One inevitable truth about aging is that as you get older, you’re bound to think everything was better when you were younger. Unfortunately, I recently discovered that rule applies to one of my favorite childhood television shows:
“Ghostwriter”.
The “Ghostwriter” series aired in the early 1990s, following a group of cool inner city kids who spent their time solving mysteries. And no, this wasn’t just some live-action knock-off version of Scooby Doo. Instead of hunting down creepy spooks, this group went after real-life crimes, but with some supernatural assistance from a mysterious, literary-minded ghost.
And what made this show seem even cooler was the fact that I never got the chance to watch it all! The episodes aired at weird times— either crazy early on Saturday mornings, or else just as school was letting out— so I always ended up tuning in late. To make it more difficult, all of the “cases” were serialized across four episodes, with scripting designed to keep viewers in suspense, and the show’s elusiveness only added to its mystery.
For some reason or other, “Ghostwriter” popped back into my brain recently, and I felt compelled to spend a few minutes searching it out. These days, since pretty much all of the world’s collected useless knowledge is stored on the Internet, I was I was able to pull up full episodes of the show with just a few clicks:
But in hindsight, though, that was probably a mistake.
When it comes to nostalgia, the past always looks a little bit better in the rearview mirror. It was almost embarrassing to think back on how cool “Ghostwriter” was to me back then, because it forced me to reflect on just how uncool I must have been myself. Even today, as a grown adult, that’s a tough reality to face.
As it turned out, there wasn’t anything particularly cool about the characters, except for the fact that they all happened to live in New York City. Their absentee parents were rarely shown on screen, which left the kids free to roam around Brooklyn— a level of autonomy which seems dangerously negligent to me now. And the friend group itself seems almost forced— a diverse, multi-ethnic cast, brought together through their public school attendance. Although the arrangement seemed perfectly fine to me back then, today I can’t manage to overlook a few painful socio-economic realities, such as gentrification and school choice, which might have kept these kids from ever meeting in real life.
After considering all of these creative liberties, the fact that there was an undead spirit who communicated by rearranging letters seemed to be one of the show’s more believable points.
But as for Ghostwriter himself (or herself?), there simply wasn’t much character development. He’s a ghost, and he writes to kids.
That’s really all there was to it.
And as for the friends’ “cases”? Those compelling mysteries which took four episodes each to solve, spread out across two hours of air time? Well, it’s apparent to me now that the kid detectives probably took these on because the NYPD probably wouldn’t have bothered showing up to the calls. All of these alleged ‘crimes’ were easily solved through research, either by paging through one kid’s home encyclopedia (remember those?), or with a quick trip to the public library.
In retrospect, the few things about “Ghostwriter” that still seemed cool also turned out to be the most inexplicable. For example, the show had a lo-fi hip hop soundtrack that was always present in the background, even while the characters were speaking. And of course, there were the notable appearances from future celebrities, like Julia Stiles and Samuel L. Jackson.
In its heyday, “Ghostwriter” was one of the top five television shows for kids, which was a remarkable achievement for a public television broadcast. But at the same time, the accomplishment played a role in the show’s sudden demise, when a drop in funding left executives to prioritize more established shows like “Sesame Street” and “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood”.
Over the years that followed, though, “Ghostwriter” was actually revived several times, and the newer shows gave the writers a chance to continue polishing their creation. More than a decade after the original show went off the air, one of the writers finally explained that the nameless Ghost was actually a former slave! After escaping to freedom and making his way north to New York City, this (still-unnamed) person began teaching other slaves to read, so they could improve their own lives. Obviously, such a compelling backstory would’ve been a fascinating layer in the original show— but without it, the Ghost seemed almost campy.
Over thirty years later, watching “Ghostwriter” as an adult was kind of like trying to read those old “Goosebumps” books in the middle of the day, and with all the lights on. Not at all scary, and just a little embarrassing.
After discovering the “Ghostwriter” remakes, though, I was almost tempted to dive down the rabbit hole, and binge watch each of them. It would have made for a fascinating critique project, but thankfully I thought better of it.
Because sometimes, the past is best left alone, to be enjoyed through nostalgia.