Pages

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Fact or Faked

Fact or Faked is a fairly new show from the Syfy network described as the following (from the official website):
"Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files revolutionizes paranormal programming by investigating the evidence witnesses post on the Internet every day. Have you ever seen a photo or video online and wondered, "Is this real?" This is the show that will answer that question.

Heading up the Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files team is Ben Hansen, a former FBI agent with a life-long fascination with the paranormal. Now, having left the agency, he leads a young team of intrepid investigators who will convene to dissect the latest unusual images and decide whether they merit further investigation. Grainy videos will be brought to life as the team conducts thorough and elaborate experiments in an attempt to recreate the phenomena, and Ben will make the final choice which cases will require a trip into the field.

Once an investigation is underway, the team will talk to witnesses, carry out experiments using the latest in high tech detection devices, collect physical samples, and determine whether a case should be debunked, or whether it's a baffling paranormal mystery that might even put the team in danger. It's all in a day's work for the dogged investigators of Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files."

I like the concept of this show. however, they seem to apply the same method of thinking as the rest of the paranormal shows, If A=3 and B=5 and the equation before you is A+B=X, and you cannot solve it….one should not assume that X does not exist and maybe you should just solve for Y.

A fine example of this was their mid-season finale in which they investigate a video submitted by an amateur ghost hunter of an alleged apparition.



(please excuse the video quality)

Here are some stills of the "ghost train"











...it's a spider.

This fact goes unnoticed as the team comes up with much more elaborate explanations in an effort to "debunk" the video:



Guys, it's a spider.

Driving ATVs through a graveyard is awesome, though.

2 comments:

  1. Hilarious. I had the chance to interview Hansen a few months ago. Nice guy. I liked him. He also assured me that Fact of Faked was taking the criticism from the skeptic community and applying it proactively to future episodes. I've seen pieces of episodes here and there since then and, uh, yeah...it doesn't appear much has changed. It still comes down to: "Well, we tried these two explanations and that didn't work. So, it must be the most complicated possible explanation we can come up with." IE: phantom, lake monster, or...ghost train.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Are you familiar with the video Rocky Mountain Paranormal created involving the Ouija board? Here's a link http://tinyurl.com/2er4x5t.

    ReplyDelete