Dead Boy Detectives—Seven Rules and Seven Buts of Being a Ghost
Ghosts might be supernatural beings seen by few people and understood by fewer people, but there are still rules to being a ghost.
The Dead Boy Detectives (otherwise known as Charles Rowland and Edwin Paine) make use of being ghosts by investigating everything from lost cats to stolen art to supernatural apocalypse (they are very versatile investigators).
Crystal Palace joins the Dead Boy Detectives after a terrifying incident at St Hilarion’s boarding school (the same school where Charles and Edwin were murdered).
To provide Crystal with an introduction to ghosts, Charles provides the seven advantages and seven drawbacks of being a ghost. Charles introduces the advantages as the rules to being a ghost:
Rule One.
Ghosts are able to pass through walls. This is an advantage when investigating a case as ghosts can access places other people can’t (and maybe don’t want to) access.
At the same time, ghosts are capable of stopping themselves from falling through floors.
Rule Two.
Ghosts are able to interact with the living and objects used by the living.
Unfortunately, ghosts are unable to feel. They might be able to eat a chocolate sundae but they can’t taste it. They might be able to give someone a hug, but they cannot feel the hug.
Rule Three.
In order to permanently use an object or wear clothes, it is necessary for ghost to use ghost objects. These are different from objects used by the living. When a person’s heart stops, any object they are touching becomes a ghost object and passes into the Neitherlands to be collected by traders like Tragic Mick.
Crystal experiences first hand the process of creating ghost objects. She travels to the Neitherlands when she is hit be an explosion. When she attends St Hilarion’s, the headmaster uses the students to create ghost objects for demons.
Rule Four.
Ghost can travel by walking or even by using public transport. They can also instantaneously move from one place to another by thinking about the other place. This is called sqwooshing.
The drawback is it makes some ghosts, like Charles, sick when they sqwoosh.
Rule Five.
Using a ghost road is another supernatural way for a ghost to travel. It offers supernatural movement from one place to another. However, the road is made of lost ghosts who are very scary and makes disembodied demands of any ghost who travels by a ghost road..
Rule Six.
Ghosts can project parts of themselves in the form of “little un’s”. It is not used very often. The “little un’s” are hard to control and more likely to cause trouble than be helpful.
Rule Seven.
The final rule and possibly one of the most significant advantages is ghost are immortal. They can exist indefinitely.
There are a couple of drawbacks. In the first instance, ghosts do not age. While Charles and Edwin might look the same age, Edwin died 80 years before Charles. Even after a couple of decades investigating, both Edwin and Charles look the same age. Edwin is over a 100 years old and Charles is over 40 years old.
The final drawback is Death, which you would imagine would not be a problem for ghost. However, Death will remove a ghost from this plane of reality. When Charles died at St Hilarion’s, Death arrived for him but he did not want to leave without Edwin. Death was not interested in Edwin and was in a hurry. So Death left both Charles and Edwin.
In the Netflix show, the Dead Boys Detectives will see Charles and Edwin using many of the advantages of being ghost to investigate a number of cases. They will also be looking to avoid the return of Death.
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