First of all, don’t bother commenting with, “I was done with Ghost Hunters from day one because I never watched it in the first place.” I’ve heard it before, and I’m not surprised. In fact, I’m sure your already low opinion of me drops down a few notches when hearing that I watch Ghost Hunters, in that you feel I’m a kook who believes in eerie visitations from beyond. Be that as it may, I’ve found myself drawn to Ghost Hunters all these years, mostly out of curiosity, but also because the team is based out of New England, with many of their locations practically in my back yard.
I’ve griped before about the odd guest investigators used on Ghost Hunters — the one with Meaghan Rath of the Being Human remake, and a wrestler from ECW — but at least those made some sense. Obviously Syfy’s adding these people to the investigations to raise awareness of their other properties, even if I can’t imagine how it helps. They’ve also had Meat Loaf on a couple of times … which I never really understood, other than maybe they’re fans of his. This last guest investigator stunt … wow. The Real Housewives of Atlanta. I cannot begin to understand it.
I knew this episode was coming, since Syfy had it in their promos for quite some time. I actually had some hope that it simply wasn’t going to air at all, since we were fast approaching the season finale and the episode hadn’t aired yet. Then the promos started coming via email, and I just shook my head. What the hell is this? What devilish deal was made to make someone approve of this motley mashup? Fire them, because this was just dumb.
I’m reasonably certain that not one person on the TAPS team approved of the Real Housewives stunt. I swear I could see it on their faces as they mentioned it in the episode’s brief interviews with Grant and Jason. As good as they were at saying it would be “interesting,” I feel as though I could hear their stomachs turn at the thought. I can see Jason throwing up a shit storm to the Syfy producers, demanding this not happen, because … well, it’s just a really birdbrained idea that only serves to further cheapen the show. How the hell could it help? Maybe drag in the 12 people watching The Real Housewives of Atlanta to watch? Meanwhile, they’re losing faithful fans at the same time.
This isn’t the only reason I’m calling Ghost Hunters quits. I’ve grown tired of the silly, unnecessary setups back at TAPS HQ, where Jason and Grant are presented with the next case, yet obviously they already knew about it and, in the case with this episode, they were already in Atlanta doing most of the rest of the season! Then there are the phone calls to Grant while he’s fixing a sink, as though he wasn’t expecting the call or that the cameras just so happened to be there during their plumbing job. Thanks, guys, for only further making a show appear completely acted and fictional.
Grant once told me that if Ghost Hunters were to fail, he wouldn’t really worry about it and he’d be fine plumbing. If that’s true, I’d like to know what’s more important to him: His integrity, in reflecting what I believe was false enthusiasm for having The Real Housewives on his show, or the money he gets from being on Ghost Hunters? Because if it’s the former, I’d like to see him come out on Twitter (or, hell, on the show itself) and state for the record his true feelings on the stunt casting. You are really OK with this?
I was happy when Ghost Hunters dropped the unnecessary drama aspects to the show, getting into their personal lives and such, but I’d actually welcome that back over these idiotic guest stunts and corny fake phone calls and meetings. Just get to work and show in unadulterated and “real.” If you want untrained guest investigators that will boost interest in your show, how about tapping into the thousands of fans of yours who would give their right arm to accompany you on one of these? Do it every week! Don’t you think your fans deserve that chance over a bunch of hens who don’t deserve their own TV show in the first place?
As fellow Clacker Brett put it, who was more embarrassed by this crappy crossover: fans of Ghost Hunters, or fans of The Real Housewives of Atlanta?
Clacked by Keith McDuffee 
on Dec 02, 2010 @ 13:00 EST5EDT
I watched every single episode of “American Chopper” and don’t believe that anything that was showed there was fake.
This was fun to read and I read your earlier posts about the show as well. To me this is the same as McDonald’s or any other burger joint. I ate at Burger King today. I know it’s not healthy, I know I could have a long conversation with myself how the country is getting fatter each day… especially since I was there after I had an appointment for taking blood RIGHT BEFORE and talked to a doctor about 10 minutes earlier.
But man I felt so good eating that burger. And ironically I still feel great even though I should’ve gotten a stomach ache from it. I usually get it from Burger King, this time I didn’t.
So yeah I understand the guilty pleasures.
But it is so fun to read about how you didn’t understand getting the real housewives on as guests. And how extra fake the show is. My guess it is that it was always this fake but your suspense of disbelief was just not there anymore because they went too far. It just jumped the shark. It’s not like I make fun of you, it’s interesting to read about someone experiencing the shark-jumping in such a lively way. Good post. It was fun to read. I guess I like it when people rant about a show just as much as I do ;-)
I just hope you stay on board with Dexter, which to me gets a little tiresome at the moment as well, whereas the last episode of “The Walking Dead” pulled me in again. I don’t watch the event though, so if you ask me, you can drop that one ;-)
If Meatloaf wants to look for ghosts then you let Meatloaf look for ghosts! :lol:
It’s all NBC/Universal/Bravo/Syfy corporate synergy, hoping to drag viewers from one network sibling to the other. The Housewives have also popped up on some other NBC shows. Just wait till the Comcast takeover of NBC happens. Then we’ll get all of the E! personalities popping up all over the place.
I gave up on GH a while back just because it started becoming too over-produced. I still like GHI though.