The Blackwell Ghost 8

So, what can we take from Part 8?

1. Everyone in America has a really bad phone line that sounds like they're speaking from 1982.

2. The police have no idea how to analyse media and rely on genius amateur movie makers to do it for them.

3. Those selfsame amateur movie makers don't have to share any information with the police unless they reeeaaally want to.

4. The Blackwell Ghost has nothing to do with ghosts. It's a typical series focussing on the American paranoia of home invasions and 0 to do with anything supernatural.

5. Tracking Devices are big, have infinite battery life and connect to your local network as "Vehicle Tracker".

6. The director/actor of this series is so narcissistic, and believe themselves so much better than the police and everyone else, that they'll probably turn out to be a Real killer one day.

7. Sometimes, each sentence requires a different camera angle, so prepare to suffer from dizzy spells.

8. This franchise should've stopped 5 films ago.

In this, the eighth of the series wherein Turner Clay, likeable husband and father turned widower, answers the enigmatic questions in the search for a serial killer that the cops apparently can't even grapple with, we are further entertained. Yes, he somehow kept me watching again, damn likeable father. This time he finds clues and figures ciphers and, as usual, keeps it all interesting. He matches wooden discs to their destination. However! I'm not getting the scares that the first installments were so good at. The detective story is good but, after all, I'm here for the horror. The horror needs a comeback in this series.

I respect what Turner Clay (which appears to be an alias) has been trying to achieve with these films. There's not much else out there like this nowadays - essentially a longform web series like Marble Hornets, with some cheeky social media tricks that have hilariously convinced a lot of folks that this is a real documentary.

All the more impressive is that it's essentially a one man show.

His acting is great, the cinematography and editing is great, he writes all the music for the series, the ghost hunting of the early series was unique and compelling, and the Zodiac killer-style narrative he's designed is ambitious, albeit not at all unique and less compelling.

That said, it's becoming more and more obvious that this project is "steady work." The universe he's built is starting to collapse in on itself. The releases keep coming, but the quality has been on a steady decline since we went from a humble truth seeking ghost hunter, to witnessing his deceased wife playing piano from the afterlife, to now singlehandedly solving an active serial killer case that the police and FBI "don't feel like investigating" with the help of said ghosts.

The series appears to be losing audience interest with each installment as well, judging by Amazon review numbers.

I think he's keenly aware of this, which is why he's pivoting to a new ghost story, but it would probably benefit him to drop the pretense, maybe even rename the project to something fitting of an anthology, and earnestly engage with the audience about the content he's making like every other filmmaker on the planet.

It's pretty hard to believe that an entire police force has no idea how to analyze audio, and oblivious to the fact that to do was only a logical step, so for some reason, that really got under my skin.

And above that, perhaps they struggled to find the killer is because they do all their police work via telephone, with no actual "investigation" taking place. Dude's like, "I got a letter and a finger in the mail." And the response from the detective is basically like, "Cool." This has always been a sticky point for me, but the last two films it started to become overbearing and pretty incredulous, not to mention the sharing of evidence in what is probably an active case.

And I agree with another reviewer: why are all the phone conversations so horribly distorted? It does not add to the reality, only creates unnecessary distractions.

Pity though, because I did find them to be interesting and intriguing films, especially the Lightfoot arc.

The Blackwell series has been really good, for the most part. While I enjoyed the paranormal aspects of previous, I far prefer the new, grounded in "reality" approach. The shift away from the paranormal was needed. It had run its course. Having an actual killer is genuinely creepy, far more so than flipped tables, open cabinets, and ghosts banging on doors.

The only problem I have is that there's never a sense that Turner is in actual danger. He said so himself. The guy doesn't want to hurt him. It would add to the scares if the killer actually DID want to harm Turner. I'd like to see Turner get sick of being timid and tell this guy enough is enough. Bring it on.

I'm invested again. Hopefully 9 will come sooner than 8 did. Sitting on another year long "to be continued" would be a bummer.