Ghosts – Whodunnit

Spencer Cook (Michael Boatman), the new Editor-In-Chief of the Ulster County Review, tells Sam (Rose McIver) that she needs to wrap up her Alberta (Danielle Pinnock) podcast in one final episode. With that challenge, Sam heads home to tell Jay (Utkarsh Ambudkar) and the ghosts that they need to figure this out. Jay immediately gets to work on securing red yarn to put together a murder board. 

While Sam, Jay, and the rest of the ghosts are busy on Alberta’s murder, Trevor (Asher Grodman), Pete (Richie Moriarty), and Flower (Sheila Carrasco) are busy in the kitchen on the computer. At the request of Pete, Trevor helped Pete create an e-mail so he could subscribe to a Reader’s Digest daily joke e-mail. However, Pete manages to get a seemingly innocuous e-mail from a Nigerian Prince asking for financial assistance. This email piques the interest of Trevor, Pete, and Flower.  

With a murder board worthy of any crime show, Alberta starts to recall the events on the night of her death. While Woodstone was jumping with activity, Hetty (Rebecca Wisocky), Thorfinn (Devan Chandler Long), Sasappis (Román Zaragoza), and Isaac (Brandon Scott Jones) were there watching events unfold. Alberta recalls that her boyfriend Earl (Brooks Brantly) had been arguing with owner Thomas Woodstone (Daniel Rindress-Kay). In her dressing adjusting her wig, Alberta asks about the nature of the argument and Earl assures her that it was over money. Earl leaves the dressing room first and when Alberta goes to step out, she finds a bottle of liquor that she proceeds to drink….the very same bottle of liquor that killed her.  

Trying to figure out whether to help the Nigerian Prince or ignore the email, Trevor, Pete, and Flower are at a crossroads. On one hand, helping out the Prince would guarantee that they are heroes. On the other hand, they realize that they aren’t able to help out and Trevor sends an apology. 

Starting to pull together their list of suspects, the group focuses on the two people that had motive to take out Alberta: Theresa (Asia Martin) and Clara (Mercedes Morris). For Theresa, she ended up being with Earl after Alberta’s death and could be the mysterious “T.” And with Clara, it’s possible that she wanted Alberta out to take her place onstage. Yet the longer the discussion goes, it becomes clear that Clara was a potential informant for the authorities and therefore not a suspect. But despite all signs pointing to Theresa, Alberta refuses to believe her sister would do that to her. When Sam points out that Alberta died by strychnine, which is found in rat poison….the investigation heads downstairs to the basement ghosts to see if they remember anything. 

Upstairs, Trevor comes to tell Pete and Flower that the Prince has responded to them. If they send him $1,000, he will send them $50,000 for their help. Trevor realizes that he knows Sam and Jay’s banking information and convinces Pete that this is the way they can help out. While initially reluctant, Pete agrees as he wants to flex that hero complex. They go through with sending the money to the Nigerian Prince and are ready to celebrate….before realizing that they were scammed and the cost would be all of Sam and Jay’s money.  

In the basement, the ghosts are asked about their recollection of the night Alberta was murdered. While at first they don’t have any information to offer, they remember seeing Al Capone (Jeremy Luke) come down to the basement and procures the rat poison….still bitter about Alberta’s rejection. With the murder solved, Hetty tells Alberta that her demise is at the hands of a famous gangster….something to be proud of.  

Unfortunately, Nigel (John Hartman) recalls seeing Theresa stop Al Capone from imbibing the rat poison and takes the bottle of booze laced with strychnine away from him. This information leaves Alberta with no choice but to believe that her sister was involved with her murder. Realizing that she cannot let Alberta believe her sister betrayed her, Hetty finally admits that she knows who murdered Alberta: her son Thomas.  

The night of Alberta’s murder, Hetty was with her son Thomas all night and witnessed that the discussion Earl and Thomas were having was over their relationship. And when Thomas told Earl to choose between him and Alberta…Earl chose Alberta. Hurt by Earl’s choice and handed the bottle of poisoned liquor by an annoyed Theresa, Thomas decided to take matters into his own hands and take out Alberta. With this information, Alberta is relieved that Theresa did not murder her. However, Hetty deliberately withholding information about her murder upsets her more and Alberta admits how she can’t believe she considered Hetty a friend. 

Later, Hetty tries to apologize to Alberta as she never found a good time to admit that her son was the culprit. Instead, Hetty focuses on how much she has come to value Alberta in her life and was willing to put their friendship on the line so that Alberta’s image of her sister was not destroyed. While Alberta can appreciate that she did that to preserve the relationship with her sister, Alberta is more hurt as she had come to see Hetty like a sister….and then was betrayed by her. Alberta leaves the room, leaving Hetty in tears over the tatters of their relationship. 

Realizing that they need to tell Sam the truth, Trevor, Flower, and Pete seek her out to admit that hers and Jay’s money is gone. But Sam has already gotten the text alert about the fraud and made sure to cancel the transaction. With that done, Sam reminds them that they are not allowed to use the computer and were duped the same way older people have been lured into scams like this one. While they take offense to the accusation, later on Trevor, Pete, and Flower manage to be scammed once more during a commercial about reverse mortgages.