I love watching TV shows about ghost investigations. I dutifully tuned in to every episode of Paranormal State, and checked out Ghost Hunters and Ghost Adventures. Heck, I’ve been watching Supernatural since Season 1. I’ve seen a lot of questionable camera work and many things I can’t explain on those programs, but APTN’s The Other Side certainly seems to be on the up-and-up if you believe in the spirit world in the first place.
Returning Saturday on APTN—and just in time for Halloween—Season 2’s 13 half-hour back-to-back episodes of The Other Side once again mesh technology and the spirit world with things that go bump in the night as intuitive Jeff Richards, investigator Bill Connelly, spirit guide Tom Charles and researcher Priscilla Wolf investigate spookiness across Canada.
I screened Episode 4, “Love More,” and it’s pretty creepy stuff. Camped out at a burial ground for 16 hanged men outside Manitoba’s Headingley Prison, scientific instruments capture blips, bleeps and noises that are turned into a recognizable voice. Photographs taken at the scene uncover an orb—long thought to represent a wayward spirit—hanging out nearby. Is it really an executed murderer named Peter communicating with the team, or a local having them on? Backstory into the crime Peter was accused of rounds out the story nicely, adding a human face to the apparition the squad communicates with.
Regardless of your beliefs, The Other Side is solid entertainment. None of the team members freak out when something happens, an annoying trait on Ghost Adventures, and no jump cuts or sudden camera movements sully the shots.
Prior to Saturday’s return, The Other Side crew will be conducting a live-stream paranormal investigation on Thursday, Oct. 29, from the Senator Hotel, one of the oldest in Saskatoon. Check it out at 8:15 p.m. PT/11:15 p.m. ET from APTN’s website or the show’s website.
The Other Side airs Saturdays at 8 and 8:30 p.m. ET on APTN.
