Ghostbusters Plasma Series: Venkman

Bill Murray is the greatest actor of all time. If you want to disagree with me, that’s fine, just know that you’re wrong. Because of my love of toys and Mr. Murray, I’ve always wanted a Bill Murray action figure. It might sound like a weird want to most people, but to a toy enthusiast it probably isn’t. If one were to aspire to own Bill Murray in plastic though, then the easy franchise to look to is Ghostbusters.

The Real Ghostbusters is the toyline that made me an action figure fan for life. I loved that series from Kenner as I had the firehouse, the Ghostbusters, numerous vehicles, and some ghosts. That franchise is based on the cartoon though, and the actual Ghostbusters did not resemble their real-life counterparts even in the slightest. That is almost certainly due to money, as if you’re going to make a cartoon that uses the likeness of actors like Murray and Harold Ramis then it stands to reason that those individuals need to be compensated.

Nostalgia has taken over the toy collecting world though, and actual toys based on the original 1984 hit Ghostbusters have been trickling out for years. There have been some high end ones, and some more mass market friendly releases. I’ve always intended to purchase a Peter Venkman from one of those many lines to satisfy my Murray obsession, but I just never did. For one reason or another, I just either wasn’t enthused with the product or I didn’t like the price. Well, today on a trip to Target for some essentials, I made an impulse buy when I stopped by the toy section as staring at me right in the face was a Peter Venkman from Hasbro’s new Plasma Series of toys.

Hasbro is the latest license holder to acquire Ghostbusters. Previously, Mattel held the license and I believe Diamond Select also had it at one point. Hasbro is a well known toy creator as it currently holds many of pop culture’s biggest licenses such as Marvel and Star Wars. Once upon a time, I was a Marvel enthusiast and was way deep into the Marvel Legends line, but when Hasbro acquired the license from Toy Biz I wasn’t impressed. I left that line around 2006 and I haven’t purchased a Hasbro toy since. For that reason, this purchase was a bit like a homecoming for me. I have nothing against Hasbro as a company, I just don’t have much interest in the licenses they hold. This was the first release that had appealed to me in quite some time, so I was curious to see how Hasbro’s action figures stand up in 2020.

The Ghostbusters Plasma Line all come packaged in an attractive window box display. One side panel features a bit of stylized art of the four Ghostbusters and the rear dispalys the rest of the line. There’s also a brief blurb on the character. For Venkman, the box reads: “The man with the mouth: Peter can convince (almost) anybody of (almost) anything.” Short and to the point, it described the character well enough. Each figure comes with a few accessories as well as a piece of Vince Clortho in demon-dog form. For Peter, it’s the left, front, leg. The other figures in the line include the other three Ghostbusters, Dana in her Zuul attire, and Gozer. The retail at Target was $19.99 so if you want to build your own demonic canine it will cost you around $140. Hopefully you don’t want two.

Peter Venkman comes clad in his traditional Ghostbusters outfit from the first film. It’s the khaki one with the logo on the right shoulder complete with black boots and gloves. He stands right around 6″ and possesses a great deal of articulation. His head sits on a ball joint with great range of motion. The shoulders are ball-jointed and there’s a hint of a butterfly joint in there as well for turning the shoulders into the body. It doesn’t do much though. He has a biceps swivel which is a little tight out of the box and double-jointed elbows. At the wrist he has a swivel and a hinge joint to tilt the hands up and down. His torso is on a ball-joint so he has some good motion there that doesn’t detract as much from the sculpt as an ab crunch would, though he lacks traditional waist articulation. The legs are attached via ball-joints with thigh swivels and double-jointed knees. The ankles are on swivels, but with an odd pitch to them so they sort of turn out and up instead of on a straight plane. The feet also rock side to side.

What I understand to be typical of Hasbro is fairly true here in that most of the figure is colored plastic. There’s not a ton of paint work aside from a yellow cable on his belt and the logo on his arm. The face is a solid likeness for Murray, as good as one would expect at this price point. I’ve seen more expensive Venkman figures with lesser face sculpts. He has a cocky smirk which is befitting of the character, though I wish he had a five-o-clock shadow. The uniform looks great and even features the screen accurate detail of Venkman’s pants not being tucked into his boots. He has his walkie talkie affixed to his belt, though it’s non-removable, and the belt itself is a floating piece of plastic which adds a little depth to the look of the figure. The hands are in trigger-finger positions as opposed to a more generic grip. I’m not sure this really adds anything to the figure as the proton pack doesn’t feature a trigger, but the plastic is soft enough that he can hold his accessories with only a little bit of fuss. The lack of paint means he’s fairly glossy to look at. A wash over the uniform might have done some good, and his eyes are particularly shiny, but it’s an attractive enough piece.

For accessories, Venkman comes with his proton pack and a ghost trap. The proton pack is a really nice sculpt with some paint highlights as well. It’s attached to a harness that features two shoulder straps, a belt, and a peg to fit into Peter’s back. The belt of the proton pack detaches on the left side and it was more than a little troublesome out of the box. It almost looks like it was glued in place which had me doubting myself if I was supposed to even go this route in order to get this thing onto Venkman. I did manage to unfasten it, but I was scared the whole time that the peg would come off with it. It definitely could have been done better and isn’t something that would probably hold up well to repeated removals. The actual blaster portion can be holstered on the side of the pack or held by the figure. It’s on a soft piece of plastic and seems reasonably durable. Venkman has enough articulation that he can hold the end of it in a casual manner, ready across his chest, or point it to bust some ghosts. The other accessory, the trap, looks the part, though it doesn’t do anything. Venkman can hold it, but there isn’t an easy way to clip it onto his belt or anything like that. It also doesn’t have the activation pedal. The only other accessory is the build-a-figure piece which I suppose looks fine, though I’m not about to judge that figure based on one leg.

Positioning and posing Venkman is pretty rewarding. There isn’t much he can’t do that you would want him to do based on what the character does in the film. His feet are a bit small, so he’s a little harder to stand than I expected he would be. The proton pack also adds some weight to the figure, but not enough to make standing him impossible. For the price, he’s as good as expected. The only real shortcoming with the figure is the lack of extra hands as he pretty much needs to be holding his proton blaster to not look stupid. A screaming second head would have also been cool, but not expected or really necessary. I wouldn’t be surprised if Hasbro does a slimed variant in the future.

The Plasma Series Venkman is an action figure that gets the job done. I wanted a Bill Murray toy, and was happy to take him in his Ghostbusters attire, and this fit the bill. It’s about what one would expect of a mass market action figure at the $20 price point, but it also doesn’t exactly leave me feeling like Hasbro went above and beyond like NECA often does with its products. It also didn’t leave me with a compulsion to buy the rest of the line, so Peter is going to have to get used to hanging out with the Lego versions of the other Ghostbusters. Maybe if they ever hit clearance I’d revisit it, but probably not. For Ghostbusters enthusiasts, I suspect they’re happy to have an improvement on what Mattel did in the past and at an affordable price point.