Ghostwatch

[Becca]

I'm mostly a lurker on these forums, but I must step out of the shadows for one moment.

Ghostwatch? Chuck's going to review Ghostwatch?

This thing is legendary here in the UK, but I'm not sure how big it is over there in the US. It's right up there in the urban legend stakes with the Orson Wells War of the Worlds broadcast and the Goodie's "Ecky Thump sketch (in which a demonstration of the "ancient" Lancastrian martial art of hitting people with black puddings actually killed a man resulted in one of the viewers dying of laughter)

It's going to be interesting to see Chuck's response to this.

I know right?!

I was about 11 when it aired, so while I had my parents say it wasn't real as we were watching it, I did have that nagging feeling at the start that it might be-because you've got all these familiar faces that I knew weren't actors- especially Sarah Greene because all I knew her from was Going Live. (A Children's magazine show on Saturday mornings).

When it started to go over the top with the ghostly stuff happening later on- that was when it got less believable.

I remember the backlash reported on the news- particularly because of Sarah Greenes involvement- it meant a lot more kids were watching it despite airing after the watershed.
Also, a young man with mental health issues supposedly committed suicide over it, which I can imagine added to its urban legend status, and was a factor in it not really being aired again, at least on terrestrial TV.

[Thebestoftherest]

He hit on one of my pet peeves in this reviews. The incessant need of shows about the supernatural to include straw skeptics. It really does take me out of the illusion.
For example, if you're making a world where magic is so commonplace that 'Wizard for hire' is its own section of the yellow pages, someone going around saying "magic isn't real" is about as off as someone going around saying "electricity isn't real".
Ghosts in the ghostbusters universe aren't rare events easily explained away by promiscuous teleology. This story takes place about a decade after a spectrally animated gigantic marshmallow man roamed the streets of New York.

Yeah that is a a problem with a lot of fiction (revenge of the fallen anyone) where they have a story should be a change world, and the writers have a hard time accepting that and try to act like it is our world as oppose to changing it.

[Becca]

I've started a dedicated Extreme Ghostbusters Thread for discussions of that show and its reviews.
https://sfdebris.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&p=91508#p91508

Thanks Crypticmirror

Although watching the review on Extreme Ghostbusters he did hint at Saturday's review being difficult to suspend disbelief.

I get the feeling he's not really going to have enjoyed it too much...

Looking at the scant clips on YouTube, some of the actors that weren't celebrities do give off that The Day Today vibe that would have taken me out of the moment if I was to watch it now.

Linkara did a mini review of something similar but also leans into the found footage genre- The WNUF Halloween Special.

[ProfessorDetective]

All I know about this is that Doctor Who referenced it with a tie-in flash game for 'Army of Ghosts'/'Doomsday'. https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/Ghostwatch_(video_game)

It'll be nice to fully understand said reference.

[MafiaKirby]

You know, as someone whose 'thing' I believe in tends to revolve around ghosts and whatnot, the whole thing annoyed the hell out of me almost as much as it did Chuck. Like, when I hear someone say 'Believe them,' I'm like 'Yeah, okay, makes sense, because whatever's going on, whether there's ghosts or not there's something that's clearly upsetting them and they're not coming to you looking for someone to tell them it's bullshit. So listen to what they're saying, believe the experience is genuine, and try to figure out what sort of help you can get them.'

I mean, let's assume (And I think it's reasonable to do so) that ghosts don't exist. And yet, a person comes to you and tells you they don't feel safe in their home, all these strange things are happening, and they can't sleep and are stressed out constantly. Well, maybe these things are just coincidences. But coincidence or not, telling them "Ghosts aren't real" isn't going to help them get any sleep, because whatever's stressing them out isn't going to go away if you do that. Offer them a place to stay if you can, see if you can help them feel safe, whatever it is. You might not believe ghosts are real, but if someone else does, and they need comfort, listen to them and don't mock them.

But this idiot character expects you to just say "Yes, ghosts are OBVIOUSLY real!" And I think part of what sparked the reaction Chuck had both in him and also in me, someone who in real life might actually believe this stuff, is that by setting it in what is 1-to-1 the real world, we know what access to the supernatural this person has. This Doctor Pasco has access to the same world and proof of the supernatural as anyone else. If I watch even a fairly realistic horror movie, I can believe that at least SOME of the evidence out there might be more convincing. But if Doctor Pasco doesn't have any more proof of the supernatural than I do, then her smug and superior attitude is unjustified. Skeptics have every reason to doubt. Someone who, in real life, acted like Doctor Pasco would be an asshole. Even if the people who say the supernatural exists were right, acting like that with only the evidence we have makes you come off as an overconfident crank who, at best, happened to stumble into the one situation that would confirm her nonsense.

[FaxModem1]

Okay, I've never seen this before, but that part at the end with the multiple cats meowing was disturbing. Probably because I'm a cat owner, and dislike the idea of cats being stuck in some sort of haunted scenario, stuck as undead hungry creatures for the rest of eternity.

But, I can get why this was a hit back in the day, with it both being a "This was a prank by Suzanne for attention because of the divorce" and "This is actually a haunted apartment". In both cases, the important thing is to get that family help.

[CrypticMirror]

I think it helped, on first broadcast, that it was a Saturday and it seemed like Saturday evening tv in that it is the sort of thing you have on in the background while you get on with all the other stuff in your life that you deal with on Saturdays. You only give it half your attention to start with, so it is the "scary" and odd parts that grab your attention, slowly reeling you in. All the things we see as padding and fluff really are intentionally there as padding and fluff in order to help the more unreal aspects of the show get passed the filter in your brain which normally cuts in to flag up the absurdity. It sets the hook deep.

[Riedquat]

Okay, I've never seen this before, but that part at the end with the multiple cats meowing was disturbing. Probably because I'm a cat owner, and dislike the idea of cats being stuck in some sort of haunted scenario, stuck as undead hungry creatures for the rest of eternity. But, I can get why this was a hit back in the day, with it both being a "This was a prank by Suzanne for attention because of the divorce" and "This is actually a haunted apartment". In both cases, the important thing is to get that family help.

The noise of the cats in the review certainly bothered my cat a bit.

From what I remember of this at the time it did a good job of being creepy but like another poster I found it lost it a bit late on, since it was enough to make me start thinking "yeah, this is scripted." I think from that perspective it would've remained convincing to the end if it had always left the door open for mundane explanations, and thus keep the impression that it really was live and unscripted.

[Rocketboy1313]

You know, as someone whose 'thing' I believe in tends to revolve around ghosts and whatnot, the whole thing annoyed the hell out of me almost as much as it did Chuck. Like, when I hear someone say 'Believe them,' I'm like 'Yeah, okay, makes sense, because whatever's going on, whether there's ghosts or not there's something that's clearly upsetting them and they're not coming to you looking for someone to tell them it's bullshit. So listen to what they're saying, believe the experience is genuine, and try to figure out what sort of help you can get them.' I mean, let's assume (And I think it's reasonable to do so) that ghosts don't exist. And yet, a person comes to you and tells you they don't feel safe in their home, all these strange things are happening, and they can't sleep and are stressed out constantly.

Okay, stick with me when I talk about this, because you touched on what I want to discuss.

Ghosts in fiction are REALLY EFFECTIVE METAPHORS.

They are the sins of the past that are hanging out and causing problems for the here and now that people don't know about or don't talk about (hence all the Indian burial grounds or unsolved murders). When someone says, "Believe them" I take that as a bad mixing of the genre (mockumentary) and the metaphor (someone has a problem in their life that they can't express clearly).

Replace the word "Ghost" with "my husband hits me" or "My dad rapes me" or "(Insert horrible thing)" and the idea of, Default to believing this person who claims they are a victim, instead of greeting them with skepticism.

It works in a normal fictional setting, because the metaphor is subtext, but in this genre style you take LITERALLY that they are talking about ghosts, which kills the Metaphor aspect.

[AndrewGPaul]

Perhaps ironically given the subject matter, Michael Parkinson isn’t dead. he’s retired from his talk show (he’s the prime example of a talk show host in the UK - everyone else, Jonathan Ross, Graeme Norton, etc, will be compared to Parky) and is now ... well, a professional Yorkshireman, I suppose, but he’s still with us.

As for Sarah Greene, she was most well known at the time as a childresn’s TV presenter, which is why there were so many complaints, it seems. For Americans, it’d be like having Mr Rogers or someone from Sesame Street investigating the Amityville house.