Ghostbusters (2016)

This flick will make you feel good.

As most of us are now sadly aware, a toxic strain of male nerd has bloomed throughout the internet, an invidious weed born of entitlement, persecution complex and utter unwillingness to evolve.

Of course, one of the latest sites of unbridled hot garbage umbrage for the wailing shitheadus neckbeardus has been focused on Paul Feig’s all-lady remake of Ghostbusters.

Yes indeed, True Believers, apparently the 1984 original is so sacred a text to these pituitary pedants that these, if you’ll excuse me, “men’s right’s” advocating baby-men feel justified in orchestrating a full scale, gut-wrenchingly regressive GamerGate style hate campaign in defiance of this perceived affront to some weird, backwards cultural ideal.

Happily, Feig (The Heat) and his SPY co-writer Katie Dippold (the former received some comparatively lukewarm Twitter bile, the latter, sadly, a sickening, jaundiced stream of threats to her physical well-being), in tandem with their superb cast of funny-ladies (and, yes blokes, calm down), have crafted a jaunty, candy-hued, spook-laden middle finger t0 all of the above.

Saturday Night Live alumni Kristen Wiig (Welcome To Me), Kate McKinnon (Sisters) and Leslie Jones (Top Five), with Feig-fave Melissa McCarthy (Bridesmaids) in tow bring their contemporary improv dynamic to this tale of Ghostbusting badarses, with McKinnon in particular bringing the bad-arse oddball to stand out effect. Which isn’t to say the quartet don’t shine individually and as a unit.

Meanwhile, there’s the mighty Odinson himself, Chris Hemsworth, gamely playing thick-as-two-planks perv-magnet slash receptionist Kevin.

In the Big Bad corner, Neil Casey’s (Saturday Night Live) Rowan is perhaps most illustrative of the flick’s awareness of the petulant online maelstrom directed at it- he’s the ultimate persecuted fanboy and loner, convinced of his righteousness and darkly intoning that he’ll soon bring down The Fourth Cataclysm and cleanse the world of, well, everyone who doesn’t agree with him?

(Rowan’s sketchbooking, all adolescent power fantasies, are equal parts hilarious and horrifyingly, well, illustrative of the juvenile tantrums played out online).

Seemingly tailored right up to release, so prescient are the gags and rebuttals to the rage-gasms and sadness beards erupting across the ‘net as its release approached.

Jubilant and inventive, with fan-pleasing cameos, (was Rick Moranis in there?), I’d even dare posit that Ghostbusters, 2016 spec, gives us a more emotionally satisfying ending, all told.

I feel a great swell of pity (well, sort of) for the bro-beard who can’t get over his sad wee persecution complex and fails to allow actual joy into his “life”.

Because this new Ghostbusters is just that- a joyous time at the flicks.

Ruin the rest of a sweaty MRA broceph’s year and see it twice.

* Word to anyone who’s taken curmudgeonly offence to the Fall Out Boy/ Rihanna theme “reimagining”: you don’t even have to really endure ‘that’ song if your delicately tuned Gen X misanthrope ears are so easily affronted (it’s in the flick proper an entire twenty seconds, tops).

Originally published at http://hopscotchfriday.tumblr.com/post/147266898851/ghostbusters-this-flick-will-make-you-feel-good