Issue 2 - Party Like It's 198X - Page 28 - Watchin' Ghostbusties

[Jessica Safron]

When I sat down to start sketching this out, I took a look at the script and this was the only thing written for this page:

Sam is sitting in Eddie’s room, watching Ghostbusties on Eddie’s little TV. He looks like he’s tripping on something as he jacks off. The busty ghost girl in the TV turns toward him and beckons him. Sam grins and crawls into the TV and begins making out with her. But then she goes all The Shining on him and Sam is terrified and surrounded by ghosts.

No dialogue, no sound effects. Seemed sort of odd for Sam to be watching porn on mute. Since Adam was sleeping and I couldn't consult him, I took it upon myself to write the dialogue for this page. Except the name "Peter Spankman." Credit goes to our friend Gregg Samsa for suggesting that. Thanks.

[Adam Dravian]

Hey, I told you to add the "Me?!" So it's not like I completely failed as the comic's writer...

[Michigander1911]

For starters, it's awesome to get your input this week Jess.  You did a hell of a job coming up with awesome dialogue, and made the whole trippy page look like it was happening. 

Greg gets the awesome award for Peter Spankman. 

Okay page is totally badass. Ghost Busties seems like it is the film we all expected it would be.  Plus it went to a crazy place from whatever hallucinogenic Sam took before watching porn. 

Ghost babe looks great for a ghost at least until she goes all "The Shining" anyway.  I also really dig the ghost monster with the Boobies on it's tongue.   

[Michigander1911]

Hey, I told you to add the "Me?!" So it's not like I completely failed as the comic's writer...

It's all good Adam sometimes you just have to give your illustrator artistic freedom.   

[Rae]

I think this is my favorite page so far.

[Ghoul]

I would be right at home in that bed with all those spooky characters. It would be one hell of an orgy. Especially that titmouth thing..

[Adam Dravian]

I would be right at home in that bed with all those spooky characters. It would be one hell of an orgy. Especially that titmouth thing..

Right. That's basically what your typical Friday night is like, I assume.

[Rijst]

First off, it's great to see you guys also have weeks where you're not so busy you can't put up the pages in time.

Not sure if I'd rather be Eddie or Sam on this night, he's doing well with the porn and getting a good handful in frame 5, but every time he jacks off something weird happens? The boob-tongue is simply amazing, is it a reference to Barbara's scary face in Beetlejuice?



I see what Adam meant earlier when he said the rough outline of the comic is written but much is made up on the fly, that's not a lot of detail!

[Mumm-Rad]

Radical page! Looks like it was a triple feature horror move beat off! A Ghostbusties, Beat-my-juice and Poke-her-guys marathon!

[Adam Dravian]

The boob-tongue is simply amazing, is it a reference to Barbara's scary face in Beetlejuice?

Correct.

I see what Adam meant earlier when he said the rough outline of the comic is written but much is made up on the fly, that's not a lot of detail!

We do have a rough outline of the entire story, but what she quoted from was the actual script for issue 2. The reason it was so sparse on details is because I envisioned the page not having any dialogue. Not really sure why, as the dialogue Jessica added definitely made it better.

To give you an example of what the Satan Ninja plot outline is like, here's the outline for the very first part of the story:

Eddie is celebrating his 18th birthday at the local arcade/pizzeria with some of his friends. He and Joe are playing Double Dudes vs. Satan Ninja. They get up to the final boss and both die. Eddie is out of money, but Joe gives him his last quarter, since it’s Eddie’s birthday. Eddie gets the boss to change into his second form, and seems like he might have a shot at beating him, but then punkers come by and mess with the buttons, causing Eddie to die. Eddie and Joe are dejected, and go get some pizza.

They are eating their pizza with Corey while watching Trance and Alex play a driving game. Eddie complains about how he was so close to beating the Double Dudes game. Corey claims that no one has ever beaten the game, not even Japanese people. Psycho Sam’s absence is brought up. Corey mentions that Psycho Sam believes in aliens and Satan Ninjas.

Eddie suggests they all go see a movie, but Joe says he needs to call it a night to work on homework. This leads to Trance and Cory saying they should go home as well. Alex offers to go see the movie with Eddie, but Eddie is bummed that his friends left and turns down her offer because he’s just going to call it a night.

And now here is the actual script for just the comic's opening two-page spread:

PAGE 1 & 2

We see the video screen of what appears to be a late-80’s arcade brawler, Dude Shinobi in: Double Dudes Vs. Satan Ninja (At one point we need to show the arcade cabinet art which can be similar to the American art for Double Dragon. Somewhere on the cabinet it could say something like, “You’ve seen the film, now experience the video game!” and maybe, “Join the Dude Shinobi Fan Club!”). Player one (EDDIE) is Cool Dude, clad in black with a red headband, while Player 2 (JOE) is Heavy Dude (a palette swap of Cool Dude). They are in some demonic-looking palace, fighting at least one skinless biker chick and at least one barbarian cockrocker with flaming axe-guitars. One or more of the enemies are meeting a very violent end by the players.

EDDIE: Axe Shredders! If we can beat these guys I think we’ll reach the final boss.

JOE: Watch your health. There might be a pot roast inside that skull there. Bust it open!

So you can see that the actual script is a lot more descriptive and contains the character's dialogue, but still leaves some room for Jessica to add her own ideas to it. I almost always leave it up to her to decide how many panels to put into a page and where to place the point of view "camera." She also sometimes suggests tweaks to the dialogue if she thinks of an improvement to make or a joke to add.

Radical page! Looks like it was a triple feature horror move beat off! A Ghostbusties, Beat-my-juice and Poke-her-guys marathon!

Some impressive puns, there. You've pegged three of the movies the ghosts were culled from, but one of the ghosts was taken from another, more obscure '80s haunted house movie.

[Rijst]

She also sometimes suggests tweaks to the dialogue if she thinks of an improvement to make

I wonder how she came up with "Ready to get your dick slimed?".. 

[Mumm-Rad]

Yes indeed the fourth is from House. William Katt and George Wendt made great comedy.

[Adam Dravian]

Yes indeed the fourth is from House. William Katt and George Wendt made great comedy.

Good job. You win the page!

[Rijst]

This guy is good..

[Jessica Safron]

I had to come up with ghost characters to parody, and monster-Barbara was the final one I thought to include as I was still sketching the final panel. Actually, it was when I was sketching her that I thought to turn her eyeballs into boobs, which lead to me boobing everyone out. It's Ghostbusties, after all. Seemed like the most appropriate thing in the world.

I was looking up pictures from House for inspiration (goofy as that movie is, I remember parts of it disturbing me as a kid), and I happened upon this:



My anger at how stupid that poster looked compelled me to seek out and watch Ghost Fever in its entirety on Youtube as I worked on the page. I was in a masochistic mood.

Here's the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nJ1xmkG3UU

The movie was just as bad as it looked. It isn't even worthy of one of Adam's reviews. I feel sorry for any Germans who were bamboozled into watching it by this sweet work of art (but at least they'd have an excuse, unlike me):



There were no tits, no scary ghosts, and no zombies. Fuck Ghost Fever.