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"Slimer's Sacrifice" is the twenty-third episode of Extreme Ghostbusters. It first aired November 5, 1997, and was written by Adam Gilad.1 The episode pulls Slimer back into the action when a Norse harbinger of the apocalypse breaks loose in New York, and it ties the new team's Containment Unit back to ghosts captured by the original Ghostbusters.
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A wolf-like ghost called Fenris surfaces from a park lake and turns up at the Museum of Natural History. Egon Spengler identifies him as the harbinger of Ragnarok, the point man for the apocalypse, whose role in Norse legend is to prepare the way for his master, the destroyer Surt. To do that, Fenris must enslave three souls as his vanguards, one for the air, one for the land, and one for the sea. Egon notes that the threat should have ended long ago, because the original Ghostbusters and Slimer captured Surt years earlier and remanded him to the Containment Unit.
The team corners Fenris near the museum's Jurassic dinosaur exhibit and traps him, but his frost breath sabotages the trap. They rush the failing trap back to the firehouse to transfer him into the Containment Unit, and Fenris breaks free before the transfer is complete, loose in the basement. The trap door opens and other captured ghosts begin to escape. Slimer flies into the group, pushing them back inside, and seals the inner hatch from within, trapping himself in the Containment Unit alongside Surt's gathered legions.
Inside, Surt has built an army of entities who view Slimer as a traitor. Surt forces Siren to hypnotize Slimer and bend him to his will, then lures Eduardo Rivera into reuniting with the ghost, expecting Eduardo to open the exit and let the legions out. Out in the city, Fenris attacks the remaining team members and converts them into his vanguards: Egon becomes the Vanguard of the Air, Garrett Miller the Vanguard of the Sea, and Roland Jackson the Vanguard of the Land. Kylie Griffin reads up on the prophecy and warns that if Fenris collects all three vanguards, nothing will stop Surt's arrival.
Eduardo realizes the easy reunion is a trap and destroys the device that would have opened the exit, denying Surt his escape. With the plan foiled, Surt orders a retreat. As Surt is about to break free, Kylie wrangles Fenris with her Proton Pistol and shoves him into Surt. Because Fenris embodies ice and Surt embodies fire, the collision of opposites forces both entities back behind the inner hatch. The Containment Unit is resealed and the three vanguards return to normal.
The episode features the Extreme Ghostbusters team: Egon Spengler, Eduardo Rivera, Roland Jackson, Garrett Miller, Kylie Griffin, and Janine Melnitz, along with Slimer.
The principal antagonists are Fenris, the wolf-like harbinger of Ragnarok with cryokinetic frost breath, and his master Surt, the fire-wielding destroyer held in the Containment Unit. Surt's gathered forces include the Glostic Sisters, Banshee and Siren, the latter of whom hypnotizes Slimer on Surt's orders. The three team members frozen by Fenris become the Vanguards of Fenris, one each for air, sea, and land.
The episode reaches back to The Real Ghostbusters era: Egon states that the original Ghostbusters and Slimer captured Surt years before, placing him in the Containment Unit where he assembled an army. The Containment Unit escapees who briefly slip out when Fenris breaks the trap connect to earlier breach incidents, including the events of "Sonic Youth," in which ghosts were released while Roland was under Siren's hypnosis.
The official Extreme Ghostbusters website described Fenris as a "Fire Demon" that breathed fire rather than frost, which conflicts with the episode itself, where Fenris uses ice and Surt is the fire entity.
Some interpretations of Ragnarok place four figures alongside Fenris (Hel, Loki, Garm, and Jormungandr) rather than the three vanguards depicted here, and these may have inspired the episode's trio of elemental slaves.
Air date and writing credit per the Extreme Ghostbusters episode guide. Adam Gilad's other animation work includes Gargoyles and RoboCop: Alpha Commando. ↩