Beginning with the 1984 live-action film Ghostbusters, directed by Ivan Reitman, and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, the premise and storyline have inspired sequels, spinoffs, and reboots.
Louis is still employed by the Ghostbusters, but he left a note on his desk saying that he is "feeling sick, going home early", explaining his absence (due to Moranis declining to reprise his role for the game) and it is filled with piles of paperwork needing to be finished.
Though the character did not appear in the 2021 sequel Ghostbusters: Afterlife, old aura scans of Louis taken from when he was possessed by Vinz Clortho are in Egon's storm-cellar laboratory, acknowledging Moranis's past involvements to the franchise.
According to Sam Delaney of The Guardian, "Stay-Puft's familiar mascot combined elements of real life brand ambassadors Bibendum (aka the Michelin tire man) and the Pillsbury Dough Boy.
Gozer the Gozerian is a Class 7 Deity of Destruction revered by the Hittite, Mesopotamian and Sumerian cultures who appears as the first film's main antagonist, known by many titles that include "The Destructor", "The Destroyer", "Volguus Zildrohar, Lord of The Sebouillia", "Scourge of the Glethestements" and "The Traveler."
Via its chief minions – Terror Dogs Zuul the Gatekeeper and Vinz Clortho the Keymaster, Gozer can enter into another reality and offers those witness to its arrival to choose an avatar form known as a Destructor before proceeding to destroy that plane of existence, as it did in one dimension as a Torb (electric eel-like creature) and in another, a Sloar (reptilian humanoid that produces venomous ectoplasmic substance that conducts psychomagnotheric energy).
Vinz Clortho and Zuul picked new hosts and return to the Gozerian temple, and Gozer was brought back to Earth in a form similar to its previous, but includes skeletal protrusions and spikes, with energy surging throughout its body (due to Jason Reitman's desire to use prosthetic like Alien film series' that starred Sigourney Weaver instead of a form-fitting costume like the first film's and of different actresses as the character both physically and disembodied, and with Gozer being a shape-shifter, explaining the differences in appearance).
[16] Zuul and Vinz Clortho are the primary servants and harbingers of Gozer the Gozerian, their true forms being bipedal demons before manifesting in the physical world as horned quadruped hounds.
[17] A pair of fully corporeal possessors, Zuul and Vinz seek out a mortal female and male to inhabit and turn them into The Gatekeeper and The Keymaster, respectively, for a sexual rite to open a portal for their master to manifest through.
Shandor is obsessed with mythologies, having extensive knowledge on the occult and science that rivals Egon Spengler and Ray Stantz, despite being insane with a God complex, he deemed that humanity is beyond redemption after the First World War.
After Shandor apparently died in 1945, reputedly from complications surrounding an attempted self-surgery, his body was believed to be buried in a cult-owned mausoleum in what is currently Central Park, his resting place desecrated, as had been most other deceased New Yorkers.
By 1991, Shandor possesses the body of Mayor Jock Mulligan and makes Peck head of PCOC to hinder the Ghostbusters, while he abducts his descendant – Dr. Ilyssa Selwyn – to invoke the nodes of his mandala and revive Gozer's Mr. Stay-Puft Destructor form.
After Gozer is defeated by the Ghostbusters and Dr Selwyn freed, the disillusioned Shandor forsakes the deity and decides to use the mandala to deify himself, boastfully renaming himself "The Architect" (Class 7 Transformed Mortal Remnant).
During his time, he was as despotic as other notorious tyrants in history like Attila and Genghis Khan, and according to Leon Zundinger's article in the occult text Magicians, Martyrs and Madmen, that "Carpathia was in a constant state of turmoil" until he died.
In "Fear Itself", it is revealed that Garrett is claustrophobic (though he never admits it to anyone), and has a deep disdain towards the FBI ever since the incident where two agents arrested them under the belief they were causing the sabotages and released a gremlin they recently captured while they were on a plane.
An engineering physicist by training who just missed being admitted to CERN, she is introduced as Abby's research partner on the paranormal (taking over Erin Gilbert's position) and becomes the team's equipment designer, constructing their proton packs as well as a range of auxiliary weapons.
Director Paul Feig confirmed in an interview with The Daily Beast that Holtzmann was supposed to be a lesbian, or somewhere on the LGBT+ spectrum, but the studio refused to allow that detail into the movie and instead left the audience to more personally interpret her character.
After contacting them to report a ghost sighting in one of the tunnels, she joins the team and borrows a hearse from her uncle Bill Jenkins's funeral home that is eventually converted into Ecto-1, a vehicle for personnel and equipment transport.
She shares traits with Winston Zeddemore (revealed later in IDW Comics's series Ghostbusters 101 that her uncle is a parallel universe counterpart of him) as both believe in the supernatural without being scientists, and are African American.
Numerous diplomas on his wall indicate that he is a scientist, having earned a bachelor's degree and a Doctorate in Physics from Stanford University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, respectively, making him a foil personality to Abby Yates, Erin Gilbert, and Jillian Holtzmann.
He places ionizers (similar to the Ghostbusters' proton packs) he built all over Manhattan connected to the main machine in the Mercado Hotel, as a former site of paranormal history of violence that sat on the intersection of ley.
Its origins are unknown but likely it was not human based on its bestial appearance akin to a bat, suggesting it an animal spirit claiming the theater as its territory, and it manifested after Rowan North planted his ionizer there.
Due to the family's financial troubles and eviction, Phoebe travels with her mother and older brother Trevor to Summerville, Oklahoma to begin anew at the farmhouse left to them by the now deceased Egon.
At the same time, he adjusts to their new life in Summerville, Oklahoma, gets himself a job as a carhop at the drive-in diner, Spinners Roller Hop, to help his mother financially and to be close to the waitress Lucky Domingo.
He is a paranormal believer and conspiracy theorist who makes a series of vlogs detailing strange events and occasional restaurant reviews in Summerville, in which the forty-sixth episode is the most popular and attracts Ray Stantz as his only subscriber.
He is apathetic about his job, and because most of his students are delinquents and not interested in learning, he just lets them watch old violent movies in his classroom and gets paid while focusing on his seismic investigations - except Phoebe and Podcast, whom he mentors in science and the paranormal.
Later, during an interdimensional crossrip event caused by the possessed Grooberson disabling the proton cannons, Domingo's department flee, allowing the neophyte Ghostbusters to retrieve their equipment from the evidence storage locker.
Following a failed attempt to capture him in the plant, Muncher flees into Summerville and heads to Shandor's mines, leaving a trail of destruction in his wake; the kids have no choice but to stop him, as they are the only people around with the Ghostbusters' means.
In the film, Lars is an eccentric new recruit and inventor from the United Kingdom who is responsible for creating new technology for the Ghostbusters, include upgrading Egon Spengler's decades-old equipment in his absence.
Since then, she haunts Central Park and frightens people with her presence in spite of her longing for a friend, though in time they see her and other ghosts as pests due to the supernatural has become a common occurrence in New York City for decades caused by Ivo Shandor and his Cult of Gozer.