So I’m just beginning the voyage of Volume 4 of the giant RGB box set. Maybe three episodes in to the Slimer and The RGB years and it hits me. Slimer and the Real Ghostbusters was the same time that they went to 1 hour with the RGB show sandwiched between two of the Slimer cartoons. But watching these RGB shows from that time I see there’s a lot of Slimer there too.
ANd then it really hit me, Slimer and The Real Ghostbusters is really just an hourlong Slimer show. Wall to wall Slimer. I was a Slimer fan, (the character not the cartoon of which I remember very little), but even I have to say, that’s way too much of the Green guy. Especially since it seems the four GB’s were being pushed to the back in their own series so that Slimer could be more active in busting the ghost.
Not that the episodes themselves are bad, just from the perspective of a fan who loved the RGB for the 4 guys fighting the paranormal, and liked the green ball as a secondary character, I can see why it started to taper.
So really this long wind up leads to this: Did the executives not think that they were going to overkill the people on Slimer? Really? I love Bugs Bunny, but that hour long show he did with Tweety was helped by the fact that they only showed one Bugs Bunny cartoon. Did they never hear of less is more?
::SIGH:: Well that was my minor epiphany, now I’m going to take my Hi-C juice box of the SLimer ecto cooler that I have left over from 1988 and keep pushing on through Vol. 4. By the time I get to Volume 5 I may just hate the little spud.
Oh i feel your pain i’ve just started volume 5 and it’s killing me to watch beacause of the slimer related stuff.
Also, did you notice that in volume 4 the GB’s rarely used their proton packs and the animation just got too bright with lots of color, i preferred when the show’s color was darker as well as the tone of the show itself.
Ah well when volume 5 is finished i’m just gonna keep replaying volume’s 1-3
I did notice that. Even the night scenes were alot brighter, I guess to keep from scaring kids. Which, that explanation never made sense in how a show could run one way successfully for three seasons and then all of a sudden it’s just not good enough and needs to be changed. The ain’t broke don’t fix it rule should be stapled to every executives head with the note: remember what we did to RGB.
I just watched “The Joke’s on Ray” and Slimer was all over that episode. I have to marvel at how Frank Welker managed to get his voice to do Slimer, but honestly I really wonder how I’m going to feel about Slimer after I get through Volume 4.
To me the stories aren’t bad, the writing hasn’t been bad just yet, but the overall tone in visual style, the change in Peter and Janine, and the increasing prescence of SLimer is why the show fell out of popularity to me. I’ll keep an eye out on the pack issue. I just don’t understand how a character who effectively has his own spotlight for half the show was felt had to have his presence increased in the main series. I don’t think Slimer cartoons would have been an issue if he had been kept as he was in the RGB cartoon but him being the deputy to one of the guys at all times makes no sense. He rides with Ray in the ECTO-3, WHY?? it made no relative sense.
I really worry about how I am going to be after Volume 4. I really don’t want to start hating Slimer and it seems the executives are daring me not to.
There are only a few glimpses of brilliance during the Slimer and the RGB years. Notably “Flip Side and Poultrygeist” but as season 5 hit there is a sharp decline in animation almost like someone took the season 3-4 Disney-esque style (still a fan of the anime style in the first 2 seasons) and tried to make it in their basement. Honestly the series hit its stride during the first 2 seasons. The story telling, the animation, the voice acting, everything. Plus Slimer was still a second tier character like Janine and his purpose wasn’t to drive the plot. I honestly can’t stand to watch the Slimer! episodes. Everything about them is ■■■■. Now as my son gets older the latter seasons, 4-6, will be good to let him watch due to their lighter subject matter and overall tone. But for me the series ends after the second season.
Unfortunately, I have this need to complete stuff even though I really shouldn’t. First three volumes are good, but I know volume 4 and 5 are going to be tough with the focus on Slimer and the change in animation. But I have to finish this collection. I really have no interest in the Slimer cartoon but I know full well that I’m going to watch it just because I fell the need to have watched every episode of this series good or not.
Thing is I had no preconceptions of the seasons after Music left and the change happened. I really could only ever remember one episode of the series “No One Comes to Lupusville”. And I was interested and intrigued at the new title intro when it became Slimer and the Real Ghostbusters… and then I saw it and immediately did not want to see it ever again. I’ll say this, the overenergetic Slimer is definitely going to grate after a while and I will do my best to put that out of my mind because I loved the Slimer who was rambunctious but a little shy. The “and me and me” reaaaaaaaaally annoyed me right off the bat.
And that’s the overall problem, I don’t hate the series and I really don’t want to go negative with the latter part, but it definitely is going to be a chore.
I think once I’m done I’m going to go back and do reflections of each episode. I know someone else is doing that but heck 2 diferent perspectives are better than 1.
I really find myself reacting to Slimer as if there were two of him.
There was Real Slimer. He was in the first ABC season, the syndicated episodes, EGB, and the iBooks novel. He was a babbling eating machine who was there mostly to ■■■■ off Venkman–by making the otherwise unflappable Venkman occassionally lose his cool, the character was both humanized and his ego punctured. Venkman was further humanized by those rare moments when he acted nice to Slimer (“If you tell anyone about this…I’ll deny it.”) And every once in a great while, Slimer did something helpful, which felt like a neat underdog moment. I liked that Slimer in small doses.
But then they replaced him with Action Hero Slimer in the 1987 ABC episodes, and a year later retitled the show to give him top billing. He was an attention ■■■■■. He talked coherently. He was best pals with the dumb jock who was impersonating Peter Venkman. He went on all the Ghostbusters jobs and routinely saved their butts. Action Hero Slimer sucked. THAT Slimer I got sick of fast and grew to hate.
That sums it up for me and probably everyone else who as ever seen those episodes.
The big thing that I have to remember is that Hero Slimer episodes came between two episodes of the SLimer cartoon which, from the animation I’ve seen look like a bad WArner Brother cartoon.
