Ok. Have you ever wondered why the painting changed to the GB’s & Oscar when Vigo is defeated? Whenever I watch GB2 with a new girlfriend or friend, they always question what exactly is happening there. Well I have a theory or two.
pardon spelling and grammar errors. Wrote this on an old 3G flip phone
So my theory is that The negative energy from Vigos spirit manifests itself as a portrait of Vigo so he can communicate with whomever he needs to help him achieve his goal(death is but a door time is but a window, the painting being that window). When the Ghostbusters destroy Vigo the painting has changed to Ghostbusters and the baby. Why? The canvas absorbed the positive energy of whatever was in the room at that time and manifests itself as what you see in the final shot. So the canvas is obviously supernatural in some unexplained way. I remember reading a GB2 script that contained a scene in the museum storage room where a painting “melts away” revealing Vigo underneath(I could be imagining this but I swear I read it). With Vigo destroyed and the positive slime playing a part in weakening him and the canvas, we get the opposite of the dreary morbid Vigo painting.
Another theory I have involves someone creating the canvas as a way to trap Vigo’s spirit or that Vigo himself created it just incase anything should happen to his body(like a Horcrux from Harry Potter) so he might one day return. When blank The canvas absorbs whatever energy is strongest, be it positive or negative. Vigo just happened to be negative. So what do you folks thinks? Did someone, a primitive Ghostbuster perhaps, create the canvas to trap Vigo OR did Vigo create it either before his bodily death or after?
Out of these scenarios, I’m pretty sure Vigo created it ala the Voldemort in Harry Potter. The canvas operates like a horcrux.
I’m new to these boards so my apologies if this has been debated
A painting of five subjects that coincidentally strongly resembled the four GB’s and Oscar was ALWAYS on that canvas, but Vigo painted his supernatural self-portrait on top of it.
When Vigo was destroyed, all the old slime and paint were washed away, revealing the original painting. The fact that its subject matter strongly resembled the men in the room at the time was sheer happenstance.
They themselves don’t seem to take the resemblance too seriously, since they immediately begin an art critique trying to pinpoint the identity of the early Renaissance artist.
Really? You think a painting depicting the GB’s and a baby just happened to be under there? Man I wish Reitman would do a commentary so we can get the real story behind these sorts of things. I guess that painting could have been there the entire time. Maybe whoever painted it could see into the future. I always thought the art critique was a joke(Venkman using an Italian pasta dish as a “punch line”). I always figured Egon was just being Egon & deducing the style of the piece rather than the portrait itself.
Of all the ‘backup’ features in the GB ongoing comic, one of my all-time favorites was the story featuring John Horace Tobin, and backstory about the bag used by Egon’s college buddy to capture Death. Maybe one day the same creators can get a crack at similar story regarding the history of the Vigo painting.
My interpretation is that it was never really a painting. Vigo changes its appearance frequently and it looks different when the photos are analyzed. I don’t think it was ever Vigo physically changing the paint around. I kind of doubt it was ever actually painted by anyone.
It was some sort of portal and conduit for psychomagnetheric energy (be it negative or positive).
With all the positive vibes from the city and when it was cleansed of Vigo’s evil, it adopted an image of overwhelming goodness or happiness, which at the time happened to be the Ghostbusters. And as the world started to go back to its normal, “rather step on your face than look at you” self, the image of Vigo started to manifest again (as seen in the video game and comics).
This may also be why Vigo physically came out of the painting at the end. It’s possible the painting was rejecting him and he had to make himself physical to survive (though he was in a severely weakened state).
Newborn pretty much nailed it. It’s not explained in the movie, of course, but in the 10/20 draft of the script, Venkman tosses a can of paint thinner on the Vigo painting. This does in our favorite Carpathian self-portrait and reveals the other painting underneath. I kinda wish they would have stuck with this ending-- a nonchalant Venkman taking the low-tech, obvious way out. It could have been pretty funny.
Whatever higher powers exist in the GB universe rearranged the canvas as a thank you to the guys.
I also connect it to the series of paintings that apocryphal rumors attributed to Nostradamus.
Both Vigo and Nostradamus were born 3 years apart. I can imagine Vigo seeking out the famous Nostradamus and asking him to see into the future, tell him what Vigo’s destiny was. When he foresaw Vigo’s death, the tyrant commissioned a very special portrait from Nostradmus. A portrait painted by a true seer of the future, that would act as a window through which Vigo could enter into the future from the other side of life.
However ..PENTIMENTO! The Italian word for one painting painted over another. Nostradamus’ visions also showed him a group of four very special men and one very special baby that would spell the end of this tyrants plans for the future. He painted Vigo’s portrait over another painting of these four heroes as a message to the future, knowing that Vigo’s destiny was to fade away into nothingness.
Or…it was four guys that just happened to look like them.
I always thought that the positively charged mood slime was just so strong that it temperarily altered the painting into something more positive than a several-hundred-year-old tyrant standing on a pile of skulls. Is everybody getting this so far?
