I have yet to see a film with the outlandishly popular Minions in it, and yet I find the adoption of them into current zeitgeist irritating. Hands down, the single worst aspect of 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife were the mini Stay Pufts, which were basically the Minions of that film. Somebody behind 2024’s Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire thought audiences were clamoring for more because, goddammit, they’re going to give you some extra helpings of them here.
The preceding film surprised me, as I enjoyed it more than I anticipated. It wasn’t great, mind you, but I could still imagine myself watching it again someday.
I can’t say the same about the latest installment. And it isn’t even a bad film. Unfortunately, it is something worse: a completely forgettable picture.
Oh god, I was so bored. At one point, I had such a hard time keeping my attention on the screen that I found it hard not to notice the border around it. I’m not sure how far we were into the runtime when I realized I was simply running down the clock, waiting for the credits to roll.
The newest core cast of heroes from the previous installment have returned. Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Mckenna Grace and Finn Wolfhard live and work as Ghostbusters out of the original facility in New York City. I continue to be confused as to why Wolfhard’s character is here, except to repeatedly fail to capture Slimer in a subplot this already bloated film did not need. There’s one scene where he puts two fingers in a hole in a ceiling and pulls them out to find them covered in ectoplasm. I wondered if there was a deleted scene where he figures out how to get his dick in that hole.
Ernie Hudson’s character from the original has apparently made out better than his co-workers, as he is now a wealthy philanthropist—wealthy enough to have restored the old firehouse, as well as establishing a second, state-of-the-art facility. That is where we will meet new characters I assume will be part of the core cast, should the series be continued. There, we also find Celeste O’Connor. No knock on the actress, but her character felt shoehorned into the first movie and is barely more relevant here.
New to the cast, but I doubt unlikely to be reused, are Kumail Nanjiani and Patton Oswalt. Both are welcome presences here, but I didn’t feel their characters added much. Nanjiani fares the better of the two, if only because the cunning weasel he plays will have a redemption arc that makes him an important part of the climactic battle.
This time, the big bad is an ancient demon that chills everything it touches to absolute zero. The thing looks like the kind of CGI boogeyman in every horror film Screen Gems has released in this century. Like all things artlessly done through computer imagery, it did not scare me for a single frame it was on that screen I had so much trouble keeping my focus upon.
It is no surprise the original trio is reunited again for that final battle. We already saw them reunite in the finale of the previous film, so why should we care they are together again, again?
I went into Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire with expectations set very low, yet I was still left greatly unsatisfied. If there’s one thing I didn’t expect to experience from such big-budget, special-effect-laden bombast, it was boredom. A bonus scene in the end credits suggests there will be even more mini Stay Pufts in the inevitable next film, so I guess at least that will film will leave me feeling something, even if it is only extreme irritation.
Dir: Gil Kenan
Starring Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Mckenna Grace
Watched in a theatre, which improved the experience not one whit