You may have missed it, but most characters in CBS’ popularGhostsseries are similar to those inGhostsUK, the original British program.GhostsUK andGhostsUS are both critically acclaimed in their own nations, and the shows’ similarities aren’t by accident. The series share the same creators, who originated and starred in theBritishGhostsseries. British actors Matthew Baynton (as Thomas), Simon Farnaby (as Julian), Martha Howe-Douglas (as Fanny), Jim Howick (as Pat), Laurence Rickard (as Humphrey, Robin), and Ben Willbond (as the Captain) are executive producers for both respective series.
When the American series launched in 2021, nearlyevery CBS ghostresembled their UK counterparts. Both series had a young couple move into a haunted mansion, with Allison and Sam figuring out they can see the dead in the second episode. Both subsequently realized that they hadghosts from various time periods and backstoriesliving in their homes, groups of ghosts in their basement who died of a plague, and pesky neighbors who would try to overrun their B&B businesses. The US series significantly changed the UK version, distinguishing it as an American series.
9Sam Arondekar
Based On Allison Cooper
Rose McIver’sSam Arondekar draws inspiration from Charlotte Ritchie’s AllisonCooper of the BritishGhostsseries. Sam shares core qualities with Allison that define the UK program, primarily Allison’s ability to see ghosts after a near-death experience. That said, Sam’s unique abilities resulted from an accident in the American series, whereas one of the ghosts intentionally pushes Allison out a window inGhostsBBC.
The spirits that Sam and Allison can see in their respective series make up a family they never had.
Allison and Sam have other similarities, including the dynamic of being surrounded by their spouse’s family while having little family of their own. In the American show, Sam’s mother is deceased, and Jay’s sister, Bela, often stays with the young couple. In the British series, Mike’s family visits throughout, but Allison has no family. As such, the spirits that Sam and Allison can see in their respective series make up a sort of family they never had, and it’s a defining quality of each series.
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8Jay Arondekar
Based On Michael “Mike” Cooper
Utkarsh Ambudkar’sJay also draws inspiration from the BBC couple in the originalGhostsseries. Allison’s husband, Kiell Smith-Bynoe’s Mike Cooper, inspired the Jay character, and the leading husbands share important qualities that enable the concept of bothGhostsseries to work. Jay and Mike are both patient and have a large capacity for living with the ghosts in their homes without being able to see them. Mike and Jay’s tolerance and kindness to their partners and the ghosts in their homes is essential for the series to work.
When Thorfinn believes that Flower may have been“sucked off,”Jay tells Thor that in Hinduism, they believe that someone in Flower’s position is reborn after they die.
Jay and Mike share qualities, like being sneakerheads, that sustain their commonality. One improvement the American series made with Jay is that he’s a self-proclaimed nerd who enjoys science fiction and the paranormal more than your average person. As such, Jay is deeply intrigued by the ghosts. Mike doesn’t mind them in the original series, but he doesn’t have the same appreciation for them as Jay. Jay is also a talented chef who can cook for his visitors and guests. Lastly,Jay is Hindu, so he infuses fascinating perspectives on life and death into the AmericanGhostsnarrative.
7Thorfinn
Based On Robin
The USGhostsViking character, Devan Chandler Long’sThorfinn, is loosely based on Robinfrom the original British series. Thorfinn and Robin’s primary commonality is that they have been on their properties for the longest time and have seen many people, dead and alive, come and go. The main difference between the characters is their age. Even though Thor is 1000 years old, Robin is way older. Robin is a caveman who occupied the land of Button House, and the character is at least 100,000 years old.
Robin and Thorfinn can manipulate electricity similarly. The characters share the ability to make lights flicker and occasionally power electronics on and off with a significant amount of force.
Another commonality that Thor and Robin share is thatthey both died from being struck by lightning. However, their deaths are different. Lightning struck Robin while hiding in a tree to escape a bear. Thorfinn’s story gives the character a bit less credit in theGhosts' Woodstone B&B timeline. In the American series, Thor is struck by lightning because he is wearing his metal Viking helmet in a thunderstorm. That said, the result of the characters’ deaths was the same.
6Isaac Higgintoot
Based On The Captain
Brandon Scott Jones' Isaac Higgintoot has similarities to the Captain fromGhostsUK. Isaac Higgintoot is a Revolutionary War soldier who died on the property before it was the Woodstone Estate.The Captain was a World War II soldier stationed at Button Housein the 1940s. Isaac and the Captain died in their uniforms and felt a sense of disgrace surrounding their deaths. Isaac died of dysentery, whereas the Captain died of a heart attack. Isaac and the Captain brought diversity to their series as gay men, though neither felt comfortable acting on their sexuality during their lifetime.
The American series made an essential change to Isaac, allowing him to explore his sexuality in the afterlife.
Isaac and the Captain provide a sense of order to the ghosts, presiding over the other paranormal members of the house as if they were their former battalions. Isaac also borrows a trope from Thomas, a dead English poet in the BritishGhostsseries. Thomas had a disdain for Lord Byron, one of the significant figures of the Romantic movement, despite Thomas’ failure in his field. Isaac similarly abhors Alexander Hamilton, and his obsession worsened when Sam revealed that Alexander Hamilton was famous and had a musical produced about his life.
5Hetty Woodstone
Based On Stephanie “Fanny” Euphemia Button
Henrietta “Hetty” Eleanor Woodstone is one of the most prominent characters based on a British series spirit. Like Martha Howe-Douglas’ Fanny or"Lady Button"character, Rebecca Wisocky’sHetty is the lady of the estate. One significant difference between Hetty and Fanny is that Hetty’s family seems to have built the Woodstone Mansion, whereas Lady Button married into the Button House. Still, both characters inhabited the house during their lives, familiarizing them with their estates. One difference between Fanny and Hetty is that the latter changes more throughout the series, adapting to new beliefs and ideologies.
Fanny falls out of the second-story window every morning in the British series, reliving her death.
Another quality that separates Hetty from Lady Button is the cause of their death.Hetty’s death inGhostswas self-inflicted, whereas Fanny was pushed out the window by her husband. Hetty and Fanny also share a connection to Sam and Allison. Hetty and Fanny are distantly related to the women who inherit their family homes, and they serve as maternal figures to Sam and Allison, advising them on business and customs whether it’s wanted or not.
4Alberta Haynes
Based On Katherine “Kitty” Higham
CBS’Ghostsloosely based Danielle Pinnock’s Alberta Haynes on Lilly Adefope’s Kitty character. Both characters incorporate historical Black stories into their series, and their most common thread is an element of their backstory regarding the events of their death.Kitty and Alberta have mysterious circumstances surrounding their deaths, and in both series, the other ghosts investigate. The spirits investigate Alberta’s death in the American series for a podcast. In the British series, they are curious about Kitty’s death because her retelling of the event is naive. Still, both ghosts died of poisoning. However, the events of Alberta’s death were malicious.
Thomas Woodstone poisoned Alberta with a toxic bottle of moonshine, while Kitty died of a poisonous spider bite.
Both parties suspect that the character’s sister was behind her death. InGhostsUK, Kitty’s sister is an awful Georgian noblewoman who resents her sister. In the American series, however, Alberta is fond of her sister, and to save Alberta’s memory of her sister, Hetty admits that the murderer was her son, Thomas. A significant contrast between the characters is that Alberta is indelibly more street-smart and snappy than Kitty, who is bubbly and innocent. Still, both women are charming in their own right and arguably the best dressed in their afterlives.
3Crash
Based On Humphrey Ignatius Bone
Crash is a 1950s greaser in the AmericanGhostsseries, loosely based on Headless Humphrey fromGhostsUK. The connection between Crash and Humphrey is their deaths and how they must spend their afterlife. Both characters had their heads cut off, making their heads fully detached in the afterlife. For both characters, this ends up being a complete pain.Crash and Humphrey’s heads are constantly dislocatedfrom their bodies, causing the characters to spend most of the series as talking heads.
Hudson Thames (season 1), Alex Boniello (season 2), and Matt Keyes (body) portray Crash.
A primary difference between Crash and Humphrey is that the latter has a much more significant role in the UK series. While Humphrey is often just a talking head, he is in more scenes than Crash, who sparsely appears in the American series. The actor who plays Humphrey in Ghosts UK also plays Robin, giving the actor, one of the executive producers, more screen time.
2Pete Martino
Based On Patrick “Pat” Bobby Butcher
Richie Moriarty’s Peter “Pete” Martino resembles Pat fromGhostsUK.Pete and Pat were both scout troop leaders, shot in the neck with an arrow by someone from their scout troop. After their deaths, both characters, who died in the 1980s, get regular visits from their families on the anniversary of their deaths. Pete and Pat both had a wife named Carol, to whom they stayed loyal until they realized that their spouse, who had married their best friend, had been unfaithful during their marriage.
In the British series, the other ghosts help Pat realize the apparent signs of his wife’s affair, but in the American series, Carol admits her affair to Pete, not knowing he is in the room when she recounts the event to Sam. The American version ofGhostsalso gives Pete’s wife, Carol, a recurring role in the series after Carol dies on the property and joins Pete in the afterlife.
The differences between the characters are slight tweaks to their stories, as both characters share a chipper, optimistic attitude and only occasionally show the chinks in their metaphorical armor. In the American series, Pete went to lie down after he was shot, whilePat had a fit and tried to drive a busto get help. Unfortunately, Pat crashes the bus into a tree in the UK version. Still, there are no characters more similar between Ghosts US and Ghosts UK than Pete and Pat, who both play a crucial role in the morale of their respective cohorts.
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1Trevor Lefkowitz
Based On Julian Fawcett
Lastly, Asher Grodman’s Trevor Lefkowitz shares commonalities withGhostsUK’s Julian. BothTrevor and Julian died without their pants on, leaving them exposed from the waist down in their afterlives. Both characters are womanizers. However, the American series improved Julian Fawcett’s politician character. Julian, an MP, died without his pants on because he was intimately engaged with his secretary, cheating on his wife, which is something he did regularly. While the assumption is that Trevor also died while having sex, Ghosts season 1 revealed that Trevor died without his pants on because he gave them to a friend.
Trevor also borrows a trope from Thomas from the UK show. When Allison first moves into Button House, Thomas is infatuated with her and proclaims his love for her throughout the series. Trevor is similarly struck by Sam when she first appears at Woodstone Mansion.
Another similarity between Julian and Trevor is their role in Allison and Sam’s unique abilities. In the British series, Julian pushed Allison out the window. Again, the American series improved the character. Trevor was responsible for Sam’s near-death experience because she tripped over a vase that he intentionally knocked over onto the floor. While it caused Sam to fall down the stairs inGhostsUS, it was an honest mistake.
Ghosts (US)
Cast
Ghosts is a comedy series about Samantha and Jay, who convert a country estate into a bed-and-breakfast. Unbeknownst to them, the house is inhabited by ghosts of former residents, visible only to Samantha. The show blends humor with supernatural elements as the couple navigates their unusual challenges.
