A brief bit of set-up with Peck and Mayor Mulligan. Peck points out that the city is gonna get a lot of money from the federal and state governments for letting them "borrow" NYC contractors, which pretty much undercuts Hizzoner's displeasure with the Ghostbusters being out of town during tourist season.
Even with my affection for the RGB Containment Unit, I think it makes perfect sense and is a nice call-back to have the ECTO-9's portable ECU be patterned off the "hole in the wall" ECU in the first movie. It's a great touch, and means we sorta get to "have our cake and eat it too"--the RGB ECU in the basement, the GB1 one in the ECTO-9.
"The Ghostbusters have been to Detroit before" on the same page as gremlins in an abandoned car factory. Sure, we hear about a "Red Gnome", but between that picture and the giant portrait of the president of Generous Motors over the Mayor's desk, we know what they really mean. It got them meet Aretha Franklin, after all, who's picture is also prominantly displayed in the office--just tribute to the Queen of Soul, after all. I bet those gremlins are still trying to crack that ugly shapechanging car.
Anyway, they're in the Mayor's office because there's a problem: the "haunted tour" at Fort Wayne is actually...gulp...haunted.
Cut back to New York, and a simmering subplot we haven't looked in on in a while. Ron "Jake Kong" Alexander and Jimmy "Eddie Spencer" Doesnthavealastnameyet test their new Dematerializer prototype on Larry the Crash Test Dummy, complete with a possible logo for the new group. It.... doesn't look to be a successful test. Looks like no shouts of "Let's go, Ghost Busters!" just yet.
We all know why Ray's so eager to go into Fort Wayne. He was hoping it would turn out even half as much fun as Fort Detmerring--it didn't, but it didn't get recut into a dream sequence either. Still, it gives him a great star turn and broadens his character a bit--his bluff to get into the Fort is the kind of ball-to-the-wall BS job that's usually Venkman's territory.
Man, some of the ghosts in this issue are
hideous. I wonder what dark corner of his imagination Dan reached into to pull these monsters out of, but man, it's effective.
You know I'm just kidding around, mrmichealt. Put down the musket. Please?
Anyway...the guy behind the haunting is General Anthony Wayne, for whom the Fort was named. He was a real guy. Look:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Wayne He's restless because he was shipped back to Pennsylvania for burial, but some of the pieces got lost in shipping. After giving up on the goal of getting himself together, he's decided to invade Canada. Because, after all, it's full of unAmerican things like hockey, Celine Dion, and affordable health care.
So...Venkman realizes he's not pulling his mandated level of BS this issue and starts spinning a pitch about a snake oil product called "Ahgotcha Juice" to lure the soldiers into ghost traps. Probably one of his Dad's old products--and ol' Charlie would no doubt be proud to know it worked, sucking in the entire spectral horde except Wayne himself. It's Winston, former military man himself, who convinces Wayne to accept being contained. A nice satisfying end to another great story.
We get the start of Tristan Jones' "Who Killed Laura Parr?" back-up story (the title a call-back to the 1990's show
Twin Peaks, and it's famous "Who Killed Laura Palmer?" tag line) which apparently starts sometime later relative to the main "Haunted America" arc. Ms. Parr apparently dies in an auto accident caused by a ghost, and we flash to the "present" (really about twenty years ago, of course) with Venkman arriving at a diner, and that's about it. I like Jones' version of Venkman here--it looks like a slightly grittier redesign of RGB Venkman than another "We'll make him look as much like Bill Murray as we can without being sued" clone. It even comes complete with Venkman's "Camping It Up" vest.