*This edition contains spoilers for past seasons of The Gold and Unforgotten
Do you believe in ghosts?
I once heard an episode of This American Life called “The Question Trap” that suggested this as one of the best questions you can ask on a first date is.
Whether you believe in ghosts or not, a flat-out “no” with no follow up might be reason enough to reconsider the relationship. Why? Well, your date might struggle with abstract concepts and lack an open mind. To put it bluntly, the question is a litmus test that weeds out boring people. For me, I don’t need you to believe in ghosts, but I do want you to be curious about it. So, if you are curious about what I mean when I say “ghosts,” read on.
I think everyone lives with some sort of ghost. I think ghosts can inform how we make decisions. I think they can offer comfort, and I think they can deliver a message that perhaps no one else can. In other words, I think they are forces from the past that shape our ability to live in the present.
If you look hard enough, you see ghosts that haunt our PBS characters. I recently rewatched Season 1 of The Gold to remind myself where we left off before Season 2 premieres this month. One of the most compelling characters is Edwyn Cooper (pictured above), the slick lawyer who escaped a life of poverty in South London. In the closing scene of Season 1, Cooper catches a glimpse of a young boy on the street by his mother’s house as he sits in the back of a police car. This scene invites us to connect him to Cooper in some way. Is it Cooper looking at a ghost of himself as a young boy or does the boy simply remind him of his past self? Cooper may have married into money and changed his social limitations, but scenes like this suggest his success hasn’t erased the shame he feels about his past. Perhaps these insecurities prevent him from accepting any level of wealth or success as “enough.”
In the Masterpiece Mystery Unforgotten, Cassie’s ghost, seems to loom over her team in Season 5. Their grief of a beloved colleague makes connecting with their new leader (D.I. Jessie James, artfully played by Sinéad Keenan) difficult. Jessie knows she’s stepping into the shoes of a beloved leader and struggles to earn their trust. Sunny and the team need to figure out how to remain loyal to Cassie’s memory while also making room for someone new and with a different approach to leadership. Sunny and the team need to figure out how to remain loyal to Cassie’s memory while also making room for someone new and with a different approach to leadership.
There are so many more characters that live with ghosts. In Professor T, Jasper is haunted by a clouded memory of his father when he was young. In Magpie Murders, Susan Ryeland has to enter the world a deceased Alan Conway left in his manuscripts and finish what he started. Inspector Maigret has a ghost in a recurring dream that seems to be attempting to call him home. In the dream, he is a younger version of himself, and his father (now deceased) wakes him up to go to Mass. When he enters the church, a woman asks him a question: “When are you coming home?” Maigret’s wife points out to him that it makes sense to dream about his father as he faces the prospect of becoming a father himself. Does this dream suggest unfinished business that his subconscious needs resolved?
Sometimes ghosts won’t let go; sometimes they help us move forward. Some ghosts are companions we learn to live with. Ghosts aren’t good or bad; they’re simply a part of the past that, for one reason or another, our present needs. My ghosts are teaching me how to move about this world all the time. One of the reasons I love mysteries on PBS is how the stories and characters continue to reveal those ghosts to me.
MY PICKS FOR SPOOKY SEASON
We have a curated list of programs for you to watch on the PBS App to keep you sufficiently spooked for Halloween holiday. One of these is Death Comes to Pemberley that I watched WAY back in 2014 and didn’t realize how many actors I would come to know through Masterpiece on PBS Utah. Have you seen it? How many Masterpiece darlings do you remember? I won’t spoil it for you, because I think it’s worth a rewatch, especially with Matthew Rhys dominating the entertainment headlines lately. Also, do you recognize the mansion posing as Pemberley in this mini-series? Can you name another popular Masterpiece program that used that mansion? I can.
Do check out the list of programs I put together for the app! It’s called Things that Go Binge in the Night. Maybe you’ll discover something new. Let me know if I missed one of your favorites, I’d love to hear your ideas.
THE O.G. DETECTIVE PROTAGONIST
As I was putting together this list of scary programs for you, I came across an American Masters episode called Edgar Allen Poe: Buried Alive. I mean, what’s spookier than Edgar Allen Poe? Anything gothic- themed just screams haunted and scares me away, so I never spent much time with him, until I watched this program. Poe wrote over seventy stories, with only a dozen of them that belong in the genre we call “horror.” He wrote romantic comedies, science fiction, and satire, but that handful of horror fiction is what he would become known for. Did you know that Poe is credited with inventing the detective protagonist? The very character that is foundational for most of our favorite PBS dramas? I didn’t.
His 1841 story The Murders in the Rue Morgue introduces us to C. Auguste Dupin, a reclusive and eccentric gentleman-intellectual who often worked outside the law (sound familiar?) Folklore and foreign tales have always featured investigators, but it was Poe who assembled this very specific persona and intellectual focus that essentially defined our modern detective hero. In fact, in this documentary they call out Sherlock Holmes and Poirot as direct ripoffs of Edgar Allen Poe’s Dupin.
A SPECIAL INVITATION FOR YOU!
Note: This event has already happened.
If you love books and stories, I want to invite you to a very special event our engagement team has been planning called “For the Love of Libraries.” Librarians have been under a lot of pressure lately, making headlines and being unlikely targets of scrutiny (as examined in the award-winning documentary, The Librarians) and PBS Utah wants to celebrate their knowledge, expertise, and genuine interest in the people who rely on them to access knowledge and resources.
We’re having a free community book exchange, and I would love to see you there with some of your favorite stories that you’re ready to pass on to another curious mind. We’ll have refreshments, you can write a thank you note to your librarian, watch the new POV film, How to Build a Library, and maybe even pick up a new book for yourself.
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