- July 22nd, 2016, 6:57 am#4873240
EDIT 15/08/2016
Hey guys. I've put a little (a lot) of work into this story and composed a full blown story with a foreword and detailed afterword. Check it out please and give me your thoughts.
A4 size link and A5 size link
I also gave this a new thread because I think it deserves one: viewtopic.php?f=39&t=42087
ORIGINAL POST
Hello all. Long time lurker, first time poster. How are you?
Somewhere through my second viewing of the new Ghostbusters film I realised this is not actually a reboot, but something much more exciting. The universe of GB84, GB2, the Video Game, the IDW comic series, and GB16 form a cohesive timeline with just a few missing pieces.
Rich subtext running throughout the Paul Feig sequel centres on the premise that the original team were finally defeated some years ago.
i.e. They lost.
I'll refer to Greek mythology for the likely culprit. Lethe is the embodiment of oblivion. The daughter of Eris, goddess of strife. She was also considered the personified spirit of forgetfulness. A benign entity in isolation, but once corrupted would feasibly have the power to subjugate – and manipulate – an entire people.
Were a team of individuals to oppose her and lose, it would be conceivable that her punishment would be a form of Damnatio Memoriae, wherein they would be erased from the memories of everyone who ever knew of them. Which, in the case of the Ghostbusters, would need to be on a global scale.
In all forms but physical, they would cease to exist. However, traces would remain. Such a widespread application could never be perfect. Most notably, the individuals themselves would remain with little or no recollection of their previous identities, besides a tendency towards repeating old patterns.
Which is to say:
- Ray Stantz still drives the streets of his beloved New York, serving the people in a taxi cab.
- Winston Zeddemore is a funeral director, laying the dead to rest. He even has a collection of hearses.
- Peter Venkman finds fame and fortune on television, through his unmistakable brand of cynicism (under the stage name of Martin Heiss, a spiritual debunker).
- Janine Melnitz runs the front desk of the Mercado hotel, which happens to lie on a convergence of spiritual energy (laylines).
To viewers of these films, several clues are arranged which the characters wouldn't understand:
- The existence of ghosts is no longer accepted by the general public.
- The GB84 fire station is selected as the preferred base of operations for the new team.
- A graffiti artist tags a “no ghosts” logo on a subway from subconscious memory (often without even looking).
- Jillian Holtzmann finds inspiration from that logo to recreate the Ectomobile.
- Slimer still exists, apparently unchanged in over thirty years.
Hints as to how the film series can move forwards are primarily placed in front of Erin Gilbert, laying the groundwork for a future plotline:
- Analysis of background noise recorded within that fire station reveals the name Zuul (suggesting that minions of other gods cannot be erased so easily, backed up by the existence of the Stay Puft balloon).
- Erin encounters a taxi driver with deep, inherent, inexplicable knowledge of spiritual classification.
- A sculpted bust at the Columbia University is of a person no one can remember, of whom no record exists.
- The supposed members of Homeland Security drop threats that “people always forget” supernatural events, raising questions of their own involvement / identity.
A minimal number of triggers could prompt the new team to investigate further, and one final point deserves special consideration: The technology developed to capture ghosts in 2016 bears some stark similarities to the 1984 equipment (though with the advances would might expect from modern science). Whereas this gear is undeniably conceived and manufactured by Holtzmann, she has guidance from her mentor.
The physical form of Dana Barrett, with a degree of suggested insanity.
And parts of the mind of Egon Spengler.
So the big questions: What exactly happened in the battle with Lethe? Did the goddess leave or is the whole world still under her control?
And if mankind really is in chains, what can the Ghostbusters – new and old – do to set things right?
CH
Hey guys. I've put a little (a lot) of work into this story and composed a full blown story with a foreword and detailed afterword. Check it out please and give me your thoughts.
A4 size link and A5 size link
I also gave this a new thread because I think it deserves one: viewtopic.php?f=39&t=42087
ORIGINAL POST
Hello all. Long time lurker, first time poster. How are you?
Somewhere through my second viewing of the new Ghostbusters film I realised this is not actually a reboot, but something much more exciting. The universe of GB84, GB2, the Video Game, the IDW comic series, and GB16 form a cohesive timeline with just a few missing pieces.
Rich subtext running throughout the Paul Feig sequel centres on the premise that the original team were finally defeated some years ago.
i.e. They lost.
I'll refer to Greek mythology for the likely culprit. Lethe is the embodiment of oblivion. The daughter of Eris, goddess of strife. She was also considered the personified spirit of forgetfulness. A benign entity in isolation, but once corrupted would feasibly have the power to subjugate – and manipulate – an entire people.
Were a team of individuals to oppose her and lose, it would be conceivable that her punishment would be a form of Damnatio Memoriae, wherein they would be erased from the memories of everyone who ever knew of them. Which, in the case of the Ghostbusters, would need to be on a global scale.
In all forms but physical, they would cease to exist. However, traces would remain. Such a widespread application could never be perfect. Most notably, the individuals themselves would remain with little or no recollection of their previous identities, besides a tendency towards repeating old patterns.
Which is to say:
- Ray Stantz still drives the streets of his beloved New York, serving the people in a taxi cab.
- Winston Zeddemore is a funeral director, laying the dead to rest. He even has a collection of hearses.
- Peter Venkman finds fame and fortune on television, through his unmistakable brand of cynicism (under the stage name of Martin Heiss, a spiritual debunker).
- Janine Melnitz runs the front desk of the Mercado hotel, which happens to lie on a convergence of spiritual energy (laylines).
To viewers of these films, several clues are arranged which the characters wouldn't understand:
- The existence of ghosts is no longer accepted by the general public.
- The GB84 fire station is selected as the preferred base of operations for the new team.
- A graffiti artist tags a “no ghosts” logo on a subway from subconscious memory (often without even looking).
- Jillian Holtzmann finds inspiration from that logo to recreate the Ectomobile.
- Slimer still exists, apparently unchanged in over thirty years.
Hints as to how the film series can move forwards are primarily placed in front of Erin Gilbert, laying the groundwork for a future plotline:
- Analysis of background noise recorded within that fire station reveals the name Zuul (suggesting that minions of other gods cannot be erased so easily, backed up by the existence of the Stay Puft balloon).
- Erin encounters a taxi driver with deep, inherent, inexplicable knowledge of spiritual classification.
- A sculpted bust at the Columbia University is of a person no one can remember, of whom no record exists.
- The supposed members of Homeland Security drop threats that “people always forget” supernatural events, raising questions of their own involvement / identity.
A minimal number of triggers could prompt the new team to investigate further, and one final point deserves special consideration: The technology developed to capture ghosts in 2016 bears some stark similarities to the 1984 equipment (though with the advances would might expect from modern science). Whereas this gear is undeniably conceived and manufactured by Holtzmann, she has guidance from her mentor.
The physical form of Dana Barrett, with a degree of suggested insanity.
And parts of the mind of Egon Spengler.
So the big questions: What exactly happened in the battle with Lethe? Did the goddess leave or is the whole world still under her control?
And if mankind really is in chains, what can the Ghostbusters – new and old – do to set things right?
CH
Last edited by GBfan_CH on August 16th, 2016, 12:04 am, edited 3 times in total.