Cast and crew
Regular voice work came from Lorenzo Music, Frank Welker, Maurice LaMarche, Arsenio Hall, and Laura Summer, with Danny Wells as the guest voice. The featured characters are Egon Spengler, Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, Winston Zeddemore, Janine Melnitz, Slimer, Egon's Uncle Cyrus Spengler, and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
Plot
A quiet day on West 12th Street is interrupted when ghosts appear and terrorize civilians. Egon pops out from a manhole cover and the other Ghostbusters open fire, capturing six Full Torsoed Apparitions and a Vaporous Phantasm. Distracted by a calculation, Egon announces that his Uncle Cyrus will arrive at the airport in roughly 20 minutes and 57 seconds. The team never makes it to the airport because they get busy capturing more ghosts, and Cyrus arrives at the Firehouse by taxi instead. He is disappointed by the interior, meets Janine, and, unable to see without his glasses, mistakes Slimer for a pet cat. The Ghostbusters then return with four full traps.
Cyrus calls Egon a brilliant mind and declares that it is unsuitable for a Spengler to do anything as unscientific as ghostbusting. The team takes Cyrus along to a job in the Garment District, but Egon's P.K.E. Meter detects nothing until ghosts appear at a 50% off sale; Cyrus' glasses are knocked off and he sees none of it.
Back at the Firehouse, Cyrus reminds Egon of a promise to help if it was ever needed, and asks him to run his new research lab. Egon reluctantly agrees to go back to the Midwest and leaves a letter behind. The next morning, a call comes in about poltergeists in Central Park, and the three remaining Ghostbusters are no match and have to retreat. Egon's new job turns out to involve lab rats, which quickly bores him and leaves him homesick. Janine and the guys sneak in to visit and decide to ask Cyrus for Egon's help on one last case, hoping it will also convince him to release Egon from his promise.
Cyrus declines the invitation to Central Park. Egon and Ray debut Ecto-Visors with polarized lenses set to accept poltergeist frequencies; the ghosts are trapped. Meanwhile, down at the Containment Unit, Cyrus presses several buttons he should not have. The unit opens and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man escapes, growing to full size. Janine sets off an emergency alert to Ecto-1 via a basement emergency beacon, and she, Cyrus, and Slimer run outside as Stay Puft forces his way out.
The Ghostbusters hear the alarm in the car and race back, spotting Cyrus, Janine, and Slimer fleeing with Stay Puft behind them. Everyone piles into Ecto-1, Winston drives off, and Stay Puft gives chase through the city. Watching the giant follow them, Cyrus finally accepts that the ghosts are real. The team realizes Stay Puft is too big for the traps they have on hand, so they devise a plan: Winston drives far enough ahead, Egon ties a cable to Ecto's bumper, and four traps are laid on the ground. Egon gets Stay Puft's attention by calling him "Fatboy," and when Cyrus drives forward to tighten the cable on Egon's signal, Stay Puft trips and falls onto the traps. The Ghostbusters open fire and capture him in the four units. Back at the Firehouse, a converted Cyrus releases Egon from his promise, acknowledging that Egon belongs with the other Ghostbusters and that their work is important. Cyrus proposes a toast, but Slimer pops out of his cup.
Notes
The episode centers on Egon's relationship with his uncle, Cyrus Spengler. When Ray announces the team caught six Full Torsoed Apparitions and a Vaporous Phantasm, Peter chimes in with a line riffing on "The Twelve Days of Christmas," adding "an ectoplasmic partridge in a pear tree." Egon notes that math was always Ray's weakest subject. Winston admits to Cyrus that he did not believe in the paranormal at first either, until he saw it himself.
When the team visits Egon at Spengler Laboratories, Egon remarks the lab is over 1,500 miles from New York, placing it in the Midwest. Based on that distance, the lab would fall roughly in South Dakota, near Rapid City. During the Central Park bust, Peter refers to a basketball-wielding poltergeist as "Kareem Abdul-DeGhostie," a nod to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
This episode marks one of the first appearances of the Marshmallow Man in the series, where, as in the pilot, he is a villain rather than an ally. It is also the only time the entire front of the Containment Unit is shown opening and closing by itself. Ray is seen wearing his Electrical Gloves, though they are colored an incorrect flesh tone.
The look of Central Park in this episode later inspired the Central Park setting in Ghostbusters International #8. A panel in that same issue also includes a portrait of Uncle Cyrus Spengler, and Janine's desk is shown with a Coke cup she is holding in "Cry Uncle." In Ghostbusters: Crossing Over Issue #2, the Containment Unit opens in the same manner as it does in this episode.
Animation errors
When Ray turns the key in Ecto-1, only the key turns rather than the ignition barrel. When Egon runs up to call Stay Puft "Fatboy," his character model briefly becomes Peter Venkman; once he runs back, the model returns to Egon.
Episode order
In air-date order, "Cry Uncle" follows Ghost Fight at the O.K. Corral and precedes "Bustman's Holiday." In DVD order, it sits between "The Spirit of Aunt Lois" and "Adventures in Slime and Space." It was released on The Real Ghostbusters Complete Collection box set, Volume 1, Disc 3.
References
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Eatock, James and Mangels, Andy (2008). The Real Ghostbusters Complete Collection booklet, p. 7. CPT Holdings, Inc.
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Marsha Goodman (1986). Episode Call Sheet and SAG Report, "Cry Uncle" (1986).
