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Apparently, there was a Ghostbusters cartoon series before the ones that we know of today that call themselves the REAL Ghostbusters. There was a reason that they added "REAL" to the Ghostbusters that we all know and love, assuming that you all know and love the Ghostbusters that had Slimer, Winston, Janine, Egon, Ray, and Peter.
Check this the heck out:
Yeah, WTF.
An ape is one of the ghostbusters. Turns out that he's the scientific brains of the operations.
But it's theme song has been lodged in my hippocampus (look at me using neuroscience terms!) region because of its sheer ridiculosity. The monkey barking actually reminds me of this one Filipino guy on the Macon St. basketball court who would curl his lips into that "O" shape as if he were about to woof.
Someone had commented that its quirkiness in cartoon form was ripped straight out of the Scooby Doo. The monkey represents the scared non-vernacular-speaking, yet highly communicative, intelligent "animal." The human protagonists appear to be these quirks who operate on the margins of society.
The equipment they use is even quirky. Or at least it appears so because it doesn't appear that they even try to explain why they use those objects. They're too busy bouncing around and acting strange, which gives off this very all-around disengaging, disorienting feel. From the skull phone that would tell them their next mission to the humanoid bouncing carriage car, there was too many elements left unexplained to actually understand the storylines.
Though they may operate in what appears to be New York, they react to things defined as outside the city. Representative of its behaviorist antecedent (I always wanted to use that word), at the end they have some kind of explanatory lesson that can be gleaned from the events.
Despite their slightly marginalized status, they apparently had their followers and even took time out of their schedules to do PSAs:
An astute commentary on the appearance of drug dealers.
Well, this series seems to have been part of NBC's final attempts at showing cartoons before their dive into Saved by the Bell and other teen-oriented shows.
Now look at the contrasts to this:
The Real Ghostbusters is the highly institutional cartoon relative to the one above in more ways than one.
It's institutionalism is even embedded in it's logo. A strict crossing out of ghosts, as if it was a say no to drugs or forest fires kind of thing vs. the wavy, almost smiling ghost that you see in its predecessor.
vs.
The Real Ghostbusters is the most known and it brings out this highly authoritative feeling. Creators of this series did not portray them not as kooky, quirky outsiders but as these respected fireman-type heroes who actually did science.
Yes, yes, a double dollop of authority. Firemen as the go-get em tiger types and scientists who strategically and effortlessly planted words like "frequency", "plasm", and "proton pack" into my pre-pre-school vocabulary. They even had a secretary, of course a woman, to take calls.
The equipment they use is not weird at all. At least, I never thought to think how weird it was because they explained why they need to use each of their objects. Ecto-1 is a highly functional shaggin' wagon which Winston maintains which gets them to places. Proton packs bust ghosts. Put those punks in the containment unit, which actually is peculiar and would make them seem to justify the prison-industrial complex --- by taking care of these societal "problems" and packing them into an "airtight" scientifically inescapable portal.
But I won't go there. Yet.
The net effect of this Ghostbusters is that they made it accessible to anyone. Like the other Ghostbusters, they too operated in some type of firehouse in New York, except it actually felt like New York because of the many interactions with regular people.
Add me to your reading list.
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