OMFG it’s true though O.O

CHRIS HEMSWORTH as KEVIN BECKMAN in GHOSTBUSTERS (2016)

Star Wars // Ghostbusters AU

Who ya gonna call?

Ghostbusters Text Posts (5/???)

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Bonus Kev:

☆  The Conductors of the Metaphysical Examination, a.k.a, The Ghostbusters  ☆

Ghostbusters Halloween Appreciation Post

“I didn’t think that I would ever really have a friend until I met Abby and then I feel like I have a family…”

Headcanon that two or three times a year the Ghostbusters do like an open house for girls interested in science and the station house is just FLOODED with girls, wee ones all the way up to awkward high schoolers and college kids.

Each Ghostbuster gives a 20 minute lecture on their particular specialty–Erin does a boiled down Physics lessons, Abby talks about the supernatural, Patty talks about history, and Holtz gives gadget demonstrations. And for 80 minutes all the girls watch in wonder because they have FEMALE SCIENCE HEROS. Then after they do a Q&A and after that do photos and autographs and station tours. They raffle off a ride in Ecto-1 to a lucky group of three kids.

Each time they do it it gets more and more popular until they literally have sign ups and a waiting list for it. The women are just flabbergasted by how popular it is, but then they remember how going into STEM was for them (or in patty’s case, how awful STEM was to women) and they get why their open houses are important. So they keep doing them. And girls keep coming.

Girl Scout troop visits.

Girl Scouts earning their Ghostbusting badges. And Local History badges. And Engineering badges.

The Ghostbusters taking turns leading their local Girl Scout troops.

Girl Scouts.

Ghostbusters.

Who wants to talk to me about the day the Girl Scouts of Night Vale make the trip to Ghostbusters Open House Day?

I’d promised not to do spoilers, but I’m taking a break from that promise to talk about the main villain of Ghostbusters and how anyone saying he’s a bad character is quite simply wrong. Also much talk about Patty Tolan because I see posts about Gilbert’s and Yates’s involvement, but not hers. So, even if I keep things as vague as possible, spoiler warning. (I have tagged this “Ghostbusters spoilers” if you want to quickly blacklist.)

Rowan North is a white man. He is unhappy about life. He considers himself worth more than he gets from the people around him and has experienced bullying. All this has brought him to regard himself with a certain grandeur of the misunderstood genius and if society won’t give him its acknowledgement and praise, then he will destroy society. In the most bombastic way possible literally with his own personal army.

I’m seeing reviews that act like North is not well-motivated. All of the above is all you need to know about the character to understand his motivation and all of it is in the movie, though I concede that one needs contextual understanding to put the pieces together. But every one of us should have that contextual understanding. Are there people who by any chance don’t engage with the news? “Rowan North” is the guy who every half a year or so shoots up a concert, a movie theater, a school, a center, and wherever it is folks gather. Or is this about engaging with the news too much? And what is complained about is the emptiness detected when suddenly the story doesn’t talk about “Rowan North”’s childhood and hobbies.

Like, the concert case? Where North walks casually through the crowd, being greeted and greeting people in return when he’s actually there to kill as many as are going to be caught up in his Day of Reckoning scheme? Not subtle at all. It frightens me there are people who don’t pick up on this. Or demand more of him.

I will keep saying as long as is necessary that the quality of the 2016 movie is to be placed in context of the 80s movies. And if we do that? Gozer is a primordial entity worshipped by the population of the Mediterreanean-Middle East in The Old Days, though somehow is kinda white. Not that the situation would improve with a racially accurate actor, but I’m tired of this reduction of culture to props. It’s so very Lovecraftian (let me tell you about how much I hate that names like “Dagon” and “Tiamat” sooner associate with horror than a beautiful piece of history). Its demigod servants are Zuul and Clortho. Gozer’s storyline is that they’re an ancient evil that wants to kill us all because that’s what ancient evils do. For Gozer to get access to our world, their demigod servants first have to possess two humans, a “gatekeeper” and a “keymaster”, for what is heavily implied to be a ritual involving sex. Because why the heck not. And without consent of the hosts whatsoever.

Vigo the Carpathian is barely better. The Mediterreanean-Middle East is exchanged for neighborino East Europe. “The Carpathian” still sounds nicely “other”. His goal is a reign of terror, somewhat for revenge but mostly because that’s just how he is. He too goes the “minion, get me access to this realm”-route by abducting a baby for body hijacking.

How the bleeping hexagon can you consider either of these two well-written but Rowan North “unfinished” (the people saying this tend to praise the 1984 movie)? North’s the better villain, whether you like the fact he’s a white American man from the present or not. I assume the problem is that the racist & xenophobic fantasy of the inhumane powerful other in the end soundly defeated by the casual-but-secretly-awesome self not only is not applied, but that this round the villain is that casual-but-secretly-awesome self. And this villain could be the person standing next to you and you’re the neighbor who’ll one day be interviewed whether you saw it coming (spoiler: you didn’t), but just as easily it is the person within you. That’s not a story as easy to accept as the dangerous yet inferior foreigner.

There’s probably also something to be said about a reversal of gender and gender performance considering Gozer’s gender-ambiguity and Vigo’s hyper masculinity (I recall him being called butch?) compared to Rowan’s “just a guy” as well as the 1984 gender (performance) dynamics of the heroes vs the 2016 ones, but I’m not the one for that task.

And this is where I’m bringing in Tolan. Admittedly, there’s a note of sympathy to have for North in the sense that you end up asking “Did this have to happen?”. The receptionist and the waitresses paint a lonely picture of rejection, but the concert-goers demolish that picture. And so does Tolan. Because Tolan is like North, “stuck” in an unappreciated job and smart enough to know that maybe they don’t belong there, even if there’s no feasible way onwards. But where North goes for the apocalypse, Tolan doesn’t falter to smile to every patron even if they ignore her. That’s why North talked to her. He sympathizes with her because she’s like him, but she disgusts him because she’s not bitter or vengeful. He literally promises her she’ll be among the last of his victims, getting extra time, but being worthy of death all the same.

Patty Tolan is a black woman. I can’t name a case in which a black woman is the aggressor, but I can name plenty in which they are the victim. Dear Tolan remains polite, not recognizing the danger. She does keep an eye on him for his odd behavior and sees him go on the tracks. Presuming a suicide attempt (I think? If so, foreshadowing), she goes after him herself and that way comes into contact with the paranormal. She survives and keeps control of the situation by getting herself help from experts, thereby being a parallel to Dana Barrett. But where Barrett got the sexualized damsel-in-distress treatment, Tolan takes her steps self-consciously to always be with the situation. She doesn’t send the ghostbusters to the ghost, she takes them to it, and after that joins them on her own initiative and on her own conditions. It is her unique encounter with North that lets her later identify him and get her team to his lair timely. The confrontation is one of multiple stages and one has the ghostbusters offer him sympathy and a way out, which of course he doesn’t take because that’s not what he’s been fantasizing about. And if you’ve seen the movie, you know the rest of the story.

I am not commenting on the matter of Patty having or lacking a degree, because an education would not make it impossible for her to be a subway worker, but Patty being an everyman is of relevance to the story. Because only by being in that unassuming role, she was someone North thought he could vent his arrogance on, which ended up being the biggest mistake in his entire scheme. It bought the ghostbusters time, brought them knowledge, and got them Patty Tolan on their team. If we look at Zeddemore’s role as an everyman in the 1984 movie, then we see someone who does not contribute anything unique in that form. All the role does is create more room for Venkman and, by making Zeddemore join for money and explicitly not genuine commitment, for part of the movie he has this potential to become the traitor hanging over him. This is played up at the end where his “arc” is resolved by him getting enthusiastic about the job. But if anyone is the traitor in the 2016 movie, it is Gilbert, who, despite being the narrative lead, also is opportunistic and selfish until she makes the jump and the one contributing nothing unique. Yates is the core that the others flocked to. Holtzmann is the gadgeteer. And Patty is the perspective. Maybe my memory is failing here, but I can’t think of a thing Gilbert adds that is inherent to her. This doesn’t make Gilbert a bad character, but her personal journey is far more significant to her presence than her team contributions. And from there, notwithstanding that the movie follows Gilbert, notwithstanding what each member of the team had to overcome and accomplished, but Patty Tolan is the hero of the movie. Because she was promised to die and not only she didn’t, but no one else died either thanks to her.

Whether Tolan ultimately is a good character and treated fairly by the narrative is a discussion not for me and larger than the observation I wanted to write down. Feel free to comment. Although I would like to take the moment, speaking as a chemist, to ask people to stop emphasizing that Patty is the only one who isn’t a scientist. Because she’s an historian and I fail to see how someone with my skills would be more “admirable” than someone with Patty’s skills. It’s right to point out how Patty’s differences combined with her being the only non-white ghostbuster are othering, but urgently please put an end to “Scientist > Historian”. As for Rowan North, in short, he’s an excellent villain with clear motivations and I worry about those who act like he isn’t. On an individual level and a societal level.

Listen, Ghostbusters passes every test I can think of for the treatment of women in media.

Bechdel Test: All the women have a lot of conversations about things other than men. Like ghosts, and cadavers, and technobabble.

Sexy Lamp Test: None of the women can be replaced by a sexy lamp and have the plot remain intact.

Mako Mori Test: All the women have a narrative arc about busting ghosts and gaining respect, with the separate arc of Erin and Abby re-gaining their friendship, and neither arc supports a man’s story.

Furiosa Test: The movie pissed off manbabies on the internet.

Basically, this movie is a gift.

I am a HUGE fan of the Furiosa Test. 

omg the Furiosa Test is the BEST

It even passes a test you left out: I've seen two versions of the Mako Mori test, and the other one is "Two characters of color have a conversation not about White people."

squad goals

I can’t stop thinking about Patty in Ghostbusters. I was worried she was going to be a sort of stereotypical “street smarts” character, but instead she was just a massive adorable history nerd who showed up like “I HAVE READ EVERY BOOK IN THE LIBRARY AND I HAVE AN ENCYCLOPAEDIC KNOWLEDGE ABOUT THIS CITY FROM THE BRICK UP.” You just know she’s the type of friend who would have incredibly overzealous discussions about the development of the textiles industry in NYC while all her friends smile and listen patiently. Investigating a haunted house? Patty’s got it covered. She already knows every nasty thing that happened there since 1873 and will proudly inform you that they suffered a cheese shortage in the summer of 1901. Is it relevant? No, but she has waited literal years for a chance to use all this knowledge and by God it is her moment to shine. Idk, I just really related to her because I always get people asking ‘but what will you DO with that’ when I tell them I study history, and I feel useless and self-conscious as compared to my friends who are in the fields of science of medicine. I was just so happy to see a history nerd who was treated as just as smart and useful and important as the others. 

You know Public Works has an entire file cabinet for Places That Should Have a Historical Marker (And Supporting Documentation) Submitted by Patty Tolan.

oh boy help me

Someone just sent me a URL to a video about “Why it’s important to be honest about Ghostbusters.”

It’s a 14 minute video, and I’m not spending 14 minutes out of my life watching a video some rando sends to me without a word of explanation, especially when all the top comments on the video are things to the effect of “Great video, I agree with everything, except the wage gap isn’t real.” 

But don’t worry, folks! I’m also not about to dismiss it without giving it a chance. See, I don’t need to be convinced. I already agree with the premise: it is important to be honest about Ghostbusters.

It’s important that we point out that this movie is a huge and affirming love letter to geeks and geek culture, unlike the male version from 1984 in which nerds were losers, punchlines, stooges, and bad guys, in which even the nerdy good guys (Ray and Egon) were the butt of jokes for their gullibility (Ray) and “weirdness” (Egon) and existed only to make the cool slacker look good.

It’s important that we point out that everything people say they like about the male version—stuff like great comedians given free license to riff off of scenes and each other and create their own characters and chemistry—is fully present in this movie. 

It’s important that we point out that everything we’re supposed to hate about Ghostbusters—low-brow humor like slapstick comedy and jokes about body parts and body functions, all the problems stemming from the arrogance or ignorance of men, the whole world-threateing ghost infestation plot actually stemming from technology created by a disaffected man—was also present in the boy version.

It’s important that when people say things like, “I don’t object to female characters, but there’s no reason to change the gender of established characters,” that we challenge this statement which is either ignorant or dishonest, as the four characters in Ghostbusters are all original creations, not gender-swapped analogues of the ones from the male version. 

There’s no female Egon, no female Winston, no female Ray, etc. This is part and parcel of why Paul Feig went with a fresh take: those characters already exist, and they are so iconic there’s no reason to try to do them again.

It’s important that we’re honest about its flaws—and it does have them, I mean, every movie does—but part of that honesty is admitting that the male Ghostbusters was also flawed.

It’s important that we’re honest about what it means for so many women, including the often-overlapping categories of female geeks and queer women, to be able to go see a movie with women like ourselves as the heroes, to see them overcoming challenges that aren’t just a bunch of gift-wrapped misogyny, sexualized violence, demeaning language, body shaming, etc, to see them just be the heroes for once.

It’s important that we’re honest in pushing back against the noisy narrative that says the marketing was “nothing but girl power and misandry”, that the movie itself is nothing more than that.

Let’s be honest about Ghostbusters: the hate is trumped-up, the excuses for the hate paper-thin, the majority of the negative user reviews are faked, the people pushing a biased narrative are the ones who staked their soul on the movie sucking from the day it was announced, and the desperate and increasingly sexist and racist backlash against it is getting louder now because the positive buzz from people who’ve actually seen it is likely to make it the same kind of slow-burning build-up that have propelled previous Paul Feig releases to certified hit status.

If I’m going to be honest about this movie (and I’ve been making the case for this whole post about doing just that)… no, it’s never going to take the place of the male version in my heart. Why? Because I saw the boy Ghostbusters when I was 5 or 6 and so for basically my whole life, my whole family has walked around quoting it. If you average out the times I’ve seen it over the years I’ve been alive, it’s probably more than once a year. It’s hard to beat a thirty yer head start. 

But there’s a whole generation of kids seeing Ghostbusters, their Ghostbusters, for the first time. And if we’re going to be honest, it’s more about them than it is about us. They’re seeing a movie in which women are respected and have agency, not used as prizes to be pursued. They’re seeing a movie in which geeks are vindicated, and the people who mock them are the bad guys. They’re seeing a movie in which the queer-coded characters aren’t the bad guys, for once. They’re seeing a movie in which age and physical shape are not disqualifiers for a woman’s personhood.

And let’s be honest: this is all a good thing.

So, Patty Tolan?

Patty Tolan.

The other ghostbusters are scientists, right?  They’re there because Science!, or maybe in Holtzmann’s case because Boom!.  Basically all the plot has to do for Abby and Erin is dangle the chance to do real, replicable science in front of them while removing any excuse to drag their feet.  So tangible ghost + fucking fired = done.

But Patty’s not a scientist.  Patty’s got a decent job, even if it’s obviously not what she wanted out of life.  Patty’s motivation appears to be that she’s basically just a good person and responsible citizen?  I mean, obviously she wants some excitement, and to feel like she’s making a real difference, but seriously.

We first see her stuck in her little booth, trying to be cheerful and positive at commuters who appear largely indifferent, until one guy comes along who’s clearly having some sort of mental health crisis.  She stays pretty cheerful, she’s kind to him, and then she gets out of her booth and goes looking for him when he disappears and she reasonably assumes he’s in trouble. 

Like, she could very easily have called it in and washed her hands of the situation.  It’s not her fault/problem that maybe the transit cops won’t get there in time to help if this guy’s suicidal or delusional.  I’m pretty sure people doing her job aren’t even supposed to leave their booths on-shift.  But no, she gets out and goes after this bro just in case.

And meets a ghost.  A terrifying ghost.  Who scares the dick out of her.

I mean, what happens in the Aldrich Mansion? The tour guide tells his boss, who goes to Erin.  Then they stay as far as possible from the scene while the women investigate.  Patty goes herself, on her own time.  Maybe her bosses didn’t believe her, maybe she knew she’d be dismissed and didn’t bother trying to explain what she saw, but she knows something’s up, and she takes it on herself to do something about it.  And then she goes back to the scene of the haunting with them, to see what happens.

Every time they turn around, she’s handing them useful facts and history about the sites they’re investigating.  Her interest in the city is keen and backed up by extensive knowledge.  Hell, when she runs into something that shouldn’t be happening and she can’t explain, the first thing she does is head for the likeliest source of expertise to learn about it.  She’s excited by it–it’s scary and maybe dangerous, but it’s new and interesting and she wants to figure it out.

Like, Abby might want recognition on top of that, and Erin so desperately wants to be believed that she risks the scientific mission for a shot at it, but Patty just wants to fucking know.

And she feels a genuine duty to help, too.  She might not be able to build a ghost-blasting plasma-cannon, but she notices when a teammate’s mood is in the toilet and takes steps to address it.  She knows the ghost-booster isn’t supposed to be in her subway, and that this is important.  When things get ridiculously dangerous, and city hall’s smearing their names in the press, and she’s still not getting fucking paid for this, she never even looks tempted to say fuck this shit and go home.  Her little monologue about going back to her booth is more to soothe/trick the ghost standing on her fucking shoulders than sincere.

Patty’s first instinct is to pool resources, and look after people, and encourage everyone to bring what they’ve got to the table.  She might be disappointed or angry when nobody meets her halfway–the concert crowd drops her, and nobody acknowledges her compliments when she’s in her booth–but it doesn’t stop her from bringing her A-game.  When the squad rolls out to save the world, it’s wearing her uniform and driving her car.

Just Patty Tolan, everybody.

I saw GhostBusters a couple night s ago and it was amazingggg!!! If you know what’s good for you, you’ll go see it too!! 

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