THREAD: Does anyone else think about how the only non-supernatural antagonist character in Ghostbusters is a guy who works for the EPA, and his concerns about the safety of ghostbusting equipment and the containment unit were totally justified?

Like, Walter Peck (even though he was totally shitty about it as any lanyard dick would be) wanted to know if the untested ghostbusting operation, basically an unregulated tech start-up, was going to be safe at its location in a largely residential area of NYC.

And yes, Walter Peck was shitty about it, but he only got really shitty after Venkman gave him hell. I think Egon and Ray probably would have cooperated if Peck had been a little nicer on approach, but Venkman fucked up any goodwill Peck was willing to extend.

I think Egon and Ray had good points, that their equipment would need to be proven safe under different conditions due to involving dangerous processes, but that also validates Peck's concerns.

So even though Peck is an asshole, he's with the EPA, and if you find out a group of dudes is creating nuclear powered unstable equipment which involves working with unknown materials (ectoplasm etc) which is also a huge drain on the power grid... Yeah.

So the whole thing in Ghostbusters of the EPA being depicted as a horrible unfair government entity out to get them is some tech bro startup bullshit, even if Peck was a douchebag. The EPA had the right to be concerned.

Obviously Peck went apeshit and did the worst thing possible (just turning the power off on a mysterious unstable critical system lmao bruhhh) but that doesn't invalidate his initial concern as an EPA representative.

We see just how dangerous Ghostbusting is right away; Egon mentions specifically their backpacks have untested "nuclear accelerators" on them, crossing the streams can cause "total protonic reversal" (disintegration + explosion) and it's like holy shit

And the containment unit, which is what really alerted the EPA/was Peck's biggest concern, is a repository for unknown ectoplasmic material and spectral entities, reliant on huge amounts of power with no viable backup or secondary containment, located in a hugely populated area.

So I'm just saying... Peck is a douchebag but the EPA is justified in wanting to know what will happen if this fails, what are byproducts of this process if any, does this pose a threat, and I mean, YEAH.

Peck as an individual fucks up and forces Egon to shut it down, which causes immediate problems, but the EPA itself has a right to be concerned and has a point in that maybe an abandoned firehouse in a residential zone isn't a great spot for something that can cause this???

Also what emissions does any of this cause, if any? What pollutants are produced, if any? And so on.

Oh fuck. The Ghostbusters are just tech start-up bros. FUUUUCK that SUCKS

But essentially the Ghostbusters are just like, no, fuck the EPA! We're smart tech dudes, we can do this wildly dangerous shit with untested equipment and unknown results because ghosts are scary as fuck and super interesting and we'll make money and maybe save some shit idk!

And idk in the modern world making a movie where the EPA is the only "real world" villain and the main cool dudes of the film are all start-up tech bros who refuse to submit to any regulation of any kind would be a hard sell

I know you're all going to call me a killjoy now but that's fair tbh

Also I want to point out that the current IDW Ghostbusters series actually does a good job of acknowledging this, like EXTREMELY well, and it actually works in the ongoing story in the comics which is also excellent! 10/10 series, highly recommend it.

This thread is what happens when I'm on twitter at 6 AM due to anxiety insomnia lmao