Irish Ghost-Hunting TV Series - To View Or Not To View?

Major Lovechild wrote: »

The truth may not be to everyone's liking.

Yeah, but you can’t please ‘em all. Sometimes people watch shows even though they don’t like them, or if they find them irritating. It’s like how some people say how much they hate reality shows, yet they still watch things like The X Factor. I know people who think Jedward are dopey little langers, yet they still know what happened in a recent episode of that documentary thing they’re doing atm.

It was the same love/hate thing with the Late Late Show when Prat Kenny was presenting it (possibly the same thing now that Tubridy is at the helm!). But its viewing figures haven't ever suffered greatly, AFAIK.

A polarised reaction is better than a luke-warm one, for love and hate are but two sides of the same coin.

maccored wrote: »

i think there needs to be a more thought out format for a paranormal show on telly.

MH has done the 'oh noes! it's a ghostay!' to death (pardon the pun), it'd be hard to compete with ghost hunters for the investigation technique idea, ghost adventures has covered the 'doing it for the buzz' angle and ghost hunters academy has covered the 'teaching people how to investigate' angle so imo, you'd really need some kind of show with a difference of some kind.

Yeah, that’s true but I think daredevilfan and BluesBerry hit the nail on the head with where the appeal for a show like this would lie:

daredevilfan wrote: »

[...] Imagine your town is on tv and it was showing you haunted places your familiar with i reckon curiosity will take people over to watch they're area to see what is found.
i personally would love to see more haunted places around ireland instead of Leap Castle and wicklow gaol.
Go for it and do something that is fact and not fiction [...]

BluesBerry wrote: »

I would like to see a series done on haunted Irish sites , hope its not like spooked turning it into a big joke but actual serious investigations on places that would be familiar to us

From a personal P.O.V., I would be very interested to see areas I know that have so-called ‘haunted’ sites.

Grimes wrote: »

There is one being done at the moment thats not Spooked. Already commissioned for a series & looks at the paranormal seriously without branded clothes and mediums.

That sounds good.

Grimes wrote: »

Also the Poll will be very bias on this forum, try sticking it on after hours for an accurate response.

Will do. I knew that the poll being placed here would attract the usual paranormal heads (no offence like – I’m one myself), but I just wanted to test the water in more familiar waters first. I’ll try After Hours but I’d say it’ll be like taking a gay pride parade through bible belt America.

daredevilfan wrote: »

[...] im very skeptical about ghost hunters and even ghost adventures.
the three lads have film school education and may be up to a sneaky edit here and there!

I find it difficult to take those shows seriously – there’s a fair bit of posturing going on and not enough serious and balanced coverage of the areas into which they take their teams. It’s as if they’re in that TV series ‘Supernatural’. The only ghosthunting show I like is Ghost Hunters International (GHI).

paranormal wrote: »

i think it would be very hard to make a series of serious investigations interesting as a lot of the time nothing happens and most of the shows have to make the mundane parts look scary or exciting for tv .i think that is why people who do investigations are very critical of these kind of shows as they know from experience that it is not as exciting as it looks on tv.but this is just my opinion

That is very true, but I think what would make for exciting, or at least watchable, TV would be for the team to speak to locals in the areas beforehand and hear their stories as part of visible, pre-emptive research. If people know that John-Joe Hurley or Cait Ni Riordain, or whoever the bleedin’ hell lives down the road from them, is gonna be on the telly, they’d all be eager to tune in to have a look (and a laugh probably). The human interest side of it would make it watchable.

On this note, if there were any ordinary Joe/Josephine Soaps drafted in to partake in investigations, I guarantee you that, despite the absence of convenient trickery for the purpose of good TV, people would still lapse into histronics about feck all. You’d still get people like that, which would be a good laugh in fairness.

Next in line for drawing interest would be the ‘I wonder if the team will find anything paranormal?’ curiosity, and the stone cold reality of how proper paranormal investigation is really carried out. Grand, the latter might seem dull and banal to the investigators themselves, but kids and teenagers love gadgets and exploration of old and ‘forbidden’ buildings. Dark tunnels, passageways, ancient castles with bloody and notorious histories. That’s cool stuff to the younger generation (and possibly beyond, too). What young fella (or girl) doesn’t like that sort of thing? I did a fair amount of, er, ‘liberal exploration’ of various buildings and sites with a group of lads (and a few girls) when I was younger...

The team could run through the equipment they’re using for the investigations. The likes of TomsGadgets or whatever other paranormal gadgetry shops there are would probably see a surge in sales as a result of the success of the show. Actually, it’d be handy if a place like that sponsored the show, or else Halford’s or Woodie’s because they have a lot of practical tools like decent flashlights and ladders, etc.

Another point of attraction would be the confirmation or quashing of long-standing ghostly myths attached to ‘haunted’ places around Ireland. It all sounds good to me, but I’ll see what the dragons in After Hours have to say about this nevertheless...