Review: "Fact or Faked"

(Enjoy--two for the price of one, or is that four for the price of one? Well, Dale horned in with my gal and me)

The newest episode of "Fact or Faked" picked two interesting cases; ghost writing on photographs and a sea monster in PA. In their usual manner, they interviewed the eyewitnesses at the lake where the monster was photographed and seen. Then, they checked to see if logs could reproduce the look of it. When that didn't work, they built a sea monster and floated him and took photos from a distance. Now, before you beat them up for building a monster just to prove that it was too much work for a local to put into a prank, they had to do it to show us if it looked similar and it did, but not 100%. So, off to inspect the lake from underneath with sonar and then some nighttime diving. The determination was that it was unexplained...

Next, someone thinks something paranormal is happening in their house. When they take Polaroid pictures, words are etched on them. They were told there is a body under their house by a psychic. There is a vortex in the house supposedly. The team decided to use the camera and try taking pics towards the vortex area. When they got nothing, they tried some techniques to recreate it on the film. Their experiment didn't work out. Then, they decided to try and recreate the video of ghost writing. They erected some plexiglass and put some writing on it and did Polaroids and videotaped. They found the plexiglass was too bright and reflective. Now, they decided to look under the house with ground penetrating radar to find the supposed body buried there. They actually found some bones and they were...cow and chicken. So, they studied the credibility of the people

ultimately when they couldn't recreate how it was done. The voice analysis showed credibility. So, this was...unexplained.

Okay, so let's break it down. I still like the premise and am excited by disputing viral videos. Part of me wants them to sit back in their seats and pull a Joel McHale "The Soup" on them and just throw popcorn at the screen and mock the vids, but then I'm a huge fan "MST 3000."

That said, I'm still waiting for someone to break an expression, get a personality, and get ruffled. It's the Martha Stewart versus Julia Roberts syndrome. What is that, you ask? Martha is flawless, self-conscious, immaculate, constantly circumspect. Julia is, well, spontaneous, bursts into laughter, trips over things, willing to burp and look crazy. Who do we like better? Who do we identify with? Who is lovable? Yeah, it's kinda like that. We compare the show to "Mythbusters" but the fact is Jaime and Adam are wicked awesome with personalities and their gang is too. They love what they do and you can't imagine them doing anything else, same with "Destination Truth" and Josh Gates and "Ghost Hunters" with its grumpy pants, Jason.

If I'm recasting the show? I'm cool with Ben. He's smart, he's calm, he's a steady voice. I'd keep Bill because he's sassy and enthusiastic and rough around the edges and smart. I'd dump both of the expressionless women who don't seem to add anything to the mix but a low level of anxiety. I'd get rid of the guy who looks too much like Ben. He confuses the hell out of me. I'd add a brassy woman who is assertive and doesn't accept answers and I'd add a middle-aged man who is excited like a kid about everything and gullible. Hey, I'm casting this make-believe redo, you design your own version. We need some confrontational personalities because, honestly, when we see these videos online, we laugh and sometimes we defend the videos to the end as being genuine. I want that water cooler banter going on. I want to know where they stand before they investigate and challenge each other to prove or disprove. Right now, they are just too freaking polite, calm, and self-conscious. I don't have any doubt with one season of "seasoning" they will get the formula right. I saw this with lots of other SyFy hits.

QUIZ: Was it Bill or Ben who went in search of the sea monster?

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