Ghost Hunters

Other than one of the members getting knocked over (after what I thought was a cheap stunt, trying to provoke the elemental) and the spooky voice caught on tape, this episode harkens back to the other frustrating episodes. Ones in which there were some personal experiences unfortunately NOT caught on tape, and very little was captured by the sophisticated equipment. This was not like the last season finale, the St. Augustine lighthouse episode where evidence (metaphorically) leaped out at the team.

Which is really disappointing because Leape Castle is generally regarded by many ghost hunters to be the most haunted place in Ireland. Maybe it was the ghost's Poker Night or something...

Well, here we are, the mid-season hiatus. I know a lot of fans are annoyed at the scheduling, but it’s hardly surprising, since SFC has been doing this with almost every series on its slate over the past few years. But it does make it harder for the network and production company to find a solid episode to mark the end of the fall episode run. One is left wondering if the editing in this particular episode was designed to play up the drama for that exact reason.



At this point, I think it’s clear what the third season dramatic arc will be. In the second season, the editors had a field day with Brian’s personal issues, and they tried to pull together something of a story arc around it. It was easily the worst element of the second season. This time around, I’ve noticed that they won’t stop mentioning that Dave Tango is hungry for a personal experience with the paranormal.



Here’s my problem with this. It’s one thing when they take a person’s real world troubles and play it up a little through editing and staged scenes. It’s annoying, but it’s a version of something that is relatively harmless. On the other hand, if the third season is playing up Tango’s desire for a powerful paranormal experience, it follows that he must eventually have that experience. And since paranormal activity is notoriously random and rare, if that does happen, skeptics and naysayers will have a field day claiming fakery for the sake of drama.



At any rate, this episode highlights the Irish contingent of the TAPS Family. I must say, I’m less than impressed. Granted, Barry Fitzgerald fits the mold of a traditional Irishman quite well, and I wasn’t at all surprised to learn that he takes elementals and other such folklore seriously. For the Irish (and truly, many Gaelic/Celtic peoples), lore of the faerie folk and Otherworld is taken as seriously as Catholicism.



For that reason, I wasn’t particularly surprised that Barry was “assuming the result” when stepping into Leap Castle. I was just a bit shocked that Jason, Grant, and the rest of the team fell into the step with it so quickly and completely. There were a couple times when Jason and Grant looked at Barry like he was going insane, but they all seemed to be falling into an uncharacteristic hysteria.



The Evidence



Unlike the first season, where we saw Frank getting smacked down by his own soundboard, Dustin’s experience is completely off camera. So it’s a little harder to take seriously as proof of paranormal activity. His reactions appeared to be authentic, but I can already hear the skeptics ripping into that part of the show. Similarly, all that talk about the “face with a beard and hood” took up a lot of time, but without anything on camera, it’s not particularly substantial.



The EVPs were interesting, but the only one that struck me as impressive was the wailing woman. If it was English (and I have my doubts), then I think it says, “Oh God, (two unintelligible words)”. Neat, but not exactly proof of a haunting.



I also noticed something that wasn’t mentioned at all on the show. When Dustin was describing his experience, I heard an odd mish-mash of conversation in the background. I hit the rewind on the TiVo twice to confirm it. It didn’t sound like normal background chatter, and while it could have been added in post, I’m still not convinced. I’d love to hear any thoughts on that one.



Much like the previous episode, Jason and Grant conclude that the site is haunted despite a relative dearth of data or evidence to support it. While the episode was definitely entertaining, the questionable depiction of the personal experiences made it hard to follow the logic.

It was nice to have TAPS investigating someplace different, and it was even better not having Steve along to play act and mess things up. Barry their Irish host was a nice enough guy, but he played everything up like it was this horrible dangerous place and they were all to be killed. He actually made the show cumbersome to watch with his antics and scare tactics. In these episodes around this time in the series' history, they seem to be struggling to make dramatic events occur. The thing with Dustin falling on his butt then claiming he was pushed was so lame. The gasping and play acting to impart drama into the show were unwelcome, and made the show seem scripted. For all the hype, they ended up with nothing.

The team investigates Leap Castle in Ireland. There is a half human, half beast that is reputed to roam there named the Elemental. Rumor is the Elemental can kill you but people live in the old castle apparently not too afraid of their eventual doom. The best part was Dustin getting nailed. It was totally awesome. Did he fall and try to pass it off as the Elemental? Could be but I don't think so in this case. You have your typical shadows, noises, and bumps in the dark. I missed Steve on this episode being there in actual person. The EVP's were pretty cool. All in all not a bad episode.

This episode is one of their more exciting ones, and I think it qualifies for a classic. Fear surrounds this episode, starting simply with Steve's fear of planes (somewhat reminiscent of his fear of heights) disallowing him to accompany the rest of TAPS on the trip. Since Steve was unavailable, they had the tourguide who was a TAPS family member fill his place. His jumpiness added to the growing fear and hysteria in the episode, ending up with him running up the stairs in panic to see if Grant was alright...when he was just fine.



The castle itself looks straight out of some Horror movie or Scooby-Doo Episode. There was a lot of hype and excitement about this one, so more hysteria was only to be expected during the investigation. Brian got pretty freaked out by seeing his own shadow. All of the members at one point mentioned an "old stale rubber" smell, similar to the sulferic smell the Irish guy described. Unfortuneatley when Grant went down into the spooky Oubliette...nothing happenned except the Irish guy running in a panic; another disappointment for the hype, but entertaining none-the-less.



This supposedly is their "darkest" encounter. The "Elemental" or "Demonic" presence may not have been demonic at all but a spirit at most, or just acting on the part of the Ghost Hunters. There was no actual evidence of it at all, which I found diappointing, however it was exciting to see one of the TAPS crew get "attacked." The only real hard evidence was in the EVP's, the wailing woman in particular, which sends chills down my spine.



Overall, the episode is definitely worth the watch, full of fear and paranormal experiences...but not paranormal evidence. I think this qualifies as a classic.

The plumbers by day go to Ireland for one of the most elegedly haunted places in the WORLD... AWESOME. If you like taps or even the paranormal at all than this will rock your world. Unlike the movies in real hauntings there are rarely many notable occurences, and when you get one it is exciting. Leap castle was packed with personal experiences and even some great evidence of an authentic haunting. Dustin even gets hit by an unknown force and he is visibly shaken by the experience ( which is odd for Dustin, usually he is extatic if something happens). He even wanted to "get the hell out of here" and told Tango to "stop pravoking it". This is an extraordinary episode and should not be missed by any fans. The only thing that dampers the episode is the fact that steve could not attend due to a paralizing fear of flying.

Whoa! The fall season ends with a high note, it going to be hard for the rest of the new episodes to equal to what went on with this episode.



The TAPS teams heads to Leap Castle, in Ireland, one of the world’s most haunted places and area that is covered majority by the “Most Haunted” team and I love the fact that they were in unknown surroundings, it give a great sense of alienation for the TAPS team, since they are American and are used to American buildings and ghosts, how to deal with them. This added to creep factor with this episode and which didn't make the episode boring one signal bit during the investigation part of the episode, which I think sometimes are the weakest part of this show. This place was a completely new type of animal that they were dealing with and it did bite back, but Dustin was the person that received the bite. Like what happen to Frank their sound guy in the first season, they did get footage of the attack, but unlike Frank's attack, which was right in front of a professional camera and their DVR. The footage jumps over a lot and dose not give us the moment of when the attack happens, plus their isn't a second view of the attack, which will leave a lot of skeptics saying that it was staged. Despite the fact that Dustin just like Frank was brought to tears after the attack. Not to sound, malevolence, but I like the fact that it wasn't Frank that got attack, because if that happen, then this show would of started down the path of most "Most Haunted", where it seems that one peculiar member of their crew always seems to get attack all of the time.



On to the evidence , we get four EVPs, which I think is the most that they ever got, and personal experiences with the crew. The two strongest EVPs ones are the two that aren't even in English, but in an ancient form Irish, which the castle owner recognizes as soon as he hears them. This clearly shows that this show isn't staged, because how could a TAPS member or even the show 's producers know this form of Irish. Know it well enough to even speak the language fluency to make those EVPs. With the personal experiences, I know they aren’t making the stuff up, but once in a while I would love to see one of these experiences actually caught on film at the same thing that they experience.



With Steve, we finally found out what is breading grounds for his fear of flying, and it was one that he was born with, but one that he learned because after a horrible flying experience. Again, I can feel for Steve, because I know what is like to have a bad experience with something and then stay away from it. Plus I also know how these fears can truly cause a person bugged out and interfear with their live, because sometimes I go through it and I have seen what an anxiety attack look like, trust me people it ain’t pretty, my Mother went a through a couple of them. Unlike Steve’s fear, my Mom’s fear was driving, but she got over it and I think Steve will conquer it. That getting physical one the plane before it took off is a great way to start to get over your fear, but Steve you have take baby steps to truly conquer it.