Something to Share?:Ridiculous Society in BBC's Ghosts

This chapter positions BBC’s sitcom Ghosts (2019–2023) as ridiculous, theorising the ridiculous as an alternative aesthetic experience to the sublime, eschewing its emphasis on individual magnificence in favour of collective laughter. All of the ghosts are represented as ridiculous: silly, low, and vulnerable. In the episodes focusing on Thomas and Kitty’s “sordid life stories”, misunderstanding is represented in a formally innovative fashion leading to a fresh appreciation of both characters. Whereas Thomas is led to a reckoning with his own ridiculousness, Kitty is allowed no such recognition, although her ridiculousness is the object of sympathy rather than ridicule for both the other characters and the show’s audience. The show focuses on the creation of a new affective community of the living and the dead who are bound not just by the setting of Button House but by their own ridiculous society.