Ghost Busters Timeline

[Hermiod]

^It's fun to think about such things. It's not about whining or attacking, it's about recreational exercise of the mind -- tackling interesting puzzles and using one's imagination to propose possible solutions.

Spot on. I've seen plenty of threads like this about all sorts of movies. I'll pick holes in the Back to the Future trilogy, for instance, until the cows come home but it's still got pride of place in my DVD collection and I'll be double-dipping when it comes out on Blu-Ray.

Same with Trek, Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Robocop, Terminator and any of the other movies I've loved for years.

 

[payndz201]

I've got the 'Making Of Ghostbusters' book from the 1980s (which is actually a really meaty, in-depth look at its development) and one of the things that it points out is how many scenes were shuffled around during editing, so that ones which were consecutive in the original script end up several minutes apart on screen, and potentially days in movie-time.

What ends up on screen counts for the most, obviously, but it's interesting to see just how much a story can be shaped in post-production.

 

[barnaclelapse]

That's really a good book then?

I've been meaning to hunt down a copy for ages.

 

[Trekker4747]

I'm guessing that at the very least the scene where Peter brings the information on Gozer to Dana was moved. It seems to me like it maybe should take place after the montage.

 

[Broccoli]

I'm guessing that at the very least the scene where Peter brings the information on Gozer to Dana was moved. It seems to me like it maybe should take place after the montage.

That does seem bizarrely placed. If memory serves, Winston is hired after the GBs come back from a job. Peter meets with Dana. Then we are back in the firehouse where Winston is still learning the ways of the GB (in the same clothes, with Peter in slime). Enter Walter Peck.

 

[Trekker4747]

Yeah, I think that's it. After the montage we see Winstong get hired, this scene ends with Ray hiring Winston and handing over the traps, we then cut to Peter meeting Dana in some plaza, then back to the firehouse where Ray shows Winston (and us) the containment unit, then we get the scene with Janine asking Peter for a day off/the scene with Walter Peck.

Peter talks with Dana in his GB uniform, witch is dirty, and when he meets with Dickless he has slime on his hands.

It's interesting to me that Walter Peck would have such an 'easy' time with his claims against the Ghostbusters and getting a court-order against them. His claims have no foundation (I really doubt the Proton Packs and containment unit used any harmful materials/nuclear energy despite Peter's quip in the elevator) and the ghosts they fight clearly would've been seen by others but Peck is somehow able to get a court-order on them based on his beliefs that they're putting people under the influence of hallucinogens and then "busting ghosts" with a "fake, electronic, light show"? His claims are based on what, exactly?

 

[Broccoli]

Yeah, I think that's it. After the montage we see Winstong get hired, this scene ends with Ray hiring Winston and handing over the traps, we then cut to Peter meeting Dana in some plaza, then back to the firehouse where Ray shows Winston (and us) the containment unit, then we get the scene with Janine asking Peter for a day off/the scene with Walter Peck.

Peter talks with Dana in his GB uniform, witch is dirty, and when he meets with Dickless he has slime on his hands.

It's interesting to me that Walter Peck would have such an 'easy' time with his claims against the Ghostbusters and getting a court-order against them. His claims have no foundation (I really doubt the Proton Packs and containment unit used any harmful materials/nuclear energy despite Peter's quip in the elevator) and the ghosts they fight clearly would've been seen by others but Peck is somehow able to get a court-order on them based on his beliefs that they're putting people under the influence of hallucinogens and then "busting ghosts" with a "fake, electronic, light show"? His claims are based on what, exactly?

I think he was able to get his court order because the EPA wasn't sure if how they were storing the ghosts was safe. Peter's attitude probably didn't help matter much either.

Also, it took him a few weeks to get the court order if we are to believe Winston's line about his time with the GB. Peck saw Peter, presumably, the same day Winston was hired and the explosion happened the same day (or day before) they saw the mayor.

I think his accusations of a "fake electronic light show" was made up when they saw the mayor, because, at that point, he screwed up (despite being warned) and wanted to pin the blame on the GBs.

 

[Trekker4747]

I think he was able to get his court order because the EPA wasn't sure if how they were storing the ghosts was safe. Peter's attitude probably didn't help matter much either.

They didn't have evidence that it wasn't safe, either. But, no, Peter's attitude probably didn't help much but I doubt, "I need a court order to cease commerce and utilities to this business I've no evidence is storing or doing anything harmful because their manager was mean to me," would fly far with a judge.

 

[Christopher]

Next is the New York Post dated October 22, 1984. Then, there's a series of magazines that flash up. These include:

Time dated October 1984
Omni dated October 1984
The Atlantic dated October 1984

and finally the Ghostbusters Super Diet edition of The Globe dated October 15, 1984.

So, the USA Today would've gone up shortly if not the day after the Hotel Sedgewick was busted (October 8) and the last dated paper would be the New York Post at October 22. After the montage is when Winston Zeddemore is hired, and he says he's only been with the company for a couple weeks before they fight Gozer.

So, it looks like the Ghostbusters business was only successful for, at most, a month and a half before getting shut down.

That's a problem, though, because for a monthly magazine like Omni, the cover date is a "display until" date, not a release date. A magazine with an October cover date would probably hit the shelves around August. And any reporting for it would've probably been done a month or two earlier.

(I really doubt the Proton Packs and containment unit used any harmful materials/nuclear energy despite Peter's quip in the elevator)

He called them unlicensed nuclear accelerators. That doesn't mean an accelerator powered by nuclear energy, it means a device that accelerates nuclei or nuclear particles, in this case protons (aka hydrogen nuclei). Protons are fairly massive particles, and if you accelerate them into a high-velocity particle beam, that gives them a lot of kinetic energy and makes them a rather dangerous form of particle radiation. Heck, that's what the Van Allen radiation belts around the Earth basically are -- protons and electrons from the solar wind, captured and accelerated to high velocities by the Earth's magnetic field. So yeah, the Ghostbusters' proton packs would be pretty dangerous.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Damn, Blu-Ray's got a good picture! Ghostbusting never looked so good!

Damn straight. Since getting a blu-ray, I rent far more older movies than I do newer movies. It's like seeing them for the first time.

 

[Broccoli]

I think he was able to get his court order because the EPA wasn't sure if how they were storing the ghosts was safe. Peter's attitude probably didn't help matter much either.

They didn't have evidence that it wasn't safe, either. But, no, Peter's attitude probably didn't help much but I doubt, "I need a court order to cease commerce and utilities to this business I've no evidence is storing or doing anything harmful because their manager was mean to me," would fly far with a judge.

Well, with Peck, he just wanted to see the storage facility based on mixed reports his office was getting and Peter, for really no reason, went all jerk on him about it, probably inadvertently suggesting that something was suspicious going on down there. So, he probably would have gotten the court order for at least that.

But the shutting down, that is a little perplexing. Then again, who knows what Peck actually reported. As we see later in the movie, Peck is not above stretching the truth to get what he wants.

 

[Timby]

But the shutting down, that is a little perplexing. Then again, who knows what Peck actually reported. As we see later in the movie, Peck is not above stretching the truth to get what he wants.

There's also the fact that, from a judge's perspective (especially if it's one similar to Judge Wexler in Ghostbusters II), four potential nutjobs were running around town wearing backpacks that could blow the everloving shit out of anything (as evidenced by the Sedgewick Hotel), effectively functioning as a paramilitary organization with no oversight or accountability. Once they refused inspection of the facilities, combined with the dubious nature of "ghosts" in the first place, a temporary cease-and-desist / shutdown order is hardly out of the question.

Specifically, as I recall, Peck came armed with a cease and desist all commerce order, a seizure of premises and chattels, a ban on use of public utilities for unauthorized waste handlers, and a federal entry and inspection order. Given what I outlined above, all of those are largely plausible.

 

[Trekker4747]

I wonder why they didn't just leave the containment unit on, esp. after told turning it off would be dangerous.

Imagine going into a nuclear reactor facility and say "turn it off."

"We can't just turn it off, we have to cool it turn it off properly..."

"Don't care. Turn it off."

 

[Broccoli]

But the shutting down, that is a little perplexing. Then again, who knows what Peck actually reported. As we see later in the movie, Peck is not above stretching the truth to get what he wants.

There's also the fact that, from a judge's perspective (especially if it's one similar to Judge Wexler in Ghostbusters II), four potential nutjobs were running around town wearing backpacks that could blow the everloving shit out of anything (as evidenced by the Sedgewick Hotel), effectively functioning as a paramilitary organization with no oversight or accountability. Once they refused inspection of the facilities, combined with the dubious nature of "ghosts" in the first place, a temporary cease-and-desist / shutdown order is hardly out of the question.

Specifically, as I recall, Peck came armed with a cease and desist all commerce order, a seizure of premises and chattels, a ban on use of public utilities for unauthorized waste handlers, and a federal entry and inspection order. Given what I outlined above, all of those are largely plausible.

Excellent points.

I wonder why they didn't just leave the containment unit on, esp. after told turning it off would be dangerous.

Imagine going into a nuclear reactor facility and say "turn it off."

"We can't just turn it off, we have to cool it turn it off properly..."

"Don't care. Turn it off."

By that point, I think the "power trip" that Peck wasn't really allowing him to think rationally beyond, "Haha...I got these fuckers!"

 

[CommodoreKong]

I wonder why they didn't just leave the containment unit on, esp. after told turning it off would be dangerous.

Imagine going into a nuclear reactor facility and say "turn it off."

"We can't just turn it off, we have to cool it turn it off properly..."

"Don't care. Turn it off."

By that point, I think the "power trip" that Peck wasn't really allowing him to think rationally beyond, "Haha...I got these fuckers!"

Also I'm pretty sure Peck didn't actually believe in ghosts. He most likely thought the Ghostbusters were lying about how dangerous it would be to turn it off and it was just there for show.

 

[nx1701g]

^ That could be a possibility too.

Eh at least he got covered in the guts of Mister Stay-Puft.

 

[Hermiod]

Has William Atherton every played a nice guy ?

 

[Broccoli]

Has William Atherton every played a nice guy ?

Hmm...I think not. Must be in his contract. It seems that only he and Tim Curry can only be allowed to play antagonistic characters.