Today Is Ghostbusters Day! Sony Pictures And Ghost Corps Celebrate And Kick Off Plans For Two Years Of Celebrations

Sony Pictures And Ghost Corps Celebrate Ghostbusters Day Today And Kick Off Plans For Two Years Of Celebrations

Today is Ghostbusters Day – the annual celebration of the release of the classic comedy and the wave across popular culture that has resonated since its original release on June 8, 1984. In celebration, Sony Pictures and Ghost Corps are announcing two years of special events, concerts, licensing collaborations, and the first-ever Ghostbusters Fan Fest presented by Wizard World, to take place on June 8-9, 2019, the 35th anniversary of the film.

Ivan Reitman, director/producer of the 1984 film Ghostbusters and principal of Ghost Corps, said, "It's immensely gratifying to see the way the fans have embraced our movie over the past 34 years, in a way we could never have imagined in 1984. The credit goes to the fans – collected in over 1,000 fan groups globally – who have kept the flame burning for decades. I'm excited to see you all at Ghostbusters Fan Fest one year from today!"

Jeffrey Godsick, Executive Vice President, Brand Strategy and Global Partnerships for Sony Pictures, added, "Ghostbusters has not only endured, but has taken on a life of its own and become its own world – from references in 'Stranger Things' to the TMNT/Ghostbusters comic-book mashup to fantastic memorabilia, Ghostbusters continues to penetrate pop culture. That's what these next two years are all about – a celebration of Ghostbusters and the fandom. It's an incredible lineup of events."

⏩ Ivan Reitman and Dan Aykroyd marked Ghostbusters day with a special video message to the fans: 

For all the details on the celebration, fans can visit ghostbusters.com, which relaunches today with all-new design and content from the entire universe of Ghostbusters, including a brand-new Ghostbusters 35th anniversary logo, which will represent the film throughout the 35th anniversary celebration.

Among the treats launching today on the website is the original four-minutes of test footage for the animated series "The Real Ghostbusters," now restored and in high definition by Ghostbusters superfan Robert Barbieri. 

⏩ Fans can register for e-mail updates at the site and follow @ghostbusters on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social media services to keep up to date on Ghostbusters events, news, charity offers, and more.

Fans can also get involved through a collaboration between the studio, Ghost Corps and Omaze to benefit the For the Win Project. Fans are encouraged to make a $10 donation, and can enter for the chance to win a Grand Prize Experience, which includes lunch for the winner and a guest with Dan Aykroyd, a VIP visit to Sony Pictures, including Ghostbusters HQ offices, a private guided tour of the Sony Pictures museum (which includes Ghostbusters props), photo opportunities in the Ecto-1, and an original Ghostbusters poster created especially for the winner. Flights and hotels will be included. Other prize incentives include tickets to the Ghostbusters Fan Fest event and tickets to Ghostbusters Live. 

⏩ Visit omaze.com/ghostbusters to enter for your chance to win. 

As another way of celebrating Ghostbusters Day, many Ghostbusters licensees and promotional partners will be sliming their social profiles and premiering exciting new products and special offers. LEGO is debuting two brand-new LEGO Ghostbusters BrickHeadz figures of Peter Venkman (covered in slime) and Slimer. International Game Technology (IGT) announces the revolutionary new Ghostbusters 4D Video Slots game, coming soon to a casino near you.  Immersive, True 4D technology delivers glasses-free 3D graphics, and gives players the power to feel energy beams created with hand gestures to capture popular ghosts from the original 1984 film. 

Wizard World is celebrating Ghostbusters Day at its annual Wizard World Comic Con stop in Columbus, Ohio this weekend, with free single-day admission for fans dressed as Ghostbusters, and a unique program of events. Over the next year, Wizard World will present a touring experience at Wizard World Comic Con events throughout the country featuring a pop-up shop with exclusive Ghostbusters merchandise. 

⏩ Next year, following the Ghostbusters Fan Fest Event, Wizard World will continue to tour the additional elements debuted for the 35th anniversary celebration.  

Later this year, fans will be able to play the Ghostbusters World augmented reality game. A collaboration between Sony Pictures Consumer Products, Ghost Corps, publisher FourThirtyThree Inc. (4:33) and developer Next Age, the game enables players to battle and capture hundreds of ghosts from all dimensions of the franchise, including the films, TV shows, comic books, theme parks, and video games. It features the latest in AR and other mobile technologies and differentiates itself with skill-based gameplay. Fans visiting San Diego in July will be able to experience the game's first public demo build and booth at The Experience at Comic-Con at Petco Park.

Beginning this fall, musical Ghostbusters fans can attend Ghostbusters Live, produced by Schirmer Theatrical – special screenings of the 1984 classic with live accompaniment by symphony orchestras around the world, conducted by Peter Bernstein, the film's original orchestrator and son of iconic composer Elmer Bernstein, who wrote the film score. Today, the studio announced that the Ghostbusters Live will be staged in such cities as Los Angeles, New York, Toronto, London, and Dublin, and many, many more to be announced. 

⏩ Fans can find links to a complete schedule here 

At ghostbusters.com, fans can register for more information for the Ghostbusters Fan Fest Event, which will take place one year from today. At the event, fans will meet for two days at Ghost Corps headquarters on the Sony Pictures Studio lot in Culver City, California. There, for the first time ever, the studio will join forces with Wizard World to bring fans an unforgettable experience. 

For the 35th anniversary, fans will participate in exclusive panels, meet the Ghostbusters creators, talent and crew and experience Ghostbusters augmented reality and virtual reality games.

SOURCE: Sony Pictures Entertainment

Tony Albert’s Politically Charged Kitsch Collection Confronts Australia's Racist Past

Tony Albert Girramay/Yidinji/Kuku Yalanji peoples. Australia Qld/NSW b.1981. Mid Century Modern (series) 2016. Pigment prints | 24 works: 100 x 100cm (each) (Collection: The artist. Courtesy: Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney)

The collector dreams his way not only into a distant or bygone world but also into a better one.

-Walter Benjamin, The Arcades Project.

Seeking exile from the growing anti-Semitism in his native Germany, author Walter Benjamin’s words are just as relevant today as they were when he wrote them in the early 1930s. Living in Paris, Benjamin loved rifling through what he saw as capitalism’s ruins in the fusty and out-dated 19th-century arcades, delighting in the mass-produced detritus that he found in secondhand shops. Freed from what he described as the “drudgery” of being useful, Benjamin’s objects were transformed by the act of collecting and acquired a quasi-magical status.

Tony Albert. Girramay/Yidinji/Kuku Yalanji peoples Australia Qld/NSW b.1981 Child Riding Kangaroo (from ‘Mid Century Modern’ series) 2016 Pigment print on paper 100 x 100cm (Collection: The artist. Courtesy: Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney)

Like Benjamin, Tony Albert is the quintessential collector. A descendent of the Girramay, Yidinji and Kuku Yalanji people, he has carefully scoured thrift shops for what he calls “Aboriginalia”: the kitsch caricatures of Indigenous people adorning trays, tea towels, playing cards, spoons and even pinball machines from the 1940s to the 1970s. Albert reassembles these vintage objects, creating poignant displays of memorabilia. Each individual object contains its own memories and stories. In this way, Albert holds a mirror up to our own collective memory and reminds us that this is the stuff, the matter, that forms the substrata of contemporary Australia.

To place collective memory under scrutiny is not easy and hence the significance of Albert’s new survey exhibition, Visible, at Brisbane’s Queensland Art Gallery. It was the conspicuous absence of Indigenous representation in visual culture that initially drew Albert as a child to secondhand shops in the 1980s.

By making the invisible visible, Albert stages a direct confrontation with Australia’s difficult and racist not-so-distant past. Akin to Benjamin’s quirky assortments of stamps and snow domes, new meanings are acquired through Albert’s reassembling of disparate objects into a collection. What comes to the fore in the show is how deftly he traverses mediums, moving from his iconic text-based assemblages of the 2000s to photography, installation and newly commissioned sculptural work.

Mid Century Modern is a 2016 series continuing Albert’s reactivation of kitsch memorabilia. He has carefully arranged a series of ashtrays in a grid-like formation. His trademark sense of humour and playfulness is on display here. His point, however, is deadly serious: what does it mean to stub a cigarette out on a black face? It is this tension between the absurd and serious, visible and invisible that prevents his work from slipping into a predictable monotony.

Collaboration is a core theme that runs through Albert’s practice. Consider, for example Moving Targets 2015, the result of a collaboration with Stephen Page, the Artistic Director of Bangarra Dance Theatre. Taking its departure point from a 2012 police shooting of two Aboriginal teenagers in Sydney’s King’s Cross, the multimedia installation is comprised of a stripped out, dilapidated car. Inside the car are screens and the viewer is invited to contemplate the final moments of the boys’ joyride as Bangarra’s Beau Dean Riley Smith dances with increasing agitation and intensity.

Tony Albert, David C Collins and Lucy Lewis Warakurna – The Force is with us #1 2017 Archival pigment print, ed. of 3 + 2 AP. 100 x 150cm (Collection: The artist. Courtesy: Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney)

The notion of giving back to community permeates Albert’s recent work. Newer projects, such as his collaboration with the children of the Warakurna Arts Community feature alongside some of his most recognisable collaborative projects such as Pay Attention 2009-2010. In the series Warakurna—The Force is with us (2017), Albert handed over artistic direction to Warakurna’s children who were charged with the responsibility of creating costumes and identifying set locations. Finally, all sales of the ensuing photographic series were shared equally amongst all parties.

Tony Albert. Girramay/Yidinji/Kuku Yalanji peoples Australia Qld/NSW b.1981 Sorry 2008 Found kitsch objects applied to vinyl letters 99 objects: 200 x 510 x 10cm (installed) (The James C. Sourris Collection. Purchased 2008 with funds from James C. Sourris through the Queensland Art Gallery Foundation Collection: Queensland Art Gallery)

Some of Albert’s works have gained a potent political urgency since their original creation. Sorry 2008 was a key installation in the Queensland Art Gallery’s 2008 exhibition Contemporary Australia: Optimism. Referring to then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s Apology to the Stolen Generations, the exhibition cautiously welcomed a new era of hope, healing and reconciliation.

Albert has since requested that Sorry be reversed to instead spell YRROS, effectively parodying and evacuating the sincerity of the Apology. Words and meaning exist as a series of conventions. In this act of reversal, Albert underscores how arbitrary and fragile these conventions are. Ten years have now elapsed and with discussions pertaining to Indigenous constitutional recognition reaching a political impasse, we are left to uneasily consider: what, if anything, has changed?

⏩ Visible is at Brisbane’s Queensland Art Gallery until 7 October.

About Today's Contributor:
Chari Larsson, Lecturer of art history, Griffith University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. 

"Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse" - The Trailer Has Landed!

"Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" - Poster

Sony Pictures Animation today launched the first full trailer for "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" and confirmed the vocal cast joining Shameik Moore as he takes on the role of Miles Morales. 

⏩ The film will be released in theaters nationwide on December 14, 2018. 

Jake Johnson is joining the cast as Miles' reluctant mentor, Peter Parker, with Liev Schreiber playing the larger-than-life crime lord Kingpin, Hailee Steinfeld playing the spunky, free-spirited Spider-Gwen, Oscar winner Mahershala Ali as Miles' influential uncle Aaron, Brian Tyree Henry playing Miles' father Jefferson, Luna Lauren Velez as Miles' mother Rio, and Lily Tomlin as Aunt May. 

Peter Parker serves as Miles Morales' reluctant mentor in "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse"

Commenting on the announcement, producers Phil Lord and Christopher Millersaid, "We are lucky to have such an amazing cast of funny, genuine creative souls to populate the Spider-verse. They have generous minds and great big hearts. And they have very talented throats. Which is where their delightful voices come from." 

Lord and Miller continued: "We can't wait for the world to see Miles Morales on the big screen. He's such a fun and exciting new character, and telling his story through a revolutionary visual style makes for a totally fresh cinematic experience that, if we may say so, is freaking amazing."

The Trailer:

Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the creative minds behind The Lego Movie and 21 Jump Street, bring their unique talents to a fresh vision of a different Spider-Man Universe, with a groundbreaking visual style that's the first of its kind. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse introduces Brooklyn teen Miles Morales, and the limitless possibilities of the Spider-Verse, where more than one can wear the mask. 

Hailee Steinfeld voices the role of Spider-Gwen in "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse."

Directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman, the screenplay is by Phil Lord. The film is produced, in association with Marvel, by Avi Arad, Amy Pascal, Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and Christina Steinberg.

Shameik Moore voices the role of Miles Morales in "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse."

SOURCE: Sony Pictures Animation

Jurassic World: Can We Really Resurrect A Dinosaur?

Resurrecting dinosaurs might not be so easy. (pixabay/azdude, CC BY-SA)

This summer, the fifth instalment of the Jurassic Park franchise will be on the big screen, reinforcing a love of dinosaurs that has been with many of us since childhood. There is something awe inspiring about the biggest, fiercest, and “deadest” creatures that have ever walked the planet. But the films have had an additional benefit – they have sparked an interest in dinosaur DNA.

The “Mr DNA” sequence in the original movie is a great piece of science communication and the concept of extracting DNA from the bodies of “dino” blood-engorged mosquitoes is an outstanding piece of fiction. It is, however, just fiction.

⏩ Video-clip: Jurassic Park’s solution for resurrecting dinosaurs.

Quite by chance, we’ve recently identified the overall genomic structure of dinosaurs. The genomic structure is the way that genes are arranged on chromosomes in each species. Although individual animals from the same species will have a different DNA sequence, the overall genomic structure is species-specific.

We began by working out the most likely genomic structure of the bird-turtle ancestor, before tracing any changes that occurred from then to the present day. This lineage includes the emergence of dinosaurs and pterosaurs ~240 million years ago, passing through the theropod dinosaurs (whose members include T.rex and Velociraptor) and ends with birds.

Despite us not making any claims to have extracted dino DNA, the question that seems to be on most people’s lips is “does this bring us closer to a real Jurassic Park?” The answer is an emphatic “no”, and here’s why.

First, the idea that there is intact dino DNA contained within blood-sucking insects preserved in amber just doesn’t add up. Prehistoric mosquitoes containing Dino blood have been found, but any dino DNA contained within them has long since degraded. Neanderthal and woolly mammoth DNA has been successfully isolated, but dino DNA is just too old. The oldest DNA ever found is around one million years old, but for dino DNA we would need to go back at least 66m years, so realistically we’re not even close.

Second, even if we could extract dino DNA, it would be chopped up into millions of tiny pieces and we would have little clue as to how these pieces should be organised. It would be like trying to do the world’s hardest jigsaw puzzle with no idea what the picture looks like or whether there are any missing pieces.

In Jurassic Park, the scientists find these missing pieces and fill them with frog DNA, but this wouldn’t give you a dinosaur, it would give you a hybrid or a “frogosaur”. These bits of frog DNA could have all kinds of negative effects on the developing embryo. It would also be infinitely more sensible to use bird rather than frog DNA as they are more closely related (but it still wouldn’t work).

A Velociraptor can’t be resurrected in a chicken egg. (Fred Wierum/Wikimedia, CC BY)

Third, the idea that all you need is a strand of DNA and, hey presto, you can recreate a whole animal is, again, science fiction. DNA is a starting point but the development of the animal inside the egg is an intricate “dance” of genes switching on and off at the right time with a series of environmental cues.

In short, you need the perfect dino egg and all the complex chemistry contained within it. In the book, they generate artificial eggs, in the films they use ostrich eggs. Neither would work, you can’t put chicken DNA inside an ostrich egg and hope to get a chicken (people have tried). The same would be true of a Velociraptor.

And this is before we even consider legislature, planning permission, protest groups and the effect on the ecosystem.

So we can’t resurrect a dinosaur, but…
Here’s the thing: dinosaurs never became extinct. Quite the contrary, they are among us right now. Birds did not evolve from dinosaurs, birds are not closely related to dinosaurs. Birds are dinosaurs.

Dinosaurs (including birds) are the survivors of at least four extinction events, emerging each time in more diverse, weird and wonderful forms. One key element of our paper is that we theorise that their ability to do this is facilitated by their genome structure. We discovered that birds and most non-avian dinosaurs had a lot of chromosomes (packages of DNA). Having so many allows animals to generate variation, the driver of natural selection.

Nevertheless, and it is a long shot, it may be possible in future to use Jurassic Park technology to help undo some of the harm that humans have caused. Mankind has seen the extinction of well-known avian dinosaurs such as the dodo and the passenger pigeon. Recovery of DNA that is a only few hundred years old from these birds is a far more realistic proposition. It may also be that eggs from closely related living species might just be good enough. In the right conditions we may be able to use them to resurrect some of these species from extinction.

About Today's Contributors:
Darren Griffin, Professor of Genetics, University of Kent and Rebecca O'Connor, Postdoctoral research associate, University of Kent

This article was originally published on The Conversation. 

Jurassic Park/World Related Videos:

Jurassic Park/World Related Stories:

• From Universal Pictures Home Entertainment: Jurassic Park 25th Anniversary Collection
• World Premiere of Jurassic World in Concert

Four Important Lessons About Family That We Learned From "American Dad!"

The Smith Family. (TM and (C) 2017 Fox and its related entities. All rights reserved.)

The Smith Family. (TM and (C) 2017 Fox and its related entities. All rights reserved.)

American Dad!, though bearing similarities to its sister shows Family Guy and The Cleveland Show, has definitely made a name for itself in its own right in pop culture. With a focus on creating relatively more relevant stories and relatable characters, American Dad! creates hilarious and sometimes surreal episodes that still have heart and can connect with its viewers.

To date, American Dad! has released almost 250 episodes and has been nominated for three Primetime Emmy Awards and two Annie Awards. It has also been named top television series by the American Society of Composer, Authors and Publishers.

⏩ The accolades the show has earned is unsurprising given its large fan base, many of whom have connected and taken lessons from the show. 

Here are some of those takeaways:

1. Keep Your Family Close

This may be an obvious one, but if there's any lesson that viewers take from American Dad!, it's that family is the most important thing to prioritize. 

While the Smith family has more than its fair share of trouble and adventures, they always stick together in the end, and you can see each and every character in their house practice this somewhere along the course of the show.

2. We have to accept our family's flaws in order to love them

In American Dad!, each member of the family is incredibly flawed in their own, often absurd, ways. 

• Stan can be incredibly rash and drastic, sometimes bringing home the extreme ways of dealing with things from his CIA job. 
• Francine is oftentimes a nag and can become scornful. 
• Both Hayley and Steve have been very inconsiderate, ungrateful, and selfish in the course of the series. 

While the members of the Smith family have certainly embarrassed each other and irritated each other, at the end of the day, they get through it not by trying to change their family members but accepting them for who they are.

3. You don't always have to agree

One of the most central conflicts in American Dad! is the opposite political views of Hayley from the rest of her family. It's often the root of many arguments and problems that have occurred in the show and is a running theme across the series. 

While it certainly gets brought up and tackled by the characters, Hayley and her family still have each others' backs despite not necessarily seeing eye to eye on everything.

4. Sometimes, you can choose your family

Not everyone in the main cast of American Dad! is related by blood. While they all certainly live in the same household, Klauss, Roger, and Jeff aren't at all related to the Smiths. 

In Klauss' and Roger's case, they're not even the same species. However, it doesn't stop them from actively choosing to treat each other like family. 

It teaches viewers that anyone can be like family as long as you treat them with love and respect.

"American Dad!" - Stan Smith 

SOURCE: FOX+