We have reached the forty-year celebration of a very much beloved film and its pop culture influence, something I may never fully understand or grasp, but have learned many times that nostalgia is a hell of a drug. Maybe that is what makes Sony pump out so many of these, even when it is clear the story is being stretched thin, holding onto the remembrance of Egon Spengler and the nostalgia of a movie that struggled producing a successful sequel until the past few years. Maybe that is why people still argue so strongly about the impact the movie had, and the industry seems so unsure whether to produce another version of a team hunting ghosts, afraid to step on the shoes of an IP that clearly didn’t create ghost hunting. Maybe that is why so many exposed their sexism with their denial of the 2016 reboot prior to the films release. I will admit the movie is not great, but I left with the same feeling as the first: it’s kind of fun, but never crosses my mind until someone brings it up.
Now, we have the fifth installment in the beloved franchise: Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. This is a direct sequel to the 2021 movie, Afterlife. Here we follow the Spengler family again, and this time there are some tensions building amongst the parents and children. Eighteen year-old Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) is hoping to be seen as an adult, and has no other characteristics here; Gary Grooberson (Paul Rudd) is the most Paul Rudd character we get, who hopes to be seen as an official father figure in the children’s life, and is the supposed leader of the Ghostbusters, I guess; Callie (Carrie Coon) is mom; and Phoebe Spengler looks like her grandfather and wants to be seen as an adult. Maybe Phoebe is queer, I feel that is what they were hinting at, but I don’t know. Honestly, I am not sure what anyone’s definitive motivations are here. We also have most of the original cast (R.I.P. Harold Ramis). Murray gives us a couple scenes so we know he’s alive, Hudson appears to be the most spry at his age, and Aykroyd shows he’s enjoying being back more than anyone else. Oh, Potts shows up for a bit too. So, the gang’s all here, and we get some additional characters to tease maybe another team? Maybe they’re just there for support in future movies. Maybe, there is no reason for them to be there. We’ll get to that. Anyway, this movie is about a family trying to balance home life with Ghostbusting life, as everyone in the household is a part of the team and are dealing with growing pains of moving and having a new father figure in the home. After many established internal conflicts are presented, and a tease of an external conflict – that sounds much more fun than what we got – we find our team facing a powerful and scary evil force that can control other ghosts and is much more powerful than any ghost they have faced before…in the last twenty minutes.
Now, the trailers did well at getting many excited for a villain that appears for maybe fifteen minutes, and this affected my experience because I ended up confused through a good eighty minutes of the movie, waiting to see our big baddy, and just noticed a lot of set up for things very unrelated. Maybe if I wasn’t waiting for this big force, I would be more open to everything else going on. I like the introduction to a larger Ghostbusters team, and a better lab, where busters study ghosts and have upgraded equipment. Here, Celeste O’Connor and James Acaster are given some limelight, but aren’t given much personality, used only to create situations that push the story forward. Still, I was intrigued at the possibility of a larger team. Rudd’s character struggles getting into his role as the step-father and connecting with Phoebe, while Phoebe feels outcasted, making friends with a ghost. Again, we don’t go further than that. Also, the ghosts that the busters have captured are accumulating in their little cage in the basement and are bound to break free. This is what I would have preferred to watch: this larger team going out to get these escaped ghosts. Instead, we get Kumail Nanjiani’s character who is supposed to help the busters stop a creature who isn’t even on the rampage yet. Nanjiani’s delivery was my favorite in this movie though.
Now, the antagonist. Once you get through nearly an hour and a half of set up and drama, you get a pretty cool and creepy introduction to this well-designed monster. Its powers which involve freezing things is pretty cool, and frightening. There is a point where you can tell this thing is not to be messed with and the busters need all the help they can get. I just wish we didn’t have to wait so long just for them to find a potential solution so fast. Still, the final act was a lot of fun and looked good. My biggest issue is the scariest scene involved a different ghost, one that could possess inanimate things and you cannot see it move from one thing to the next. We get two scenes with this character being a major threat throughout the film, and it delivered on its moments. Another thing that had little to do with our main villain.
Overall, the movie is fine. I had fun, and I enjoyed the ending, I liked Nanjiani, I like the effects, and wish half the scenes weren’t there just for plot convenience. We literally have a scene where two characters go somewhere just to help something escape, with a device that clearly was created by the plot, and the characters just happen to use it. I think most people will have an entertaining time but will end up forgetting about this movie by the end of summer. Until then, I’ll be looking for something a bit more frightening, a bit more focused, and with characters I can connect with.