Real Ghostbusters Minimates, Toys R Us Wave 1

After they made minimates of pretty much every Ghostbusters movie character that should get a toy, they began to do minimates based on the spin-off cartoon. The Real Ghostbusters was an amazing cartoon. If you watch it as an adult it still holds up. (Although I recommend the syndicated episodes and first season which feature the great Lorenzo Music as Peter. Also, they were allowed to make some of the characters more snarky.)

If you're wondering, they called it the Real Ghostbusters because the name Ghostbusters was trademarked by Filmation due to an old 1970's live action show they did about wacky exterminators who hunted down Ghosts with their Gorilla. They actually had to get permission from Filmation to call the movie Ghostbusters. That permission did not include the cartoon. (And actually Filmation did their own cartoon version of the original Ghostbusters around the same time Real Ghostbusters came out.)

Egon and RayVoiced by Maurice LaMarche (Brain from Pinky & the Brain) and Frank Welker (Megatron, Baby Kermit, Doctor Claw, Abu, Fred Jones, Soundwave, and any animal you've ever heard in a movie) respectively. Growing up these were my Ghostbusters since I didn't see the first movie until I was much older. I can still hear Egon talk about Tobin's Spirit Guide. Even through all the cast changes, Egon and Ray were the constants.

Oh, hey, dig it, they come with a cartoon style PKE meter. And you can take off their chest pieces to reveal regular jumpsuits underneath for lounging around the Firehouse action.

Janine and Slimer

These minimates depict Janine and Slimer during the times that they've put on proton packs. This usually happened when something happens to the regular Ghostbusters, like they get kidnapped or suffer some sort of supernatural ailment. The best one was the episode with the Sandman. It also tended to happen a lot in the later seasons after the second movie came out and everything became more cartoonishly over the top. As depictions of the Real Ghostbuster versions of these characters they're pretty neat, and you have to love that their proton packs come off, so you can have regular versions of the figures. Janine's glasses are shown in the promotional pictures with her looking over them, which is how she was always depicted on the cartoon, but I can't get her figure to do that, so her glasses just look like sunglasses, which isn't what the character was about. But on the other hand she does come with an extra ghost trap that attaches to her proton pack.

Lord, how many times can I write "proton pack" in one entry?

There's different versions of Slimer and Janine in the 4-pack sold at Direct Market retailers. (Comic book and online toy stores.) Those have Janine in her secretary outfit and Slimer with a big goofy smile. Neither have proton packs.  (There's another one.)

Okay, now onto the cool part of the Toys R US exclusive waves: The ghosts!

Sam Haim and Egyptian Ghost

So how do you choose the most iconic ghosts from a cartoon show where the only evil ghost who recurred was the Boogie Man? I have no idea. Pointless aside!

These are Sam Haim and the Egyptian Ghost, two ghosts from episodes I never saw. They stretch the definition of minimate, since both are essentially sculpted shells that go over a basic minimate frame, but could easily exist without the minimate skeleton. Perhaps in response to this, they've added some details to those basic minimate frames, with a glowing skeleton body for Sam Hain and dude in a mask inside the Egyptian Ghost, betraying the Scooby Doo-like revelation about the Egyptian Ghost.

Boogeyman and Energy Terror Dog

Okay, seriously, I must have seen fewer episodes of the Real Ghostbusters than I thought, because the only ghost I remember from this set was the Boogeyman. He was awesome though. The ghostbuster chased him through various closets in a reality warping thing similar to Monsters Inc., or Mario's acting juggernaut Voice of Reason. It's an interesting toy, with his backward jointed goat legs and oversized head that forces the packaging to bulge in way that it really shouldn't. Meanwhile the Terror Dog is simply the same from the movie line but now in a translucent blue plastic.