how I see the start of "Ghostbusters III"...
INT. NEW YORK PNEUMATIC RAILROAD - NIGHT
Oscar slowly paces through the vacant railway as night vision goggles line the way. His slow steps crush ages-old rubble and gravel under his deliberate progress. He hears faint howls in the distance.
OSCAR
C'mon you shiny, green bastard. I know you're here.
Granted this is a huge reduction of the writing that will make this movie an automatic success. But you get my point. Make the kid the primary focus. Uncle Ray, Uncle Egon, Uncle Winston, Mama and the very silent Uncle Pete not only shaped this kids motivations, but the men in his life could help busting ghosts his passion.
And think about it, doing a "Ghostbusters" in modern-day New York City...c'mon...how cool would that be? Fighting the sons of the Scoleri Brothers in Park Slope? Another Level 5 Phantasm in the Lower East Side? The newest population of ghosts that populate that city? C'mon, steal a page from Breaking Bad and use the city as a dynamic character. The possible story lines are more than bountiful...aside from being bitterly macabre.
Anyway, appropriate to the "season", I just think it's smarter to extend trilogies on a generational level. Why create a haphazard second trilogy when you already created the next extension of the saga? Oscar is your new Venkman, even though he takes the name of Barrett.
Just an idea...
Lessons Learned, my three things:
1) I should write these posts more often at 3AM.
2) Grass is grass, why worry about the shade of green?
3) I am (apparently) very passionate about Halloween.
Here's to more posts. Need to be better than I was yesterday. Talk later.
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