The Real Ghostbusters Kenner 1986 Firehouse headquarters
This huge playset stands roughly 20.75 x 11.75 x 12.25 inches.
Ahh.. the Ghostbusters Firehouse headquarters. The crowning jewel of any Ghosbusters action figure collector. I was fortunate to get this at a real good price, complete with no damage issues on Ebay about a year ago (followed by the Ecto-1. The figures were the last things added to the set). The only real issue was dirty and grime. I mean, serious grime! I had to scrub the whole thing down with melamin sponges (those little white squares) to clean it off. It looks really good now.
The garage doesn’t feature anything other than parking space for the Ecto-1 and some stickers on the wall and the base of the slide pole.
The second floor features some railings, “bookshelf” stickers.
Nothing really here to do though.
The third floor features some more railings, a grate for “oozing ectoplasm” to pass through and a “mirror with a ghost” sticker and the start of the slide pole.
There’s a gimmick for pretending your guys get slimmed, pose a figure over the grates and drop a cup of Ectoplasm over the roof, this will seep through the grate and onto the figure. I used to have some Ectoplasm. It eventually evaporated and became jell-o and eventually turned hard. But I had loads of fun sliming my GB figures back then. then washing them off.
The slide pole platform can be hooked onto the third floor. Pushing the switch on the roof will release the lock and the figure will swirl down the pole with the platform.
The Ghost Containment Unit(s). There’s obviously no basement in the playset so they will have to be displayed inside the garage.
I guess the outside works too, if you plan to park the Ecto-1 inside.
The bottom sides of the units can actually slide open for you to put small ghosts in. The set does not come with any ghosts though. You’ll have the use the ghosts that come with the figures.
The Ecto-1 cannot fit entirely inside the playset. Which kinda gives a really weird look to it. Better to park it halfway from the front end.
There are parking “dips” for the tires of the Ecto-1, this will prevent the car from rolling out accidentally off a shelf.
So that’s that. I’ll draw the line here for this toy line, as I’m not interested in collecting the ghosts (I think only H20 Ghost appeared in the show, but none of the others?) and the wacky variations of the heroes. I might try to get Ecto-2 later on. I’m passing on Slimer as he’s way too big for the figures to blend in properly. But for now I’m happy with these guys. It’s been a long time coming.
Diamond select announced recently that they plan to do a Real Ghostbusters toyline, hope it happens. As the last one to announce such a line was Mattycollector and they closed within a year after announcing the line so that never came to pass.
“Who you gonna call?”
Gold
