Ghostbusters: Answer the Call (2016)

  It's been a pretty shitty week for me.  I know you guys are probably tired of hearing me say that I am totally swamped with school but I am.  I also had to put my dog to sleep on Thursday, so as you can imagine, I haven't been able to watch anything.  Christy (of the Experiment) came into town today, however, so I managed to make the time to sit down and hang out with her and watch a movie neither of us had seen before.

Dr. Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) is on track for tenure at Columbia University when a book on the paranormal she had co-authored years ago resurfaces.  In an effort to get Dr. Abby Yates (Melissa McCarthy) to take the book down from Amazon, she agrees to introduce Abby and her assistant, Jillian Holtzmann (Kate McKinnon), to a man who claims a historic New York City house is haunted.  This leads to an actual ghost sighting and the realization that all the paranormal crap Erin had dismissed was real.  She, Abby, and Holtzmann band together to investigate other instances, meeting Patty (Leslie Jones), a subway worker who had seen a ghost in the tunnels, and more importantly, a man (Neil Casey) leaving a device nearby shortly before the sighting.  Erin and Abby realize that the device is intended to supercharge the ghosts and draw more of them out, leading to an apocalyptic event in the middle of New York City.

I have a lot of love for the original and I did my fair share of eye rolling when this remake/homage was announced.  Honestly, I don't approve of this new trend of remaking movies with an all female cast and pretending that it's anything other than pandering.  It's not equality.  Equality would be making a movie and casting whoever (male or female) was best suited for the character.  Also paying them equally, but that's a separate issue.

All that aside, this was pretty cute.  I don't particularly care for Wiig, but McCarthy has grown on me and McKinnon and Jones made this movie.  There are a number of cute cameos from the original stars (except Rick Moranis) and Chris Hemsworth is really adorable as the himbo receptionist.  It's nice to see him do something that's totally comedic and not attached to his Thor characterization.  If you're dead set against this film because you just can't stand that people made another Ghostbusters, fine.  I can respect that.  If you're just mad that it's all women, go fuck yourself.  This movie had a fair share of problems (weak plot, painfully unfunny recurring jokes, Kristen Wiig) but that was not one of them.