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I think I need to post this before I go any further:

Dr. Peter Venkman

Brains 2 Parapsychology 5
Muscles 2 Brawl 5
Moves 3 Seduce 6
Cool 6 Bluff 9

Goal: Sex

That's Venkman's write up in the old GBI game system (It was very crunch-lite). That sheet is sorta invalid in second edition, where Seduce became a Cool specialty, but I'm getting off subject here...

I got this game for Christmas in 1986, about the same time I'd become addicted to a cartoon called The Real Ghostbusters. It went a long way to "solidifying" how I thought of Peter Venkman. Not actually especially bright (2 is an average score in the GBI system), but man, look at that Cool score. When it comes to fast talking, and keeping his wits in a bad situation, he's unbeatable. Basically, I think Venkman not only rolled lots of 5 and 6s on his dice this issue, he probably blew--and then earned--lots of Brownie Points. Venkman's so easy to play as a libertine buffoon--I know, I've done it a time or three myself--that we forget he's also got incredible social skills. He's lazy, not stupid.

There's a lot going on in the outside world--Winston, Ray, and Egon are still trying to get the Whittingtons, DiTillio, Madame LaFarge, Leda, the Carter kids, and more injokes I'll leave to mrmichaelt to point out, to safety, meaning outside Ghost World and into the slightly less unsafe environment environment of Schenectady (Schenectady Schenectady heh hehhehheh heh...)--as in the landscape of Venkman's mind, he and the Manitou are having an epic showdown.

Venkman is invited into his old Weaver Hall office (complete with "Venkman Burn In Hell" graffiti on the door) for a chat by the Manitou. The critter is wondering why Venkman isn't scared, since, you know, the Manitou is about to eat his soul and his friends are about to die blah blah blah. Venkman tries to talk sports; it isn't really the Manitou's thing, but it does provoke him to conjure up the Umpire from "Night Game" to attack the other Ghostbusters.

The Manitou sneers. It thinks it knows why Venkman isn't scared: it pulls the "You've lost what you care about most anyway, right?" card and conjurs up the image of a woman playing a cello. "I can't make it more obvious who this is, you know...IDW doesn't have the right to use Dana Barrett in their stories, even though I can't see why not since it's not like they have Bill Murray's likeness rights either." To which Venkman responds "Intellectual properties lawyers can be a low species of life". Okay, the last two sentences aren't in the story, but the next part is:

Venkman tells the Manitou he's figured it out: he has to be afraid before the critter can get about to the "devouring his soul" part. It pulled every trick in the book--the familiar locations, the old lost love ploy, even card tricks...and Venkman didn't crack. Cool 6 was just too much for it.

The Manitou freaks, doffing it's zombie Venkman form and revealing itself as a giant brain bug. About this same time, the Ghostbusters have scored a proton hit on the possessed body, causing the Manitou to declare that "WBOO, the Big Boo, is on the air!" as it manifests the form of "The Unreal Shriek Squeal" from "Station Identification". Of course, just about then Venkman shakes off the brain bug, and the other Ghostbusters pull the plug on it by trapping it for real this time.

As an epilogue, Janine (wearing a more conservative outfit she wore a few times in the show, most notably for this case "Doctor, Doctor"--several characters from that episode make cameos) visits Venkman in the hospital. We find out as an aftereffect of the possession, he's actually in better shape than before...aside from the whole cracked ribs, broken arm, and appendectomy thing...and got to rub Peck's "physical requirements" thing in his face. Janine turns to leave as Venkman opens his gift from Ray...a stuffed monkey from the Theme Park From Hell. She gets a satisfied smirk as he starts screaming invective.

It's one more time I wish this was a cartoon. I mean, sheesh, the late Lorenzo Music would have earned his paycheck on this one. Imagine him voicing not only Venkman in the inner world, the Manitou while it was doppleganging (I bet that's not a real word) Venkman's form, and the possessed Venkman in the outside world. Usually it was Frank Welker or Maurice LaMarche doing most of the talking to themselves. (Dave Coulier handle this script? Bwahahahahah...shyeah, right).

I gotta get my little nit picks in.

Mrmichaelt, Kingpin, and others agree it appears that, in the tiny type on Venkman's wrist band, his Date of Birth is listed as "11/21/..." something. Which doesn't make much sense, as that's Harold Ramis's birthday. Bill Murray's is 9/21. I would have been deliriously happy in the unlikely event the RGB-derived birthdate of October 24th was used.

(For what it's worth: Bill Murray was born on September 21, 1950. The GBI game suggested Venkman was born sometime in 1954. A date of October 25, 1956 has been attributed to RGB Venkman, but it's source may be fan-based; it does match the mention of Venkman being a Scorpio in "Mean Green Teen Machine", though--and admittedly, November 21 also matches that, but, again, it's Ramis's birthday, and RGB/EGB Egon's birthday as established by "Back In The Saddle". I used a combination of the GBI and RGB dates for a birthdate of October 25, 1954 in the Original Timeline.)

The Portable Ecto Containment Unit vehicle is neat looking. I'm just not sold on naming it "ECTO-2". For the last twenty-plus years, ECTO-2 has referred to either the Ghostbusters mini-helicopter, which was pretty cool, or as a trivia note for the original name of ECTO-1A (possibly changed as to not contradict the cartoon ECTO-2). I'd really prefer if IDW used the name, to have it be for something closer to the earlier ECTO-2. Call this neat new vehicle ECTO-3 because the ECTO-3 toy, a go-cart with paddles, was super lame; and the cartoon ECTO-3, a motorized unicycle with a sidecar for Slimer, was even lamer. It'd be neat to have an ECTO-3 that's actually awesome. Or even call it ECTO-9 because it's the next one after ECTO-8 from the Video Game.

(I mean, hey, Now turned on a dime when they referred to their own ECTO-3, but by the time it actually appeared two months later they were calling it ECTO-4--which is the second coolest Ghostbuster vehicle after the ECTO-1 itself)

Back next month, for the beginning of the Rogerpocalypse.

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I was almost right about one part of it...I'd guessed RGB...but then my head utterly exploded when I read the dialog

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Ha ha! That's about how I imagined your reaction to be. When I saw the last name, I blinked to adjust my contacts then my jaw dropped.

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So Eugene Visitor has been hiding at his Father's place for 20 years? Or did he drop out of time and just reappear recently? Spengler says he vanished at the scene of the accident, and reappears looking presumably the same age but this was kinda murky for me. The backup story actually helped a lot in understanding the, uh, "science" behind part of the event but I felt that the time displacement could've been explained a little better.

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But man, the looks on the faces of my brother and a couple of my friends when I show them this thing.

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Eugene was a time traveler and not a ghost was a wild turn of events

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Was it a dwarf or something? Why did he vanish? And crap, that was epic weaving Vigo into the story. The ending was so sick. "Death."

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Issue #8

COVER A
*A Crunch bar is in one of Egon's pockets, referencing his love of junk food
*The ads are for "The Hound of Blubbervilles," a play on "The Hound of Baskervilles" who also appeared on "Elementary My Dear Winston"
*Groucho from Sesame Street?

COVER B
*The cover references The Doors' "Morrison Hotel" and Gozer

PAGE ONE
*The Ghost Actor trio from "Lights, Camera, Haunting!" are among the senior citizens waiting outside the rest home.
*The portrait of Charles Foster Hearse from "Ghostbuster of the Year" hangs in the hallway
*Past Charles is the portrait of the woman from "Mrs. Roger's Neighborhood" who becomes demonic behind Winston's back.
*Peter walks near the Painting of the Trustees from Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Realistic Version
*Behind Ray is a portrait of the Hotel Boudreaux from "Play Them Ragtime Boos"

PAGE TWO
*The door knocker of the Doomsday Door from "Knock, Knock" sans nose ring appears on one of the doors.
*A portrait of the melting clock dimension from "The Cabinet of Calamari" hangs in the hallway

PAGE THREE
*On the mantle lies the Stone Angel Head from Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Realistic Version
*Also on the mantle is the Statue of Liberty torch lamp seen in Peter's apartment during Ghostbusters II
*On the last panel is the Whistling Bust of Mausch from Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Realistic Version

PAGE FOUR
*Winston references his famous "Yes!" line from the first movie and the bust from Issue #2 involving Slimer.

PAGE SEVEN
*Egon references the events of the first arc, involving Gozer and Idulnas.
*The guestbook is turned to a page with the infamous bad English text that you see at the end of the Ghostbusters NES video game.

PAGE EIGHT
*Power Guy from "Station Identification" is plastered on one of the arcades
*The Ghostbusters arcade lies nearest to Egon
*A Slimic Net from "Adventures in Slime and Space" is standing upright near Egon
*Next to the net is Zedekiah Spengler's hat from "Egon's Dragon"
*On the poster board are
**PCOC file photos seen in previous issues
**photos of the Mandala nodes from The Video Game
**Egon's critique of the Firehouse from the first movie
**the list of parts for the Containment Unit Egon read out in the "Citizen Ghost" flashback
**obscured by Zedekiah's hat is Tristan Jones' Tobin art he did of Tony and Nunzio Scoleri
*Peter is wearing the robe his animated counterpart wore in "Mr. Sandman, Dream Me a Dream"
*Winston refers to the Da Vinci Sleep Cycle, and Egon mentions the scientifically known term of the Polyphasic Schedule.
**Coincidentally, in Ghostbusters: The Video Game, at the start of the library level, Egon mentions he's had time to make prototypes due to an ongoing experiment where he sleeps an average of 14 minutes a day.
*Peter's mug references the "World of the Psychic" show from Ghostbusters II

PAGE NINE
*On a bulletin board is a notice for free Jaguars tickets. This is the baseball team the animated Winston watched in "Night Game"
*Another notice is for the Great Strazinski from "You Can't Teach an Old Demon New Tricks"
*Egon uses Belascu shaving cream referencing Belascu's Unruly Beard from Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Realistic Versions

PAGE TEN
*Once more, are the Law Offices of Ballard Wright from the Tainted Love one-shot and Casey Jones' Coffee and Books, a ghost from "Last Train to Oblivion"
*Janine's relatives (minus her nephew) from "Janine's Day Off" walk past the gym. Grannie Melnitz is behind Roger and Janine.
*Dewey LaMort's car from "Ghost Fight at the O.K. Corral" is parked on the street across from the ice cream truck
*The ice cream truck is from "Troll Bridge"
*Between the truck and Egon, with is back to the reader, is Andre Wallance (The Stiff) from the first movie.
*Janine mentions the racquetball court at Delgado's, referencing her hobby as revealed in the first movie.
*Roger Baugh is visually based on the Extreme Ghostbusters design of Egon Spengler and his last name is taken from Fritz Baugh of The Ectozone website
*As Egon walks away, he goes past the Party Troll from "Troll Bridge"
*Now across the street is Ecto-Junior from "Halloween II 1/2"

PAGE 11
*Ann Lawson and Posey from "The Revenge of Murray the Mantis" are in the crosswalk
*Among the crowd waiting to walk is Ray Cougar from "Rollerghoster"
*The two bums from the deleted scenes of the first movie are present
*Janine's car is parked near the bums

PAGE 12
*Little girl looks like Irma from "The Halloween Door"
*Old Man in suit is the bystander Egon prodded in the Sedgewick Hotel hallway in the first movie
*One can references the Extreme Ghostbusters episode "Grease" which featured a Gremlin
*Another can references Killerwatt from "Killerwatt"
*A third can references Shubs, a race destroyed by Gozer as mentioned by Vinz Clortho to Egon and Janine in the first movie
*A sticker references WUGH FM, the radio station invaded by the Sandman in "Mr. Sandman, Dream Me a Dream"
*The Vigo painting makes another appearance, this time in full view

PAGE 13
*Mr. Visitor's house is visually based on Mrs. Roger's house from "Mrs. Roger's Neighborhood"

PAGE 14
*Behind Egon is a Wagner's Occult Shop, seen in "The Collect Call of Cathulhu"
*The car that hits Eugene is based on Christine from writer Stephen King

PAGE 15
*A Limburger's Special Recipe Mac & Cheese box references Charles Von Limburger's business from "The Hole in the Wall Gang"

PAGE 18
*Precious from "Mrs. Roger's Neighborhood" flies above the house

PAGE 20
*The translator's name appears to be an amalgam of uncredited writer Jean-Marc Lofficier and character Lucien from "Ghostbusters in Paris"

PAGE 21
*The mention of exposing fraudulent spiritualists mirrors the career of Sam Hain, mentioned in a PCOC file from Issue #5
*John Horace Tobin encountered a Grundel, a character from The Real Ghostbusters "The Grundel" and Extreme Ghostbusters "Grundelesque"
*Tobin met Vladimir Belascu, referencing Belascu's Unruly Beard from Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Realistic Versions
*The meeting with Belascu led to the Tunguska Blast of 1909, referenced at the end of the first movie

PAGE 22
*The sorcerer from the west is none other than Vigo

PAGE 23
*Leon Zundinger is mentioned, whose work was researched in Ghostbusters II
*In the soldier's room, to the left of Mikhael is the Genevieve tapestry from "Hard Knight's Day"
*Tobin holds his Tobin's Spirit Guide

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Was it on purpose (an homage) Death was at the head of the Soldier's bed in the final pages of the story?

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Eugene somehow had the same sack from the folktale or if he didn't, how the heck did he trap Death?

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