THE GHOSTBUSTERS IN JAPAN

Attack of the B-Movie Monsters

Original Air date September 21, 1991

Writers: Jules Dennis and Richard Mueller

Director: Raymond Jafelice

Main Cast:

• Dave Coulier as Peter Venkman
• Frank Welker as Raymond Stantz
• Maurice LaMarche as Egon Spengler
• Buster Jones as Winston Zeddemore
• Kath Soucie as Janine Melnitz
• Frank Welker as Slimer
• Rodger Bumpass as Louis Tully

(Rating 4 of 5)

Summary: The Ghostbusters have been summoned to Japan deal with monsters that have been attacking.  The Japanese Government goes all out even giving the Ghostbusters the Ecto-Ichi, a super advanced Ecto-1, to use in Japan.  The Ghostbusters defeat one of the monsters and then run into a young kid who knows of their origins.

Monster

                It turns out Ectoplasm has been leaking in the old studios that produced the monster movies.  This is causing a number of movie monsters to emerge in real life forcing the Ghostbusters to fight them.  The Ghostbusters need extra power to boost their packs so they can destroy the main monster, who looks a lot like Godzilla. So they go to the Japanese electrical tower that looks a lot like the Eiffel Tower.  They lose their new car in the battle but defeat the monsters.

Top Monster

My Take:  It’s a bit ironic that the Ghostbusters original animation team was in Japan.  Yet this episode was made after they were replaced, kind of sad.

                Now for my stray observations:

•       I knew when we saw that kid being picked on in the beginning, he was going to be the hero, sort of obvious.
•       Back in the 1980s there was a fear that Japan was flying miles of head of us technology wise.  Their really nice Ecto car, that was like the Back to the Future Part II DeLorean, was a symbol of that fear.
•       So mix ectoplasm with film and the characters come to life.

A fun little episode.