Ghostly Incongruities: There’s No Death Manual

[Phebemarie]

After Eric was resuscitated, why was he unable to see the ghosts?  He was technically dead for a bit just like Sam.  Did they explain that on the show?

[KarenX]

On 2/8/2023 at 2:59 PM, KarenX said:

Hmmm…. There was a cholera epidemic pre-Revolutionary War and maybe other outbreaks after that?

Wrong wrong wrong! Yellow fever! Whoops. But there was cholera in the first half of the 19th century.

You know Mary from The Secret Garden? She was orphaned by cholera in India. Fun fact! That epidemic spread to New York. Maybe the cholera ghosts were from that wave.

[SoMuchTV]

42 minutes ago, SoMuchTV said:

It’s late, please don’t make me think too much about why they can smell but not taste. I don’t want to have to pull out the ghost manual. 

 

32 minutes ago, PaulE said:

Not to mention, how are bodiless spirits able to touch or sexually stimulate one another?  I don't think these ghosts make sense according to traditional ghost lore, but that seems to be the canon for this show.  I guess we're supposed to accept that, on the spiritual plane of their existence, these ghosts are able to interact with each other as if they had material bodies.  But you're right, that doesn't really explain why they can smell non-ghostly things (or why Hetty and Flower could use an actual washing machine as a vibrator).

Bringing this over from the latest episode thread… looking at the five senses and how they work in relation to the livings. They definitely have sight and hearing.  They seem to have some special version of touch with a lot of caveats. Like only with other ghosts? And they apparently have smell. So is the only thing they completely don’t have is taste? I  mean, since you can’t eat,  I guess that makes sense…?

[ZuluQueenOfDwarves]

We know they can feel heat and cold, since they like the shaft of sunlight, and because they objected to having the drafty bedroom last season. Hetty is slower than the others on their walks because she died wearing heels. They sleep, so presumably they get tired. They can alter their clothes to some degree, but always have to be touching the item or it goes back into place. 

[Mabinogia]

On 4/27/2023 at 11:35 PM, SoMuchTV said:

So is the only thing they completely don’t have is taste? I  mean, since you can’t eat,  I guess that makes sense…?

Do they not have taste? Or is it that they just can't eat. If they can't eat, how do they know they can't taste? They can smell because smell doesn't require touch but eating requires picking things up and ingesting them which would be tricky. 

I have no problem with them being able to touch each other (hehe, sorry, can't help myself) since they are made of the same stuff. With the furniture I assume it's kind of muscle memory and they are more just hovering on beds and chairs and things like their bodies are used to. The washing machine is a tougher one to get around since Hetty would not at all have been familiar with that sensation and Hovering wouldn't give one the vibrating required for what they were doing with it. But hey, maybe that's her special ghost power. HAHA

[Snow Apple]

I just thought of this but don't know if it's been brought up before.

Why didn't Thor and his son run into each other when the son died? There were no property lines back then. They were only two "houses" away and there shouldn't be walls back then.

Were they able to wander far and wide and kept missing each other? When property lines were established, did they get sucked back to where they died?

[SoMuchTV]

12 hours ago, Phebemarie said:

I think we need a Ghost Rules category pinned to the top of all the threads for helpful clarification of questions.  ☺️

I can't pin, but at least I can bump...

[shapeshifter]

6 hours ago, SoMuchTV said:

I can't pin, but at least I can bump...

Perfect!

I don't have the energy right now to put together a list from this thread, but here's:

• 10 Ghost Rules in 100 seconds:
  instagram.com/reel/CzMLr2xJgLw/
   
• ghosts-bbc.fandom.com/wiki/Ghost
  (includes Ghost Notes from both the UK and US shows)

[j5cochran]

I'm not sure if this belongs in Speculation or here, but . . . .

I've assumed that their boundaries are roughly circular, centered on the site of one's death. So, do all of the ghosts have the same boundaries? For example, Hetty died in the house, and Flower died out in the woods. Could Flower go farther away from the house in the direction of her death site than Hetty could?

[Annber03]

That's been a common thread of speculation, yeah! It would make sense if their boundaries were different to some degree - the car ghost had her own specific little boundary, so it's only logical the others would have something similar. It would be fun to explore that more in depth - it's one thing to have one ghost being able to go anywhere, but to have everyone all having their different boundaries, that could be a really entertaining thing to play with, and to see how the ghosts would react to this revelation. 

[chaifan]

On 4/25/2024 at 8:10 PM, j5cochran said:

So, do all of the ghosts have the same boundaries?

I think that with the exception of Pete, it's been established that the manor ghosts all have the same boundaries.  Or at least they believe it to be so.  I have no idea if through all these years at least some of them have tested every inch of the boundary.  But with nothing better to do, why wouldn't they have?  We've seen Flower bounce back, and there was the scene with Hetty getting ejected from the car (1st season?) as it crossed the boundary.  It would be fun to have a flashback scene of them testing the boundary.

Personally, I prefer the way it's been presented - that you're stuck within the boundary of where ever you die, and anyone else who died within that boundary has the same boundary.  Buildings could come and go, but the boundary remains the same.  This raises questions, like why is the boundary the manor's property line when the manor didn't exist when Thor or Sass died? 

And, it makes me wonder what would happen to a ghost who died in a phone booth or news stand or other very tiny, yet defined space.  I was hoping that the car ghost would have found a loophole - that as long as she was within a part of the car her boundary would expand, and so after buying the car they would take it apart and put pieces throughout the manor so she could hang with Sass and the rest of the ghosts.