Someone you know is a ghostbusters fan in 2025
General Ambient
I am neck-deep in the sauce. Ghost pyjamas on, glow-in-the-dark spider sheets on, cheaply-made Hammer Dracula mug I bought this time last year breaking right on cue…Oh yes, it’s all going as planned.
Also, as an aggressive plush-collector, I finally got to snag one of my dreamies. It’s Build-A-Bear’s Pumpkin Kitty, and I’m so excited to unbox it! Pumpkin Kitty is a design that came out in 2010, which according to our calculations was 2 years ago. It was then discontinued for the rest of the decade and then re-released to what I can only describe as mass-hysteria. And so, the Pumpkin Kitties thus fell into the hands of the resale-scalping dick-cheeses that went on to re-enact the economic prosperity of Weimar Germany with them. But I got lucky this year! In the middle of October of all times! I’m still in disbelief typing this, I mean, really! So yes, he will be here to enspook my dungeon very soon! I’ve also been having the rest of my plushes out; usually I store them in the summer so the moths don’t get to them. Pumpkin Kitty will have to be the last plush I buy for a while, hopefully not for too long but a good while at least. I own a lot as is and I mainly try to but things that I know I can put away in a box.
Dancing with the Dead
Episode 16 has been started, with only some minor pauses for composition improvement. The improvised father-son reunion is as flamboyant as you’d expect it to be. As for the halloween treats, they’ll be ready for release when I sweep away the last bugs. They’re right on schedule.
Old Web Findings
After being educated of the Javascript Link (a royal pain in the ass to decode and actually, well, pull links from), I took to more rewarding things. There’s a lot of seasonal specials I’ve never seen, and I decided to take a break from sleuthing by…sleuthing for them instead. After some Charlie Brown, Garfield and several careful evasions of Mad Monster Party Rewatches…
I found my new favourite show. Next to Scooby-Doo, anyways.
The Real Ghostbusters
The Real Ghostbusters is a show about kissing the homies goodnight.
No, The Real Ghostbusters is the show that fan-fiction writers wish they could make but can’t, because everyone’s too busy getting pregnant.
No- Well, yes actually, but…
But also, The Real Ghostbusters is the show for me. I was a casual fan of Ghostbusters before but now I’m bustin’ 24/7, and Egon doesn’t even have to be on screen for it to happen. I’ve become utterly, autistically fixated on the whole thing, even the first film’s getting my love all over again. Learning that Dan Ackryod is autistic himself was like putting out fire with gasoline; I didn’t even know how badly I needed to hear stuff like this until now. It shows how much of my condition I’ve repressed, even with my pre-existing openness.
So yes, Ghostbusters! Egon’s my favourite, closely tailed by Ray, Winston and Janine. Peter would probably pick on me for being the hermit I am, so he can go last. I don’t hate him as a character, especially when I have to remember when Slimer exists.
Egon Spengler Quarantine Zone
Egon has TRASHED my ability to be normal about this show. I literally cannot talk about this thing without fucking gooning over him. It’s so fucking bad in here, like, send the Ghostbuster-busters. I’m dwowning!!!
Now going in, I already knew I was going to start sliming all over this man. He’s visibly my type and his vocal performance has me gawping like he’s personally crawled into my bedsheets. But what I didn’t expect was his characterisation. Somehow, through some dark wizard sorcery, the writers have made the most autistic thing I’ve ever seen in my life. I won’t stand for anything else, this man is autistic! I saw him stimming in the ECTO-1!
I am nowhere near the first to pick up on the accidental autism-representation going on here. As a result, I’ll inevitably hit the same beats as I go over this, but I hope to bring some new things to the table. If I had to summarise in a single sentence why I feel this way, I’ll put it like this. Egon is very dry and aloof, which is typical of his archetype, but then he has this discerning quality.
It’s the hyperawareness of one’s sensory world, and the hopeless overcorrections that come with trying to navigate it. It’s a studiousness only seen in autistics. To other characters, this makes him appear awkward and unapproachable. Ray openly states that Egon is “hard to talk to”. Egon takes things literally and at times can appear dour, especially to Peter and Winston. Egon can find things funny himself, but when he quips, he prefers double-entendres over conventional jokes. If anything, conventional jokes seem to feel wrong for him to even attempt. While he and the others slide down a snowy hill, all he can manage is a stifled “Uh-Cowabunga!”. There lies the asynchronicity, the sensation that he is uniquely not designed to do this. By default, a comfortable Egon speaks in effortless layers of tech-jargon. Like his movie counterpart, he continues to collect molds, spores and fungi. He speaks directly, regardless of how other characters react to it. He speaks with a heavy monotone, even for a character of his profession. He’s obsessed with being logical, and he strives for order no matter how otherworldly the situations get.
There’s a running theme here with Spengler, and it’s disconnection. While he feels a deep love and camaraderie for them, he feels an emotional disconnect from other Ghostbusters. Egon has to reiterate his jargon, his theories on a situation, and even his own feelings. Egon is the only Ghostbuster to see Slimer as a test subject, whereas Ray dotes on him and the other two despise him. Egon is at times irritable, and becomes guilty when this spills out onto the others. He knows his emotions, while they make sense for his species, are ultimately illogical. There’s a tragedy to Egon; he’s not just an awkward genius, but he’s actively covering for his sense of disconnection. He seems mostly content with his differences with others, but what really seems to drive him is his disconnection from logic itself. He treasures logic, and seems to use it as a means to self-soothe, much like the routine-seeking behaviours of autistics like myself.
His fixation on The Boogeyman proves this; it scared him so badly it’s what got him into ghosts in the first place. By learning about ghosts, Egon created an outlet for his emotions. By being a Ghostbuster, Egon can (semi-safely) make sense of his experiences and demystify them, thus giving him closure. To the extent an 80s’ cartoon can explore, the Boogeyman represents the inverse of Egon. Spengler is a typical adult human specimen that adheres to earthly physics. The Boogeyman terrorises the young of another species from the safety of a psychedelic pocket-realm, with next-to-no explanation for any of this. Emotionally speaking, when Egon contains a ghost, he contains the Boogeyman by proxy. Then after containing the Boogeyman itself, Egon can continue this with even more ghosts.
I don’t care about the politics of cartoons kissing but it slaughters me when he and Janine share a room. I don’t even care if they weren’t supposed to be a real thing, I love these two together. He’s the stiff straight-man nerd, but he also gets cuddles from Janine, dances with his friends and gets to be himself with minimal questions. I find that deeply comforting, and an incredible subversion of the nerd archetype. All of this, and he’s completely and utterly my type.
Design, story and effect
I also really love the ghosts. They look like the creatures of a Boschian dreamscape if it mingled with the terrors of Japanese hell. No two ghosts look alike, and for a show of this era, there’s a genuine sense of artistry here. They’re strongly complicated by the music and set designs, really selling the emptiness of these post-human entities.
The plots, like Scooby-Doo, follow the same formula. As a result, there’s lots of room for characterisation, fun between-the-action domestic bits and running gags. It’s just predictable enough but still capable of delivering surprises when it wants to. I can do a serialised show, but this is where I feel most at home. This is what I think most people need when the rest of life can be so uncertain.