Plot
The team flies toward the Soviet Union, where Ray, Slimer, and Winston squabble over the window seat for a view of the Aurora Borealis while Egon works out calculations and Peter tries to muscle his way to the glass. The Ghostbusters have been invited to lecture on ghostbusting at an institute in Dnepropetrovsk.
Their sponsor, Katarina Novachenka, welcomes them and shows off the institute's collection of paranormal artifacts, billed as the largest in the world and holding items thousands of years old. Egon judges the collection charged with enough psychokinetic energy to blow out half of Siberia. In a laboratory the team meets researchers Vladimir Pavel Maximov and Dmitri Smerdyakov, who dismiss the Ghostbusters' gear as a light show. Vladimir claims a revolutionary theory that will eclipse them, and when Egon quotes Einstein the pair dismiss Einstein too.
At the conference, Vladimir presents twenty years of research arguing that the Titanic sank not because it struck an iceberg but because it struck Elvis Presley. Katarina points out that the Titanic sank in 1912 and Elvis was born in 1935, and Vladimir storms off to laughter. Egon then demonstrates the proton streams, with Slimer volunteered as the target to be blasted and trapped. Vladimir interrupts to announce a theft at the exhibit and accuses the Ghostbusters. The stolen artifacts turn out to be harmless except for one empty case: the Nameless Book, an ancient volume of powerful magic whose very title cannot be spoken aloud.
Police Inspector Faden forbids the team from leaving the institute. Ray and Egon explain the book's link to the Old Ones, one of which still remains after the Ghostbusters once stopped it from destroying the world; the Nameless Book is one of two texts that could wake it. Katarina recalls Vladimir's obsession with the Old Ones, and the team concludes he stole the book and framed them. They slip out a window and flee by car as Faden pursues.
Vladimir and Dmitri reach a mountain and meet a cult that begins chanting from the book. The Ghostbusters' car breaks down, and a man with a horse-drawn carriage carries them onward. Egon, sensing they need help, sends Slimer racing back to the firehouse for a box marked "Big Trouble." Slimer's flight draws the attention of the American military, and a general orders him shot down, but he dodges the attack and presses on. Katarina and the team descend a vast stairwell into what may be one of the Old Ones' hiding places, fighting off Nightgaunts that the standard ghost traps cannot hold; Ray hurls one trap away before it explodes.
Slimer returns with the box just as the cult, with Vladimir at the lead, completes the chant. The Old One Yibb-Tstll has promised Vladimir rule of the world. Egon connects the team's proton packs to Big Trouble, a device meant to tear open a rip in space and time strong enough to defeat the entity, but someone has to carry it to the pit. Peter kisses Katarina and makes the run. Yibb-Tstll appears as Big Trouble activates, the temple begins to collapse, and the group escapes. Outside, Faden has the cultists in handcuffs.
Cast and characters
The principal voice cast includes Dave Coulier, Frank Welker, Maurice LaMarche, and Buster Jones. Guest voices are Brian George, Walter Koenig, and B.J. Ward. The four Ghostbusters, Egon Spengler, Ray Stantz, Peter Venkman, and Winston Zeddemore, appear alongside Slimer. New characters include Katarina Novachenka, Vladimir Pavel Maximov, Dmitri Smerdyakov, and Police Inspector Faden, plus the Old One Yibb-Tstll, the Nightgaunts, and the Old One cult. Janine Melnitz does not appear.
Censorship and writing
Straczynski conceived "Russian About" as a follow-up to his earlier episode "The Collect Call of Cathulhu," which had drawn a strong fan reaction. He wanted to bring back Cathulhu, the Necronomicon, and the cult in a story set in Russia, but ran into a long fight with the network's Broadcast Standards and Practices department.
After the script was finished, BS&P informed Straczynski he could not use Cthulhu or the Necronomicon because they were "established occult and cult lore." Straczynski argued both were fictional creations; the department insisted it had researched the matter and that the book was real, written by an Arab, and the foundation of a Satanic cult.3 BS&P said it would consult the UCLA Folklore Division and later claimed the folklore staff had confirmed its position. When Straczynski reached the folklore people directly, he found that BS&P had contacted them but had already made up its mind. The dispute escalated to ABC, which issued a mandate that Cthulhu and the Necronomicon could not be used.4
Straczynski worked around the order by renaming Cthulhu as an "Old One" and recasting the Necronomicon as "the Nameless Book," a title taken from an old reference, so that Lovecraft readers would recognize the allusions.56 When BS&P then objected to the script even naming H.P. Lovecraft, Straczynski threatened to pull the script and quit. The series producers, Michael C. Gross and Joe Medjuck, at first thought the matter not worth the trouble, but as they learned more they threatened to take the story to the Los Angeles Times, and BS&P backed off.7
In his memoir, Straczynski recalled that ABC's Ame Simon asked him to let the renaming stand because it was one of the last scripts of the season and not worth a fight; he agreed as a favor to her, changing the Necronomicon to the Nameless Book so that speaking the title aloud would summon terrible things.8 He later wrote about censorship in network television animation for the June 1991 issue of Penthouse.8
Production notes
The episode was recorded on May 16, 1990.2 Dnepropetrovsk, the city the team visits, is located in Ukraine, which was part of the Soviet Union at the time of the episode.
Several shots reuse animation from earlier episodes. Crowd scenes of conference attendees are recycled from "Deadcon 1," an earlier-season episode whose animation differs noticeably in quality. Footage of the firehouse, used when Slimer flies home, is reused from "The Joke's on Ray."910
Connections and references
Egon notes the team once fought the last remaining Old One and that it nearly destroyed the world, a callback to "The Collect Call of Cathulhu." Whether the entity here is Cathulhu again or a separate Old One is left open: the episode's creature carries a different design, Slimer reacts with terror despite not appearing in the earlier episode, and the call sheet identifies the guardians as Nightgaunts, which in Lovecraft's mythos serve Yibb-Tstll.
Egon and Ray rattle off other creatures from the Cthulhu Mythos, naming Shuggoths (which appeared in "The Collect Call of Cathulhu"), Shamblers, and Ghasts, and they reference the writers H.P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith.11 Vladimir's Titanic theory ties to the franchise elsewhere: the Titanic appears in Ghostbusters II, Ray is asked about Elvis in the first Ghostbusters film, and Egon later proposes that a Gremlin sabotaged the Titanic in the Extreme Ghostbusters episode "Grease." The cult's cheer ("Ree-kah, rah-kah, firecracker, sis-boom-bah") echoes the chant from the 1943 Merrie Melodies short "Super-Rabbit."
When Katarina bids farewell at the end of the episode she kisses each member of the team in turn, including Slimer, who responds by performing the Hopak, a traditional Ukrainian folk dance.
This episode aired between "My Left Fang" and "The Slob"; in DVD order it falls between "The Halloween Door" and "The Haunting of Heck House."
References
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Eatock, James & Mangels, Andy (2008). The Real Ghostbusters Complete Collection booklet, p. 36. CPT Holdings, Inc.
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Marsha Goodman (1990). Episode Call Sheet and SAG Report, "Russian About" (1990).
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Radio Free Amerika with J. Michael Straczynski, May 2, 1991. Straczynski: "But BS&P was adamant. They'd 'researched it,' they said, and they knew that I was trying to get some occult stuff in here, that the book was real, that it was written by some Arab guy, that it was the whole foundation for some Satanic-like cult."
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Radio Free Amerika with J. Michael Straczynski, May 2, 1991. Straczynski: "I did the script, then one day arrived the notes from Broadcast Standards and Practices (BS&P) which said that I couldn't use either Cthulhu or the Necronomicon since these were both 'established occult and cult lore.' Now, hold the bus, says I. They're FICTIONAL CREATIONS. Not real occult figures."
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Radio Free Amerika with J. Michael Straczynski, May 2, 1991. Straczynski: "I called the Big C one of the Old Ones (knowing that Lovecraft scholars will figure it out), and found an old reference to the Necronomicon as 'the nameless book,' which I then used in the script."
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Radio Free Amerika with J. Michael Straczynski, May 2, 1991.
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Radio Free Amerika with J. Michael Straczynski, May 2, 1991. Straczynski: "At that point, even my producers (who produced the GB's movies) who at first thought it wasn't worth the hassle, got into it and were outraged, threatening to take this all to the LA TIMES if necessary. Finally, they backed off, and we won that one."
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Straczynski, J. Michael (2019). Becoming Superman, p. 291. Harper Voyager, New York, NY, USA. ISBN 0062857843. Straczynski recounts agreeing to rename the Necronomicon as a favor to Ame Simon because it was one of the last scripts of the season.
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The Real Ghostbusters, "The Joke's on Ray" (1988). Time Life Entertainment DVD release (2009).
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The Real Ghostbusters, "Russian About" (1990). Time Life Entertainment DVD release (2009).
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The Real Ghostbusters, "Russian About" (1990). Time Life Entertainment DVD release (2009). Ray: "But writers like H.P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith read it and used it in their stories."
