Let’s Throw a Ghostbusters Party

Let’s throw a Ghostbusters-themed party! “Why should we do that?” asks the person who’s not a true fan. OK, here are a few reasons why you might do such a thing:

  • You’re planning to run a Ghostbusters game, and don’t want any “norms” who witness it to be confused.
  • You’re excited about the new movie, and want to celebrate!
  • You are depressed about the new movie, and want to forget about it by focusing on what you love about the original Ghostbusters!
  • You like any chance to pretend it’s Halloween.

Here’s what my wife and I did for our last Ghostbusters party.

(In case you’re wondering, all 4 of the above are true for me.)

Theme Up Some Food

We did some simple brainstorming when planning our party.

  • Ghosts
  • Slimer
  • Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man

And we stopped there, because right away we knew we had to make ghost-themed marshmallow cupcakes. (My wife and I were really into the show Cupcake Wars at the time, so we knew our mad science creation in the kitchen would involve cupcakes.)

We found a recipe for smores cupcakes, and made our own candy toppers featuring Slimer and the Ghostbusters logo.

Sure, they look a little rough, but they were great!

Other ways you could theme up your party food include:

  • Ghost cookies (it’s easy to find a ghost shape cookie cutter)
  • A marshmallow man
  • Green punch
  • Twinkies
  • Jars containing green “slime” gelatin
  • Any leftover Halloween candy (If you have any candy in July left over from October, it’s definitely gonna be scary.)

Decorate

I don’t have much decorating skill myself, but searching Pinterest for Ghostbusters Party provides tons of ideas in case you want to show me up. Some highlights include:
  • Green ballooons
  • Silly String to represent proton beams
  • Green paper cut to resemble dripping slime
And my favorite…
Image: CatchMyParty.com

Create a Spooky-Sounding Mood

A Ghostbusters party definitely calls for some mood music. For starters, play the Ghostbusters Soundtrack! (You can read more about this in a separate post soon.) Beyond that, any Halloween-friendly music collection should do nicely. Or the soundtrack for just about any horror movie. A few choice ones include A Nightmare on Elm Street, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and The Addams Family.

And Play a Ghostbusters Game!

I mentioned the Ghostbusters roleplaying game in the previous post. That’s what we played at our last Ghostbusters party! If you’re not fortunate enough to have a copy, it’s not hard to use another, more modern (and available) game system. I’ll write more about this, too, in a future post.

Beyond RPGs, you still have plenty of options. Ghostbusters: The Board Game is pretty sweet…

A few non-Ghostbusters games would also fit the mood, including Betrayal at House on the Hill, Castle Ravenloft, and perhaps Dead of Winter.

Besides the Ghostbusters board game, my top pick would be Mysterium. In this game, one player is a ghost and the others are psychics. The ghost player must, without speaking, lead the psychics to discover who killed her, in what location, and with which weapon, using complex images that are especially prone to different interpretations. Play it by candlelight!

Image: Libellud.com

How about you? Have you hosted a Ghostbusters party, or been to one? If so, I want to hear about it, as well as your favorite ghost-themed foods, decorations, music, and games. Please share!

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