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Who you gonna call? If you were an evangelical parent in the 1980s, the answer was probably the producers of “The Real Ghostbusters.” One of the best cartoon spin-offs of a mature movie, “The Real Ghostbusters” continued the adventures of the movie’s band of ghost hunters for hire. Naturally, every episode saw the Ghostbusters dealing with some new supernatural foe. The series never strayed too far in tone from the movie, which had seen the Ghostbusters preventing the arrival of a god of destruction, so parents probably should have had some idea of what to expect from the cartoon. However, when one episode focused on the Ghostbusters traveling to the domain of the devil, the team behind the show was inundated with complaints.
The “Real Ghostbusters” episode “The Devil To Pay” featured the team taking part in a gameshow hosted by a minor demon named Dyb. While Dyb was not actually the devil, his horned appearance and efforts to trick the Ghostbusters out of their souls were close enough for ultra-religious parents to take umbrage. In Troy Benjamin and Craig Goldberg’s book about the history of the animated series, “The Real Ghostbusters: A Visual History,” episode writer Pamela Hickley said that “parents were p***** off that the devil was in it. But they didn’t pay attention, because he wasn’t the devil, he was a dybbuk.” Her husband and co-writer on the episode, Dennys McCoy, noted that the production team “got so much mail about ‘The Devil To Pay.'”
The Real Ghostbusters writers hit a nerve with their Satanic storyline
“The Devil To Pay” had Ghostbusters Ray and Winston audition to appear on a new a game show, while Egon and Peter sat in the audience and noticed all of the questions seemed to be about the devil. When Ray and Winston got through the audition, host Dyb Devlin had them sign a release form that was in fact a Satanic contract, surrendering the Ghostbusters’ souls if they lost at Dyb’s own gameshow.
Dyb was revealed to be a minor demon attempting to ascend the ranks by capturing the souls of the Ghostbusters. Even though the episode made it explicit that Dyb wasn’t the devil, with Ray outright stating as much to Winston, parents either didn’t take notice or didn’t care. “We had every evangelical right-wing religious nut in the world complaining about it,” McCoy told Den of Geek. “Even my own brother, who was born again, gave me s*** about it.”
“The Devil To Pay” was one of 65 episodes of “The Real Ghostbusters” that aired in syndication, while ABC was airing the official second season of the show. McCoy noted that the syndicated episodes were free of network restrictions, describing the writing process as “no holds barred. You could get away with a lot more as long as you stayed faithful to the characters.” While this freedom produced one of the greatest monster-of-the-week shows ever made, it also clearly came with the risk of upsetting more sensitive viewers.
