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Original poster

Did you watch Ghostwatch?

116 replies

Charlavail · 25/10/2022 20:37

It aired 30 years ago today and has never aired in full since. I have been reading the Wikipedia and it sounds very spooky but also seemed such a good trick that people actually believed it was true. I was only 1 at the time so I haven't seen it.

OP posts:

Knackeredmommy · 25/10/2022 22:30

Yep,I was about 10, it may be corny now, but the way it was presented by those presenters made it seem so real. I couldn't watch to the end, really scared me!

JudyGemstone · 25/10/2022 22:30

It was never intended to be a ‘trick’, or to pretend to be real.

the intro voiceover bit the bbc play before a programme starts made it clear it was an original drama starring Sarah Green and Michael Parkinson, but people either tuned in part way through or somehow forgot that part and believed it.

(I listened to the Evolution of Horror podcast episode on it recently, that’s how I know that!)

SolarEcrisp · 25/10/2022 22:30

I like many if you was about 11 or 12 and was totally emotionally scarred! We had family friends staying and there were six of us kids watching it - the youngest ones were only 7 and 8! There just be some collective trauma among kids who watched it, parts were genuinely so frightening - and the thought of lovely Sarah Greene being in danger!!

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Spooky & paranormal TV

ChocHotolate · 25/10/2022 22:31

Yes, it was brilliant. I totally believed it until the studio was trashed.
It is available on DVD

Coffeepot72 · 25/10/2022 22:32

Although some years later there was an episode of Bergerac (a Christmas special) that truly terrified me!

JesusMaryAndJosephAndTheWeeDon · 25/10/2022 22:34

Yes I watched it at the time, it was very clever, and using trusted factual TV presenters made it quite real but I was amazed by the fuss, it was quite clearly faked as the show progressed.

sparklyfacemask · 25/10/2022 22:36

The 'Criminal' podcast recently did an episode on it which is well worth a listen if you remember the programme.

WOPTF · 25/10/2022 22:36

I would have been 12 and my 11yo sister and I watched it at our grandparents'. We were totally sucked in. Their clock even stopped same time as the one on the show iirc. Or maybe gramps stopped it, I'll never know. It was probably the first time I was truly scared by something. I'm a total baby about paranormal stuff though because I believe. I'd like to think it's all fake and not be scared by it.

LachrymoseLeeches · 25/10/2022 22:47

I remember watching this as an early teen, we turned it on halfway through so missed the beginning where they said it wasn't real, so I believed it to start with, but then it became more and more obvious it was fake. My younger siblings were terrified though!

vipersnest1 · 25/10/2022 22:49

Yes, I watched it (I was an adult then). It scared the shit out of me and took me a long time to get over.

outdoorcushions20 · 25/10/2022 23:13

I watched it and loved it. Whatever happened to Sarah Greene?

Celebrityskint · 25/10/2022 23:22

Oh I remember this! I was 11 and my granny was staying over to babysit us. My wee brother had gone to bed but she let me stay up late. Only watched half of it as granny decided it was too scary. I said it wasn’t. But then demanded that she come to bed at the same time as me (I had twin beds in my room as granny stayed with us every Saturday night )

ofwarren · 25/10/2022 23:23

I was 11 and watched it with my DM.
I honestly thought it was real at the time and was absolutely terrified. My DM never told me it wasn't real so I'm not sure if she knew or what.

BretonBlue · 26/10/2022 00:10

My childhood self is very jealous of all of your late bedtimes. I was a few weeks away from my tenth birthday and would never have been allowed to stay up to watch it.

ItsRainingTacos79 · 26/10/2022 00:18

I didn't sleep for a year after that 😭

Allmyarseandpeggymartin · 26/10/2022 02:28

I was at the national media museum in Bradford a few weeks ago and they have a little section dedicated to it alongside the “spaghetti harvest” panorama story and Orson Welles “war of the worlds” radio broadcast.

Basically saying how powerful the media can be, it is one of the most complained about bits of telly ever and the bbc banned anything like it.

They’ve got a little clip of the intro playing on a loop and it’s clear from the titles that it was a drama but if you missed that and tuned in at the point Parky (who was a serious journalist) was saying here’s the outside broadcasting team, we are trying something that has never been done before, maybe we will find something, maybe we won’t you can see how people were terrified.

The next section in the museum is about deep fakes and channel 4s alternative Christmas message - I think people totally could be fooled and terrified again. The media has a responsibility in what they broadcast.

RhannionKPSS · 26/10/2022 02:37

I watched it live and recognized the actress in it from the Billy plays with Kenneth Branagh so I knew it wasn’t real, but it was still scary.

Original poster

Charlavail · 26/10/2022 03:51

I never know if Uncanny is meant to be similar as in it is being played as if it is real but most people know it isnt.

OP posts:

99redballoonsgobyy · 26/10/2022 03:59

are you sure it's 30 years im sure it was October 1993 not 92? yes I remember watching it thinking it was real at the time as nothing like that had ever been on TV before. I was a teen and did find it scary. it probably looks so cheesy now though. used to enjoy most haunted when that first started too but it soon got boring.

rocketfromthecrypt · 26/10/2022 04:14

My friend recorded it and we used to watch it at sleepovers. It was terrifying. I think that using presenters who were known and trusted for factual programmes was what gave it an air of reality which in turn made it so frightening - those people just didn't do drama.

rocketfromthecrypt · 26/10/2022 04:19

What an incredible piece of tv, though, that we're here talking about it after thirty years. Tv producers now would kill for that kind of cultural significance.

Original poster

Charlavail · 26/10/2022 05:50

Bananalanacake · 25/10/2022 20:49

Really, 30 years ago today, but it's only the 25th. I was 14 at the time and completely sucked in.

Oops, didn't mean to type today. Fingers got carried away with themselves.

OP posts:

MavisChunch29 · 26/10/2022 05:58

I was about 16 at the time. Think I started watching but switched it off as it seemed rubbish. Then lots of people were talking about it at school the next day, as if it were something shocking. It always seemed obviously not real to me. I've watched it more recently. Still rubbish. And I like spooky things. I've seen more convincing stuff on Most Haunted 😄

squarepegleg · 26/10/2022 07:55

Totally agree about the fact we're talking about it 30 years later. Also that most of us as teenagers believed it.

I can't imagine my teenagers being taken in so easily. They're either much more streetwise of just over exposed to reality on social media etc now. Probably a bit of both!

BretonBlue · 26/10/2022 08:06

Teens today could absolutely be taken in my something similar. The difference is that they wouldn’t be convinced by a television programme. A well-coordinated equivalent on TikTok could be made very very convincing, however. A lot of people were taken in by the Dear David horror stories on Twitter at first.

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