Day 2: The Hunchback Monster!!

Yes, the Mr., Ghostbuster Halloween countdown rolls on.

Day number 2 of "31 Ghosts in 31 Days!!!"

Today, we take a look at the Hunchback from Kenner's Real Ghostbusters Monsters series.

Short story about my history with this figure, when I was about 4 years old, my mom got the idea in her head that she knew how to cook.

The most important thing you should know about my mother's cooking is that one of two things is going to get burned, either the food, or her.

Having suffered through many partially black dinners, it was a welcome relief to eat something not so charred, but it came at a price. Mom burnt the living hell out of her arm. Pretty sure she still has a scar from it somewhere under all of the wrinkles.

Well, that night my dad, on his way home from work, stopped to get her some band aids and such. It was a decent burn.

I was already in bed fast asleep when he returned home for the night, so I knew nothing was coming my way until I woke up the next morning.

As I sat in the living room, trying to shake the sleep off, I noticed our friend, the Hunchback monster on the coffee table.

I asked if that was for me. I didn't know. Maybe dad felt really bad that mom didn't know how to cook and bought her a Ghostbusters toy to make her feel better. It could happen, right?????

Nope. It was for me. Of course it was.

The moral? If mom gets burnt or hurt in any way, I get a Ghostbusters toy.

The Hunchback monster is gruesome indeed.

 An ugly, wart covered monstrosity who was long ago banished to a bell tower to hide from society, he awaits the perfect time to haunt the normal civilians of Notre Dame. 

And he's probably a virgin. 

When you squeeze the figure's legs, he breaks free from his shackles, tilting his ugly, disfigured head back to let out a loud scream.

I mean, he could be good looking if you had enough booze in you, right?

The Monster series were indeed to perfect set of toys to be used nearly 30 years later in this count down. Kenner did a remarkable job to bring these famous monsters to life in the Ghostbusters universe.

While not as neat as the Haunted Humans line, they are still very cool to own.

The main difference between these and the Haunted Humans, is you know exactly what you are getting. With the Hunchback, you know you are getting a pissed off disfigures man hell bent on revenge, whereas with yesterday's Mail Fraud figure, what he appears to be on the surface is a far cry from what he will become when possessed. 

Either way, this series is a win in my book.

The countdown rolls on tomorrow for Day 3!

Day 1: Mail Fraud!

 

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is OFFICIALLY October 1st! Halloween is upon us!

What better way to celebrate the biggest day of the year for all of the Ghostbusters franchises and fans that to review 31 ghosts in 31 days?

Yes, the Mr. Ghostbuster blog is your place to be this Halloween season for all thing Ghostbusters!

I thought, perhaps, I would ease into this one a little bit. It is, afterall, going to be a VERY long month. Not only do I have a job to deal with on a daily basis, but everything else that comes along with being a grown up as well, so if at some point these reviews become slightly half assed, don't say I didn't warn you.

For day one of our long 31 day countdown, we will take a look at MAIL FRAUD!

Mail Fraud, one of the tougher figures to find from the Haunted Humans line by Kenner, is one disgruntled postal worker.

While he doesn't officially have a name, aside from his ghostly alter ego, works for an unnamed post office in an unnamed city. 

We'll pretend his name is Pat, and he is a carrier for the Bronx Post Office? Cool?

Nah.

Anyways, Mr. Postal Worker here deals with fugly (yeah, I used it) housewives and beer drinking welfare men all day long. He is just plain miserable.

 He used to wake up happy, and ready to go to work until he met Gertrude off of East 9th street, who tried to seduce him while wearing her hair rollers and night gown.

 Perhaps he wouldn't have minded so much had it not been for the mole with three dark hairs sticking out right above her lip.

Day after day of lugging around people's bills and those stupid Pizza Coupons that you get ever Wednesday, he snapped and hung himself.

A little depressing, but one person can only take so much.

He came back to haunt all of his old stops, ready to make the hairs on Gertrude's mole jump off of her face.

Mail Fraud has come to unleash holy hell on every person along his old route.

The Mail Fraud figure was a great toy indeed. The Haunted Humans line was one of the best indeed, taking normal, everyday people in blue collar jobs and giving them the perfect mixture of poltergeist and take this job and shove it.

Mail Fraud transforms flawlessly from United States Postal worker to ghost by lifting his torso up.

His stomach suddenly becomes a mouth clad with razor sharp teeth, his neck tie becomes a nose and his shirt pockets become eyes that glare straight into the depths of your soul.

I do no at all doubt that Mail Fraud would gladly scare the daylights out of anybody who gets in his way.

Now, lets just hope he takes out those people who clog up my mailbox with pizza coupons and grocery ads.

GB Swag at Krispy Kreme!

We are just days away from the start of the 2014 Mr. Ghostbuster Halloween season where we will look at 31 Ghosts in 31 Days! Cannot believe that it has crept up so fast.

I really tried to be prepared for it by writing and doing things in advance, but that really didn't happen like I would have hoped for, so it's going to be a busy month for sure.

But before all of the Halloween fun, we have bigger fish to fry. Er, doughnuts to fry. Yeah, something like that.

So, let's be honest, Lincoln, Nebraska is the worst possible place that anybody could live. We don't even have a Krispy Kreme here!

Luckily, I have friends in low places, and I was able to score the Ghostbusters doughnut box and plastic pail!

Now, I know I should be stoned with the heaviest of rocks for not at least trying the doughnuts, but in reality, they don't sound good to me at all. I'm sure they are good though, but sadly, I'll never know.

The doughnut box is REALLY FREAKIN' COOL!

Decorated with slime green polka dots, and featuring a wonderful Ghostbusters / Krispy Kreme logo mash up, the box is sure to be an excellent display piece in any collection.

I very highly recommend that if you stop into a Krispy Kreme to get your doughnuts, I'm certain that they would be happy to oblige a request for an extra box.

Trust me, you WILL want to have a clean one for display. Way too cool to pass up.

The plastic Trick-or-Treat pail is excellent. My guy who picked this up said it sold for $3.99. I'm going to assume his information is accurate, but if I am wrong, please let me know!

The plastic bucket features a tremendous Slimer sticker on the lid, with the sides of the bucket giving up the same No Ghost / Krispy Kreme logo mash up as well as the GB30 logo.

While I would love to obtain a few more of these, I'm happy with one, seeing as I didn't think I'd end up with anything at all.

Seriously, though, Krispy Kreme did an excellent job with this. Even if it's just a box and a bucket, I'm more than excited to have these in my collection. Well done doughnut dudes.

See you October 1st!

Mail Call!!!!

I was in the process of writing about something else for this site when the mail man came a knocking at my door to deliver me all kinds of goodies.

If you're wondering (trust me, you probably aren't) that "other" post will be up tomorrow.

I was pretty excited to see mister mail man today, as I knew that today would finally be the day that I got the items I had ordered online a week ago.

I typically HATE ordering things online as the wait takes forever. I'm one of those weird people who likes to have the item in my hand the moment the money is forked over.

Regardless of me being weird, lets see what today's mail brought!!!!

First up we have the Real Ghostbusters volume 1 DVD set. 

I had this so long ago, and was nearly heartbroken when it got lost in a move years and years ago.

This set, still factory sealed, was scored off of Amazon for around $8 after shipping. Not too bad.

To make things even better, I only ordered it 3 days ago. Boy, they sure are fast. Big props to the seller for being so quick!

The Ghost Spooker!!!!!!

It's a rare day that I get to add a Kenner item to my collection that I do not already own. I think I'm down to about 5 or 6 items now to have a complete Kenner collection.

Seriously, I have no idea what I am going to do with myself when I accomplish this goal. I mean, obviously I will move on to completing the Extreme Ghostbusters set, and then Matty and whatnot, but the Kenner line, as it was the original, is kind of a big deal for me to finish. It's bittersweet, that's for sure.

I'm not going to go into great detail about the Ghost Spooker since it deserves a review of it's own.

The item was not sealed in it's box by any means, so I took the contents out for a photo, but hey, the box IS there, so it makes it that much cooler, right?

And last, but not least, there is the Extreme Ghostbusters Plasma Blaster!

This is yet another item that I did not already have, but to be fair, my collecting focus for many years has been the Kenner stuff, so I have only picked up the EGB stuff when it is readily available, or cheap.

Again, not going into a lot of detail since this item will get a post of it's own at some point, but like the Ghost Spooker, the toy has been opened and played with before, so I had no bad feeling about opening it to take a photo.

All in all, I'd say it was a pretty good day, when you factor in the Stay Puft pencil sharpener and sealed Ertl Ecto-1A model kit that I picked up locally today.

Can't hate seeing your Ghostbusters collection grow!

I'm thinking sometime after the Halloween season, I am going to ask all of my readers here and on Facebook to show me a pic of their collection, which I will feature in a slide show or gallery here in a future post. It's always fun to see what other Ghostbusters collectors have, and I'll admit, even I sometimes get jealous!

Mini Traps!

Ugh, I have so many sets of these. Five of them at the very least.

Kenner's Mini Traps, much like Fearsome Flush, were stand alone toys in the Real Ghostbusters toy line, meaning they weren't tied down to a particular series such as the Haunted Humans or Monsters.

I remember when I got my first set of this. My mom and I had gone somewhere, where it was I do not recall, we'll just say the ends of the Earth because that's about how big the small town I lived in was to me in the late 80's, and when we arrived home, my dad had called from work.

Just being old enough to use the phone was a pretty cool thing. i was pretty hooked on it, to the point where I would climb up on the kitchen table, asking my mom for the numbers of anybody that I knew so that I could call them.

Anyways, my dad had asked me if I had seen what he got me.

Hell no I hadn't.

On the kitchen table, which I recall being super freakin' ugly, was a brown paper sack from Wal-Mart, because, you know, they had those back then before everybody decided to complain and be all environmentally friendly and junk.

Inside of the now defunct brown paper Wal-Mart sack were the Mini Traps!

I have always been a little more partial to the orange one being my favorite. 

I really have no reason for it, other than the horns on the top of his head that perfectly compliment his one giant cyclops eye.

I always liked to think of these as ghostly version of Venus fly traps, just chilling with their mouths open, waiting for their unsuspecting prey to make a landing.

Today we'll use Dr. Raymond Stantz as our test subject.

Ray wanders carelessly around wherever the hell he is wandering. He unfortunately forgot to bring along his Proton Pack, PKE Meter, or Ecto Goggles. He figured he wouldn't really need them where he was going. Turns out, he needs them now more than ever.

All of the sudden Ray makes ones wrong move and is snatched up by the orange mini trap.

How in the hell he didn't notice a big orange thing with teeth on the ground, I'll never know.

Able to finally pull himself free, Ray moves along. A little shaken from the whole experience, but still moving along carelessly. 

Well, for the second time, Ray, not paying attention, is swept off his feet, this time by the purple mini trap.

All Ray can do is lay there helplessly and smile.

Better you than me, Ray.

FYI, don't ever trigger these things with your finger. It hurts like hell when they snap down on you.

Before I end this, I want to send out a HUGE THANK YOU to the Montana Ghostbusters for the wonderful package they sent me! Trust me guys, it means a lot to me! You guys are awesome.  Be sure to hit them up on Facebook.

GB2 Swag From Hardee's!

Back in the 80's, before all of them in my area were replaced by Burger King's, Hardee's was THE place to be.

Their promotions of Gremlins and California Raisins among other things made them stand out even better than the likes of the big time fast food chains.

But it was really the restaurant's promotion of Ghostbusters 2 that put them above and beyond, if only for a short time.

I can recall making many trips to Hardee's in the Summer of 1989. We lived in the small hillbilly town of York, Nebraska at the time. A crappy little redneck wasteland to say the least, but apparently, because we had a Hardee's, we were good enough to get a visit from the one and only Ecto-1A.

To my knowledge, this was the legit Ecto-1A as seen in the film. From what I understand, 3 cars were made,. 2 that were used on the film, and one that was sent to Universal Studios.

I truly wish there was a photo somewhere of me with the Ecto-1A, but sadly at that time, I'm pretty sure it wasn't something that would have even been thought about. It's not like smartphones and selfies were in style yet.

With an excellent promotion came excellent Ghostbusters items.

Early on in this page's history, I wrote about my Hardee's Ghostbusters 2 banner, If you'd like to click over and take a moment to familiarize yourself with that, please, be my guest.

Now if you've refreshed yourself by checking that out, let's move on.....

One of the best items Hardee's gave away was the Ghostbusters 2 cup. It was a no brainer to have a cupboard full of these in 1989. 

At only 99 cents (see photo at very bottom for proof!) you could take home a Coke product in an Official Ghostbusters 2 cup!

This one, bought off of Ebay long ago, is a little faded and worse for wear, but it's still there

I always preferred the side of the cup that had the big GB2 logo on it, no idea why, but I think it looks cooler sitting on a shelf that way..

The noisemakers!

These things served absolutely NO purpose other than to drive parents nuts, which at the age of 4 is what I excelled at.

I always liked to imagine that these were the equivalent of a dog whistle for ghosts, giving off a nice, high pitched shriek to rid your home of things that go bump in the night.

Lastly on this trip down the memory lane drive-thru we look at the free promotional poster that Hardee's gave out. 

This one I picked up in a lot of Ghostbusters stuff about a year ago from a former co-worker. I don't even remember how much was there, but it was a lot, and I paid a lot for it. Hey, whatever keeps it off of Ebay, I guess.

These awesome posters were given out with coupons attached to the bottom, which was a genius idea. Think about it, get a free poster with coupons, go back, use coupons, get another free poster, and so on and so forth,.

As I mentioned above, here is the coupon for a 99 cent Ghostbusters cup. 99 cents seems like such a small price to pay for such a treasure, even in 1989 money.

I should end this post by saying that the Mr. Ghostbuster Facebook Page just hit 1000 "LIKES" Pretty crazy to think that I now have 1000 people following me on Facebook. Thanks for that. 

Holy Crap Look What I Found

YES YES YES YES YES HOLY HELL YES!

This fine little can of The Real Ghostbusters Ecto-Plazm is one of just a few pieces that I need to have a complete collection of Kenner Ghostbusters toys!

These little cans of goop were packed in with the Ghostbusters Firehouse and the Gooper Ghosts.

 I'm fairly positive that they were also sold individually, although my memories of it are a tad fuzzy seeing as my parents refused to let me play with them because it would just make a mess and get into the carpet. 

Stupid parents.

                           

This little can of awesomeness came to me today via an online ad I posted advertising my toy shop. A guy noticed I liked Ghostbusters and said he had this and the Ghost Popper. I picked them both up. Can't let a good Ghostbusters toy not be in my collection, right?

As you can see, the goop is still goopy after all these years. The can is still about half full, with the little nose ghost still buried deep inside. It was hard to get a good picture of it, but hey, I was excited and in a hurry to show it off, so cut me some slack.

Upon barely sticking my finger in there, it left the most heinous residue that I've ever had on me. It's probably going to be best to just leave the lid on, set it on a shelf, and never think about looking at it again. I'd like the slime to receive as little air as possible.

I would like to point out that I have started a Thunderclap campaign in an effort to get more likes and attention to the MR. GHOSTBUSTER FACEBOOK PAGE. Please click HERE or HERE or HERE to pledge your support. It literally takes just 2 seconds and you're done.

Ghostbusters Gumball Dispenser

If yesterday's Puffy Stickers weren't enough proof that at the height of Ghostbusters popularity in the late 80's, our heroes were plastered on anything and everything imaginable, then I give you the official Ghostbusters Gumball Dispenser.

Originally packaged with gumballs, of which I am certain would be long expired, the dispenser was yet another way to make a quick buck off of the Ghostbusters franchise, although in this case, it isn't necessarily a bad thing since the dispenser itself is actually pretty neat.

The "globe" portion of the dispenser is nothing more than a simple rubber sculpt designed to look like the no-ghost logo. While it does it's job identifying what the product is supposed to be, it does weird me out just a little that they gave the ghost a little nose that sticks out. 

I could see this, I guess, being as most renditions of the logo are flat 2-dimensional drawings that don't give us a full range of what our friend trapped inside of the "no" symbol looks like. 

So I guess I'm just finding something to complain about.

The dispenser functions pretty flawlessly. Put a penny in the slot, slide it over, and get your gumball.

I guess, in a way, it's even cooler that it doubles as a bank, although you would have to chew a lot of gum to even receive 50 cents worth on pennies out of it.

                           

While there was supposed to be a key for it, which I'm sure was lost long ago by a child who doesn't appreciate owning the finer things in life, the bottom does twist off pretty easily so that one could collect their money and refill the machine (one freakin' gumball at a time!).

I think I picked this up about a year ago at a yard sale for under a dollar. I had actually been looking for one of these for quite a while at that point.

They really display nice, even though I don't use it to hold any gumballs, but either way, it's a cool item to have in your collection and on your shelf.

Be sure to do yourself a big favor, and go give a "LIKE" to the Mr. Ghostbuster Facebook page. I post all kinds of neat Ghostbusters related stuff on there that you won't see here on the blog.

30th Anniversary Celebration! INTERVIEWS!!!

Hey kids, as part of all of the 30th Anniversary fun going on, I just wanted to throw up these interviews that I did a little over a year ago with none other than Michael Gross and Jennifer Runyon about Ghostbusters! Give them a listen below!!

Hardees' Ghostbusters 2 banner!

One of my favorite pieces in my collection is my Ghostbusters 2 banner that hung outside of Hardees during the restaurant's promotion.

These banners would have hung outside of every store in 1989. While they were seen by thousands of people, undoubtedly only a small number of them survived.

As with any type of promotional material, there were surely a large number of them that were sent straight to the nearest dumpster once the promotion ended, and the number of them that were smuggled away were stashed carefully in some one's home or ruined by irresponsible people who thought that it wouldn't ever be a collector's item.

The journey to getting my banner began late last year. The last one that I had seen pop up on Ebay was over 10 years ago, though, I'll admit, I didn't always go searching for them, so one would assume that they did indeed pop up a little more frequently than that.

The banner in question from last last year was up for auction. I put in a bid of $35, which then turned into $122 by auction's end. My stupid high bid was locked in, and the banner just had to be mine, right?

Wrong.

Somebody out there outbid me by 50 cents at the very last possible second. Let's just say that for the next ten minutes or so, I let out a string of obscenities that went something like

"Fuck fuck fucking son of a mother fucking bitch fucking fuckers mother fucking piece of fucking shit. Fuck."

Yeah, I got pretty passionate about this banner.

Well, as luck would have it, the Ghostbusters junk gods looked down on me, because, about a month later, another was listed.

I put in a starting bid of $20, and by the end of the auction, it was still at $20.

Yep, I got verrrrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyyyyy lucky. The banner totally flew under the radar of Ghostbusters fans everywhere for a whole week.

A plus was that the banner was being sold only about 45 miles away from me, so it arrived very quickly. I'm pretty impatient when I turn over my hard earned money for good online, so I was a happy guy to receive it almost right away.

It now hangs above my man cave, and believe me when I tell you, many minutes a day are still spent glancing up and admiring it. If you ever get the chance to buy one of these, go for it. No price is too insane as it's truly a rare item that makes any collection pop.

Welcome, First post and stuff

I really hate these things. First post of a new website. Always weird. It's like, should I introduce myself? Should I tell you that I like long walks on the beach? Should I give out my social security number?

Regardless, I'm Mr. Ghostbuster. I'm sure a vast majority of you have been following me on the Mr. Ghostbuster Facebook Page for a while now, so you already know that I'm a Ghostbusters addict and that my collection goes beyond being able to be described as "hoarding"

There is hoarding, and then there is "Holy shit." I'm more along the lines of "Holy shit."

Another thing I typically hate about these "first posts" is that I have to try to tell you what in the hell it is that I hope to accomplish by even having a website.

I suppose what I will do is not only show off my collection, but also do little write-ups about Ghostbusters products new and old. I'll probably also post the occasional news story here or there, as well as some fun things like commercials and such.

Basically, it gives me something to do in my free time, when I'm not running my own toy business.

How often will I update this page? Hell, I have no idea. It could be once a day, once a month, or once a year. It all depends on how much motivation and time I have to do anything. Sometimes, a lot, sometimes, none at all. 

Think of it as Christmas morning each time I do decide to update it. No, Christmas is too infrequent. Think of it as a surprise check for $2.56 that you got in the mail because you over paid on something. Yeah, that one.

I decided that for my first post on this thing, that I would review one of my favorite products. In fact, it's the one that started my holy shit collecting habit,

I give you, the first figure that I ever owned, the Fright Features Egon Spengler.

 I can recall it like it was yesterday.

It was late fall / early winter of 1988. I was just a hair over 3 years old. Christmas was rapidly approaching. I had been begging non stop for Ghostbusters toys. Each trip to our small town Wal-Mart made the craving for molded plastic figures worse.

At 3, I was an impatient little fucker. I still am. I could only hear my parents say "Santa will bring you some" so many times. It was like a weight that kept pressing down on me harder and harder until I finally snapped.

One night, they gave in.

As we approached the toy aisle, the usual begging began, again followed by the "Santa will bring some" line.

This is where it gets pretty fuzzy.

Something happened, an event that I really don't remember as clearly as the rest of the story, but something happened that caused them to cave in. Had they finally decided just to shut me up? Was Santa really going to bring me some? Were they on sale? Seriously, it's driving me nuts.

Either way, I don't remember, but I did walk out with a Fright Features Egon!

First, the positive.

The figure itself is really neat. You push on his arm and he gets a wonderful "Oh shit, a ghost" look on his face. 

Also, how could you not love the uniform? Kenner made a smart move by realizing that while their first set of figures was indeed popular and performed well on store shelves, they needed to up the ante and put a little something extra into the next set.

I mean, really, how great would it be if every series of figures featured the guys in their suits from the first line? Not so much. Kenner got bold, and inventive, and said "let's give these guys different uniforms for different situations. Who cares if they aren't ever going to be featured in the show. Kids are going to beg their parents to own it either way"

\

And indeed we did.

Now, the negative, which is really only one thing. I know, you already know. I don't even need to mention it do I?

Yep. The tie.

The absolute worst thing Kenner did was add the tie to Egon. Why? Did blue not go with white? Nope. It was the fact that after about 30 seconds of semi-aggressive Ghost chasing, the damn thing broke off, never to be seen again.

Think I'm kidding?

Here. Here is a shot of 99% of my Fright Features Egon figures. NONE of them have a tie.

I did manage to get lucky and acquire on with the fashionable neck piece still intact. He now sits in a plastic time capsule, never to be opened and ruined by human hands again. Just you watch, one day, it may very well be the last Egon to have a tie.

Anyways, that's the first post. We'll see about a second one sometime in the next 42 years. Although I am planning a little something later this week for the official 30th anniversary of Ghostbusters.

Catch ya later

Mr. Ghostbuster.