10 Exact Moments Recent Movies Lost Us
2. CGI Egon - Ghostbusters: Afterlife
This one might ruffle some feathers, but Ghostbusters: Afterlife's bombardment of memberberries-style nostalgic touchstones reached an unbearable crescendo during its saccharine finale, where director Jason Reitman made one wildly misjudged creative call.
Though the film begins with Egon Spengler's death, we never clearly see his face and a body double has evidently been used to respectably impress his presence in the story, what with Egon actor Harold Ramis passing away back in 2014.
Many observers pre-release suggested that the most obvious, manipulative thing a new Ghostbusters sequel could do is resurrect Egon as a ghost with state-of-the-art VFX, and that's precisely what it did.
While the CGI visage of Egon looks totally fine from a technical standpoint, it does rather feel like one step too far in a movie that shamelessly regurgitates most everything good about the original Ghostbusters film.
Even beyond the ethics of bringing a dead actor back to life without their permission - his estate clearly gave the OK - using Ramis as an emotional anchor to tug on the audience's heartstrings feels crass and cynical.
While one doesn't doubt Reitman's earnest intentions, in a blockbuster era so thoroughly defined by lazily raking over the past, this felt excessive.
For those who were already on the fence about the film's mixed bag of new characters and exploitation of existing Ghostbusters iconography, CGI Egon may have pushed them over the edge.
But for our #1 pick, note that MAJOR SPOILERS will follow for Morbius if you haven't seen it yet.