Chat out of Hell

SPECIAL FILM CLUB #4 - GHOST WARS

• Emma Crossland & Sam Wilkinson

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It's nearly time for new Chat out of Hell, but first there's a summer blockbuster film club!

And what a blockbuster it is, as we watch 13 episodes of the SyFy original series Ghost Wars. Don't say we never do anything for you.

Chat out of Hell returns for series 5 on Monday 25th of August, where we'll dive into Meat Loaf's early days with Objects in the Rear View Mirror from Bat out of Hell II and Tear Me Down from Couldn't Have Said it Better. See you then, Loafers!

Keep your comments, reviews and arguments flying in to chatoutofhell@gmail.com

Chat out of Hell is a is a review podcast: all music extracts are used for review/illustrative purposes. To hear the songs in full please buy them from your local record shop or streaming platform. Don't do a piracy.


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Sam:

what is this?

Emma:

This is Chat out of Hell Film Club, a bit of cheeky extra Chat out of Hell fun where we review some kind of punishing film featuring Meat Loaf and or Jim Steinman, or in today's case, some kind of punishing TV show.

Sam:

Who is Meat Loaf?

Emma:

Meat Loaf was a singer, which we all know already, but he was also an actor who played the part of Doug Rennie in the TV series, Ghost Wars. Who's Jim Steinman?

Sam:

Jim Steinman is a composer, et cetera, whose reputation is thankfully un tarnished by having any kind of association with the TV series, Ghost Wars.

Emma:

Who are we?

Sam:

We are Sam Wilkinson and Emma Crossland, and that's all you need to know. All right.

Emma:

welcome to Chat Out of Hell. Film Club

Sam:

Bow. Now, now, Now you put in a lot of effort to that ding today.

Emma:

thank you. I really did. as much effort as I can muster. I am currently recovering from the COVID.

Sam:

Yeah. Emma's retro listeners.

Emma:

Yeah. You cool. Kids have probably moved on to something like, I dunno, giraffe flu, but I've gone old school with a bit of lovely COVID.

Sam:

I'm sure the listeners will join me in saying, ah, sucks to be you.

Emma:

thanks.

Sam:

Now that I know you're not in mortal danger, I can be a dick about it. And you're on the way up, right?

Emma:

Yeah, I'm on the way up. I apologize if I sound a little bit croaky and rough.

Sam:

But Emma, your um, condition, condition

Emma:

Condition. The past.

Sam:

you, your condition has been perfect for watching the TV series Ghost Wars,

Emma:

Yeah. been borderline hallucinating for about a week. Which has been perfect for this.

Sam:

Listeners. This is our once per series film club in which we dive into the cinematic or televisual works of Meat Loaf or Jim Steinman. This time Emma chose the sci-fi series Ghost Wars for us to watch. What is Ghost Wars?

Emma:

Really stupid. You probably want a bit more than that though, I do. It is a sci-fi horror series about a bunch of people stuck on an island with evil ghosts,

Sam:

spooky ghost.

Emma:

spooky

Sam:

Meat Loaf is in it playing the part of Doug Rennie. The sort of local grumpy old man.

Emma:

Do you want a few basic facts about Ghost Wars? it was created by a guy called Simon Barry, who has done lots of other fantasy horror type programming, including something called Warrior Nun that's on Netflix that I have not watched yet.

Sam:

I watched one episode of Warrior Nun. Did you let me tell you that one episode was a fucking drag?

Emma:

Oh no.

Sam:

Oh, no. When you hear Warrior Nun, you wanna turn it on and have a nun punch a dude in the face?

Emma:

Absolutely.

Sam:

No dude punching in the whole episode. What? Yeah, it like, the end of the episode was basically, oh, maybe. She should punch dudes in the face. It was one of those,

Emma:

is it setting it up for the next episode and is full of dude

Sam:

Well, I don't know. I think it's this modern trend of like, the whole first season has to be set. I can't remember who did this, I'm ripping it off from someone. If you did a show called Skateboard Dracula, the whole first season would be about how Dracula gets his skateboard. And then you only see him do an Ollie right at the very

Emma:

You wanna crack on with this stuff, don't you? You don't want it to drag out for an entire

Sam:

Yeah, exactly. If you're watching Skateboard Dracula, you want Dracula on a skateboard. If you're watching Warrior Nun, you want nuns punching dudes. If you're watching Ghost Wars, you wanna see ghosts having a war.

Emma:

If you want to see ghosts having a war, I wouldn't bother with this. It was made by the sci-fi channel. And it premiered on October the fifth, 2017. So it's a pre pandemic world Golden age. A golden age. A pre pandemic

Sam:

Yes. Although it is a bit prescient. cause it's about a town that's in quarantine.

Emma:

Yeah. I guess it is.

Sam:

Yeah. And some of it is about the way that the towns folk behave when they're not allowed to go

Emma:

Yes. we've said Meat Loaf is in it. He plays Doug Rennie. I've got down here a grumpy bastard.

Sam:

I think that the part of Doug Rennie is very much encapsulates the way America sees itself. Emma cus he. The way small town America sees. For the benefit of the tape, emma fell asleep. Doug Renny is the way small town America likes to think about itself in that he's got values and they're small c conservative values, but ultimately at the end of the day, he sticks up for what's right. Yeah.

Emma:

Yeah.

Sam:

And also he's a bit of a cock This is a 13 episode. Wasn't supposed to be a miniseries, but it was one'cause it never got recommissioned for season two.

Emma:

They're called limited series now,

Sam:

Oh, is it? Okay. Oh, hello. 13 episodes of 45 minutes each. Normally on Film Club, we do give you a painfully in depth rundown of the media in question. We're not gonna do it for all 13 episodes, but we are gonna get quite spoily. So, top level, some of Ghost Wars is quite all right and a lot of it is shit, but little bits of it are quite good. And if you knew about them going in, you wouldn't enjoy the good bits. Yeah. So if the idea of a sci-fi series about an isolated Alaska town being attacked by ghosts in a tonally awkward way appeals to you, go away and watch it. We're gonna spoil it for everybody else.

Emma:

As a sort of side note if we were a podcast that reviewed a TV series, you usually cover like one episode per episode of the podcast. Yeah. So we are really cramming it in

Sam:

here. Yes, we are. We often do little jokes about how we're the only Jim Steinmanologists out there. obviously a lot of people do, know more than us and have done more research. I'm confident that this is the only podcast in history that is gonna do this much talking about

Emma:

war. If we're wrong, please point us in the

Sam:

words. Please do let us Emma's gonna kick us off. Episode

Emma:

one. We meet local outcast Roman Mercer. He's a bit psychic and can see ghosts. His best friend is a ghost called Maggie, the towns folk of Port Moore, which happens to be on an island linked to the mainland by only one bridge. They don't trust Roman, mostly because of something his mum did that I can't quite remember. Especially Doug Rennie played by Meat Loaf. Roman is trying to leave town. He's on a bus out of town when the earthquake hits. He's the only survivor of the bus journey. The ghosts have been awakened by the earthquake and are capable of deceiving the humans by making them see things that aren't real. In this case, they make it look like the bridge to the mainland is still intact when it's really badly broken. Episode two.

Sam:

A man on a boat finds a big dead whale. Bit rough shit. There's loads of dead whales. This guy's Billy, local smuggler the mayor's his sister and also the lady mayor has a lady, doctor, wife. How modern. Their kids who are also ladies, but young ones, keep drawing some curly haired guy. I bet he's dead. Spoiler alert, he was dead. Shit. Here comes Dee out of Battlestar Galactica. That was a much better show. Much better. I wish Meat Loaf had been in Battlestar Galactica and we could talk about that. Anyway, she's doing it with Billy and she works at an evil science lab just outside of town. Billy's boat gets fucked up so he can't leave. He goes to the pub when nobody wants to speak to him. Roman comes in. He wants to talk about ghosts. Billy's up for it. Everybody else wants to do a punch at him. So Billy goes off to see the local vicar. Father Dan We know that Father Dan is cool'cause despite being a Catholic priest, he's got long hair and studs in his coat. Billy's mate tries to fix the boat but gets ghost murdered in the engine room. Ghosts are murdering people all over the place, Roman is just knocking about the place, not really fixing any ghost problems, but then he does fix the ghost problems on the boat and they sail away, but it turns out bloody hell, you can't sail away. And the boat is back at the town. OMG, episode three.

Emma:

It's science time. We learn about Lambda, the science company doing creepy science things. A bunch of people die in the incident that was caused by the science machine. Of course, they come back to haunt the surviving scientists, leading them to discover that electricity makes them go away. We meet Dr. Landis Barker, who is one of the good science people, episode four. I'm trying to keep it succinct'cause

Sam:

no, no. talked That's fine. Yeah. The local towns folk are being rough. The lady mayor has a rough time telling them what to do because they're bellends. The priest offers the church's help and the mayor gets in a grump separation of church and states in the constitution. Town bullies who are previously picking on Roman now offer to hang out with him because they have a ghost in their house and he can deal with it. Boy. Marcus, who is the son of the local mortician, gets strangled by a ghost, but then he gets saved by the doctor lady and he talks something about a whistling man. And then he laughs in church and says it's all nonsense and does a vomit. He's definitely a demon boy. Father Dan tries an exorcism and the boy dies. Whoa, that's pretty rough. Dan does a big old pray in his church and suddenly discovers a secret spooky altar room in the basement. Episode five.

Emma:

It's Meat Loaf's time to shine. He's been horrible up to this episode, but now we see he's capable of being neighborly when he helps Sophia, who's just lost her son sort out her shower that seems to be spraying blood, which turns out to be rust. as a favor to the ghost of Maggie, Roman agrees to talk to Doug, but Doug pulls a gun and Roman runs away. Doug is planning to use that gun to kill himself, but he just can't do it as every time he tries the ghost of Maggie ups the haunting and rattles some pans or something. Maggie shows Roman how to win Doug around, which works at Doug now believes Roman's ability. He invites Roman over to a party, bygones and all that. Then we learn how Maggie died. She was attacked at home by family friend Rodney during another beer and pizza night. He spiked her drink, then attempted to rape her, but she had a bad reaction to the drug and died. Ghost Maggie has had enough of Rodney still being allowed to hang out with her dad. So she grabs him, throws him onto her bed where she died, and carves guilty into his chest Doug is furious and kills Rodney. Maggie can now rest in peace, but tells Roman that the other ghosts can't be reasoned with and need to be wiped out. Episode six,

Sam:

this whole electric thing is catching on. The mayor kids are now drawing Marcus the dead boy, who they say has become a ghost, but they're not allowed to tell anyone. They also drew, everybody else's died and now they've drawn their babysitter. Mrs. Dr. Mayor makes a house call to an old lady who being weird. Rodney's sister shows up and demands a trial for Doug. Spoiler alert, that never comes to anything. That plot thread just never gets resolved. Billy beats up some people who have a go at the mayor about it, so she makes him Sheriff childcare lady gets murdered by a ghost.

Emma:

Oh, hang on. You've gotta go into detail about that. Childcare lady is somehow pushed over into a badly stacked dishwasher where she's stabbed in the head by a knife.

Sam:

I was just about to mention this before that though, Emma. She goes over to the sink and sees a kitten down in the garbage disposal. Yeah. horrible Which, which she rescues. And then that turns out to be a disembodied ghost hand'cause the ghosts can make you hallucinate. Then she falls over onto an incredibly badly loaded dishwasher with a carving knife

Emma:

pointed straight over her

Sam:

head. This whole show is a Casualty slash X-Files crossover. Marcus comes along and steals one of the mayor kids away. They get to the forest and there's a big glowy orb there that has the stolen Mayor kid in just like the one in the alt secret room in the church. They rescue the child, And then we cut back to Mrs. Mayor's old lady patient who turns out to have been dead all along. Oh God. And she also tries to do a murder at Mrs. Dr. Mayor, who finally comes around to the idea that ghosts might be episode seven.

Emma:

Oh shit. The power's gone out. What will they do? The ghosts are allergic to electricity. Without it, they can attack Everyone hides out at Father Dan's church while they try to restore power. A bunch of other stuff happens, including ghosts getting into the church to fuck things up a bit. Roman learns and his mother is dead and not sending him letters from wherever he thought she was. And Billy gets blown up by the electricity. Oh, no. Dead Billy? Episode Eight.

Sam:

Oh, dead. Billy Dan's still trying to fix the power, but Billy's ghost is stood there. He's been deaded. He gets pulled into Ghost World and has a look around at all the spooky stuff in the church. In Ghost World, the glowy thing at the church is a cube. Is that important? Not really. Billy gets taken to Lambda where Mrs. Dr. Mayor attends to him and says that she probably can't save his life. But then she does. Meat Loaf takes charge at the church and is a good old community leader. Gets on with burying the new people who died last night. Father Dan does a big cry while he hugs the weird glowy thing down in the bottom of the church. I realize now why the weird glowy thing is shot in gloomy light because the prop is just a tent with a light in it, wrapped in some bits of string. Father Dan is very sad. Billy's ghost goes to see Roman, who is entirely unsurprised that he's dead and he is being a massive cock about it. Just an absolute bellend. From Billy's ghost perspective, when he sees Roman get mad, he has all electric in his eyes, and that. Billy's ghost pops to the big science machine at Lambda and sees it glowing. Then we cut to the spare cop who's flirting with Mrs. Science Pal, one of the second tier scientists who works at the science machine.

Emma:

is Mrs. Science Pal, the person

Sam:

bar ke. That's Carla. Yes. Billy actually returns to his body after chasing off the ghost of Ryan, the horrible science boss. Then the egg thing in the church births some sort of horror creature. It's a slimy, gross version of Marcus's mom. Ooh. Rescued mayor child and Marcus' Ghost mum both slink off to the dead scary old woman's house and vom up eggs or something. They put them in a corner. Thus confirming or maybe not the lifecycle of the ghost. Episode nine

Emma:

loads of stuff happens in this. A helicopter arrives with Lambda people, including their CEO Daphne which seems like a stretch for a CEO to come to an emergency of this level. You'd think that they'd safe in their castle at home. I wonder why she's turned up.. There can't possibly be a reason for that. Oh no. This is all stuff I don't give a shit about. Marcus's ghost mum is leading people to their deaths. Daphne, the CEO is trying to find a cure for death with the big science machine that started it all in the first place. and the artifact in Father Dan's basement. Episode 10.

Sam:

Following a fire at the creepy old lady's house, the Lambda goons have recovered the burnt body from one of the eggs, This time the egg ghost is Science Pal, who disappeared last episode, But the ghost wasn't quite ready and can't be revived. Daphne, grumpily, demands an autopsy Dan has become a piss head lady mayor has stopped dressing like a mayor, which shows how bad things have got. Science Pal's weird ghost body is insta healing every time they cut out his liver, another one grows back.. A passing British doctor is very excited, as is Daphne. And then she says, Mr Science Pal signed away the rights to his own body when he became a Lambda employee. This is satire. Science Pal's body escapes from the lab. And we have a few moments of a sort of Alien type adventure. Where the security goons are being hunted around the pitch dark base, but it's not long enough or scary enough to matter. Science Pal's body goes home to the bar to see his wife Carla. They get into sexy mode and do it on the bar. She's definitely gonna get pregnant with a ghost child. That's probably gonna happen in season two, right? That's the sort of thing that'll be, they'll save that for season two as a big plot point to hang something off. Oh, well, Dan attacks Marcus's ghost Mum and ties her up in the church basement alongside Science Pal and Abigail. There's a boring conversation about faith. Dan decides to set fire to everybody in the basement, but then a ghost dressed as the devil pops off and traps him in the church. Yes. A ghost dressed as the devil. Nobody mentions it, but it's there. He decides to start the fire anyway. Oh, for fuck's sakes. He's been messing about with his lighter so much that it's run out of fuel. He prays a lot until one of the candles, lights of its own accord and sets it off. Everybody burns in a bad bit of VFX episode 11.

Emma:

Oh my God. It's a weird ghost alien baby. Carla having done a sex with her haunted husband is now pregnant. Deputy Norm, who I believe was previously known as the spare cop. Yes. Steps in to look after her, she's fairly indifferent towards this and is suspiciously very pregnant. despite only doing it yesterday. She's also hungry. hungry for meat, and she sends Deputy Norm out to find some. But those pesky ghosts trick him into believing that he's finding regular meat for her. Really, it's people, the rotting corpses of people. YY yum, yum, yum. Yum. Later she goes into labour. The pregnancy has taken a day or so, but Norm is under her spell. S which proves that, sex is bad for you kids. He helps her deliver her alien worm child. Roman arrives, shows Norm the truth. The baby feeds on Carla until Norm kills them both. Phew. Episode 12.

Sam:

Fucking Nora. Here we go. There's a lady in the shower singing Walking on Sunshine. Oh, that's nice. But she wasn't in the shower at all. She was setting herself on fire because ghosts tricked her into believing it. This will be proper horrible if the CGI was up to it. It's still fairly creepy'cause she keeps singing while burning to death. But the VFX really has taken the horror down a few notches. Winston, local dickhead, comes and extinguishes her, but it's too late. Norm is heartbroken. He's pissed up at Carl and Sal's grave. You would be too. A hand reaches up out of the grave, but he knows it's an illusion and he scares it off with his electric taser. He says,"couldn't give me five fucking minutes. Fucking ghosts." Over at the bar, some of the towns folk survivors are having a big party slash orgy. They're boozing up their last, it's the end of days. There's also quite a bit of fighting. Meat Loaf comes along and sorts them out. He has a go at them for partying, but Winston says it's hopeless, so you might as well get pissed. Meat Loaf responds by smashing a passing bloke's own drink on his head. Carla's memory deserves more than to be tarnished by you clowns", he says and boots him out. Daphne is on the floor of her office being groped by Ghost hands. Her assistant comes and saves her, but she had it under control. Leave me alone, you idiot. They want the science machine to turn back on so that they can close the ghost door thing, but they need the other half of a special meteorite, the one that Roman has. Roman meets with Billy and Landis who says that Roman exists in a quantum super position so he can perceive the meteorite as both cube and lump at the same time. That must be important to the plot, right? No, not really. Winston goes to bother Norm at Carla's grave. Norm is drunk and very sad and makes bad decisions. Winston convinces him to start a coup in the town and form a a gang of idiots with shotguns going around, locking up people for shit's sake, just when I started feeling bad for Norm, he had a rough one last episode. And now look at him. He pulls a gun on the mayor and tells her he's quit as a cop,"I'm just a concerned citizen trying to keep my neighbours safe. You should try it sometime. He says". How Norm? How there are fucking murder ghosts. You utter fuck nut. She doesn't have anti ghost powers. The election didn't cover this. Norm captures the mayor and their family. He locks up Meat Loaf again for good measure. Norm and his gun twat rock up to Lambda. Billy is fucked off and wants to do a murder at them, but he's holding the mayor hostage. There's a bit of palava, but ultimately it ends up with Norm getting taken down into the Lambda base and then having his soul removed from his body so that they can, in the final 10 minutes of this episode, pull a freaky Friday. Roman uses the weird meteorite to put Billy Norm's body so that he can then drive back into town and rescue everybody and then put all the people back in the right bodies. Norm though is too sad. He doesn't want to return to his own body. So he just wanders off. He's dead now or is he? We'll never know. Norm's body gets buried besides Carla, which is nice to a degree, but also pretty rough on her husband, who also died yesterday. The coup is defeated. It's completely, almost irrelevant to the plot. I don't, it, I, it felt like it was gonna lead up to being the big plot point of the finale, but no, it happened and then it's over again and everybody's back to the status quo. Episode thirteen,

Emma:

Final episode. A bunch of the remaining characters, including Billy and the CEO of Lambda, Daphne temporarily die in the name of science in saving the town and that. Roman is their guy because he can see and talk to the ghosts. The only way they can open the gate to get rid of the evil ghosts is for one of them to actually die. Billy volunteers, which is met by minimal protest from his girlfriend, he dies. The door opens, the ghost infestation is cured. The others return to their bodies. It's fine. They're all a bit sad about Billy. And then we have a celebration at the pub. But where's Roman? And the chief science lady? Daphne. You remember her? Oh no. They fucked off with the magic artifact and the science lady has been possessed by Maggie. She plans to live as the science lady who is conveniently a billionaire. The end.

Sam:

Oh, you missed one bit there. Oh. Some kids playing outside the church. See the ghost of Father Dan. We don't

Emma:

We don't care.

Sam:

End of season end, and then this was never recommissioned. So end of show

Emma:

oh God, what a slog.

Sam:

What did you think about this TV show, Emma?

Emma:

It's very silly. bits of it are quite compelling and quite fun. Bits of it are an absolute slog.

Sam:

doesn't know what it

Emma:

Well, I've put a list together. Okay. I've called it a list of things that this show has. Number one, a secretive science company. Number two, a big science machine that blasts a hole through dimensions. Number three, a Ghostbuster Number four, the, you try to leave, but no matter where you go, you come back to where you started thing. Number five, murder ghosts. Number six, ghosts that create insanity inducing hallucinations. Number seven, alien pods. Number eight, alien birth number nine, body jumping, number 10, creepy children. Just one of those would've been a lot. It really packs it

Sam:

in. It does pack it in. Can we talk about the big science company? Yes. Okay. So Emma,

Emma:

a big science company.

Sam:

Are you familiar with the 1990s video game Half Life?

Emma:

I am aware of its

Sam:

Half Life was the story of a big science company, Out in the middle of nowhere. And the big science company does a big science experiment, just like in this show. And are told by their bosses to do more science, just like in this show, and open up an interdimensional rift, just like in this

Emma:

show. OMG.

Sam:

And the logo of the big science company in Half-Life was a Lambda. Furthermore, the Ghostbusters electric gun in this show, Uhhuh looks a lot like the Gauss cannon in the video game. Half-Life, Half-Life is one of the most influential games of all time. it cannot be accidental. No. I would like to talk about what's good cause there were some good things. Yes. The episode about Carla's ghost baby was very well

Emma:

It's really creepy and there's a lot of horror

Sam:

A lot of horror. It, there's a lot of horror. Like there is some good horror throughout the whole show. I'm a ghost story guy. I am not really a gory horror. Yeah.

Emma:

I quite liked the bit where there was a torso hung on the back of the bathroom

Sam:

Yeah. We laugh. Whoa. eating so that was quite good. And a lot of the stuff with the creepy ghost children early on, or creepy ghost child

Emma:

early on, See, I would've loved it if it would've just been the creepy ghost kids. Yeah. I love a bit of creepy ghost

Sam:

have been, could have been the whole show out of creepy ghost child, A lot of this show is filmed in some quite gloomy conditions. And then about halfway through you realize that's because the props are not suitable for seeing in daylight. Yeah,

Emma:

Yeah. We tried to make it look

Sam:

like the big

Emma:

big glowy ghost

Sam:

the the fire VFX, which, oh God, do you know what if I had that fire VFX, maybe I wouldn't write as much fire into my

Emma:

script, Just thinking is this the only VFX we've got for fire? Isn't there another one we can plug in? Is this, oh God, can't we buy another? Really? We've run out of money.

Sam:

Could we imply fire? No. Could we set actual fire to

Emma:

no. We can't actually burn one of the cast

Sam:

everybody who burns to death is very quickly unrecognizable anyway because of the fire. So set fire to a dummy, it's fine

Emma:

it's fire.

Sam:

What were you expecting when you saw the name Ghost Wars?

Emma:

was expecting a war with ghosts. Like presumably the humans against the ghosts. Which. Technically.

Sam:

Mm, but not really. No. I was expecting something sillier it's a very silly name. It silly. And this is quite a dark and serious show. It's trying to be quite a dark and serious show when it lands. It is dark and serious.

Emma:

If it had have been sillier, I think it would've been more enjoyable.

Sam:

Yeah. Probably with the big science machine. Yeah. Which is either a particle accelerator or a something else.

Emma:

It's just a big science machine. Sam, let's not get

Sam:

nobody's ever quite sure

Emma:

I do love a big science machine.

Sam:

Cast. Were any of them any good? No. No.

Emma:

No. Well,

Sam:

Roman the lead. Yeah. Shocking. bad. There's we've talked a few series ago about Streets of Fire. Yeah. Which had an incredibly wooden male lead. Yes.

Emma:

Yes it

Sam:

Roman went to the school of on Streets of Fire acting. There's a bit early on in episode one where we were just learning about Roman and what his deal is, and then Maggie appears way jumps out on him as a ghost. And he says, Jesus, Maggie, you scared the life out of me.

Emma:

Wooden, a nd also very badly written. So considering he's meant to be the lead. I cannot stand him.

Sam:

I had no interest in his welfare,

Emma:

No interest in his welfare. The bit with his mom couldn't give a fuck. Yeah, that's

Sam:

true. Did we co cover that in the rundown? I don't remember really. But yeah, there's a bit where Roman's mum, he thinks she's disappeared, gone off on her own. And through the series we understand that she's been run out of town just to generally being a bit of a dick. Yeah. She's doesn't seem to have done anything particularly bad. And then on the process of being run out of town, Father Dan was so drunk, he crashed into a tree and killed her

Emma:

Father Dan is a very bad

Sam:

Father Dan is not a top priest.

Emma:

No,

Sam:

I did quite like Vincent Donofrio's performance Yeah, I thought it was good. It's a tropey character. he did a good job of him. Yeah. He's the priest but he's, oh, he's a little bit into ghosts and shit'cause he's got long hair and he's battling between the horrors that he sees and his faith

Emma:

Because everything's quite badly written. It's quite hard for me to want to empathize with any of the characters.

Sam:

Oh, absolutely. All the characters go through some sort of character development in one episode and then the next episode immediately go back to their old ways. Yeah. Meat Loaf. We should talk about Meat Loaf. We

Emma:

Considering the nature of this podcast, what did you think to his

Sam:

I think it was probably one of the better things in it. Yes, I agree. The character of Doug is not always well written. It, he does have some nice moments, but he is trying to play the staple of the community holding everybody together.

Emma:

in the sort of what's right. After the revelation about Maggie. He is, yeah. Yeah. Up until that point, he's just difficult. Yeah. But he has a real transformation when he discovers why his daughter died and that turns him into more of a pillar of the community. Yeah. And at the, in the very last episode he's wanting to be the new

Sam:

Yes. He is wanting to be the new sheriff while awaiting a murder charge for which he will be found guilty.

Emma:

Yeah. But that doesn't seem important

Sam:

No, apparently not. Because Rodney's family who vowed revenge at one point, never appeared again. Yeah. The ghost might have got him. But if I were writing a show, I maybe just wouldn't mention that bit. But Meat Loaf's Performance, he's All right.

Emma:

he's not a bad actor.

Sam:

Definitely better than the thing we watched him in where he played a big sexy sex vampire

Emma:

Oh, creepy. Sex

Sam:

groping women's boobs and that actually Meat Loaf as a grumpy old man probably should have played more grumpy old

Emma:

men. Yeah.

Sam:

Grumpy old, slightly right wing men.

Emma:

There was comic moments where he just like knocked people out. Yeah. That was, you could tell that he was relishing getting that sort

Sam:

from Yeah. I think he, he was one of the highlights of

Emma:

this. Yeah. Which is good.'cause that was our reason for watching.

Sam:

Oh, God. Imagine if Meat Loaf would've been awful in it. Oh, we wouldn't have had

Emma:

any fun. Do you wanna know what the people of the internet had to

Sam:

say? I would bloody well, love to

Emma:

From Rotten Tomatoes? This got, like 70 something percent overall, which seems

Sam:

Well, would you like me to complain about modern review standards? Emma, why do I have to give five stars for standard performance? Five stars is for perfect. Okay.

Emma:

We've had this rant from you. Oh

Sam:

you before.

Emma:

you have.

Sam:

have.

Emma:

Anyway, somebody said, terrible series cheap. CGI, bad acting, terrible directing and editing made me cringe at how bad it was. I could not finish the first episode. Which I think is a shame because if they're given it beyond the first episode yeah, all that's true. But it's a bit of a romp, isn't it?

Sam:

It is a bit of a romp.

Emma:

And then somebody else said a bit farfetched, but the mountains are very

Sam:

now. Is, that's one of my notes from the first episode are like, oh, Alaska's so pretty. I really wanna see more of it. And they spend so little time looking at any of the rest, of the scenery in the following episodes. There's a bit of stuff in the woods and you see some dead whales floating in the harbour. But

Emma:

But

Sam:

wanted.

Emma:

sweeping

Sam:

vista. Exactly. I wanted Twin Peak style. Look at how isolated they are in the beautiful wilderness. But I never got that because they filmed it in somebody's back garden in Vancouver. Probably.

Emma:

It won some awards.

Sam:

razzies,

Emma:

no, it won Leo Awards, whatever they are. And the awards it won are best costume design in a dramatic series. Best sound editing in a dramatic series and best hairstyling in a dramatic

Sam:

Do we know for which costume, sound and hair that no just

Emma:

in there. Hair design It's Just what's a load of bullshit?

Sam:

They did have quite good hair. Hair

Emma:

Their hair was all fine. It wasn't notable in any, it wasn't particularly wacky.

Sam:

Well, I suppose that's if you are making a sci-fi series about ghosts attacking an isolated Alaska town full of rednecks and people aren't noticing the hair. Oh, it's Father Dan's hair, isn't it?

Emma:

Oh, I'm also a big fan of like Billy's general look.

Sam:

Yeah. Billy is a sort of swarthy smuggler guy with a mustache and a

Emma:

Billy's a lot of He's a smuggler. He's a

Sam:

He's a sheriff.

Emma:

a sheriff. He's a sheriff. He's a fighter. He's a bitch.

Sam:

He's a lover. He's a sinner. He's a saint.

Emma:

Oh, we wouldn't want him any other way.

Sam:

No, sir.

Emma:

Sam, do you believe in ghosts?

Sam:

No not eight. Okay. Alright. Richard Herring

Emma:

just asking. That's all. you believe

Sam:

in ghosts Emma? I

Emma:

I don't. Okay. But I am very easily spooked. That's

Sam:

what humans be.

Emma:

Earlier this year I was watching a load of episodes of Uncanny on the iPlayer and

Sam:

do you wanna

Emma:

explain it's, well it was the tv version of the podcast, Uncanny, which investigates happenings

Sam:

happened to people who have always just gone through a very difficult mental trauma. Yes. Yeah. I won't say I don't listen to Uncanny, but ethically it is dodgy

Emma:

as fuck. Well, I was watching the TV version of it'cause I needed some distraction. And I was in the mood for something a bit. Spooky. Yeah. I was in the mood and I know that it's all bullshit. It's all, I don't believe in ghosts at all, but all in the back of my head. Oh yeah. Yeah. I got proper, like spine tingly stuff and I had to do things like run upstairs to bed at night in case the

Sam:

Stop me. Oh I, but that. I've occasion. I won't, I'll take out the word occasionally. Yeah. That happens to me. I love ghost stories and ghost fiction and it does things to your brain you go, Oh

Emma:

But now I don't believe

Sam:

And now I'm worried that when I cook up a lovely steak tonight for my tea, it's gonna be will it be a human leg? The season ended on a cliffhanger. Yeah. What's gonna happen? The ghost of Father Dan is back. Roman and Maggie in Daphne's body are sailing off to Seattle to live the high life billionaire life, but they know that body is dying, so they're gonna have to keep moving her to another body. And then it was never recommissioned. No. So last night I messaged you asking you to write me a pitch for Season Two Ghost Wars. I've written one as well. Excellent. Do you wanna go first or do you want me to go?

Emma:

let you go first. Okay.

Sam:

So this is my pitch. Communications gets restored to the mainland. The mayor lady radios for help and reports what happened. Repair crews come along and fix the bridge and nobody believes them because why would you? Someone in the Alaska State government points out that a man awaiting trial for murder isn't an ideal Sheriff. Doug gets whisked off for a trial, which will ultimately end in the ghosts of some executed murderers wrecking up the courtroom, like in Ghostbusters Two. Meanwhile, the meteorite thingy turns out to be summoning ghosts everywhere it goes. Roman and Maggie fuck up Seattle on arrival filling it with ghosts. The whole town gets ruined. They realize they have to escape to save everybody from bad ghosts and go on the run in a car. Sinister government agents start following them around, trying to get the meteorite as they go on a ghost raising road trip across the continental US. The midseason twist? Those government agents are ghosts, OMG.

Emma:

O.

Sam:

It turns out there's a faction of ghosts who are goodies and trying to get the baddie ghosts to turn their lives around. They include Abraham Lincoln, Daphne's mum, mother Teresa, Elvis, and in a massive twist, Judas Iscariot, who has changed his tune since Bible times.

Emma:

my God.

Sam:

The ghost of Father Dan lures the Port More children to Lambda and they take it over somehow. Doesn't matter, the kids start doing some evil shit portals or something, I don't know. But then the ghost of Judas comes in and has a word, and it turns out that it was him that lit the candle in the church back in season one. This shatters Father Dan's faith some more. Even though he's evil now, and anti-God and anti Jesus, he still thought he was anti the God of the Catholic church and that Judas would be a baddie and on his side. At the end of the season, Roman and Maggie make it to the White House to install Maggie in the President's body. Then they find another portal in the White House basement that leads to a third dimension, which is full of dinosaur ghosts. The season ends on a cliffhanger as the president possessed by Maggie gets possessed in turn by a T-Rex and the ghost of Abraham Lincoln takes over the US government to finish his own term in office. The ghost of John Wilkes Booth pops up at Lambda and steals the electric Gun credits roll.

Emma:

I'd buy it. Yeah, At first it sounded almost like you were taking it seriously. Dinosaurs are a really nice touch.

Sam:

I just thought what VFX have they already got loaded over at the sci-fi channel. So Emma, that's my ghost wars season two. But what's yours?

Emma:

So I'm taking it in a bit of a different direction. It starts where it left off immediately. Okay. Maggie and Roman are sailing off into the distance with the artifact. But wait back there on the shore? Who's that? It's the towns folk. And who are they led by? Why, it's Doug Rennie and he's propping up the freshly reanimated corpse of Billy. Billy didn't die just so those spooky kids could take over and rule the world with their ghost pals. Doug had been secretly working on reanimation since Maggie died, and he's finally got it. But Maggie's soul was too far away with Roman in the boat, and Doug warned everyone about Roman. Doug fires a rocket launcher at the boat. He found it in the Lambda labs and the boat explodes killing Roman. And the body that Maggie now inhabits and sinking the artifact beneath the waves. Roman and Maggie are now ghosts on the island, and they're pissed off. They seek revenge, but eventually you have to work with the people again. As the artifact, which is now at the bottom of the sea, is causing a plague of ghost fish.

Sam:

That

Emma:

some reason is a massive, scary problem that causes weird hallucinations and probably some more cannibalism. That's my

Sam:

Lovely. Oh, I like ghost fish. Interesting that we both went for Ghost Animals to resolve our third act problem. Listeners, if you have a pitch for season two of Ghost Wars and at least one listener does, I know it's you, Charlie, send it into us. Regular listener Charlie Etheridge Nunn did send some comments on Ghost

Emma:

War. Oh, fantastic.

Sam:

Charlie said this on our Facebook page, facebook.com/chat. Out of hell, I love watching bad attempts at capturing the magic of the early seasons of Lost and sci-fi provided a great many of them. I remember being disappointed in this one for not really doing enough with ghosts or wars and Meat's performance was pretty underwhelming. And then in case you're stuck for things to talk about, Charlie says, here's a selection from Common Sense Media who are, they're a Christian website who give guidance to parents on what's okay to show kids, but they're weirdly positive on ghost wars.

Emma:

bizarre. I suppose there's a

Sam:

there is the religious bent and taking series one at face value at the height of his loss of faith. Father Dan prays and somebody lights that candle. That's true. Ergo God is real. Charlie send us a pitch for series two. Would you

Emma:

you

Sam:

and any other listeners if you have a pitch for series two, season two, it's American British TV is also made in seasons but it's sort of complicated, we do serieses and seasons. You have a pitch for a season two of Ghost Wars, send it in chatoutofhell@gmail.com. If you'd like to watch Ghost Wars, you can find it on Netflix in the UK, probably other places. Google it, but if you do want to watch Ghost Wars, have a word with yourself,

Emma:

If you find yourself watching Ghost Wars we accept no responsibility.

Sam:

Do you know what? I'm gonna say, it's all right for having on in the background when you're doing something else.

Emma:

Oh God, yeah.

Sam:

yeah. If you've got on, if maybe you've got a podcast to record about it, and need to take meticulous notes on every single bit of every episode, it's a bit of a drag.

Emma:

you've got COVID, and you're trying to do all of those pace yourself, darling. Take regular breaks, hydrate properly. Have a lie down, but try not to fall asleep while watching it.'cause believe me, you are gonna have some fucked up

Sam:

dreams. Ghosts in your head. Anything else to say before we rate this?

Emma:

No, no further comments on the c On,

Sam:

the series, ghost Wars. We did mention Meat Loaf for a little bit. Uhhuh, if you're here for the Meat Loaf content.

Emma:

Sorry. Yeah.

Sam:

We'll be back with proper stuff next time. But yes, Emma. Earlier this week, I set up a supercollider in my basement and plugged a piece of meteorite into

Emma:

Have you got a big science

Sam:

You've got a big science machine I've got a big science machine in the basement Of course you can. Yay. I turned it up to 105%, And the resulting resonance cascade gave me the following rating scale.

Emma:

Sorry, just let me recover from the cascade.

Sam:

Oh, that is uh, the name of the event that happens in Half Life. that was one for all the

Emma:

Uh,

Sam:

Uh, This show was created by Simon Barry. Yes. So the resulting rating scale then is, was this a Simon Barry? A Simon, Not as Good as The Stephen King Novel Carrie, or Simon Far Below Par-ie. Fuck off.

Emma:

What? Well, Oh, I can't I can't do better, but that doesn't mean I have to approve of what you've done.

Sam:

What is it, Emma?

Emma:

Oh

Sam:

it's not a Simon Barry. It's I assume maybe this is his best work. I think it is better than Battle Nun or what? Warrior Nun.

Emma:

If it is mid tier, it's the bottom of the mid

Sam:

we, we are stretching our ratings

Emma:

Yeah. we

Sam:

started off rating five minute songs and now we're doing 13 hours of ghost story on a scale of one to three.

Emma:

It's definitely not top tier.

Sam:

It's not top tier. As far as TV goes, I've had much worse

Emma:

Yeah. I'll agree with that. I think it's somewhere in the middle. But probably the bottom of

Sam:

I doubt I'll ever see or think about Ghost Wars again unless I get a pitch for Ghost Wars series two to chatoutofhell@gmail.com.

Emma:

I won't ever be revisiting the series. I won't ever watch it again. It's not like one that's it's not planted any

Sam:

You're not gonna watch it again to see the uh, the little clues that were left in the early episodes.

Emma:

Can't be bothered mate. Can't be bothered.

Sam:

This is a Simon, Not as Good as the Stephen King Novel Carrie. That was film club.

Emma:

Oh, what a slog.

Sam:

Alright, mate. No, it is lovely to see you too.

Emma:

this. Watching it, what a slog.

Sam:

Yeah, But we do it to ourselves. So yeah, thank you for listening. If indeed you did and if you didn't, I hate you. I'm a spooky murder ghost.

Emma:

I have to make an amendment. Okay. To, to something from our previous

Sam:

Oh, okay.

Emma:

I said that I was gonna bring Testify from the album Couldn't Have Said It I made a mistake. Okay. I'm actually gonna bring Tear Me Down from the same album.

Sam:

Oh. Well, I've not started listening to it yet, but, a lot of people don't listen to Film Club, so they'll be horrified.

Emma:

No. They'll be surprised. Surprised.

Sam:

Surprised. So we are back with proper Chat of Hell in two weeks time. Yay. Where we will be listening to the following songs.

Emma:

Tear Me Down from Couldn't Have Said It Better

Sam:

Objects in the Rear View Mirror from Bat out of Hell Two. We're gonna dive into Meat Loaf's youth and childhood and there might even be a ghost in it. Who knows? go away. Listen to those that won't take anywhere near as long as watching all of Ghost Wars. There's no excuse for not doing your homework this time. If you have any thoughts or opinions on those or on Ghost Wars or on anything, at this rate, we'll be talking about the news on Film Club in a few series' time. you might as well share your thoughts on any media. Send it to chatoutofhell@gmail.com. Find us on Instagram and Facebook and all that sort of stuff. Do tell your friends about the podcast. It will be nice if you did.

Emma:

Please do.

Sam:

that. felt a bit pathetic

Emma:

Oh, did feel.

Sam:

there. my friends. please tell your friends. Tell your friends about this podcast. Why not? If you enjoy it, they might too. And if they don't, they're no friends and we still wanna know about anybody who has told a date about this podcast. chatoutofhell@gmail.com. That's it. I'm off to go listen to whatever Emma just said Not Testify.

Emma:

Tear Me Down.

Sam:

Tear That's the end of film club. We're both vaguely remembering how to do this, so we'll be back at full speed next time. We'll see you again in two more weeks time for a proper Chat Out of Hell. Bye bow. Now. Now, Now.