This is a big one for me.
Let's take a little trip back to 1989. I would tell you to close your eyes, but then you wouldn't be able to read any of this. Then again, I'm not too terribly sure that anybody does anyways.
It's quite possibly fall of 1989. We were living in a small town in Nebraska, which we would soon escape with a move to the capital city, which isn't any better. Think of it as just a bigger trailer trash population.;
We take a visit to the "big town" for reasons that I honestly do not recall. I'm pretty positive that we had lunch at Burger King because our crappy little town didn't have one yet at that point.
After our lunch that may or may not have happened at Burger King, we stopped into Target, which our crappy town also didn't have!
As we browsed the toy aisles, looking at glorious 80's toy after 80's toy on the pegs, we rounded a corner and on an end cap was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my entire life.
Yes, a Ghostbusters Firehouse playset.
I begged. I begged HARD.
Surely my parents would just go ahead and snatch that shit up and throw it in the cart, right?
Yeah, no such luck.
I had no real grasp of what money even was, other than the change I had in my piggy bank. I didn't even know what it was used for, other than making a wonderful clanking noise that surely annoyed anybody that came within 14 miles of our house.
With no luck of the "Get Mr. Ghostbuster a Firehouse" front, I begrudgingly settled for a Power Pack Heroes Louis Tully figure. I suppose now I could at least say I left with
something Ghostbusters, but at this point, once you have seen the holy grail, trinkets don't hold much appeal.
Christmas approached. It approached faster than I could have ever imagined it would, but I was also 4, and had no concept of time either.
We had made our visit to see Santa Claus, where I was quick to let the fat bastard know that a Ghostbusters Firehouse was the
ONLY thing that could possibly make Christmas right for me that year. Mario pajamas were not in my wheelhouse, Lego blocks wouldn't do, and TMNT stuff would only lead to larger Ghostbusters cravings. And let's be honest, it was 1989, the last year in the best pop culture decade known to man. How could I say goodbye to the greatest decade in the history of the world if I had homeless Ghostbusters figures?
Christmas morning soon arrived. There just HAD to be a Ghostbusters Firehouse in there for me somewhere. This was going to be my big day, the day that my Ghostbusters figures would move in to their new home and establish a permanent residence while operating the greatest business in the entire world!
Present after present was opened. Mario pajamas, Lego blocks, TMNT stuff, all there and accounted for. Finally, after all was said and done, and the magic of presents under the tree wore off, I looked around and said, "well, I guess no Ghostbusters Firehouse for me this time..." to which my Dad replied, "Santa must have run out of them."
No, truth be told, Santa's elves didn't work hard enough to fulfill my wish list. Had they not taken so many smoke and coffee breaks, they could have easily boxed up a Firehouse and had it delivered while I slept on December 24th, 1989.
What seemed like an eternity later, I finally got one. I'm not sure how long it was after Christmas, but I got it. At least good ol' Dad made it right where Santa had brutally screwed me over.
All these years later, I still give them shit about not getting one for Christmas that year. Mom could never remember why I didn't get one, but Dad says it's because nobody had any. Apparently they were a pretty hot item that year, which matches up to the story I was told by the guy I bought my can of Ecto-Plasm from. He said his mother drove all the way down to Missouri on Christmas Eve of that year to get him one.
Sir, you made out better than me.
Memories aside, this really is an awesome toy.
The front of the firehouse let's us all no that this is unmistakably the Ghostbusters headquarters. The color scheme is quite different from the movie and cartoon series, but overall not terrible. It does a nice job of fitting in well with the rest of the toy line.
The big red doors both open up and have just enough room to house the Ecto-1 if and only if you remove the seat on the top of the car, otherwise it's too tall to fit inside.
The inside bugs me a little bit, and keep in mind, this is my OCD coming out.
Okay, main level, enough room for the Ecto-1 sans chair on top. Awesome. But the real question is, how in the world are the Ghostbusters supposed to get up to the second and third floors? Should they just magically sprout a set of wings and learn to fly up?
This has always been the big thing that bothered me about the Firehouse. Sure, it's a toy, it doesn't have to make sense at all, that is where the imagination of a child comes in, but for the lover of everything good, why could Kenner not put in a simple little stair case to shut people like me up?
One neat thing though is the pole. You simply put your figures on it via the pegs that fit into the bottom of their feet and watch them spin down on the red platform, just be careful when they finally land, and there is no way in hell that they wouldn't be spewing chunks everywhere.
The Firehouse also came with a can of Ecto-Plazm, which could be poured into the grate on top of the building and onto a figure. Never really got to try that feature since my parents were beyond anal about that shit getting into the carpet. So we'll just pretend I did, and it rocked.
Kenner also did us a big time solid and gave us the Containment Unit to go along with the Firehouse. My only issue, again nerdy OCD, is that you couldn't really store it inside on the building, and there was no basement, so it basically had to sit outside of the Firehouse while you created your own ghost-busting adventures.
Again,. not a big deal, I'm just cranky.
The top portion of the Containment Unit let you put in a ghost figure that would have been packed in with one of your Ghostbusters. Most of them fit well in there, but some did not at all. If you aim for anything from the first series to the Fright Features series, you're sitting pretty good.
Once your ghost was inserted, you slide the top portion over and it deposits the spook into his permanent home in ghost world.
Pretty simple, but there is too much awesome not to mention.
All in all, the Real Ghostbusters Firehouse playset was a good one. Not really anything to break on it other than the front doors, and not a millions small parts and pieces to lose.
Simple, yet effective.
