The Ectozone: The Ghostbusters Universe At Your Fingertips

It's the Ectozone Ninth Anniversary!

Item 1:

Ghostbusters West Coast: Toy Soldiers, Part Two
July 18, 2009--Timeline Year Twenty-Seven
The CEO of the GBWC and the Prince of Los Angeles meet. More bad dreams are going around. Darkness falls on Los Angeles once again.

The bad news is that, with the issues in real life I've been dealing with for the last six months or so, there's not much else of this story done.

The good news is that I think I'll have a different story, a quicker, "easier" one, done relatively soon. (fingers crossed)

Item 2:

Anyone want to guess who this guy might be?

Item 3:

As promised, the New Timeline has been updated. Issues 1-8 of IDW's comic series have been added.

I tried to not get too wacky with speculation, but check 1956 for me suggesting a new level of injokiness to a character recently introduced.

Item 4:

Mattel Confirms End of Action Figure Line

It was pretty much a given, once Mattel announced that they were canceling Club Ecto, the subscription based service that provided fans with first crack at unique figures, but Scott “ToyGuru” Neitlich, Mattel’s brand manager in charge of the license, confirmed a lot more details today, outlining exactly why the line was shut down. You ready…?

There aren’t enough of us.

Toyguru: After we did not receive enough sub holders in 2012, we could not get additional development resources for more figures so we move the most fan demanded figure that was already in development to the SDCC slot. Fans really do vote with their purchase and the sub not selling was a big red flag that we don’t have enough customers for the 6? GB line right now.

Mattel was already worried about the line when sales of the figures showed that the main interest was in the original four busters, and of those, Peter was the most popular. None of them – the later figures (which would be of more interest to more serious fans) were worse – sold anywhere near the numbers of Mattel’s best two licenses, Masters of the Universe and DC Universe.

Not all bad news, though:

Mattel still holds the license and is still looking at their best prospects with it – presumably the props – and has confirmed they are still looking at new products for 2013. As well they, like a lot of license holders one imagines, have high hopes for the announcement of a third movie, in which case Mattel would have lot’s more development resources available. Stay tuned.

I personally wonder if, when Mattel signed the contracts--what, four or five years ago?--they thought they were only a couple of years away from a movie they could merchandise the everloving shit out of; the figures they released were supposed to be the warm-up for the GB3 cash machine. But of course GB3 never makes it out of "They'll maybe start filming sometime next year" for the last four years, and the line remains a niche seller.

I dunno...I admit that I didn't buy too many because the cartoon is really my first love in the GB franchise, and there wasn't a lot aimed at that market. Yeah, there probably isn't one, which is sad considering the show was one of the biggest hits in the 80's. I bought up all the Retro Action stuff, and no doubt would have been there with everyone else braving the White Screen of Death on Mattel's server for RGB figures of the quality of the 6 inch movie line. I did get the GB2 set, and it was damn awesome--I can't understand why anyone who prefers the movie versions of the characters didn't snap that stuff up.

I don't know. I think back to the 80's and Kenner pretty much had a similar problem: you had people complaining about all the weird variants of the four to six (depending on the set) main characters but those being the stuff that sold the best. They at least had a top-rated cartoon to drive sales, though.

I'm sad to see it come to this, but I'm really not surprised.

--Fritz V. Baugh

My own take on the Ghostbusters. Some of my own creations aren't this much fun to write! Click HERE to see the stuff...

Five newest stories (newest on top)

Ghostbusters West Coast: Toy Soldiers, Part Three
July 18, 2009--Timeline Year Twenty-Seven
The CEO of the GBWC and the Prince of Los Angeles meet. More bad dreams are going around. Darkness falls on Los Angeles once again.
(First Posted May 13, 2012)

Ghostbusters West Coast: Toy Soldiers, Part Two
July 17, 2009--Timeline Year Twenty-Seven
This time it's Jason having bad dreams. Mike is reaquainted with someone he doesn't like very much anymore. Dr. Venkman is coming to town. Oh, and there's another dead body...
(First Posted April 25, 2012)

Ghostbusters: Mr. Stay Puft's Christmas Adventure
December 24, 1983--Timeline Year One
It's Christmas Eve. Venkman's in a foul mood. Ray misses his family. Egon is not sure how to react to Janine's elf costume. Winston has a fateful meeting. And then the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man shows up. Wait, what? How is that even possible?
(First Posted December 12, 2011)

Ghostbusters West Coast: Toy Soldiers, Part One
July 17, 2009--Timeline Year Twenty-Seven
Chelsea Aberdeen Baugh is shaken by a disturbing dream. Even more disturbing is the sunrise murder of a hobo--one that signifies that bubbling tensions in LA's shadow community is about to spill into the light. Dark designs are coming to fruition; the toy soldiers have been lined up, and it will take only the merest push to begin their fall...
(First Posted October 31, 2011)

Blood Feud: Los Angeles
By Fritz Baugh and OgreBBQ
July 8, 2009--Timeline Year Twenty Seven
The man known as Sergei Kalashnikov has come to Los Angeles. Expect lots of pain.
(First Posted June 20, 2011) ?>