I have made a tactical error.

no fat jokes

no gratuitous sexiness

no sexed up costumes

women interacting like actual women

no romance

realistic awkwardness a la Erin over Kevin

women eating actual food and not in a sexy way

women not needing to ask a man for help

women being skilled in their fields

women being affectionate with each other

women being confident in their identities and not being plagued with self-doubts and crying into ice cream

an actual action sequence without tit shots or ‘sexy’ camera angles (which, fyi, was the hottest thing I have seen on the big screen this year)

a line-up where the standard gender ratio of 4-to-1 is inverted

Statistically, Black women are the most educated, degree-holding group in America, and STEM degrees are not the only ones that matter.

She could also potentially be an autodidact, but there’s no reason she has to be.

STEM degrees are not the only ones that matter. Those of us with advanced degrees who are underemployed know this. Hell, several STEM degree holders are also underemployed.

architecture historian patty tolan predicting the kind of specters that might show up based on the age of the building

architecture historian patty predicting where most ghost activity will be based on which areas are undergoing extreme gentrification, all that ‘renovating’ stirs up a lot of angry ghost energy

patty knowing the escape routes because she’s familiar with the style of architecture and can get everyone out if the ghost gets too hostile

patty being really concerned over the amount of damage their equipment can do to historic structures (and holtz tinkering with it to make them do less damage in the physical world and more to ghosts because she cares about her gf)

patty geeking out when one of the more destructive technologies reveals the original facade of a cool building behind a soulless modern cover

patty being able to calm ghosts down by showing homeowners and renters and landlords what updates to the structure probably got the ghost mad and advising them to get rid of it because its not in the right style anyways

this.

Abby and Holtzmann got into some disgusting food-related habits while they were working in their seedy basement lab together, namely never throwing anything away ever. Every couple of weeks Erin and Patty have to strap on gas masks and excavate the fridge to keep it from becoming a study in the various stages of decomposition.

Holtzmann: the friend who will literally pull your pizza crust out of the trash and eat it if you don’t.

There’s a part of the lab known as the Patty Corner that contains most of her very impressive NYC history library, which consists of both conventional books and a lot of scans of historical documents, newspaper clippings, and black and white photos. There are two duct tape lines separating this corner from the rest of the lab and if any freaky ghost science or god forbid the slime gets near Patty’s books there will be Trouble.  

Every once in a while Erin feels compelled to remind her friends how much she loves them by feeding them, finds a recipe online, and makes them dinner. They love her back, so they all very nicely pretend it’s edible and wait until she’s not looking to drop the leftovers out the window. The woman can’t cook for shit.

Abby’s been putting with this literally since high school, bless her soul.

Abby will unironically rock a fanny pack over her jumpsuit. Content includes: batteries, tampons, shit that lights up when there’s a ghost nearby, band aids, wet wipes, glasses wipes, pepper spray, duct tape, whatever Holtzmann crammed in when Abby wasn’t looking, probably a single fortune cookie.   

Somebody gets pictures of said fanny pack while they’re out busting and the internet goes wild. There are actual talk show segments dedicated to the fanny pack. Patty keeps sending Abby youtube clips about it and Abby can’t wrap her head around how this is even something people care enough to discuss it’s just practical

The firehouse gets paid for but cash is still pretty tight, so on ghost-free weekends the girls are usually driving out to the suburbs for garage sales or digging through dumps for spare parts. Even if they don’t find anything else Patty usually goes home with like seventeen books that she haggled down to like a nickel.

All hail Patty Tolan, Garage Sale Queen

If they find something really heavy they’ll sometimes stop and consider calling Kevin to help them move it. And then they’ll consider what the process of trying to direct Kevin out to their current location would be like and how they’d like to get home before midnight, and they find miraculously find the motivation to lift things themselves.

Erin never learned to drive and after what happened when the first time the other girls tried to teach her in the (new) Ecto-1 she is never going to. They don’t talk about it.

Holtzmann would probably rather cut off a finger than waste time shaving. Every so often she walks into the lab, announces the jungle is flourishing, and hikes up her pants for the other girls to admire. They’re all duly impressed.

You know that post about how Clint Barton would totally ask if he can get an Avengers discount at Starbucks? Abby. Abby all the time, almost anywhere she goes. It almost never works and it’s getting a little embarrassing. 

Erin was almost definitely an only child, but Abby really hits me as one of those people who has like 8 siblings and had to learn to be loud and fighty really young to survive with them. What I’m saying is that going over to Abby’s house in high school was an Experience for Erin. 

Kevin starts an Official Ghostbusters Twitter and it’s like a month before any of them even notice. It consists almost entirely of Kevin selfies and deeply unflattering candids of the girls that they didn’t realize he was taking. They can’t get verified because nobody thinks it’s real and Erin is pissed.

She starts holding hours long Q & A sessions and then gets even more pissed when she realizes there are far too many questions to ever practically answer.

“Holtzmann a lot of thes people just really want to know if you’re gay”

*Holtzmann cackle*

And most importantly THE GIRLS OF NYC LOVING THEIR GHOSTBUSTERS

Patty let’s one of her friend’s kid’s Girl Scout groups come visit the lab, and suddenly they’re getting requests from groups all over the state. Boxes of free cookies show up. Crayon drawings of the Ghostbusters get hung up all over the lab. The girls posing for awkward selfies groups of elementary girls dressed up in little jumpsuits. Bless. 

Leslie Jones is a beautiful and talented human being and doesn’t deserve any of the shit she’s getting. no one does. 

The other ladies aren’t sure how she knows so many people or how many favors she holds in order to get all sorts of obscure equipment or access to generally inaccessible places (because oy the paperwork with Homeland Security is a nightmare and it’s always easier to ask forgiveness during the cleanup), but she always seems to “know a guy” (or girl) and stuff just happens.

okayyyyyyyyy sure but you also forgot:

it’s the BIGGEST live-action comedy debut since Pitch Perfect 2 (2015)

it’s the THIRD-BIGGEST live-action opening of the summer (behind only X-Men: Apocalypse and Captain America: Civil War, both HUGE ASS releases) 

it’s the SECOND-BIGGEST live-action/non-superhero opening of 2016 (behind Walt Disney’s The Jungle Book) 

it’s the biggest opening weekend ever for Paul Feig (director), Katie Dippold (writer), Melissa McCarthy, Leslie Jones, Kate McKinnon, Cecily Strong, and even Andy Garcia (ANDY FUCKING GARCIA)

it’s Kristen Wiig’s second biggest live-action opening weekend (behind The Martian)

it’s pretty damn big for even Chris Hemsworth (below only the MCU films and Snow White and the Huntsman)

Paul Feig has a track record of consistently solid box office sales rather than big opening weekends

the audience was 57% female, which is an UNUSUALLY high proportion for a blockbuster 

a large proportion of people who refused to see it ~on principle~ clearly don’t give a rat’s ass about cinematic quality because most of the initial reviews prior to release were at least favourable if not straight-out raves

and finally,