Everyone is probably sick of the fallout from the Ghostbusters reboot so I'll keep that commentary to a minimum if I can, in the meantime lets look at the first attempt at a reboot, Extreme Ghostbusters.
Following on from the Real Ghostbusters Cartoon, the team have gone their separate ways since the work has dried up leaving only Egon to keep an eye on the containment unit while teaching a college class on the paranormal to further his understanding of the subject, however when ghosts start returning, Egon decides to form a new team of misfits, and these are our main characters.
Role Call
Eduardo Rivera
A Latino slacker full of wisecracks, jokes and the occasional pop culture reference, he's a bit of a woman chaser but is intelligent enough to back up some of his short falls.
Roland Jackson
The level headed African American mechanic, he helps improve much of the machinery used by the team.
Garrett Miller
A Jock paraplegic stuck in a wheelchair his entire life yet he's into sports and doesn't seem phased by the whole disabled label, in fact he mocks his condition constantly.
and finally Kylie Griffin
A Goth styled girl with a high degree of knowledge in the field of paranormal, a very complex character with tons of hidden depths and a worthy backstory to go with the show's tone and is often portrayed as the leader.
Tone is an important factor in this sequel to the original cartoon as much of the comedy is mixed with dark, grittier and more older audience themes and it really works well. It's living proof that you can have a different team of Ghostbusters and still do the name justice even if it goes in a darker direction, in fact I'd rather have the reboot with this team over the all female team any day.
I don't hate the new film, I'm just disappointed by it; it was always going to be judged unfairly due to it being a remake of what was a cult classic that really influenced the interests of geeks of my generation, this cartoon got the same treatment yet it succeeded enough to be judged as it's own product because it didn't try to imitate Ghostbusters, it just approached it with a new perspective and that's what the reboot film should've done to begin with and not appear as a gender swap Ghostbusters made to please corporates who think they can make tons of money making more of Frozen's Elsa rather than respecting the franchise they have and realizing that there was already a strong female Ghostbuster they could've used instead of what we got and to top it off, Kylie Griffin is in the extended comicbook universe which would be more canon than any other Ghostbusters media outside the films.
Happy New Year everyone, at time of writing I'm in the future that is 2015 as Britain goes into the New Year before America. But there are a number of people we will miss who didn't make it this year but since 2014 was so cruel to celebrities, this has to be split into several parts starting with those we lost from January-March
So lets give these people a last goodbye.
James Avery 1945-2013
Before 2014 even began we lost the voice of Shredder, main villain of the Ninja Turtles as well as performing a memorable role as Philip Banks in the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
Hal Sutherland 1929-2014
A prominent animator for Disney throughout the 50s whose credits include Sleeping Beauty, Lady and the Tramp, Peter Pan and the last theatrical Donald Duck cartoons; he would later provide animation for 70s Filmation super hero works including Flash Gordon, Batman, Aquaman and Superman. His last work was on He-man.
Seizo Katou 1927-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include the Japanese voice of Megatron from the Transformers franchise among hundred other roles.
Ichiro Nagai 1931-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Happousai from Ranma 1/2 among hundreds of other roles along with Japanese dub roles as Yoda and Dumbledore.
Masaaki Tsukada 1938-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Yamamoto Genryūsai from Bleach among hundreds of other roles.
Arthur Rankin Jr 1924-2014
One half of Rankin/Bass productions responsible for Thundercats, numerous Christmas Specials and animated versions of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.
Gordon Bell 1934-2014
British Cartoonist whose works were featured in pretty much every British comic from Beano to the Dandy. Works include Dennis the Menace (British version) along with numerous others.
Jimmy Murakami 1933-2014
Animator for Christmas short film the Snowman as well as other books by author Raymond Briggs, also provided animation for the cartoon adaption of The Chronicles of Narnia.
Harold Ramis 1944-2014
While not animation related, Harold Ramis was still an important part of geek culture as writer and acting role as Dr Egon Spengler for the Ghostbusters films.
Runa Akiyama 1954-2014
Veteran voice actress whose roles included many characters from the Time Bokan franchise.
