Will Slimer Appear in the New ‘Ghostbusters’ Reboot?

In this modern era of 24-hour online coverage, a time when everyone’s angling to get the next hot scoop by any means necessary, entertainment journalism has become a messy, confusing game. For example:

With a planned reboot/reimagining/rework/what-have-you of the beloved sci-fi comedy Ghostbusters in the works, fans have been hungry for details. Director Paul Feig has already unveiled some set photos, announced the official cast, and generally tantalized fans through whatever means available to him. But some concerns continue to linger for those filmgoers that prefer to know every detail of a film before they actually go out to see it. Specifically, Ghostbusters die-hards have been curious about Slimer, the rascally goo-phantasm that appeared first in the original 1984 film and found greater fame in the 1986 animated spin-off series The Real Ghostbusters. (He would attain even more recognition in the years that followed, in his tenure as fruit juice spokes-ghost.)

On Saturday, the movie gossip site Bloody Disgusting ran an item “confirming” that Slimer would indeed appear in the new film. Citing a listing on the IMDb that Dan Castellaneta — better known as the voice of Homer Simpson — would voice the glowing green ghoul, Bloody Disgusting felt secure in declaring that yes, Slimer would indeed be showing his ghastly face in this upcoming project:

The IMDb cannot be trusted but, according to the site, “The Simpsons” voice actor Dan Castellaneta will be lending his talents to Slimer. Who might “Little Spud” sound like? Castellaneta is best known for voicing both Homer and Abe Simpson, as well as Barney. I think it’s safe to assume there’s truth here, considering the rash of cameos that also include Ozzy Osbourne.

Somewhat odd that they’d think it’s safe to assume that there’s truth here directly after declaring the IMDb to be untrustworthy, but okay. The item was published regardless, and shortly after hitting the Internet, Paul Feig responded with the following tweet:

Bloody Disgusting took the hit in stride, and amended the piece on their site, which they have chosen to leave up. They added the following note:

Update: Bloody Disgusting has exclusively confirmed with three separate sourced [sic] that Slimer will in fact be in the film. On the other hand, Paul Feig took to Twitter to debunk the Dan Castellaneta IMDB credit.

It’s a special sort of irony that places a typographical error in a correction that’s not really a correction at all, but a doubling-down on information that seems to have been definitively proven false.

We’ll all find out together when Ghostbusters opens in theaters on July 15, 2016.