It’s been a while now since Ghost Hunters was canceled/opted not to return to SyFy, and the departure left more questions than answers. Mainly, why did the series end after the 12th season, and when and where will it turn up again? Jason Hawes said at the time that the show would be back, but offered no specific or concrete information. But I came across this article yesterday, where he tries to give some answers. It’s a long, rambling piece with lots of self-congratulatory pats on the back mixed in with a healthy dose of pot shots at other shows, and not a lot of real answers, so I’ll just paste the relevant points below, with my thoughts, of course.
They kept it “real”
Craig made a statement to us that he stayed true to for all 12 years. ’I won’t step on your toes, Get in your way or stop you from running your crew the way you want. I just want to roll Cameras during your investigations and see how it goes. If you guys don’t do it, Someone else will and how will they portray the Field that you all love so much?’
That sold it to us. We would be allowed to ‘Keep it real and stay ourselves!’
We agreed to do a Season and see how it turned out.
Hmmm. Maybe we should ask Brian Harnois, Andy Andrews, Kristyn Gartland, Donna LaCroix, Mike Dion, Lisa Dowaliby, and other original team members how they feel about this statement?
On why Ghost Hunters left the SyFy Channel
When we got to the end of our 12th season, We felt it time to move on from Syfy channel. Syfy was splitting up our seasons. Airing 4 Episodes here, 4 Episodes there, and so forth.
‘Ghost Hunters’ was considered a ‘Tent Pole show’. What this means in ‘HollyWood’ is, Our Ratings were so high that Syfy thought to put ‘A few of our New shows airing prior to a New show they were trying to kick off’ in hopes that ‘Ghost Hunters’ viewers would stick around to watch their New show.
The Fans found it hard to get any answers on when the show was airing, Why the seasons were so short and when the Seasons would start. They would send emails to Syfy asking for answers and never get any response.
We felt that the lack of communication, Respect and support was to much to handle. Since Pilgrim and TAPS owned ‘Ghost Hunters’, We decided we didn’t want to go any further with Syfy and stopped doing the show for their Network.
I can kinda sorta see why Jason would be upset at this, but this is how TV works, especially these days. “Enjoy your 6 episodes of Game of Thrones, and be sure to catch Part 2 of the season in 2022!” It’s just how episodic television is nowadays. Same thing goes for “tent pole” shows. The television industry has always used popular shows as lead-ins to new shows they are banking on when they need to attract more viewers.
I think the bigger issue here, and one that Jason doesn’t directly address, is that he’s upset that SyFy was airing other paranormal shows after Ghost Hunters. Anyone watching the show past Season 2 or so can vouch for the fact that they hate admitting that any other paranormal teams even exist. So it must have really stuck in his craw that other shows were airing, thus proving that other paranormal groups do indeed exist. So Jason, TAPS and Pilgrim took their ball and went home. According to him, anyway. So where does that take us?
The Future of Ghost Hunters
As of right now, Craig Paligian and Pilgrim Films & Television are talking with numerous Networks about the future of ‘Ghost Hunters’.
There have been offers, But we want it to be done right. We want to keep it real. To be honest, We want to make it fresh again.
So many other shows have come and gone, Copying our format.
It’s been done endless times. If we are going to do it, We want to change it up and make it different from the endless copies that have come and many gone, since we started in 2004.
These things are usually big legal deals and take serious time.
I can say there is a lot of big things in the works. TV, Motion pictures, Radio and more.
So we are enjoying some down time for now and will be doing some great stuff if the near future.
Translation: “We screwed the pooch.” Look, love it or hate it, Ghost Hunters was a ratings juggernaut for a quirky little network like SyFy. And honestly, it was a perfect fit. But as popular as it was, it was still a niche show with a limited fan base. SyFy was big enough to reach a lot of homes, and genre-specific enough for a show like Ghost Hunters and all the other paranormal fare they tried to peddle to be somewhat successful. Ironically, SyFy has since eased off the paranormal cavalcade, and so if they had stayed, Ghost Hunters would be pretty much the sole survivor, and Jason could rest easy and not worry about any other paranormal investigators trying to steal his thunder. So now what?
Possibilities
SyFy is part of NBCUniversal, so they can forget channels like USA, E!, Chiller, Bravo, Oxygen, etc., which are also under that NBCUniversal umbrella. I doubt Discovery would want them, as their Animal Planet subsidiary has Finding Bigfoot, and I’m pretty sure they are even dumping that. A&E is a possibility, but they are running with The Lowe Files right now. “Paranormal competition bad!” says Jason Hawes, so he may not go for that. They can go to Destination America, the cable TV dumping ground where terrible paranormal shows go to die, but then again, we’re back to competing programs. Plus, Destination America doesn’t reach nearly as many households as SyFy does (by a difference of approximately 40 million), so a definite step down.
Subscriptions services like Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Prime are possibilities, and maybe the best ones at this point, but I don’t know if those services will want to pay out what Pilgrim will want. I just don’t know if those services will see the show as a great value-add. Ultimately, Hawes/TAPS/Pilgrim need a place where they will get great ratings and exposure, bring in the amount of cash they are used to, and never, ever have to act as a lead-in to another paranormal show. I just don’t see it happening. As I said, I think SyFy was the perfect fit for them, and I’m having a hard time figuring out where they will end up and still have that sort of reach and momentum.
“But wait,” you say, “maybe they’ll pursue motion pictures or radio, as Jason mentioned?” Well, radio is a terrible idea here, as this sort of thing lends itself more to a visual medium. People want to see the locations, view the evidence (and I use that term loosely) for themselves. Sure, they can get into podcasting or whatever, but it won’t have the same impact and influence as the old show had. He also mentioned motion pictures. Really? Will people pay $12.50 to watch a glorified 90-minute Ghost Hunters episode? Highly doubtful, and even more doubtful that a studio would green-light it.
The End?
I’m not saying we’ve seen the last of Ghost Hunters. They may surprise me and turn up somewhere totally unexpected. But honestly, I don’t see them ever recapturing their glory days. The longer they are gone, the less people will care. And the less people care, the harder it will be to sell this show to a major media outlet, whether that’s TV, radio, whatever. New shows are always popping up to fill that void, and the paranormal craze itself seems to be losing steam. But for now, I guess they’ll just keep making appearances on the convention circuit, along with the guy who played Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th Part XXVII.
Is it possible to show reruns of Ghost Hunters? I think most of us would still like to watch the show sometimes!!!!!!
I’m amazed that Ghost Hunters lasted as long as it did, particularly after Grant’s “collar pull”. I don’t know how it was viewed from the actual paranormal community, but for me that was the end.
I agree this is a production company and they are out to make money by sensationalizing trivial things. Are ghosts real? Absolutely as real as the ghosts of Ghost hunters past?
Oh yeah, I remember “Collargate”. I’ve watched the show from the very first episode. But they need to go back to helping families like Dead Files with Psychic Medium Amy Allen .
That’s how they started out. Historic places are fine, but a lot of fans missed them assisting families and got tired of seeing them at historic places. I even suggested a few places in my area, which local paranormal teams have investigated and mentioned on their forum, but nothing happend. I watch Ghost Adventures and Dead Files.
I loved there show they were the real deal if they come back they will be a success
Let’s be real. Everything you see short of news reels is just a different show to entertain and make money.
Today’s world likes the documentary shows where it looks live, but don’t fall for them.
I have meet some of the crews that have done shows in WV. Here everyone still believes Mothman is a real monster and not a large barn owl…lol.
The show Mountain Monsters actually made up more myths than I a 60 yr resident of WV
have ever heard of. I have spent years in the outdoors and woods never seen even a deformed squirrel.
Is there ghosts running around looking for old landmarks to haunt? NO!
Don’t believe what you see on TV, just enjoy the show, and laugh.
Youtube. Done.
Seems simple enough, but no way it could work. They’d need to hire a whole crew, and the monetization from YouTube would in no way come anywhere near what SyFy was able to pay them. YouTube is great for people in their basements reviewing toys or video games, but for Ghost Hunters? I don’t think so.
As with the previous comment youtube isn’t a viable option for any serious show as they can’t ever pay the cash for any decent show due to the no pay/low pay audience that watches youtube. This includes myself as well as I tried the trial of youtube red and dumped it as it was a joke which had three months free trial however had no decent shows on it. The best medium that has money would be amazon as they have the audience size, cash, and competence to make it a go again. As well they can reach more viewers than syfy and any cable medium could ever dream of. the only other alternative would be free broadcast as more people are dropping cable. I myself haven’t had cable for yrs and I grew up with cable as a regular thing if you had the money lol.
Ghost hunters need to get back on the air they were the first paranormal show on tv and i miss them alot i watched the show fathfully and wish it would come back really soon been off to long.
I watch ghost adventures too. In away it borders on the the ridiculous. I would rather
Watch ghost hunters. I never missed a show. But i miss jason and the crew. Jason i
Truly believed your show. Zak baggans is borderline comedic. Come back jason and crew
.
I will never stop hoping for the return of ghost hunters!!! My whole family truly miss our favorite show!!, love and miss all of you. Fingers crossed for more ghost hunters in our future!!!!!!!!
Come on ,get back two ghost hunting like you used to and bring back grant you two are,abbottand you no who you need to be together whith the same crew we are getting. older buy the day so come back and help your fans out. your show was the best paranormal show of its kind good luck
Come on lets get back to ghost hunting on tv like youused twoyour fans need both you and grant plus steve and tango it was the best and can be again so please get started on a. new ghost hunting show. good luck guys
I personally miss the show. Wouldn’t mind watching some of the reruns. Perhaps there may have been some moments where things had been staged but for the most part I think the show encapsulated the real moments of what happens at night inside a haunted home. Do I really believe it. Well I myself grew up in a home with some unusual mishaps. I lived there 22 years and grew use to it. If I had to guess I think the ghost hunters would say it was a residual haunting. lol.
I think they need to stay retired. We got so tired of the boredom and the other non personal crap Mr.Jason pulled with his oh you can’t run, you can’t be scared, you can’t have a personality stuff. But you can fake some stuff like the collar pull and the table lamp move and others. He is so full of himself. I agree with this guy that wrote this in the article about Jason’s comment. “It’s a long, rambling piece with lots of self-congratulatory pats on the back mixed in with a healthy dose of pot shots at other shows, and not a lot of real answers.”And he goes on with a lot more of his crap.
Jason Hawes had a fluke of luck getting this show. He didn’t know anything about ghost when he would go to people’s houses saying he could help. He told them all the same thing. He told ALL of them don’t worry, nothing bad here, just tell them it’s your house and for them to leave you alone. Well that’s just simply not true in some cases. Point being he didn’t know what he was doing and it left alot of people in a worse situation after he left.
Do us all a favor stay retired and keep doing that fake roto rooter stuff. Even that was a joke. Fake roto rooter jobs on the show to advertise for roto rooter. Anybody else enjoy that.
I still miss them. Would love to see them on any network anytime!!
Ghost Hunters was fake from the beginning, long before Grant’s collar pull. Remember that ridiculously fake stealing incident on location in NYC, when supposely a man walking down the street walked off with their equipment. LOL. Uh huh. Sure. It was so obviously set up for dramatic effect. Remember when the TAPS crew rescued the lost fishermen out at sea? Uh huh. Yeah right. It’s all a set-up. I wish people would see through this crap. Ghost Hunters has been faking stuff for dramatic effect since its inception. It is for entertainment only, always has been.
I enjoyed Ghost Hunters and miss it. I just can’t watch Ghost Adventures or any of the other goofy ripoffs. I could watch Kindred Spirits because of Amy and Adam, but all that’s aired now are the same handful of episodes over and over; nothing new and killing my interest in it.
I’d like to see TAPS/Pilgrim and SCIFI hug and make up, but whatever the beef really is between them must run pretty deep, because they are all walking away from a nice pile of cash.
Sometimes it’s not about money and someone’s ego needs to be stroked. Yeah, it’s disagreeable, but there’s a pile of money over there waiting for all of you! Get over it!
It’s too late for them to come back, they have been gone too long…everyone needs to accept it and move on!
I agree. The moment has passed.
Bravo Jean Thomas, you said just about everything I was going to say. I watched G H from the beginning and you were so right about Jason, I didn’t like his attitude. I mean his partner Grant left.
Ghost Adventures is the absolute worst group of ACTORS ever. Their “possessions” are totally ridiculous. “Dude” is their main vocabulary. Tried to watch a couple of times but the scripted commentary with suggestions of what they say is happening turned me and the channel off. Disgusting portrayal!
Ghost Hunters were the Beatles of the paranormal… Were they the best there was? Or were they just in the right place at the right time? We needed GH just like we all needed the Beatles. And yes there were other “acts” that followed. But like the Beatles, the guys from GH got burned out. Money changes everything. And then you begin to forget what got you into this adventure to begin with…
We may see them all together again some day, but probably not. Not like we would like. We should just be grateful that they came along when they did in the first place. Personally speaking as a paranormal investigator, they really helped in cleaning up this field, ridding it of the rif-raf… I’m grateful to them. Fake or not.
If they were fake – which they were – wouldn’t they also be part of the riff raff?
Ghost Hunters was the best! Miss it a lot!
Wish it would come back! Travel Channel should get them back.
Looks like they were back with Ghost Nation, which was pretty high tech and glossy but I prefer Season 1 of GH to this! I also preferrred when they did homes instead of echoy theaters and museums. I was upset with Collargate and the sliding lamp as well, after having been fans for so long, seeing them fake things was pretty sad. Grant was back with Ghost Hunters, but I ditched Hulu a few years ago and don’t know if they’re still on.
Ghost Adventures, I don’t know what to think of those guys, and Kindred Spirits, no way. I was so glad to see Amy and Adam leave GH. We’d play a game, put a dollar onto the coffee table and take bets on what time Adam would say, “Something touched me,” and whoever had closet time took the cash. Everywhere they went something touched him. Never liked him from the Ghost Hunters Academy days when he acted like a publicity seeking little snot, was not happy when they picked him. I did try watching Kindred Spirits but they kept stopping to play back things, and loud background effects, just irritating.