Most Haunted Live - Village Of The Damned
Ghosthunting in North Wales Hospital
Most Haunted Live has rapidly become one of the most popular programmes on Living TV with its attempts to prove the existence of paranormal activity. With a willing public who want to believe they have stumbled on a formula which can only win. But how long can they carry on without concrete evidence? Is the programme one big elaborate con.
Set In North Wales Hospital, a former mental home, in Denbigh (North Wales), the setting seems ideal for ghosthunters to find what they are looking for. It is a dilapidated building built in the 19th century which over the years has gained a reputation as being haunted.
Most Haunted Live have set up camp there for the next seven nights in an attempt to find evidence of paranormal activity. With legends of witches and ghostly happenings rife they look like they are onto a winner. Once more they set up webcams online so people can watch and report any happenings and in something akin to grand guignol they even get the entire audience involved in a seance.
For the next four hours the audience is subjected to Yvette Fielding and co. traipsing round the hospital (the South East wing tonight) in pursuit of paranormal activities. They are instantly in contact with a voice proclaiming to be Bella, an old witch. Along with Bella they encounter many occurences such as moaning, whistling and stone throwing.
Whether the public believes all this is down to their own persuasion. As the audience we have no way of knowing whether these events are real as the hosts would like you to believe. The programme is supreme in the way it can actually have you on the edge of your seat half hearing things along with Yvette and the switchboard were swamped with reports of ghostly figures on the webcams.
So is it real? It is certainly persuasive but then everything that happened could be explained by natural events. The hospital is in a terrible state of disrepair with windows broken and practically no roof in parts allowing the wind (and it was a cold, stormy night) to drift through the corridors. Any sounds which were heard could easily be caused by this.
The historical facts that the team come up with are another way of suggesting to the audience that the ghosts are real. Bella the witch for instance turns out to be real and so does John Rowlands (and his famous son). Any of this information can be found easily over the internet though and through delving through local archives. There is nothing out of the norm that can really convince.
The final payoff of night one is when they fastened Karl and Stuart in straitjackets and put them into isolation chambers. It was explained as a timeslip sensory deprivation experiment. Yvette then asked the spirits to do things to them and on the webcams we are subjected to ripping off of straitjackets, rocking and fighting as if something was in there with them.
After a while they released them and this is where it got interested. Karl was in a state of shock and lying on the floor but the true horror was what had happened to Stuart. He was found to be unconscious while standing rigid against a padded wall. This was confirmed by a paramedic. So far so creepy.
Then we can look from a sceptics point of view. Two thoughts come to mind, one is that they were faking, we don't really know if they are unconscious, and once again the audience had been duped. The second is a more scientific explanation. Sensory deprivation is a form of training taken in the army by the secret service. It can cause disorientation and in extreme cases (for a trained soldier) bodily shutdown. Once again their attempts at passing off the circumstances as paranormal can be explained.
So, the mystery of the paranormal can once again be explained. Over the next six days we shall be subjected to more of the hospital and who knows what they will find. For the sceptics it is going to take a lot more to convince but whilst doing this enjoy the ride. Most Haunted lIve does make for excellent television viewing.
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