Ghostbusters:
Frozen Empire

3 outta 5

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire is a decent entry in the Ghostbusters franchise that doesn’t really have the heart and feeling of rediscovery that made Afterlife so vibrant. But this is an excellently paced Ghostbusters movie, even if it sometimes leans a bit serious, but Frozen Empire still has laughs. The role of the original crew is larger than in Afterlife which is welcome. The effects look cool, as Ghostbusters movies have interesting effects that look somewhat cartoony but are still impressive. There’s also a gigantic skybeam at the climax which has become a cliché of sci-fi action movies by now but, following the rules of Ghostbusters lore back to the 1984 original, if the ghost containment unit is broken there must be a gigantic skybeam. So that gets a pass.

Teenager Phoebe Spengler (Mckenna Grace) is a Ghostbuster in New York along with her brother, Trevor (Finn Wolfhard), her mother Callie (Carrie Coon) and Carrie’s boyfriend, Gary (Paul Rudd). However, when they cause a lot of property damage the Mayor, Walter Peck (William Atherton), demands the kid stops busting ghosts. Meanwhile, retired Ghostbuster Ray Stantz (Dan Aykroyd) receives a mysterious orb that contains the spirit of a powerful ghost from the shiftless Nadeem (Kumail Nanjiani). Feeling abandoned, Phoebe ends up befriending a teenage ghost, Melody (Emily Alyn Lind), who just wants to move to the other side. But when the orb starts acting up, ghosts are unleashed and it’ll take the new Ghostbusters teaming up with the original crew, Ray, Winston (Ernie Hudson), Janine (Annie Potts) and Peter Venkman (Bill Murray) to stop New York from being sent into a new ice age.

The movie bounces around the different characters, leaving some with less focus. Wolfhard’s Trevor was a big part of Afterlife and now he’s mostly relegated to hanging back and firing a proton pack. He does get in some funny scenes where Trevor confronts Slimer, the original big green slimy ghost. The effects for Slimer invokes the look and feel of the puppet from the original film, but Slimer is more mobile and expressive. Trevor runs into his old friend, Lucky (Celeste O’Connor) and she’s working at a new ghost containment unit. Their dynamic was more pronounced in Afterlife but here they are stuck in action scenes. Gary gets a subplot where he becomes a parental figure to Phoebe, which gives Rudd a bit more to do, and he gets a lot of funny lines. There’s also bantering back and forth between Callie and her kids and Coon is good at snarky moments. The story of a new family coming together is the emotional core of this film, but Afterlife’s story about dealing with the loss of Egon and becoming Ghostbusters was more well done.

The unexpectedly emotionally affecting story is Phoebe making friends with the dour but likable teenage ghost, Melody. Melody has a flickering blue flame design which Phoebe thinks looks cool and Melody says, “I died before my face burned off.” It sort of feels like a romantic subplot which has no connection because Melody is literally a ghost. When Phoebe does something drastic to meet Melody on her own plane of existence, there’s an interesting twist. Grace’s Phoebe is more of a moody teenager in this one, she says less corny jokes which is a shame because it was a hilarious character trait she had in Afterlife. Phoebe is the centre of the finale action scene which is cool to see her definitively as the lead after two movies.

Nanjiani as the guy who delivers the orb gets a weird, but amusing, plotline where discovers ancestral powers to manipulate fire, and there’s a good bit when Venkman is testing him which lets Murray go off. Aykroyd’s Ray is still the most enthusiastic Ghostbuster and even when Winston tells him he should settle into his golden years, Ray says this is still what he wants to do. There’s also a fun easter egg when Ray runs into the same library ghost from the first film. Winston is the owner now and he mostly just gets to do exposition about their new containment unit, and Potts returning as the sarcastic Janine is amusingly surly and gets to wear a proton pack. Murray’s Venkman still has the best lines, and he has an awesome bit when Venkman walks into the Ghostbusters HQ and bangs on a cabinet to find a bottle of booze he stashed away decades ago. The return of Atherton as the Ghostbusters-hating Walter Peck lets him still be the exact same jerk he was in 1984 but now he’s the mayor and can back it up. It would have been nice to have him and Venkman go at it again, but they only share one line.

Visually, this definitely looks like a Ghostbusters film, where the ghost images can be really cartoony or really menacing. There’s the return of the funny, chaotic little munchkin Mini-Stay-Pufts and the design of the big horned iced guy main baddie looks freaky even if it feels too close to Night King on Game of Thrones. Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire may haphazardly bounce between scares and laughs, and it ends up really focusing on action ultimately, but Ghostbusters movies usually oscillate between the two tones. While there have been better Ghostbusters movies, this still brings together both generations of Ghostbusters for a fun ride.