What's Up With the Ending?

What's Up With the Ending?

The hero kills the monster and gets the girl. Heard that ending before? Yeah, us too. The myth of Perseus, Dracula, Iron Man—there are a billion ancient legends, books, comic books, and movies that all use the exact same ending as Ghostbusters.

In Ghostbusters, our heroes are Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, Egon Spengler, and Winston Zeddemore who defeat the evil Gozer, a Sumerian god bent on destroying New York just for the fun of it.

Not all of the Ghostbusters get the same girl as a reward for their heroics (because 4 guys + 1 girl might earn something worse than a PG rating). Instead, the honor goes to our main Ghostbuster, Venkman, who carries away the beautiful Dana Barrett in his arms after rescuing her from the clutches of Gozer.

Plot guru Christopher Booker would tell you that this ending falls into the classic pattern of Overcoming the Monster, and Ghostbusters proves there's nothing necessarily wrong with riffing on an old thing.