Paul Sinha's TV Showdown - 26th February 2022

Greetings, Ghostwatchers! 

Yes, it's that time of the year again - welcome to the 2022 edition of, Did You Know That GHOSTWATCH Was Mentioned On The Telly Again, Last Night?!™

You might recall, back in March 2019, Jenny "The Vixen" Ryan, and Bradley "Bradders" Walsh taxed The Chase contestant, Jon's knowledge of everyone's favourite Hallowe'en Hoax. Now, less than three years later, fellow Chaser, Paul "Sinnerman" Sinha, has now joined the pantheon of quiz show hosts destined to gauge the popularity, longevity, and lasting appreciation of everyone's favourite Hallowe'en... oh sorry, already said that.

Last evening at approximately 21 mins in, not counting the ad break, during the second episode of the second series of Paul Sinha's TV Showdown, the socially-distanced bastard child of Noel Edmond's Telly Addicts, and Harry Hill's Alien Burp TV Capsule, featuring a not-half-bad opening title sequence, Team Captains Fay Ripley and Rob Beckett, panellists/contestants/available celebrity-types, Georgia Toffolo, Sindhu Vee, Chris McCausland, and Jonathan Ross [whom, to my knowledge, last discussed GHOSTWATCH on-air around twelve years ago] were presented with a spoilerific clip of you-know-what.

Having gallantly waded through a number of time-grinding clips including 'Jedward' on The X-Factor, Outnumbered, Grampian's A Touch of Music, and I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, Sindhu is next-up to choose one of four remaining categories on the video wall; in this case she goes for, 'CHILLS'.

At very long last, we finally get to a clip, albeit masked by a stock overlay graphic, of Dr. Lin Pascoe, as ably portrayed by Gillian Bevan, pointing out to Michael Parkinson, as ably portrayed by Michael Parkinson, how The Picture On The Wall is inexplicably back up where it belongs DESPITE ALL OF US CLEARLY SEEING IT FALL OFF, EARLIER ON.

"We've created a séance... a massive séance!" warns Lin amidst a gathering storm of genuine paranormal activity in the BBC studio.

[Now, something that I cannot for the life of me understand, is why it sounds as though Lin's preceding line, "Jesus, Michael..." has been trimmed in the edit, particularly given this show's post-Watershed airing of 22:10. But I digress.]

"You haven't created a séance, you've opened a window." side-splits stand-up comedian and host, Paul.

His question to the team then follows, "That was a spooky moment from GHOSTWATCH, but on which day of the year was it broadcast?"

Now, in my view, this actually isn't half-bad a question considering, well, the show as a whole, thus far.

Of course, to any died-in-the-gloryhole Ghostwatcher, this simple quandary would feature in the first chapter, nay preface, of any prospective GHOSTWATCH quiz book [... actually, there's an idea]. When put to Fay's team, however, this proves a mite taxing to say the least, with two-thirds of its roster visibly bewildered in response. Wossy suggests to his team that they, "Take a stab", even though I can't help but suspect he knew the correct answer all along, before following-up with, "When would you have a spooky thing, what's the spooky night of the year?"

"... Hallowe'en?" tentatively offers Sindhu.

"Yes. I would say that, if I were you." suggests Ross.

When she does say that, however, Paul snaps back, "You didn't listen to the question properly. I said, what day... it was a Saturday. No, only joking. It was Hallowe'en. It was Hallowe'en."

Now, props must be given to Sinha for getting the actual day of the week right for transmission. Props also to the 'hoax' nature of his witty repaste, as it's about the same level and quality of gag that I might have attempted in such a scenario, and I'm really funny. Come to think of it, I wonder if he's a fellow Ghostwatcher..? That would be nice to find out.

In closing, having never before had the chance or ambition to watch PSTVS, I feel compelled to report an ever-so-slightly eerie vibe to the proceedings. Very possibly in line with COVID guidelines/restrictions, the audience appears to be positioned above the contestants, staring down as in a Roman amphitheatre from yester-millenium, in some kind of Kubrickian horseshoe loop. All appear to be sporting feature-obscuring facemasks and, like Pipes, I only really noticed them towards the end of the recording. What, to me, sounded like canned laughter, no doubt helped contribute to this perceived pervading sensory detachment. But what do I know? Anyway, Rob's team won.

The episode is currently available to view on ITV Hub care of just a simple click here.

Until next time... try not to have sleepless nights.