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Dr. Hubert Wartzki is an ancient language researcher and library folklorist at the New York City Public Library, specializing in Semitic Philological and Linguistic Studies. He appears in Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024), portrayed by comedian and actor Patton Oswalt. Wartzki serves as the key expert who helps the Ghostbusters decode the origins of Garraka and the Orb of Garraka, providing crucial lore about the Death Chill and the Fire Masters.
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During the events of Frozen Empire, Ray Stantz, Phoebe Spengler, and Podcast seek out Wartzki in the basement of the New York City Public Library. They play him a recording Podcast captured of the Orb of Garraka. Wartzki's first reaction is skepticism: he suspects his colleague Dr. Jahangiri is pranking him, since only five people in the world can understand the dead language on the recording. Podcast's offhand comment that Jahangiri is already dead startles him, and Phoebe steps in to clarify. Wartzki identifies himself as the library's folklorist, the tri-state treasurer of the H.P. Lovecraft Society, and someone who believes in spirits, self-winding clocks, and what he calls "the Singing Cheeses of Copenhagen." When Ray shows him a photograph of the Orb of Garraka, Wartzki recognizes it immediately.
He leads the group to what he considers the real library: a sub-level of the old stacks. There he retrieves the book "Explorations To The Indus Valley" and shows them photographs of a stone carving documenting the last recorded sighting of the orb. He explains the folklore of Garraka, a powerful entity imprisoned inside the orb, and Ray identifies Garraka's weapon from Wartzki's description as the Death Chill: the power to kill by fear itself.
Wartzki then opens a case of 19th-century wax cylinder recordings, offering a preview of one that allegedly captures Mary Todd Lincoln uttering an expletive upon seeing a moth. He then plays a wax cylinder of the chant capable of freeing Garraka. A ghost called Possessor, which had been stowing away in Podcast's audiovisual equipment, takes its opportunity to act: it possesses the phonograph, ejects the wax cylinder into a trash bag, and flees with the bag.
The group chases the possessed bag outside the library, where Wartzki spots it near Patience the Lion, one of the stone lion statues flanking the library entrance. He boosts Ray up to reach the cylinder, only for Possessor to inhabit the statue itself. The animate Patience roars and leaps down, forcing Wartzki to duck behind a sign while Ray is pinned. Podcast eventually uses the Particle Thrower from the Ecto-C's sidecar, and Phoebe destroys the statue along with the cylinder. The sequence ends with Phoebe, Ray, and Podcast being arrested by the police.
Wartzki also appears in a deleted scene titled "Ghost-chopper."
Wartzki gets visibly excitable when discussing folklore and ancient history. He is a genuine believer in the paranormal, and his enthusiasm for the subject makes him an immediate ally rather than a skeptic the team has to convince. His basement office at the library reflects a personality that blends rigorous academic knowledge of dead languages with an earnest love of the unexplained.
Wartzki is portrayed by Patton Oswalt, a comedian and actor known for stand-up, film, and television work including "King of Queens" and the voice of Remy in Pixar's "Ratatouille." Oswalt also voiced Mooglie in Ghostbusters VR: Now Hiring. His character's name was publicly confirmed on January 15, 2024. On March 12, 2024, Oswalt appeared on "The Late Show" and confirmed that Wartzki works as a librarian at the New York Public Library.
For his scenes in Frozen Empire, Oswalt wore socks printed with a map of Innsmouth, a location from H.P. Lovecraft's fiction. The detail connects directly to Wartzki's stated membership in the H.P. Lovecraft Society.