Ghosts
by Bernie Bell - 08:36 on 18 May 2025
Ghosts….
Saturday evening, by chance, we started watching a series called ‘Ghosts’. It turned out to be entertaining, amusing and interesting.
The basic idea is that a young woman, Alison, inherits a slightly dilapidated old mansion and she and her partner, Mike, move in, intending to ‘do it up’ and turn it into an hotel.
The problem is – the mansion has resident ‘ghosts’ (inverted commas as I don’t usually use that term when referring to dead folk).
These ghosts are a selection of characters who have lived there through time, the earliest being what I think is meant to be someone from the Neolithic or earlier who lived there, on the land.
Discoveries at the Ness of Brodgar….
http://www.spanglefish.com/berniesblog/blog.asp?blogid=16925
……. make nonsense of the view of the Stone Age people which he represents, though he is good at chess!
This is the first example of an approach to ghosts by the writers of this series which I appreciate. I’ve had people say to me that, if folk don’t just ‘go’ when they die the world would be chock-a-block with ghosts. The group of people in the mansion show how only some people ‘hang around’ - for their own reasons.
As the episodes progress we find out about their stories, who they are, how they died and why they, individually, can’t or won’t ‘let go’ of their lives, and their deaths.
When the young couple arrive at the mansion the ghosts resent their presence, and the idea of the place becoming an hotel with even more people there, as one of the ghosts puts it……‘mocking us with their life’…. appals them.
They decide to frighten off the young couple, but how to do so?
Events take a turn when one of the ghosts – a corrupt Politician! – who is the only one of the group able to actually touch material objects, pushes Alison out of a window.
She’s in hospital, in a coma, and when she comes out of hospital, having been ’dead’ for a short time herself, she finds that she can see and hear dead people.
This is another of the ideas about dying which chimes with me – how many states of mind and body in life are near to death?
The ghosts then set about terrorising her and causing her to alienate the builders who are helping to renovate the mansion.
Long story short – by the end of the third episode Alison is living more harmoniously with the ghosts, but they still don’t want the mansion to become an hotel.
We’ve set the series up to record and look forward to continuing to watch it. I have bemoaned the lack of good telly being produced these days, and this series proves me wrong.
It’s kind-of a mix of ‘Beetlejuice’ and ‘The Money Pit’……
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beetlejuice
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Money_Pit
It particularly appeals to me, as someone who has had similar experiences with ‘dead folk’…..
https://theorkneynews.scot/2020/04/07/the-orkney-housewives-farmhouse-broth/
https://theorkneynews.scot/2020/04/21/an-extra-ordinary-orkney-holiday-part-two/
https://theorkneynews.scot/2020/05/01/an-extra-ordinary-orkney-holiday-part-three/
https://theorkneynews.scot/2020/05/16/an-extra-ordinary-orkney-holiday-part-four/
…….and it’s good to see these ideas about life, death and continuation of presence being presented in a sympathetic way.
I’ll finish with a poem which explains why I don’t usually use the term ‘Ghosts’…..
Ghosts!
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Just because we’re not in bodies,
Doesn’t mean we’re DEAD you know;
We’re still part of LIFE.
You’re the shadow,
We’re the substance.
Spirit isn’t in the body,
The body moves in spirit.
Ghosts, indeed!
BB
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