Fandom Response to Ghostbusters
Fans response to Ghostbusters was immediate and swift. Fans immediately latched onto the characters and, displeased with the way the intersectional characters were treated, immediately turned to the age-old fix-it tool of fandom: fanfiction.
Abby, who was given no overt sexuality or romantic identity, was turned into an asexual lesbian. Fans saw her admiration of Gertrude Aldridge (“We saw a real life ghost, and she was beautiful.”) as context that she might be queer. They backed it up when Abby appeared mystified with Erin’s attraction to Kevin. Abby, who also seemed to not be sexually interested in anybody, was determined to be asexual. Fanfiction immediately sprung up about Erin and Abby’s college relationship and what it might have entailed, as well as her close relationship with Holtzmann in canon. (1)
Erin, with her history of bullying, was fleshed out by becoming a character with mental illness, including anxiety and depression. Fanfiction writers wrote her as to taking medication and attending therapy to help manage these mental illnesses, turning her into an icon for positive mental health representation. With her interested, and flustered, reaction to much of Holtzmann’s canon flirting, the fandom determined her to be bisexual. The relationship between Erin and Holtzmann (named Holtzbert) quickly became the fandom’s most popular romantic pairing, with Erin specifically mentioned as bisexual in the fanfics—a turning point in fandom, as until recently bisexuality was not well represented in fandom. Erin close friendship with Patty was also explored, as well as her previously mentioned pre/post college relationship with Abby. (2)
Patty’s storyline was quickly fleshed out by fans to give her an education to match her history degree. History, architecture, and/or architectural history became educational paths that Patty had pursued before Ghostbusters, or would pursue with support from the Ghostbusters after the events of the movie. Her friendship with Holtzmann was explored as something more romantic, and fans provided ways the movie could have involved Patty more in the exposition. (3)
Holtzmann was given the biggest fandom overhaul. She was immediately accepted by the fans as gay and proud—a suave lady killer with impeccable bed sport manner. The fandom fights back and forth about whether or not her background is a tragic kid of the system or a girl who grew up with loving family that supported her idiosyncrasies. This dichotomy comes out of the fandoms desire to break out of the tragic lesbian stereotypes that so often haunt Sapphic characters. Many fans also immediately embraced her as nuero-atypical, taking her canon eccentricities and turning them into headcanons that place her somewhere on the autism spectrum and as some flavor of mentally ill. (4) (5)
One of the most interesting things that came out of Ghostbusters: Answer the Call was the fandom deciding to involve all of Ghostbusters in a polyamorous relationship. This ship, called #Polybusters by the fans, is a fandom rarity. Generally fans fight over romantic monogamous pairings of characters in so called “ship wars.” One of most famous incidents of this sort of ship war is the Katara/Aang versus Zuko/Katara ship war of the Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom, and the Bella/Edward vs Bella/Jacob ship war of the Twilight Fandom. (6)
Instead of devolving this way (at least, at first), fans of Ghostbusters decided that a healthy, consensual polyamorous relationship between the four women would be a better solution than ship wars or love triangles. This interpretation of Ghostbusters provides great representation to those in the fandom who identify as polyamorous and is a welcome change from usual fandom behavior of arguing over which monogamous ship is superior.
This is not to say the Ghostbusters fandom does not have its own ship war—the ship of Holtzmann and Erin (Holtzbert) is constantly under fire for being racist and fat shaming, as the fandom immediately paired the two thin white women together over all other options (this was before the infamous “we’re dating” deleted scene became public knowledge). Despite the existence of this ship war, it is encouraging to see a fandom thinking about intersectionality when it comes to their romantic pairings, as it means the fandom is particular about their media in a way that feminist humor would approve of.