Biography Channel's "Paranormal Trauma" and Hauntings from the Past: A Television Review

Writers: Marcus Goodwin, Bert Klasey and Lisa Knapp.

Executive Producers: Matt Chan and Lisa Knapp.

Biography Channel has a new series called "Paranormal Trauma." Unlike its cousins that investigates the unknown, this program offers up a different formula that is heartily welcomed. This show deals with the people affected by their encounter with the supernatural and explores how they are coping.

The anxieties and dread these people felt has affected their daily life for far too long, and they are tired of it. Unless they get help, those emotions they harbour are just going to drag them down.

In the pilot episode, two cases are explored. The most intriguing one is about Matt, a man with a child’s fear of the dark. This problem developed after having encountered the ghost of his grandfather and cousin when he was at the age of 13. He was very close to them when they were alive, and their death affected him greatly. When these ghosts reached out to him for some unknown reason, the young Matt was by no means ready to comprehend the experience.

Matt resorted to drugs to sedate his anxieties and he developed a rough-and-tumble attitude. At the same time, he cannot hold a job and his life is constantly in the dregs. Everyone close to him is concerned, and until he gets the counseling he needs, he's not going to improve.

This series is interesting because it does not dwell on simply recounting the incident. Instead, it focuses on the healing process through psychiatry. Although the in-video process is a controversial method, to listen to Matt talk about how he has to get past his fears is somewhat interesting. To seeing him revisit the places where he encountered those spirits helps build some tension, and for Matt, the anxiety feels real. But no healing process happens overnight. It's a gradual one that, hopefully, the series will explore by following the clients they have introduced and seeing them through the entire process.

Even psychiatrist Dephyne Platner says there is a lot more work ahead of Matt. Both of them acknowledged that more has to be done. What viewers are seeing is that first appointment. Sometimes reasoning is all that's needed to explain what Matt is going through but sadly, that does not get explored. Matt's encounter could have simply been a product of him simply waking up. The perceptual world is still coming into focus but he is not 100% there yet.

With Biography Channel as the network broadcasting this show, this product comes through as slightly more believable. Their other program, "My Ghost Story," which features celebrities recounting their encounters, is a double-edged sword. These are actors who do what they do best, and the question of what viewers want to believe is simply on them. To sate the needs of a more demanding audience looking for some authentic ghost stories, "Paranormal Trauma" is at least getting original.

For paranormal television shows to evolve, it has to move away from the traditional formula of investigation and focus in on the people affected. This potentially new series does a reasonable job in getting viewers to emphathize with the victims. And instead of exploiting them, they are offered treatment that hopefully this program will chronicle instead of leaving off. Eventually, Matt will overcome his fear of the dark, and hopefully understand that his ghostly encounter is simply of his loved ones visiting to simply say, “we are doing okay.”

But for a young child, he is not going to understand that. His fright response is natural. And if the oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is indeed fear, as author H.P. Lovecraft wrote, then the most powerful medicine is to have the desire and hope to be healed. Without either of these emotions to motivate individuals to mend themselves with, nobody is going to crawl out of the hole, and that's a message "Paranormal Trauma" nicely delivers.

Overall 6 out of 10.

A preview of the show is available at the Biography Channel website:

Paranormal Trauma Video Preview

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