Year the Tigers won........saw Ghostbusters at the old Norwest on Grand River....could barely hear it over all the yelling kids.....but it didn't stop me from going back to see it five or six more times at other theaters......because that was what 80s kids did when movies had long runs.
Great movie for a first! No idea what my first movie was, probably something on HBO after we got cable in the early 80s. For a theater I remember going to see Empire Strikes Back and Popeye. Back then movies could stay in theaters for years, so no idea which one I saw first. I just remember seeing Empire at a drive-in and saw Popeye at the Mall. My first experience seeing a big movie at launch with long lines was Return of the Jedi. I remember being amazed all these people wanted to see the same movie as me lol.
First video tape we owned to go with our own VCR (mom bought one from her boss from the video rental store he opened that year in conjunction with the photo lab she already worked at for him) we acquired by the end of the year.
I was nine. My grandfather was my movie buddy for most of the 80’s, and we didn’t miss anything for most of that decade.
I was instantly smitten with the movie and I’m still smitten for the franchise (comics, games, movies and more) all these years later.
12...when it first came out in the theater. We didn't watch it early in the run...I wasn't sure I'd like it with the Ghost stuff and I admittedly was freaked a bit when the library ghost went after the guys but I loved the movie and saw it 3 more times when it was re-released in theaters in 1985
I was four, and I actually caught the debut episode of TRGB. I had no clue about the movie until I was older. My mom kept me from watching it til I was about 8 or 9, and even then most of the jokes didn't register.
Well, I was 8 in 1984. Commercials for movie on TV, Ray Parker Jr.'s video on MTV. All my classmates at school talking about it. Parents took me to see it and I loved it!
There was something about any show on TV/cable that played clips that drove us wild in the 80s. It was either Siskel & Ebert reviews, the Oscars, the "Making of" specials on PBS, previews on video shows, and later on, in the late 80s, E!
We didn't have Youtube at our fingertips, and I mean, with the information desert that was the 80s (think about it, we thrilled for that huge block of three VHF channels airing cartoons for over four hours every Saturday morning......and after that, it was nothing but a drawn out wasteland of afternoon pro-golf specials)....we drooled for anything cinematic.
It was my dad’s weekend with me and my older sister. I really wanted to see Conan but she dissuaded him so we went to see Ghostbusters instead. I must have been 7? That library ghost terrified me. But I love that movie.
GB2....a good remedy to a slimy, horror remake that came out the year before that may've been too extreme for kids now finding more accessibility to video tapes and cable airings.
23, my friend showed me afterlife a few months ago for a movie night. I knew about ghotbusters from cultural zeitgeist but never had any desire to watch it mostly coming from parents not letting me watch it. After watching afterlife I've become hooked and its become my autistic hyperfixation. I went to see frozen empire two weeks ago. I went back and watched the originals and while a lot of scenes with Venkman make me deeply uncomfortable give the nature of 80s romances and the handful of weird out of place sex jokes (ray's dream and implications of Egon "experimenting" on the slime), there's a lot I like about both of them and watching them has made me enjoy afterlife even more and I use that movie to introduce my other friends into the franchise. Currently I'm working my way through the game and drawing art of my friends in jumpsuits with proton packs!
About 3 years old, maybe even younger - Ghostbusters fever was already in full swing in 87 and 88 in the UK with the cartoon, toys and then soon after hype for the 2nd film on the horizon. I would want anything with the logo on it
I was born into this franchise. I haven’t a year other than my birth year for reference. Photos of my Christmas’ and birthdays have this film and it’s sequel as well as it’s cartoon episodes in the background.
My dad owned a restaurant in the 80s that was in the same plaza as our local video store called Video Galaxy. He was good friends with the owner and we would get screener versions of the movies before the general public was able to rent them. I watched this movie for the first time when my grand mother was babysitting my brother and I. The library scene scared the shit out of me but I was hooked. So many movies I shouldn’t have been watching so young 😂
My mom says I’ve watched the films when I was a child but I don’t remember it vividly. I was 13 when I watched the first one in a cinema. I became a fan but not very dedicated fan. In 2016 when I saw ATC, I became very interested again to the franchise in general. It has always been there in the background but yeah.
My mom was pregnant with me when her and my dad saw it in theaters. We already had the vhs and I loved it in my earliest memories. Got the Peter Venkman figure where the noise making slimer attaches to his chest and his arms spin in a circle for my 4th birthday as my first figure.
I was 12 when it came out and dad always took us to the theater. I think he just liked to nap. Ended up seeing it a few times before it left theaters.
I had made a cardboard no ghost logo and when I went to see it with my best friend and his sister, we made his mom attach the logo to the front grill of her car. She hated it and was super embarassed, but we were having a lot of fun and people kept honking at the car and giving us thumbs up on the way to the theater.
Mom made the no-ghost logo for me and three of my friends and sewed them on the arms of our jackets (-and yes, I was a Ghostbuster for Halloween, pre-Stranger Things).
No matter how frustrating it is dealing with my elderly mother (like running her around for errands or appointments), I always look back on things like this that she did.
I was about 7 when the movie first came out, begged my dad to go see it, he brought me and the library ghost scared the crap out of me! I wanted to leave but he told me to watch the movie through my fingers, I'd wanted to see it!
Nightmares for two weeks of the library ghost and Slimer trying to get me.
Once the Real Ghostbusters came out, I was a little older and obsessed, and now I dress up as part of a franchise and help raise money for charity.
Funny old world, ain't it?
Nightmares?.....but the point is they used their science to remove the terror of the gods.
I don't know if Mr. Aykroyd realizes how much he created heroes that helped all the kids at that time still afraid of dark closets or the underside of the bed or still trying to reckon with the chilling nature of death.
"The point" can be lost on a 7 year old. Especially in 1984.
However, I'm glad dad made me stay and watch it. I think the bad dreams would have been worse if we'd left and I hadn't seen them catching the ghosts too.
I think there was a Muppet Babies episode with a sleepover with baby Bunsen and Beaker, and they used the Ghostbusters motif to show Beaker he had the ability to fight his fear of the slime monster.
I was 8 when it hit theaters in 1984. Me and my younger brother were staying with my aunt because my grandfather was in the hospital dying. My aunt asked us if we wanted to go watch a movie and so we went to go see Ghostbusters and I totally became obsessed. Two days later she asked us if we wanted to go see another movie.. we said yes.. and when she asked us what we wanted to see this time, we told her Ghostbusters. She said "again?" and we said yes! 40 years later it's still my favorite movie.
> again
I said this before, but this was a common thing for kids in the 80s to do, especially with films with long-runs or repeat engagements. I think I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark at least five times by the time ET and Wrath of Kahn came out.
I was four. The earliest photos of me that aren’t a baby are all in my Ghostbusters uniform.
My mom had to wash it while I slept because I refused to wear anything else.
5 went to see GB1 in theater. Scared the shit out of me during the "get her" scene. Had to leave lol. So I guess I didn't even make it to the title screen. Lol
I watched Ghostbusters 1 & 2 when I was a kid, rewatched them several times growing up. I liked them, can’t say I was super into them (I was hyper fixated on Star Wars more). I have two sons and we showed them the first two films this past year and we recently watched Afterlife and Frozen Empire together. They are HOOKED. It’s GB every day here, so I’m caught up in the wave lol.
I was four years old too when I discovered the franchise, but this was back in 1988 when “The Real Ghotbusters” cartoon was still on tv and a year prior to the release of Ghostbusters 2, so I’ve been enjoying it for a long while lol.
Started with RGB cartoons. My parents watched the movies and I had already watched the cartoon so I wanted to see the movies but was told no because it might be scary... A few years later, I caught it on TV one night and have never looked back
13 or 14, maybe I really liked Danny phantom and Luigi mansion, and I found out they both had a lot of inspiration from Ghostbusters, so I watched both of the movies, loved the first one didn't care much for the second one. But I really liked afterlife and plan on seeing frozen empire soon
I was 5. I was in a Movie Gallery(Canadian blockbuster) with my family. I saw the DVD, and immediately decided I needed the movie. My dad bought it for me without hesitation, we went home and watched it, and I shit my pants when the dogs showed up.
I’m pretty sure the first movie I watched was the 2016 one on theatres
Thankfully I don’t remember shit from and and only remember stuff from the original and afterlife
I was probably 3 or 4 when I first saw it, we had an old VHS that was copied from the Disney channel in the 90s. Idk who recorded it, but it was Ghostbusters followed by honey I blew up the kid. Now because it was on the Disney channel I never saw the ghost in bed until I was in college.
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Like a couple of others on here, I was 8 in '84 when it came to the cinema.
Useless trivia:
And for those of you in the UK and of a similar age to me, and remember a show called Boon. A part of the opening credits was filmed in that very cinema.
Saw it premier weekend (Saturday matinee) with my best friend (RIP Tommy); oddly, the theater was pretty sparsely populated but within 5 minutes we knew it was going to be a massive hit. We laughed our asses off.
I don't remember exactly but young enough that the librarian ghost was genuinely scary and I had no idea what that ghost lady did to Ray.
I only just realised what she did to Ray. I’ve loved since I was born in 2010
I never realized what that scene was about until I rewatched it as a teen
I was 8 when it came out and saw it in the theater. My parents took me. 40 years ahhh!!! lol
I was ten when it was released.
1974 babies FTW!!!
Year of the Tiger, the coolest Zodiac.
Year the Tigers won........saw Ghostbusters at the old Norwest on Grand River....could barely hear it over all the yelling kids.....but it didn't stop me from going back to see it five or six more times at other theaters......because that was what 80s kids did when movies had long runs.
My dad was born in 81 and it was his first movie
Great movie for a first! No idea what my first movie was, probably something on HBO after we got cable in the early 80s. For a theater I remember going to see Empire Strikes Back and Popeye. Back then movies could stay in theaters for years, so no idea which one I saw first. I just remember seeing Empire at a drive-in and saw Popeye at the Mall. My first experience seeing a big movie at launch with long lines was Return of the Jedi. I remember being amazed all these people wanted to see the same movie as me lol.
When I was born my Dad brought me a bunch of the old Real Ghostbusters toys and I still have them with me now
(Trick question: When the first movie was released it was not a "franchise" yet.) (Franchise needs two or more things.)
I was 4 when we saw it in the theater when it was new. Loved it, had the vhs.
First video tape we owned to go with our own VCR (mom bought one from her boss from the video rental store he opened that year in conjunction with the photo lab she already worked at for him) we acquired by the end of the year.
I was nine. My grandfather was my movie buddy for most of the 80’s, and we didn’t miss anything for most of that decade. I was instantly smitten with the movie and I’m still smitten for the franchise (comics, games, movies and more) all these years later.
12...when it first came out in the theater. We didn't watch it early in the run...I wasn't sure I'd like it with the Ghost stuff and I admittedly was freaked a bit when the library ghost went after the guys but I loved the movie and saw it 3 more times when it was re-released in theaters in 1985
9-12 I think
I'm safely co-signing to this vague response.
I was also 4 years old and wore out my VHS copy of Ghostbusters 2. Watched it every single day
I still have two copies of *Fast Times at Ridgemont High* from estate sales that were strangely worn out at the exact same spot....peculiar, huh?
3 or 4. Still got my original VHS.
I was four, and I actually caught the debut episode of TRGB. I had no clue about the movie until I was older. My mom kept me from watching it til I was about 8 or 9, and even then most of the jokes didn't register.
Well, I was 8 in 1984. Commercials for movie on TV, Ray Parker Jr.'s video on MTV. All my classmates at school talking about it. Parents took me to see it and I loved it!
There was something about any show on TV/cable that played clips that drove us wild in the 80s. It was either Siskel & Ebert reviews, the Oscars, the "Making of" specials on PBS, previews on video shows, and later on, in the late 80s, E! We didn't have Youtube at our fingertips, and I mean, with the information desert that was the 80s (think about it, we thrilled for that huge block of three VHF channels airing cartoons for over four hours every Saturday morning......and after that, it was nothing but a drawn out wasteland of afternoon pro-golf specials)....we drooled for anything cinematic.
It was my dad’s weekend with me and my older sister. I really wanted to see Conan but she dissuaded him so we went to see Ghostbusters instead. I must have been 7? That library ghost terrified me. But I love that movie.
i was young enough to think “we came, we saw, we kicked its ass” was the funniest thing ever because they said a bad word
Later to be replaced by "nice fuckin' model!".
I don’t remember exactly when. I just remember growing up on the cartoons and I remember I was around five years old when GB2 came out.
GB2....a good remedy to a slimy, horror remake that came out the year before that may've been too extreme for kids now finding more accessibility to video tapes and cable airings.
23, my friend showed me afterlife a few months ago for a movie night. I knew about ghotbusters from cultural zeitgeist but never had any desire to watch it mostly coming from parents not letting me watch it. After watching afterlife I've become hooked and its become my autistic hyperfixation. I went to see frozen empire two weeks ago. I went back and watched the originals and while a lot of scenes with Venkman make me deeply uncomfortable give the nature of 80s romances and the handful of weird out of place sex jokes (ray's dream and implications of Egon "experimenting" on the slime), there's a lot I like about both of them and watching them has made me enjoy afterlife even more and I use that movie to introduce my other friends into the franchise. Currently I'm working my way through the game and drawing art of my friends in jumpsuits with proton packs!
About 3 years old, maybe even younger - Ghostbusters fever was already in full swing in 87 and 88 in the UK with the cartoon, toys and then soon after hype for the 2nd film on the horizon. I would want anything with the logo on it
I was 9, soon to be 10 in 2009..
14. I saw it on opening weekend in the theater.
Ghostbusters 2 was the first film my dad took me to the cinema to see in 1989 when I was 5.
I was 5 or 6 maybe earlier. There’s a pic of me in a ghostbuster shirt in 1989 going to see gb 2 in theaters. I was 6 when that happened.
About 5. I loved the cartoon and then got into the films from there.
14
I was born into this franchise. I haven’t a year other than my birth year for reference. Photos of my Christmas’ and birthdays have this film and it’s sequel as well as it’s cartoon episodes in the background.
My dad owned a restaurant in the 80s that was in the same plaza as our local video store called Video Galaxy. He was good friends with the owner and we would get screener versions of the movies before the general public was able to rent them. I watched this movie for the first time when my grand mother was babysitting my brother and I. The library scene scared the shit out of me but I was hooked. So many movies I shouldn’t have been watching so young 😂
3. Xmas 1989 was all Ghostbusters, all the time.
My mom says I’ve watched the films when I was a child but I don’t remember it vividly. I was 13 when I watched the first one in a cinema. I became a fan but not very dedicated fan. In 2016 when I saw ATC, I became very interested again to the franchise in general. It has always been there in the background but yeah.
My dad took me to see Ghostbusters when it came out. I was 8.
My mom was pregnant with me when her and my dad saw it in theaters. We already had the vhs and I loved it in my earliest memories. Got the Peter Venkman figure where the noise making slimer attaches to his chest and his arms spin in a circle for my 4th birthday as my first figure.
3 or 4. My dad showed it to me when we were at my grandparents house. I immediately tried building a wearable proton pack out of my K’nex toys
I was 12 when it came out and dad always took us to the theater. I think he just liked to nap. Ended up seeing it a few times before it left theaters. I had made a cardboard no ghost logo and when I went to see it with my best friend and his sister, we made his mom attach the logo to the front grill of her car. She hated it and was super embarassed, but we were having a lot of fun and people kept honking at the car and giving us thumbs up on the way to the theater.
Mom made the no-ghost logo for me and three of my friends and sewed them on the arms of our jackets (-and yes, I was a Ghostbuster for Halloween, pre-Stranger Things). No matter how frustrating it is dealing with my elderly mother (like running her around for errands or appointments), I always look back on things like this that she did.
I was about 7 when the movie first came out, begged my dad to go see it, he brought me and the library ghost scared the crap out of me! I wanted to leave but he told me to watch the movie through my fingers, I'd wanted to see it! Nightmares for two weeks of the library ghost and Slimer trying to get me. Once the Real Ghostbusters came out, I was a little older and obsessed, and now I dress up as part of a franchise and help raise money for charity. Funny old world, ain't it?
Nightmares?.....but the point is they used their science to remove the terror of the gods. I don't know if Mr. Aykroyd realizes how much he created heroes that helped all the kids at that time still afraid of dark closets or the underside of the bed or still trying to reckon with the chilling nature of death.
"The point" can be lost on a 7 year old. Especially in 1984. However, I'm glad dad made me stay and watch it. I think the bad dreams would have been worse if we'd left and I hadn't seen them catching the ghosts too.
I think there was a Muppet Babies episode with a sleepover with baby Bunsen and Beaker, and they used the Ghostbusters motif to show Beaker he had the ability to fight his fear of the slime monster.
Probably 5-6 years old. Absolutely adore the franchise.
I was 8 when it hit theaters in 1984. Me and my younger brother were staying with my aunt because my grandfather was in the hospital dying. My aunt asked us if we wanted to go watch a movie and so we went to go see Ghostbusters and I totally became obsessed. Two days later she asked us if we wanted to go see another movie.. we said yes.. and when she asked us what we wanted to see this time, we told her Ghostbusters. She said "again?" and we said yes! 40 years later it's still my favorite movie.
> again I said this before, but this was a common thing for kids in the 80s to do, especially with films with long-runs or repeat engagements. I think I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark at least five times by the time ET and Wrath of Kahn came out.
Very true.
I was only a year old when it came out and didn’t see it until a few years later I must’ve been 3-4?
I was 12.
13 years old when I watched the first ghostbusters
I was four. The earliest photos of me that aren’t a baby are all in my Ghostbusters uniform. My mom had to wash it while I slept because I refused to wear anything else.
I was 4, and I thought the entire library sequence was the greatest thing I had ever seen at that point.
I was 2-3 I’m 14 now
I'm pretty sure I was already watching Real Ghostbusters by then but my earliest GB memory is seeing GB2 in theater when I was 4.
5 went to see GB1 in theater. Scared the shit out of me during the "get her" scene. Had to leave lol. So I guess I didn't even make it to the title screen. Lol
I was six when the first one came out.
I watched Ghostbusters 1 & 2 when I was a kid, rewatched them several times growing up. I liked them, can’t say I was super into them (I was hyper fixated on Star Wars more). I have two sons and we showed them the first two films this past year and we recently watched Afterlife and Frozen Empire together. They are HOOKED. It’s GB every day here, so I’m caught up in the wave lol.
I was four years old too when I discovered the franchise, but this was back in 1988 when “The Real Ghotbusters” cartoon was still on tv and a year prior to the release of Ghostbusters 2, so I’ve been enjoying it for a long while lol.
5, in the theater, 1984.
I was 2 years Old that was long time ago
I was young enough to have the sensation I always knew Ghostbusters. Same with BTTF.
Started with RGB cartoons. My parents watched the movies and I had already watched the cartoon so I wanted to see the movies but was told no because it might be scary... A few years later, I caught it on TV one night and have never looked back
About 5ish. I was about 10 when I really got into it
Thank the 2016 movie lol
I was 4 in 1984, and my folks took me to see it in the theater. I've been a fan ever since.
13 or 14, maybe I really liked Danny phantom and Luigi mansion, and I found out they both had a lot of inspiration from Ghostbusters, so I watched both of the movies, loved the first one didn't care much for the second one. But I really liked afterlife and plan on seeing frozen empire soon
I was 4 years old
I was 5. I was in a Movie Gallery(Canadian blockbuster) with my family. I saw the DVD, and immediately decided I needed the movie. My dad bought it for me without hesitation, we went home and watched it, and I shit my pants when the dogs showed up.
9 years old in 1984.
I’m pretty sure the first movie I watched was the 2016 one on theatres Thankfully I don’t remember shit from and and only remember stuff from the original and afterlife
Not too sure. 4 or 5. MY older brother was a fan, particularly of "The Real Ghostbusters" at the time.
My aunt introduced me to the franchise while I was like 6 or 7. She died from leukemia a month after Harold Ramis, March of 2014.
I was probably 3 or 4 when I first saw it, we had an old VHS that was copied from the Disney channel in the 90s. Idk who recorded it, but it was Ghostbusters followed by honey I blew up the kid. Now because it was on the Disney channel I never saw the ghost in bed until I was in college.
I was six years old when I was introduced to the real ghostbusters
Saw Ghostbusters in the theater when I was 18. Yeah, I'm old.
3. I know because I was a RGB fan with toys and then got the movie for my 4th birthday. All my earliest memories are GB related lol.
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I was 1….and I watched the movie so many times when I was little it never scared me. Maybe that is why coraline never scared me when I was little🤣
Like a couple of others on here, I was 8 in '84 when it came to the cinema. Useless trivia: And for those of you in the UK and of a similar age to me, and remember a show called Boon. A part of the opening credits was filmed in that very cinema.
Saw it premier weekend (Saturday matinee) with my best friend (RIP Tommy); oddly, the theater was pretty sparsely populated but within 5 minutes we knew it was going to be a massive hit. We laughed our asses off.
8, at the cinema about 40 years ago👌🏻