With the recent release date for Ghostbusters Afterlife, we wanted to look at who the villain for the film is and what’s the deal with the baddy behind the Summerville shakes. The original two films had great bad guys, or bad girls as in the first film, so there’s a lot of pressure on the 3rd main film to live up to expectations.
This is one of the areas that the 2016 reboot got wrong with a really weak villain that was way too tongue-in-cheek to actually make you at least a little concerned about them. However, Gozer the Gozarian was enough to terrify any ten year old back in the 1980s and it was a similar story for the Scourge of Carpathia, the Sorrow of Moldavia, Vigo the Carpathian for the sequel.
AdvertisementGhostbusters 2016 kind of made a mockery of this with Neil Casey’s Dr. Rowan North falling way short of the mark, even when he took the form of a giant Ghostbusters logo ghost. Ultimately, the 2016 film failed to kick start a proper rebooted franchise and resulted in the creation of Afterlife, which looks much more in-keeping with the first two films. However, it needed to get its bad guy right to pick up the ticket sales it needs to land a sequel of its own.
Ghostbusters Afterlife villain, earlier rumors and wish list
Way before the film came out, we’d scoured the polter-web for clues about the villain in Ghostbusters Afterlife, but to begin with there didn’t appear to be anything to go on as such. There was little in the way of rumors to hang our hat on, so to begin with it felt like this was going to be an exercise in advanced spectral make believe.
AdvertisementHowever, with the arrival of the second trailer, we were pretty sure we’d managed to puzzle it all together for sure, so don’t read on if you haven’t seen the film yet and don’t actually want to know who the villain is. Our theory went on to be confirmed with the international trailer in October, which featured more of the baddie and her minions of destruction, so here’s everything that you need to know. However, we’ll cover the additional possibilities we’d come up with in the section right at the bottom of the page, taking into account the curve balls we’d hoped the film might throw at us.
With the double-sided sticky tape out of the way, we’re actually going to go back to the end of the 2016 film for the first clue about the bad guy/girl/person/none gender-specific ectoplasmic divine being. In the aftermath of the whole debacle, Patty goes on to overhear the name Zuul while listening to recordings of Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP).
AdvertisementFor anyone with a passing interest in the Ghostbusters, you will already know that Zuul is the demigod worshiper of Gozer the Gozarian. Zuul is one of a pair of demon dog creatures, who appeared in the first film and, alongside Vinz Clortho, are referred to as the Gatekeeper and the Keymaster.
When they get together, they’re able to summon Gozer, a shape-shifting Mesopotamian god of destruction, and this resulted in the Manhattan cross-rip of 1984… essentially ghosts running wild throughout the Tri-State area in the very first film. At the end of it all, the Ghostbusters cross the streams from their Proton Packs to beat down Gozer and then singe the “choose and perish” out of her when she transforms into a giant Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
At this stage, you might be wondering what the history lesson has got to do with Afterlife? Well, the answer is that it has everything to do with it. For a start, the official Sony Pictures Releasing synopsis for the 2021 film included a reference to it, stating that, “supernatural phenomena relating to New York City’s “Manhattan Crossrip of 1984″ arises and threatens the world”. They were pretty brazen about it right from the get go, and Goza is the villain at the heart of the story for the young Spengler family and their new friends.
If you also look at the production efforts that have led up to the release, the 2016 film seemed set for a sequel with the Zuul tease at the end. However, it was canned, seemingly due to the poor performance of the film and the fan fallout that ensued. In the aftermath, Ghostbusters Afterlife was born in its place. When you look at it from this point of view, what you’ve got is Stranger Things meets the previous sequel plan reincarnated and shipped out to Summerville, Oklahoma.
The good news for any skeptics out there that might have been keen to pass this off as hearsay and the delusional ramblings, trailer 2 put the nail in the coffin for the upcoming film release. Not only do you have miniature Stay Puft Marshmallow Men, but you can also see what looks exactly like either of the two hell hounds from the 1984 film smashing out of a Walmart at the 2 minute mark.
This is far from the smoking gun in terms of the Ghostbusters Afterlife villain being Gozer, but if you really focused, used well-timed pauses and even confirm it by taking down the trailer speed to 0.25x you can actually see the baddy clawing her way out of the hole. The camera doesn’t show her face to make it 100% confirmed, but the lightning crackle, silvery skin-tight outfit and funky short hair are a dead giveaway. She then went on to feature even more prominently, along with her demigod worshipers, in the international trailer, and with the arrival of the film it is now a done deal.
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You can also see additional info on the film in the run up to the release with the official Twitter page at https://twitter.com/Ghostbusters.
Who plays the Ghostbusters Afterlife villain Gozer the Gozarian
Gozer was played by Slavitza Jovan in the first film, but sadly she’s not back in the role again for the 2021 release. She was voiced by Paddi Edwards, who passed away in 1999, so either archive recordings will be used or a new voice has been found for the baddy.
However, the actress in the role of Gozer the Gozarian in Afterlife is Olivia Wild, who you might recognize from Tron: Legacy and Her.
Could the villain have been anyone else
The simple fact is that just because we were 99.9999 (plus a thousand more 9s) percent sure that Gozer the Gozarian was going to return in the film, it didn’t necessarily mean that she was the ultimate villain. Maybe, there was something darker and more powerful under Summerville causing all of the seismic activity, so we were waiting for the film’s release date to confirm things.
The biggest argument against it all being about Gozer was the simple fact that this might feel a little too much like a cut and paste job from the first film. This turned out to be the case, though and while it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, it would have been cool if it turned out there was something even scarier lurking underneath all of the tremors.
One option was that it might all link up with Ivo Shandor, the architect of Gozer’s return in the first film, and while that was the case a little, he’s far from the ultimate villain of it all.
You can check out our 2021 films section to see other big releases that are on the way this year, or visit the Ghostbusters website to see more on the film at www.ghostbusters.com.
