Let’s get this out of the way. The 2 questions on everyone’s mind are

Is the new Ghostbusters film as good as the original(s)? Is the new Ghostbusters as bad as the internet thought it was going to be?

The answer to both these questions is “no”. No, the Paul Feig reboot doesn’t hold a candle to Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis’ penned original – you might remember them as Ray and Egon from the first crew. Even though Feig’s version does invoke a sizeable dose of nostalgia (music, Chinatown’s famous fire station, Slimer and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man) with mixed results. And no, it doesn’t deserve all the internet vitriol its trailer generated (a historic 900k dislikes!).

Fun cast, kooky characters with some absurd moments and several servings of supernatural adventure

Erin (Kristin Wiig), a professor loses her teaching gig in NYC over a ghost book she wrote with her estranged childhood friend Abby (Melissa McCarthy). Abby has been working with her oddball colleague Holtz (Kate McKinnion) on building gadgets that marry science and the supernatural to quantify and prove paranormal activity. Together with a himbo secretary (Chris Hemsworth) and an ex-transit worker Patty (Leslie Jones), they go into the business of Ghostbusting. Now that hauntings are on the rise, the women (and token remarkably useless man) must figure out what’s up and save NYC while they’re at it, even if everyone thinks they’re crazy.

Step back for a second and completely disassociate 2016 Ghostbusters from 1998’s pioneering paranormal scientist investigators. However much you can, anyway. Ghostbusters 2016 has a lot going for it – a great premise, a kooky cast with some funny (and some not so funny) moments, the best theme song ever, the handsomeness of Chris Hemsworth…. Which makes for a fun (but forgettable) outing to the movies. It starts off pretty slow, the party heats up in the middle, but the Ghostbusters kind of lose their way and meander about the final third of the movie. Mostly, they seem to hope it works out, and spoiler alert, it does.

It’s a confused story of friendship with a haphazard message about love thrown into towards the end. The biggest flaw in the movie is that the characters are pretty uneven. Abby and Holtz (who alternates between being hilarious and just, too out there) are insane and likeable, and Patty balances out the crazy. But the main character, Erin, and her relationship with Abby simply doesn’t work, and this is the relationship that the movie rides on. Abby sabotages Erin’s career with their joint ghost work and videos but isn’t held accountable, their previous falling out is never addressed. Kristin Wiig is just really unlikeable, I really don’t know why that is. She’s kind of tense and twitchy, and has a frenzied desperation to her that is just painful – plus her mancrush on sexy meathead receptionist borders on (borders? straight up is?) sexual harassment.

But don’t let that hold you back – it’s not a perfect film by a mile but it’s fun, the women are funny, it’s got a good theme song and a great dance end credit sequence. As long as you’re not expecting it to be anything like the original (great script, great cast, laugh-out-loud hilarious, impeccable pacing, wow what a classic), you’ll be entertained.

Get your tickets on Popcorn!