Plot
At the Firehouse, the Ghostbusters finish packing the Ecto-1 for a week-long vacation. Egon insists they bring their equipment along, while Ray jokes around at his expense. Janine calls for Slimer, who flies down the stairs with a duffel bag and loads it into the car. Ray gets suspicious and inspects the bag: it is full of junk food, and he orders Slimer to put it all back. Peter hangs a closed sign on the front door and Ecto-1 sets off.
After passing Exit Q-5, the team turns onto a dirt path in the New England countryside, drives straight into a mud puddle, and gets rained on before reaching the camp grounds. As they unpack, Janine takes Polaroid snapshots of the guys and unknowingly photographs a Bigfoot lurking in the background.
Egon opens a high-tech suitcase that unfolds into a sophisticated tent with luxury amenities. Peter complains that they were supposed to be roughing it, but cheers up when Ray produces Peter's audio-visual system. Slimer, meanwhile, sneaks off to observe nature by the river and secretly eats a candy bar. The team gathers around the campfire to roast marshmallows while the Bigfoot watches from a distance. Slimer prompts Winston to accompany him into the woods; a branch whips back and knocks the Bigfoot over.
Ray tells a scary story about a werewolf attacking his friends in a cemetery. Everyone is spooked by the ending, and the startled Bigfoot reveals himself. The team retreats into Egon's tent, where Egon writes the sighting off as overactive imagination until the Bigfoot appears at the tent window. Outside, they find a giant footprint, and Egon and Ray conclude they are dealing with a Sasquatch. Worse, Egon picks up strange P.K.E. readings off the creature.
Janine and Slimer befriend the Bigfoot and feed him. After eating, he decides to sleep in Egon's tent. The sky soon changes and lightning begins striking the camp. Egon detects Cherenkov radiation, which he reads as evidence of damage to the space-time continuum. After lightning hits the tent with the Bigfoot still inside, the team pulls him free. Bigfoot, now frightened, hides up in a tree; the branch suddenly breaks and he lands on Slimer. Egon realizes the creature is the nexus of the disturbance, which is reaching critical levels. While Egon theorizes the Bigfoot came through a time warp from another dimension, Slimer talks with him; the Bigfoot says he arrived through "a hole in the noisy water" and points down the river.
Egon inflates a raft and the team escorts the Bigfoot downriver, nearly going over a deadly drop before grabbing a log and climbing to safety. The Bigfoot recognizes the area and leads them along a path behind a waterfall to the time warp Egon predicted. The doorway to his world is closing, and the Bigfoot must return home to restore the cosmic balance. He goes through, and the team races back before they become trapped in limbo, passing through the waterfall and getting swept down the river. Egon confirms things are back to normal. Back at camp, Peter accidentally triggers Egon's tent, scattering their gear, and jokingly suggests they stay a few more days. Everyone groans.
Cast and characters
The episode features the regular team of Peter, Egon, Ray, Winston, Janine, and Slimer, with the Bigfoot as the central guest character.
The Bigfoot is portrayed as a shy, frightened creature displaced from his own dimension through a time warp rather than as a threatening monster. He communicates initially through gestures and Slimer, and by the episode's end he has picked up enough English to say "Bye. Bye." Slimer complains about needing to use the bathroom twice during the episode.
Equipment and locations
Equipment seen in the episode includes Ecto-1, a P.K.E. Meter, proton packs with particle throwers, Egon's self-deploying high-tech tent (referred to in production materials as the Quonset Hut), and Egon's inflatable raft. Locations include the Firehouse and the wooded New England camping grounds, which border Bigfoot's home dimension accessible through a waterfall time warp.
Production notes
The episode was recorded on August 5 and 7, 1987, with Dave Coulier recording alone on the second day.2 At least four script versions existed: a first draft dated June 17, 1987, a second revision on July 29, the final on August 3, and a revised final on August 21.3
In the script, Slimer's bag was originally written to contain Twinkies.4
The August 21, 1987 Revised Final Draft was later transcribed and published by Spook Central.5
Continuity and references
A line of Peter's establishes that Ray used to be a Boy Scout. Ray later recovers his old Boy Scout shirt at the end of "The Brooklyn Triangle."
Ray's campfire tale is about a werewolf, a type of creature the Ghostbusters had previously faced in "No One Comes to Lupusville."
Janine remarks that no one has ever liked her cooking. Her reputation for bad cooking carries forward into Extreme Ghostbusters.
Peter is reluctant to leave because he does not want to miss the television series "Moonlighting."
The Bigfoot from this episode makes a background cameo in IDW Publishing's Ghostbusters #10, visible in the bushes as a nod to this episode.
In the Extreme Ghostbusters episode "Killjoys," Eduardo suggests Bigfoot might be responsible for a disturbance, and the show acknowledges that the original Ghostbusters previously encountered one in this episode.
Episode order
In air-date order, "Camping It Up" follows "The Copycat" and precedes "The Joke's on Ray." In DVD order (Vol. 3, Disc 5), it follows "The Copycat" and precedes "The Grundel."
References
