Directed by Jason Reitman.
Starring Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Sigourney Weaver, Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts, Logan Kim, Celeste O’Connor, Oliver Cooper, Sydney Mae Diaz, Bokeem Woodbine, Marlon Kazadi, Tracy Letts, Paulina Jewel Alexis, Josh Gad, and J.K. Simmons.
It’s never a good sign when a film is preceded by a quick prerecorded video of the director (in this case, it’s Jason Reitman, the son of Ghostbusters 1984 helmer Ivan Reitman) proclaiming that what viewers are about to see is an extreme Easter Egg hunt. Admittedly, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, while not exactly subtle about its references to the original, temporarily does a decent job of balancing such fan service with paving the road for new heroes. And then the third act comes, which is not only a ghastly CGI mess of colors and creatures that feels like something ripped out of the Marvel playbook but also indulges in the past to a cringe degree that takes the thunder away from the younger cast through special effects and plot points that are unnecessary.
The disappointing finale hurts more considering Ghostbusters: Afterlife is surprisingly decent and relatively charming up until that point as it positions itself as exciting and hip. Mckenna Grace (underappreciated and talented, having impressed by Gifted and in more minor roles such as I, Tonya) stars as Phoebe, the young granddaughter to Harold Ramis’ Egon Spengler. Unfortunately, she never got to meet the like-minded brainiac, as Egon had a strained relationship with his daughter Callie (another tremendous yet underrated performer in Carrie Coon), seeing him moving to a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere preaching the end of the world. She’s not the only one that thought he was insane; the rest of the Ghostbusters team also broke off from him, eventually disbanding as spectral sightings ultimately fizzled out anyway.
Egon is now dead (presumed to be natural causes), so with Callie facing a financial crisis paying the apartment rent, she relocates the family to the farmhouse, hoping it will be worth something on the market or have a valuable heirloom. Luck is not on her side, ensuring the family stays there for the time being. Phoebe’s brother Trevor (a jittery Finn Wolfhard) is slightly better at making friends, crushing on a restaurant worker named Lucky (Celeste O’Connor). In contrast, Phoebe virtually has no one like-minded curious about science, which is especially a shame considering she tells a plethora of intentionally awful yet funny science-related jokes.
Ghostbusters: Afterlife works when it’s playing up the role science has in this family’s life, specifically between mother and daughter (and more importantly, a granddaughter that is not aware she is related to a famous Ghostbuster). As Phoebe explores the farm, uncovers familiar gadgets, and even discovers a supernatural threat, she finds information about her family tree through the assistance of YouTube and a newly befriended summer-school pal that has nicknamed himself Podcast (Logan Kim). On that note, not every character here is a winner; Podcast comes across more like an embarrassing gimmick rather than clever comedic relief in a movie that’s already primarily intended to be funny. Nevertheless, the more Phoebe learns, the more a rift grows between daughter and mother, with the latter perceiving science as a waste of time that fractured the core foundation of her family.
Behold the craven exercise in hollow nostalgia that is “Ghostbusters: Afterlife.”
Ultimately, though, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” isn’t about any of these people. It’s about the ghosts of the pasts: the original performers, who show up and sleepwalk their way through their cameos. The film’s depiction of the late Harold Ramis is especially cringeworthy. But at least those guys all realized what this is supposed to be: a goofy good time, and nothing more.
Decades later, we’re supposed to believe, people still talk about what happened that summer in Manhattan. The one friend Phoebe makes is a supernatural-obsessed kid named Podcast (Logan Kim). “I call myself Podcast. Because of my podcast,” he explains. These are the jokes. Podcast enlightens Phoebe about the original Ghostbusters—as in, they literally sit in front of a laptop watching clips from the 1984 movie “Ghostbusters” on YouTube. A hidden lair beneath the farmhouse reveals all the archaic technology, and in the barn beneath a tarp rests the rusty, dusty car from the original film. In case we couldn’t tell what we’re looking at, Reitman repeatedly lingers on the converted Cadillac’s ECTO-1 license plate and the famous, red-and-white logo on the doors. At one point, a character has to make a phone call, prompting another character to ask: “Who you gonna call?” prompting me to groan “Oh my God” out loud to no one in particular in a nearly empty movie theater.
It's like that, over and over and over again. There’s a thing you know, and there’s another thing you know. And look! For the serious fans, there’s a super-nerdy, arcane thing that only a few people know. The Stay-Puft marshmallow man is back, but this time in the form of a bunch of adorably evil, normal-sized marshmallows who wreak havoc at Walmart. (And the interior logic in this bit is confusing. They want to attack Paul Rudd’s middle-school teacher character, but they also try to make s’mores out of each other. So they’re cannibals …?)
This is sort of a sequel and sort of a reboot, but it’s definitely an erasure of the 2016 “Ghostbusters” starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones, which caused such a stir because it dared to feature women busting ghosts. That’s men’s work! Women are allowed to answer the phone at Ghostbusters headquarters, and they can be possessed by an ancient demon from another dimension as long as they still look sexy, but that’s about it. Come on, guys. When Ray Parker Jr. sang that busting made him feel good, we all knew what he was really talking about. (And yes, that catchy theme song is in here, too, playing over the end credits. It’s truly bizarre in retrospect to realize that it was a massive radio and MTV hit in 1984.)
But first, we must establish why we are taking this slog down memory lane. Reitman, in co-writing the script with Gil Kenan (who directed the 2015 “Poltergeist” re-do), has contrived to send the estranged relatives of one of the original Ghostbusters to middle-of-nowhere Oklahoma. The prodigious talents of Carrie Coon, one of the most insightful and exciting actresses working today, go depressingly to waste as Callie, a single mother of two. Son Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) is a sullen teen with a knack for mechanics. But 12-year-old daughter Phoebe (Mckenna Grace) is a misfit science whiz, a gift she apparently inherited from her grandfather, whose identity is revealed to us in the most eye-rolling way. They all schlep to fictional, small-town Summerville to take over Grandpa’s dilapidated farm, but when they get there, they soon realize there’s something strange in the neighborhood.
In taking over the “Ghostbusters” mantle from his father, Ivan, director Jason Reitman trots out all the characters, props, gags and famous lines from the 1984 original as if the mere presence of them were enough for a laugh, or at least a familiar chuckle. His movie wallows in the superficial trappings of the franchise without ever recapturing—or seemingly grasping—what made it such a phenomenon in the first place. It’s essentially a two-hour version of that meme in which Chris Evans, as Captain America in “The Avengers,” says earnestly and with more than a little pride: “I understood that reference.”
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