Thoughts on 8TV's new series: Ghost

If Dzof has peeked from under the anonymous bedcovers of the Internet, it must mean that he has something he thinks is important to say. Well, true:



Yes, Popiah Picture's latest production, Ghost, is making its debut this Sunday. As far as involvement goes, I feel I had less of a hand in this one than I did in Realiti, for all sorts of reasons, but mainly because I tried to jam too many things into one day.

The trailer above should give you a good idea what the show is about, but I wanted to write a little about the history of the show, and what guided us through its various machinations and incarnations.

Truth be told, the very initial idea came from Ping, and I never really questioned how it really started, but we seemed to agree that it should be two things: (1) A detective whodunnit - who killed Zack Imran?; and (2) A love story about what happens when want what we can't have.

For the detective part of things, I remember that we used Veronica Mars a lot as an example, and a lot of how clues are revealed as part of the larger story arc is basically either setting up or eliminating suspects. The final solution of how Zack died was settled even before episode two was written. So, no Sashi, it wasn't a case of "the manager in the parking lot with a candlestick".

I personally worry that it may be a little complicated, but we have trust that 8TV viewers are smart enough (and weaned enough) with modern entertainment that they can figure out how things fall into place.

For the love story, this is clearly set up from the very beginning, when Eza is dumped by her boyfriend Adzam in practically the second scene of the show. If you think this is a case of will-they, won't-they, then you're right. I don't know how clearly it's articulated in the final product, but the idea is that Adzam had his own particular reasons for dumping her, and then when those reasons are turned around, he looks for reconcilliation. And, yes, in effect Zack acts as the nth party in all this.

As for the "ghost" bits... well, we didn't delve too much into it. I had an idea that Zack should reveal his powers slowly over the season, much like Clark does in Smallville, but that idea was thrown out in the end. It's a slight shame for me, because I thought it would make for a nice third story arc, jiving nicely with the rise and fall of the other two arcs, but hey... I'm just a writer.

So, although on the surface it looks like we moved away to something more thriller-based, at the end of the day, like for most of life, it's still about love.

(AND, if you should happen to be on facebook, you can join in the fun by adding yourself to the group It's Ghost, not Hantu to keep track of the latest updates.)

Labels: ghost, tv, writing