MAKE ME A WISH

Janine's Genie

Original Air date: December 6, 1986

Writers: Len Janson and Chuck Menville

Director: Richard Raynis

Main Cast:

·         Lorenzo Music as Peter Venkman

·         Frank Welker as Raymond Stantz

·         Maurice LaMarche as Egon Spengler

·         Arsenio Hall as Winston Zeddemore

·         Laura Summer as Janine Melnitz

·         Frank Welker as Slimer

(Rating 4 of 5)

Summary: On a routine call Janine decides she has had enough and wants the Ghostbusters to take her with them on a job.   Although surprised, the Ghostbusters agree and after a few missteps Janine even bags her first ghost.  Janine expressed a desire to be a full-time Ghostbuster, and the others tell her they will think about it.

Janine gets what she wanted!

                It turns out that the owner of the shop they were rescuing thought to call the Ghostbusters but didn’t think about how to pay them.  The poor broke owner offers the Ghostbusters to take anything from the shop, only Janine is excited about this and she picks out a lamp that is so ridiculous looking that the rest of the Ghostbusters chuckle at her at all the way home.

And this is why some businesses have you pay up front. If you don't pay learn to live with ghosts.

                Later when Janine is alone she is cleaning her lamp and a genie pops out.  Janine doesn’t believe this at first and unfortunately for her she doesn’t stick with her initial skepticism.  The genie is actually an evil ghost in in disguise who wants to bring his friends through a portal to ravage New York.  He is somewhat powerful though and he tells Janine he will grant her three wishes.  She tells him that her wish is that she were the boss of the Ghostbusters.  As a call comes in, the Ghostbusters are interrupted from spanking Slimer for stealing a watermelon, the four men come down all line up in front of Janine’s desk.  When Janine asked why they responded this way they reply by saying “well you’re the boss.”

Guys aren't impressed with Janine's payment choice.

                Janine decides to lead them on their mission to the airport but before she goes she makes a second wish to the genie, and this wish is for Egon to be crazy about her.  As they get to the airport they notice a two things that are very obvious.  The first is the airport is overrun with ghosts far more than normal.  The second is Egon has lost the ability to rationally function as a Ghostbuster when he is continuously distracted by how beautiful he thinks Janine is.

Okay maybe she wished too hard.

                The Ghostbusters chase ghosts onto a plane that takes off while the Ghostbusters are still hunting them.  The whole thing turns out to be a big misadventure that ends with a destroyed airplane but everybody survived miraculously.

Janine and her genie.

                New York City is now being over run with ghosts, the Ghostbusters track the problem to its source that happens to be their own firehouse.  Ray wonders if something is happened to the Containment Unit they quickly discover however that’s not the case.  The issues weren’t the Containment Unit, but rather in Janine’s lamp. Janine tries to get the genie to put the ghosts back, however the genie at this point reveals himself to be the villain of the story.  He gloats about his victory and disappears.  Ray finds a way they can use the combined power of their traps to reverse the flow the portal coming from the lamp, and Janine volunteers herself to make the connection.  She gets in there and the evil genie almost stops her but the Ghostbusters have her back and they send all the ghost back where they came from.

Janine might have cause the problem but she will solve it, unlike Peter.

                In the end they offer to make Janine a full-time Ghostbuster, but she decides to keep her current job.

My Take: I really enjoyed this episode Janine is a great character and it’s nice to see her take center stage for once.  It wouldn't be bad to see an entire episode from her point of view and not just as a wish fulfillment episode.  Although I really like the story I ranked it a four as opposed to a five because the writers’ tendency to forget that they're writing the Ghostbusters and not the Looney Tunes.  Yes it is a cartoon and yes it’s a comedy, but it’s important for writers to understand the difference between a cartoon like Batman and a cartoon like Duck Tales.

Now for my stray observations:

·         So Janine can whistle so hard she break glass including Egon’s glasses.  Does Egon carry a lot of glasses around with him?  Multiple pairs in his pocket?  I asked because his glasses are fine later.

·         Janine put her foot down and said she wants to go.  Do the Ghostbusters now have an answering machine?  They didn’t bring her to California with them because they need somebody answer their phone.  This is no longer a problem?  Who’s doing her job when she’s off hanging out with the Ghostbusters? Slimer?  He can be trusted with a watermelon.

·         I love that Janine has her own colored style jumpsuit even though her joining the Ghostbusters on this mission was spontaneous.

·         Also when and where she does she change into the jumpsuit?

·         When she and Winston fought the Sandman she used the proton gun on him even before he put her to sleep and her dream self took over.  So why was she having such a hard time using one now?

·         How powerful was the genie?  We didn’t see him do too many reality altering stuff so I don’t think he was that great.  The seemingly only extent of his power was the ability to minorly alter the minds of humans with false memories or ideas.  He convinced of the Ghostbusters that Janine’s their boss and he convinces Egon that he’s in love with Janine.  I don’t think the latter one was that much of an alteration he just changed Egon’s potential to react to something.

·         The scene where Slimer nearly get spanked is hilarious.

·         The plane scene is what I’m talking about when I said we need less Looney Tunes stuff.

This.  Less of this.

·         Okay, if Janine did allow them to make her to a full-time Ghostbuster, who would take her job?  Janine works around the clock.  There really should be more than one of her anyway, so who else can they possibly sucker into a job where they seemingly had to work 18 out of 24 hours a day.

It’s funny a few years back, before Harold Ramis died, I heard Dan Ackroyd talking about a third Ghostbusters movie where there was a new younger generation of Ghostbusters and their leader was a woman.  I wonder if this episode planted any seeds about that idea.