Ghostbusters Onionhead/Slimer Backside Design Movie Concept Drawing

This original Prismacolor pencil drawing of Onionhead/Slimer's backside by concept and storyboard artist Thom Enriquez was made for the production of Ghostbusters (1984). The supernatural comedy garnered a nomination in the Visual Effects category at the 57th Academy Awards and remains a pop culture staple to this day.

The illustration appears on page 81 of the 2015 art book Ghostbusters: The Ultimate Visual History and on page 43 of the 2020 retrospective book Ghostbusters: The Inside Story.

Before headlining a Saturday morning cartoon and becoming the face of citrus-flavored ectoplasmic fruit juice, the ugly little spud was born on the pages of Dan Aykroyd's very first draft script, Ghost Smashers. Pulling from academically-published theories of parapsychology and his own family's psychical mediumship history, the interdimensional plot set in a science-fiction future opens with janitor-like Ghostbusters responding to a call about a not-so-cute "free-repeating vaporous phantasm" drinking from a milk carton in the kitchen of the rustic upstate New York Greenville Guest House bed and breakfast.

The putrid-smelling poltergeist came to be known among crew members as "Onionhead," and when Harold Ramis joined the project as a co-writer, moved to the 12th floor of the posh Sedgewick Hotel to guzzle down scraps of room service leftovers and unfinished vino.

Enriquez got word from associate producer Michael C. Gross that the working screenplay's vague and nondescript spirit happened to be a homage to Aykroyd's dear friend John Belushi, who was slated to star in the movie prior to his death. Gross advised the artist to specifically conjure up the comic's over-the-top performance in National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) for creative inspiration.

"Suddenly it became John's torso with a mouth on it and an insatiable appetite to go with it," Enriquez was quoted as saying in an interview.

As for why the ghostly glutes required such artistic attention, Slimer's big reveal was once a P.O.V. shot from the rear--literally--with Peter Venkman and Ray Stantz expressing repulsion at the naked sight.

But that's not all for the butt: In the final shooting script, Slimer blasts the Ghostbusters with a "flatulent gust" as a last-ditch effort to escape the pull of their Ghost Trap; a storyboard of the scene shows the vapor inverting itself to cut one loose and then spinning back upright with a relieved look on its face.

After serving as a production illustrator on Ghostbusters II (1989), Enriquez spent most of his subsequent career in the world of animation, helping to develop seminal Disney classics like The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), and The Lion King (1994).