Growing up, it was one of my all time favorite movies. Ghostbusters 2 was child friendly and innocent enough. Then I watched it as an adult and folks – it sucks dick.

We start enough 5 years from the previous movie. Dana, pushing a baby stroller you would never see in 2013, passes three people being assholes. It’s a set up for the entire “negative energy” message that is present throughout. Then, after pushing the stroller through pink slime, it takes off toward the center of a road. Ghostbusters. Then, Ray and Winston are boo’ed out of an 8 year old-filled birthday party.

This raises several questions. For one, does no one remember how 5 years earlier, these guys saved New York City? Remember how 9/11 happened? Imagine if on top of one of the towers, four guys with proton packs saved the whole day. Now, as crazy as that may sound, airplanes would have paled in comparison to a 100 foot marshmallow monster. If you saw the Michelin Man walking down 5th Avenue, stomping people to death and crushing buildings, then someone killed him (and somehow aimed his melted body at an EPA dick), would you boo these people a mere 5 years later?

No.

The second question that gets raised is that – if Dana and Peter did not work out, how do you write her back into the script AND include involvement with the supernatural villain? Oh, she just happened to drive her baby’s carriage over a slime puddle. Or she just happened to work at the museum where a possessed painting was on display. Or both. This is what is known as an “unbelievable premise” – where even if I choose to accept that ghosts exist, I must also accept that this lady is unrealistically unlucky.

Her misfortune in Ghostbusters 1 led her to the “boys in gray” after seeing their commercials. It was set up very well. Now, she just seems to be repeatedly placed in unfortunate situations.

Also, with Peter and Dana having broken up and not lived happily ever after, viewers don’t feel the same about the love interest. Relationships with break-ups usually don’t work out and aren’t special anymore. I never understood why they did that.

Back to the movie. Dana goes to Egon’s lab, where he studies what happens when he treats people like most doctor’s offices do. Dana appears rather homely and has shoulder pads.

Venkman has taken up a job as a TV host. One of his guests predicts that the world will end on New Year’s Eve – predicting Vigo’s plan. The other guest predicts that the world will end on February 14, 2016. That’s coming up and would make for a great sequel. But anyway, the woman reveals that she got the info from an alien, who got her drunk and took her to his room. Venkman encounters this movie’s prick and we see the Vigo painting brought into an art museum – where Dana works. Yanosh has a crush on Dana, also a continued theme from the previous film.

Ray, in addition to being booed by 8 year olds, owns an occult store and dresses as a 75 year old lady.

Venkman figures out Dana has come to them and sneaks over as a weird baby examination scene ensues. We are now explained that Dana and “Mr. Right” deprecated because he was in the orchestra. Must have been the nasal spray guy. They dig a big hole.

Then, Yanosh gets electrocuted by Vigo, who is obviously lip syncing his lines poorly. I would buy a life sized Vigo the Carpathian painting, though.

Ray finds a river of slime in the big hole. We see some special effects from the 90s. Then a shot of the World Trade Center going dark along with the rest of the city. The towers appeared in both Ghostbusters movies.

The Busters are in court as we see Winston – who is inexplicably gone as the chaos breaks up. Must not have been worth 11,500 a year. Louis also is introduced – as a lawyer now. He previously was an accountant – so he can’t make his mind up about his career path. He probably lost all of his clients after the shitty party from the last movie that ended with him possessed by a clumsy demon dog (that are intelligent, in human form but just roar and get petted in dog form).

Someone blows bubbles and more slime into the slime jar from under the table. Then, the Scoleri Brothers show up.

Their plan? Carry people short distances. Also, ghosts can cause explosions now, opposite of Ray’s rule that “it won’t hurt you.” The proton packs now make the “turning-on” noise anytime fired. They couldn’t get this right. So the ‘busters (minus Winston, who got da fuck outta there!) capture the Scoleri Brothers – and we never find out where they take them. They apparently have a new containment unit – and have their building back with full repairs and – for no reason – the logo holding TWO fingers out! This movie may be the second one but to these characters, back in business, this isn’t a sequel.

The next scene implies that Egon and Ray are gay and slept together with the pink slime, as an “experiment.” Winston says “It’s always the quiet ones.” The toaster begins dancing and Venkman begins joking every second. The scene ends with Ray yelling and a commotion – it makes no sense.

Peter visits Dana and Yanosh acts weird and talks to the painting. Peter makes a “green card” joke, since Yanosh is foreign and this isn’t 2014.

We get a glimpse of Oscar’s dick and the bath tub tries to “eat” them. It also folds like it’s rubber – even though it’s likely an iron or porcelain tub. Egon correctly identifies the atomic weight of cobalt as 58.9 and we see Oscar’s dick again, at Peter’s (Venkman).

Then, the Ghostbusters show up to the museum! Already? Don’t worry, it’s just to take readings. Even Winston has a new scanner that he uses – for 4 feet. He holds Yanosh the rest of the time. Vigo does something to Ray, and Peter acts like a loud moron. You expect Vigo to appear and start killing – but he doesn’t.

Peter returns home and is upset that Dana cleaned. Now, this movie gets one thing right, as Peter explains how there are many subtle levels of cleanliness. A romance sparks between Louis and Janene – who will be doing more than ringing the bell in this movie. She’ll be babysitting.

Ray and Egon decide on pizza, Chicago style. Then, the photos of Vigo catch on fire! Winston saves the day. We don’t get to see if they still ate that pizza but I would have liked Ray to say “Thai doesn’t sound so bad now.”

Sadly, a check of the timer reveals around 50 minutes left to go at this point. I have no idea how this movie got to be as long as it did, and I would stop the review now – if not for what’s to come.

The boys in gray (in yellow) try to cockblock Peter. Then, the three unsuccessful blockers head down into the sewers in a scene that horrified me as a child! Ernie Hudson’s acting is really good at this point, outshining the others. The ghost train comes through. Egon asks Winston if he got the number on the locomotive. As a kid, I paused the movie a million times trying to get that number.

“I used to have a room mate, but my mom moved to Florida.” The Ghostbusters arrive in their pajamas to interrupt Peter’s date. Bobby Brown sings his song (that actually charted. This is why I love the 90s).

The Ghostbusters explain the situation to the mayor. While these four men saved the city merely 5 years prior (from a giant walking monster marshmallow man, so everyone knows by now that ghosts are real). The mayor gives them two-closed minded minutes and leaves. Luckily, everyone doesn’t freak out when Winston steps up to explain all of this. They do freak out when they’re committed to the psych ward at Parkview, though.

Vigo smiles and grants Yanosh his approval to kidnap Dana, oddly.

“I don’t know why beautiful women love horses so much. Do you love horses” “No.” Dana catches a breeze on her hair through a door she has to open next. Yanosh takes Oscie.

The guy from As Good As It Gets that “found him in the basement garbage bin eating diaper shit” is here to, again, make it out like these four are insane. One issue with that…

Fun fact – that’s actually Bill Murray’s brother, Brian-Doyle Murray. He also played the mayor in the Ghostbusters Video Game, although I don’t recall if he was the same character, having become the mayor, or just the mayor. I knew this was Bill Murray’s brother but I couldn’t recall his name. Notice how Google immediately made me search elsewhere for an answer:

 

We get a cool scene as slime starts to cover the Manhattan Museum of Modern Art. Then, a different color slime goes across the city as the song “Flip City” plays. I went to Minnesota once as a young child, blasting the Ghostbusters 2 soundtrack though cassette the entire song. This was my favorite. Looking back, every song on that cassette was shit, especially this one.

We see the Titanic arrive and a young Ben Stein makes a cameo. The unusually short mayor says, “Somebody get me the Ghostbusters.” And it occurs to me that I would care so much more for this if Dana and Peter had been married when the movie began.

The boys get out of the psych ward and drive their really colorful car (Ecto 1A).

Egon goes from looking ravenous to being a rational genius in one camera cut. Watch it.

Now the movie takes an unusual turn. The boys decide that the Statue of Liberty is the only way to get inside the large slime shell. Ray and Winston use the stream setting to coat the entire statue’s innards. Why not use the spray setting? They do later, on Yanosh, where I felt a stream setting would have made more sense than spray.

Anyway, I’m not going to pick on the scale of the statue and all of that too much. I have too much other stuff to cover. For example, anyone that has ever seen the Statue of Liberty in a photo or real-life knows that if it took one step forward, it would fall head first into the ground, killing everyone inside. Imagine taking a step forward off of the top of a van, with your other foot literally (correct usage motherfuckers, stop abusing this word) stuck in the ground. Apart from this, the statue is around 100 feet from heel to head and the water near Ellis Island, to Manhattan, doesn’t seem to be beyond 70 feet deep in oceanic charts I actually checked for this review, so that gets a pass.

Now, when the statue is walking through the streets, it starts looking at people and even smiling!!

 

 

But close ups show the statue as stone faced as ever. What?

 

 

Slimer takes up a job as a bus driver to make the kids happy. Vigo begins to become an ugly baby, but the statue inexplicably strikes the top of the MoMA and the ‘busters rappel in. Yanosh gets hosed, again on the spray setting, and his words don’t match his lips. Peter admits that he’s already shit his pants and a bunch happens. Ray mentions the hell hounds as Vigo appears in physical form. They don’t slime him with good slime for some reason. He paralyzes the guys with a quick Hadoken and then has the worst hair ever.

Peter taunts this demon to delay him from eating (I assume?) the baby. But Vigo hits them with shit breath and they all spasm in agony (except Peter – he’s mildly inconvenienced and says “darn it.”) but the people outside start singing – and this ruins Vigo (and his skin). Vigo tries taking control of Ray but Winston saves the day by actually using his slime blower. At least, that’s what I would tell my kids if I were black.

We see a stupid, senseless painting in place of Vigo now. No reason.

Then, the guys walk outside to see the Statue of Liberty had fallen, killing hundreds. The people don’t care though and cheer the Busters! And we see someone cheering for a brief second behind them. We can’t tell who or why. But it’s the mayor – and they didn’t really point it out well that he’s a slime bag. Ha! Puns.

Yep. We finish with the statue perfectly fine and in place, reminding us that this was fake.