The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History Hardcover Book Review

Dark Horse Books recently released The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History by Troy Benjamin and Craig Goldberg, in both Standard and Deluxe editions. Let's take a closer look at it...

This massive tome detailing all aspects of The Real Ghostbusters has been produced as a hardcover book, roughly 9.25" x 12.25" on the outside, with 248 pages, featuring high-quality printing on thick paper. Language is not censored, so expect to read a few F-Bombs. It is described on the back cover as such:

When the global phenomenon Ghostbusters made the transdimensional sidestep to animation with 1986's The Real Ghostbusters, the Saturday morning cartoon was an incredible success. The series was acclaimed for its mature storytelling, its fantastical animation, and a voice cast that became as synonymous with the characters as the live-action actors who originated them. A simultaneous toy launch from Kenner ectoplasmatically energized the property with some of the most memorable, most beloved, weirdest, and best-selling toys in popular culture.

The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History is the ultimate collector's dream. This franchise overview combines rare and never-before-seen visuals including conceptual artwork, storyboards, script excerpts, internal memos, packaging art, unseen prototypes, abandoned concepts, and brand-new stunning photography with new and exclusive interviews.

The best way for me to tell you what this book is all about will be to go through it chapter by chapter. So, in that regard, here is the table of contents.

Page 007 - Foreword by Joe Medjuck
Page 009 - Introduction
Page 010 - A Brief Timeline of The Real Ghostbusters
Page 014 - Chapter 1: Manifestation
Page 074 - Chapter 2: Heroes, Ghouls, and Marshmallow Men
Page 108 - Chapter 3: Tools for the Talent
Page 126 - Chapter 4: The Franchise Rights Alone: Toys, Merchandise, and the Rise of Ecto Cooler
Page 218 - Chapter 5: Sequels and Spinoffs
Page 232 - Chapter 6: Total Protonic Reversal
Page 248 - Acknowledgments and Contributors

Not much needs to be said about the Foreword or Introduction. The foreword by producer Joe Medjuck is brief (half a page) and depressing. The single-page Introduction lays out what the book aims to do.

The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History is the ultimate collector's dream. Its humble authors were also guilty of being those kids running around on the playground pretending to circumnavigate an Ecto-Containment Unit meltdown by overloading the Proton Packs and fleeing in the Ecto-2. It has been our pleasure to research and analyze this beloved cornerstone of the franchise. Most importantly, we consider ourselves fortunate to have spoken with the creative minds behind the show and the toy designers who made the show popular beyond the screen for their first-person perspectives. Sometimes stories differed or contradicted each other. Perspectives and points of view provided different takes on certain events. Several key figures became our resolute sounding boards to find the space between and tell the entire story.

When you get to page 10, you'll find a three-page timeline of events for the franchise. It starts with "June 1984: Ghostbusters is released in theaters", and ends with "October 5, 1991: Last new episode of The Real Ghostbusters airs: 20,000 Leagues Under the Street".

The meat and potatoes of the book are the six chapters that take up 234 pages in total. Let's take a look at what subjects are covered therein. I will also point out a few interesting tidbits. One thing to note is that there are a few sidebars throughout, mainly "Highlight Episode" sidebars that briefly profile one of sixteen significant episodes, usually accompanied by related animation cels and production artwork.


Although there is no index or table of contents for these "Highlight Episode" sidebars, I have personally compiled a list.

Page 068 - Ghosts R Us
Page 087 - Knock, Knock
Page 094 - Citizen Ghost
Page 104 - The Revenge of Murray the Mantis
Page 107 - Mrs. Roger's Neighborhood
Page 114 - Troll Bridge
Page 118 - The Boogieman Cometh
Page 124 - Mr. Sandman, Dream Me a Dream
Page 152 - Take Two
Page 162 - Night Game
Page 179 - Chicken, He Clucked
Page 195 - Venkman's Ghost Repellers
Page 204 - The Collect Call of Cathulhu
Page 212 - The Halloween Door
Page 220 - The Grundel
Page 227 - Attack of the B-Movie Monsters


Jason Reitman and Gil Kenan share childhood Ghostbusters memories, as does Violet Ramis Stiel. This segues into the formation of the animated series, the creation of the pitch pilot, different Japanese animation studios, and so on. It is extensively detailed about the writing and animation process... a little too detailed. It goes over such mundane day-to-day stuff that it gets a bit boring after a while. This is one of only two or three spots where the book is a dry read.

There is an episode list of the first 78 episodes on pages 72 & 73, and the Slimer! shorts later on page 228. The later 63 episodes are primarily ignored (aside from an episode here and there). Furthermore, what is sorely missing from the book is a COMPLETE EPISODE GUIDE! That should have been the final chapter, even if it was just a reproduction of the one James Eatock wrote for the Time Life DVD set. Since the last half of the series is kinda glossed over, no mention is made of the last season only having four episodes, or why there were so few episodes produced instead of a more "filled out" season.


Finding the characters, translating them to animation, the voice talent, character profiles, and so on. There are a few non-sequiturs and repetitive quotes, as different people are quoted saying the same thing as someone else earlier, but it's nowhere as bad as the Cleanin' Up the Town book.


Designing and animating the Ghostbusters' equipment, vehicles, and locations. The book features LOTS of artwork from the 1980s up to the 2008 Time Life DVD set, and that includes scans of animation cels and production drawings that are usually placed somewhat in close proximately to where the subject is being discussed.



At 91 pages, this is the largest chapter in the book. The majority of it is about the Kenner toyline. Again, it's a bit of a dry read; at least at the beginning when it gives backgrounds for several toy designers that really aren't relevant to the overall narrative. It does get better, MUCH better. There is a profile for every single toy ever created by Kenner, or just about, with beautiful large reproductions of toy artwork and packaging. There is even extensive discussion about unreleased and undeveloped toys, such as some really cool-looking wind-up toys on page 134. I would love to see Hasbro actually produce these.


There is even some information about the Kenner toy commercials. Two are spotlighted on page 189: "One commercial featured a live-action actor as the Wolfman having a conversation with a puppeteered Fearsome Flush. Another featured live-action actors of Dracula and Frankenstein's Monster, crank calling the Ghostbusters, with Laura Summer's voice as Janine answering on the other end."

After the Kenner toys, the chapter takes a look at other Real Ghostbusters merchandise and tie-ins that were released concurrent to the toyline. This includes, but is not limited to The Real Ghostbusters magazine, cereal, McDonald's Happy Meals, comics, other books, and more. Hi-C Ecto Cooler is discussed, but not to the extent that it should have been mentioned in the chapter title. "The Rise of Ecto Cooler" feels a bit misleading.

There are no photos of the Time Life DVD set and the beautiful firehouse box that I suggested - I really should finally write that "Making of the Time Life DVD Set" feature I have been wanted to do for years using all of the e-mails and files I saved from 2008 when I consulted on the set - or any of the VHS and DVD home video releases from Columbia/Sony, both domestically and internationally. There is only a scant mention of home video releases here and there in the book. As a physical media collector, that is really disappointing.

The chapter concludes with a discussion of music used in the series: the theme song, the Saban/Levy score, and the Tahiti soundtrack album. It is here where we learn the true identity of the "John Smith" who performed the original version of the theme song on the series. Ray Parker Jr., believes it was Carl Anderson (on pages 214 & 215). Sadly, Carl passed away in 2004, so he can't personally confirm it. We will just have to assume that Ray is remembering correctly.

"It's definitely not me singing on it, and I don't know anybody named John Smith," says famed musician Ray Parker Jr., who himself is a storied session musician who played on tracks for Stevie Wonder, the Temptations, and many more. "I wasn't there when they redid my song, but I was always under the impression that it was Carl Anderson." Anderson, who famously played Judas in Jesus Christ Superstar - including the 1973 motion picture version - and topped Billboard's sales charts with his duet with Gloria Loring, 1986's "Friends and Lovers," had signed a record deal with Columbia Records in 1982 and released his self-titled album with the label in 1986, when the theme song would have been recorded. He had also dabbled in performing theme songs for films and television shows throughout his career, including the theme song for the film Her Alibi in 1989 and the theme to Equal Justice in 1990. Anderson, who had a long battle with leukemia, passed away in 2004.

The revised Slimer and The Real Ghostbusters theme song is said to have been done by Chase/Rucker Production, but it is not said who actually performed the vocals; Thomas Jones Chase, Steve Rucker, Carl Anderson, or someone else.

It is in the vicinity of the music discussion where a Highlight Episode for "The Halloween Door" appears. I bring this up because it is a great example of where text documents are displayed, but they are overlapped, so you can't read all of the text on them. Why bother including the original Halloween special premises if they're not entirely readable? At least the small original Slimer! Series Bible pages (on pages 224 & 225) are readable; though you may need a magnifying glass.



We now jump back a bit to talk about Ghostbusters II and how it negatively affected the animated series and vice versa. It is here where the Slimer! series is finally brought up. As is already known, it is mentioned that "Scareface" was originally a half-hour pilot for Slimer!, but was reduced to 14-minutes for broadcast. It is not made clear if it was shrunk down in the writing phase or after it was already produced and edited together. Could there be a longer version of this episode sitting out there somewhere? Anyway, Slimer's appearance in the Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue anti-drug special is also discussed.

A few times in the book, when mentioning the Q5 changes to the show, there will be a "more than that in chapter 6" notation. That's a bit annoying to read. While it makes sense to devote an entire chapter to that subject, it seems weird to push it to the back. It makes it seem like the chapters about Kenner toys, other merchandise, Ghostbusters II, and Slimer! were dropped into the middle of a book about the show.


Here we go, the grand finale: The death The Real Ghostbusters due to all of the unwarranted Q5 Consulting Group changes, and other factors that were out of the show's control. All of the Q5 changes are listed one by one with feedback from those involved about each of them. There is even a screenshot from the episode "Camping It Up" on page 243 showing Ecto-1 driving past a road sign reading "EXIT Q-5" that Michael Reeves wrote into the script as an inside joke.

The chapter, and the book, ends with the legacy of The Real Ghostbusters featuring some comments from Jason Reitman and Gil Kenan. It seems weird to end the book with quotes from people who had nothing to do with the series. I feel like J. Michael Straczynski should have had the final word.


You will find my name, Paul Rudoff, listed here, presumably for the use of materials found on Spook Central. Although I never directly contributed to the book, I'm glad I could help.


Unlike some of the other books I've reviewed, this one was properly edited and proof-read. I didn't find very many errors. There was a double word on one page, which in fairness to the authors, I didn't bother noting specifically. On page 193, when talking about the Ecto Glow figures, it says "1989" when it should be 1991. ("In 1989, the highly anticipated sequel Ghostbusters II was in the rearview mirror with no apparent plans for a third installment. The animated series was ending development and production of new episodes.") The third and final error I noted was on page 242 where it says that Little of Clowns of Happytown was on CBS. It was actually on ABC, as proven by the "American Broadcasting Companies, Inc." copyright given at the end of the episodes.

So, what we have here is a very detailed book covering nearly all aspects of The Real Ghostbusters with large images showing off beautiful series and toy artwork. It's not perfect, but it is damn close to it.


As stated in the opening to this review, Dark Horse has chosen to release the book in a Standard Edition for $54.99 (MSRP) and a Deluxe Edition for $109.99 (MSRP). Each edition has a different front and back cover for the book. The Standard Edition features the iconic promo image on the front (also found on page 29 inside), with the series title above it and the book subtitle and authors listed below it. Another iconic group image appears on the back, along with the official description.


The Deluxe Edition looks bad in comparison. No title, no authors, no iconic series imagery. Instead you get the interior front of the Kenner Firehouse playset on the front, and the interior side of the playset on the back. The Deluxe Edition comes with a slipcase that ties in with this, but the book covers didn't have to follow suit. I would have preferred to have the Standard Edition book in the Deluxe Edition case. At least the details are actual scans of the playset's decals, as evident by the poor print quality. Look at the Granny Gross portrait with a magnifying glass (or in the enlargement below) and you'll see what I mean.


Both editions come shrink-wrapped with a piece of paper across the back illustrating the finer details to prospective buyers. This paper is different, as well. In the side-by-side below, the Standard is on the left and the Deluxe is on the right.


That's it for the Standard Edition, but there's more to the Deluxe Edition. Given that it costs double the price, there better be. So, what do you get for the additional $55?

- An exclusive firehouse-inspired slipcase.
- A folio enclosing two acetate "animation cel" replicas and background painting lithographs.
- A firehouse flagpole-inspired ribbon bookmark.

I'm not not sure what makes the ribbon bookmark "firehouse flagpole-inspired". It's just a plain royal blue ribbon.


The slipcase is based on the Kenner Firehouse playset, mirroring the exterior front on the slipcase front, and the playset's exterior side on the slipcase back. It measures approx. 9.5" x 12.5".


Slipped inside the slipcase is not only the book, but also a royal blue portfolio containing the two animation cel replicas. The portfolio measures approx. 12.25" x 9.25" closed (24.5" x 9.25" when opened). The front of the portfolio features colored model sheet images of the four guys with "We're here to save the world. - The Real Ghostbusters" printed underneath. The back of the portfolio is blank.


The animation cels side-by-side inside are of Ray and Egon. The cels are actually removable from the portfolio, while the backgrounds are printed on the portfolio itself. A small copyright notice has been added in the lower right corner of each cel, though it's mostly covered by the corner tabs holding the cel in place.


Ray and Egon are nice, but they're not the best choices, in my opinion. A group image, Janine, and/or Slimer, would have been preferable. Perhaps these were the best of the cels they had access to that had matching backgrounds.

Well, that's it for the Deluxe Edition. The ribbon bookmark is a nothingburger, so really what you're getting for the additional $55 is the Kenner firehouse slipcase, the portfolio with the animation cel replicas, and the crappier book covers. Personally, I don't think that's worth the additional money. You can buy two REAL Real Ghostbusters animation cels for less than $55 on eBay right now. They may not be of Ray and Egon, or they may be better.

The standard book clearly has the better cover, which should have been used in both editions. I would prefer to have the standard book in the deluxe case with the portfolio, but that's not a possibility unless both versions are purchased (for over $150 total). So, with all of this information, I leave it to you to decide which version you want: Standard Edition for $54.99 (MSRP) or Deluxe Edition for $109.99 (MSRP). Either way, YOU WANT THIS BOOK!

This item was provided by Dark Horse for review on this site.