Going THERE.

[tdotbabs]

Just a heads up, I hate every single one of you that put me into this headspace to begin with. But here goes. Shipping.

So, I was watching the Real Ghostbusters episode, "Boo Dunit". There's a scene where Egon lands in Winston's lap, and Winston offers to read a story out loud to him. There's also a scene where Egon and Ray are bickering back and forth, and briefly there's a scene where Egon's holding onto Ray from behind for no real reason. And Peter? He's kind of off on his own, and other than a few bits where the other 3 regard him in annoyance, no one pays him too much mind.

So yeah. I can see Egon/Winston (And there need to be more of that, if you really want to Go There. Hell, Omorka? You wanna help me out with that one? :D), I can see Egon/Ray, I can see Ray/Winston, but Peter's....just this kid. He's lazy, irresponsible, makes messes, whines, and half the time is a hilariously useless little brat. The other 3 initially are supposed to be a few years older. But that's in the original 78 episodes.

When they retconned the show's continuity and got Dave Coulier to voice Peter, THEN he aged 10 years to about 35, grew a foot taller and become more robust looking. He became a completely different character who was much more in line with the other 3. But I always hated that version of him and the show was a flaming hot mess, so you want to ship that version of Peter, go ahead.

But the original Peter? Scrawny derpy little thing voiced by Lorenzo Music? Not seeing it, man. Leave the 'ships to the "grownups", and Let Cupcakes be Cupcakes.

(Obscure reference for the win!)

Comments

[serendipity8791]

I don't really have a slashy ship in GB, the main reason being that, for me to ship something, there has to be a plausible romance between the characters, and I just don't see it with them. That could just be me clinging to a childhood thing and whatnot, but I don't see it. I have preferences to slash pairings, but no ship.

Yes, I read smut for smut's sake... sue me, lol.

I honestly thought the only pairing I would like at all would be Egon/Ray (all 'verses), for some reason, that made the most sense to me, but I wound up prefering movie-verse University!Peter/Egon (Peter was clearly the instigator) as written by Omorka. But I am not emotionally attached to the pairings.

My actual Ghostbusters ships are all het... and all canonical (whether movie-verse, RGB/EGB or IDW), because I am boring like that. My OTP being Egon/Janine, and, on a lesser level, Ray/Jenny (I hope they get together before the end of the IDW comic series, omg...) and Winston/Tiyah.

[tdotbabs]

I always thought ships and pairings were the same thing. Shows how much I read the stuff. XD

Anyway, I can see Movieverse Peter working in slash. But not the feisty brat in the cartoon.

Finally, YES!!! Winston/Tiyah!! I really hope they have a baby. Cos I've got this dark little head canon that the radiation from the proton packs have made all the ghostbusters and Janine sterile. I really want that to go away. X.x

[serendipity8791]

I read an article recently that talked about the origin of the term (I think it came from the X-Files fandom) and this is how I understood the difference.

From the way I interpret the term ship versus pairing, all ships are pairings (romantic or platonic, an example of the latter would be like Groot and Rocket, totally platonic, but I ship them so hard in a platonic way!), but not all pairings are ships. It's more the shipper's level of emotional involvement that differentiates what is a pairing they are casually interested in (movie-verse Peter/Egon for me), and pairings they are emotionally involved in (Egon/Janine, again for me).

Seriously, I have toyed with that too, in my head, and I was all "Please no?". I still found it hilarious when the cooling cases were "removed" (in reality, it was because IDW got the rights to using movie-accurate versions of the equipment in the artwork) because they were more of a cancer risk than the packs themselves. XD

[tdotbabs]

This is why I don't write fan fiction. Stuff like this gets confusing! XD But I get what you're saying, and it does make sense. Also, got a link for that Movieverse!Peter/Egon story? You have me curious.

[omorka]

If it's mine and it's movie!verse, it's probably Leaking The Secrets. (The only other collegiate P/E story I have is Loose Threads, and that one's RGB rather than GB, although I think it could be read either way - see below for more of that.

[tdotbabs]

Awesome thanks! I'll check them both out!

[serendipity8791]

It's called Leaking The Secrets by Omorka, of course.

Just to give a heads up of what to expect:

Not safe for work, mainly because there is an explicit oral sex scene (I'm linking to the warning page, because I am at work, lol), practically at the end. It's when Peter sneaks them into... I think it's a microfiche archive or something. About halfway through, Peter unexpectedly kisses Egon (from Egon's point of view, from the reader's, it's obvious it's about to happen) and there is a mention of Egon realizing it aroused him, but that's pretty much it, the rest is mainly subtext.

[tdotbabs]

I actually read that before bed last night. It was good! I think I prefer reading the Movieverse stuff over the cartoon. The characters are more believable.

[omorka]

You have a much, much stronger division between the cartoon and movie characters than I do. For me, Peter Venkman is first and foremost the guy telling the library manager to "Back off, man, I'm a scientist." And I think from a writing perspective, if perhaps not so much a visual one, the showrunners and better scriptwriters for ABC Season 1 and the syndicated season - JMS and Mueller especially - have based RGB!Peter off of GB!Peter, which makes it really hard for me to see him as the youngest. He and Egon, after all, both have two doctorates, while Ray only has the one. Did you see the cartoon before the first movie?

To answer the specific question, I never saw a whole lot of chemistry between Egon and Winston. Winston and Ray, absolutely; Winston and Janine, sure; Winston and Peter, even, when they were divided off into Team Physical (versus Egon and Ray on Team Intellectual). But Winston and Egon don't directly interact directly nearly as much as either one does with the other three. I can happily ship them in the various triads, or in my One Big Happy Firehouse OT5, but as a pair I think it would have to be an angsty story about father issues and expectations never met no matter how good they were (which is really only canonical on Winston's side, no matter how much the show and novelization may imply it for Egon).

Ray, on the other hand, I will and do ship with anyone and everyone. Like, the entire universe. I would write Ray/Howard the Duck fic if I thought anyone other than me would read it.

[tdotbabs]

Sort of. I saw the first movie when it came out, but I was only 7 at the time and too young to fully understand what was going on. The cartoon I bonded with a TON more when I ran across it 2 - 3 years later, and when I went back and saw the movie again, I saw the correlations, definitely, but I always felt the cartoon versions were a separate thing. Kind of like the Muppet Show vs. Muppet Babies. Though different premise, obviously. :)

The youngest and shortest thing, I got from Gabi, who designed him for the cartoon. And in the very early episodes, I agree there is definitely more of the movie influence going. Same with the 1986 writer's bible. At the same time though, Peter develops his own personality and there are hints to his background and education. He has two doctorates, but Egon states he cheated his way through college. (Given the red tape I went through, when I went to University, I don't blame him. :P) And in episodes like the "Long Long Long Etc Goodbye", "Last Train to Oblivion", "Apocolypse, What Now" "Lost and Foundry", and "Boo Dunit", he's much less mature and much more playful than his 3 coworkers.

(On a side note, yer gonna have to elaborate on the OT5 thing. I'm curious. Is this something you wrote or just a concept that the Mane 5 are one big polyamourous relationship?)

[omorka]

I ship them as a poly quint in various permutations. This is something I tend to do in any fandom with a Four Man or Five Man Band. Of course, here one of the "men" in the Five Man Band is a woman, but that suits me just fine, too. (I am not under any impression that JMS or any of the other writers intended that to be canonical; it's more a "they care about each other so much, this is the way it could be" sort of headcanon.)

[tdotbabs]

that makes sense. Me, I see Egon, Winston and Ray that close, since they work as a unit so often. Peter and Janine I see as being separate, since Janine has her own life outside the firehouse and treats the others like coworkers rather than family, Egon nonwithstanding.

Peter's more independant of the others, and is more likely to go off by himself and have his own adventures. This is hinted by his having unseen friends in other states, his attempts at dating and buying a car or trying new things. He likes the other three well enough, but he's not tight enough to be part of that bond.