Remember The Real Ghostbusters Proton Packs And Ghost Popper?

Friends, last October marked the 35th anniversary of Ghostbusters and I wrote an article about attending the Fathom Events celebration – in said article I also shared with you how thanks to some can-do attitude and a desire to earn some money in the Summer of ’84 – I started up a local Ghostbusters business. As kids we had to make do with backpacks and a chopped up garden hose attached to plastic machine guns and some electrician’s tape – plus a good dose of imagination. Two years after that however when The Real Ghostbusters hit Saturday Mornings on ABC – if you were lucky you could have got your hands on a Kenner Proton Pack, which included a PKE meter for tracking those supernatural entities that needed bustin’. Or if some heavier firepower was required you might have picked up the Ghost Popper – which safely fired foam “ghostpops” at cutout standees of a Class 5 Full-Roaming Vapor Ghost or even a Class 7 Outsider Avatar Deity in the form of Mr. Stay Puft!

I sadly never was able to lay my hands on one of The Real Ghostbusters Proton Packs or even Ghost Popper, although I am proud to say that Shea has one of the Proton Packs hanging up on the wall of the arcade as a decoration. I also never had the opportunity to try and get one of those awesome digital watches that you saw in that TV commercial – in all honesty I do not remember ever seeing that particular ad before. Did you know though that Kenner continued to make the Proton Pack and other toys for The Real Ghosbusters until 1991? That includes the Ecto-Blaster, Ghost Grab-A-Meter, and the Ecto-Charger Pack accessories – with the last one resembling the Slime Blowers used in Ghostbusters II.

With the upcoming Ghostbusters: Afterlife – which was originally scheduled to debut on July 10th but was pushed to March 5th of 2021 due to COVID-19 – I am sure we are going to be seeing some new merchandise in the near future. As it is now, you should be able to visit your local Walmart and pick up both a PKE meter as well as a Ghost Trap… for all of your supernatural elimination needs.