List of Crap #75: Top 50 Ghosts Countdown

[Johnny Unusual]

"Ever since I was a little boy, I always wanted to be a ghost.  Luckily it happened sooner than expected."

[Johnny Unusual]

Number 7

The Flying Dutchman

(73  points on 4 of 12 lists. Top Vote #2 Stethacantus and Tripe)

The Flying Dutchman is a legendary ghost ship that can never make port and is doomed to sail the oceans forever. The myth is likely to have originated from 17th-century nautical folklore. The oldest extant version dates to the late 18th century. Sightings in the 19th and 20th centuries reported the ship to be glowing with ghostly light. If hailed by another ship, the crew of the Flying Dutchman will try to send messages to land, or to people long dead. In ocean lore, the sight of this phantom ship is a portent of doom.

Spoilered for length.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The first reference in print to the ship appears in Chapter VI of A Voyage to Botany Bay (1795) (also known as A Voyage to New South Wales), attributed to George Barrington (1755–1804):

“I had often heard of the superstition of sailors respecting apparitions, but had never given much credit to the report; it seems that some years since a Dutch man-of-war was lost off the Cape of Good Hope, and every soul on board perished; her consort weathered the gale, and arrived soon after at the Cape. Having refitted, and returning to Europe, they were assailed by a violent tempest nearly in the same latitude. In the night watch some of the people saw, or imagined they saw, a vessel standing for them under a press of sail, as though she would run them down: one in particular affirmed it was the ship that had foundered in the former gale, and that it must certainly be her, or the apparition of her; but on its clearing up, the object, a dark thick cloud, disappeared. Nothing could do away the idea of this phenomenon on the minds of the sailors; and, on their relating the circumstances when they arrived in port, the story spread like wild-fire, and the supposed phantom was called the Flying Dutchman. From the Dutch the English seamen got the infatuation, and there are very few Indiamen, but what has some one on board, who pretends to have seen the apparition.”

The next literary reference, which introduces the motif of punishment for a crime, was in John Leyden (1775–1811): Scenes of Infancy (Edinburgh, 1803):

“It is a common superstition of mariners, that, in the high southern latitudes on the coast of Africa, hurricanes are frequently ushered in by the appearance of a spectre-ship, denominated the Flying Dutchman ... The crew of this vessel are supposed to have been guilty of some dreadful crime, in the infancy of navigation; and to have been stricken with pestilence ... and are ordained still to traverse the ocean on which they perished, till the period of their penance expire.”

Thomas Moore (1779–1852) in his poem Written on passing Dead-man's Island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Late in the evening, September, 1804 places the vessel in the north Atlantic: "Fast gliding along, a gloomy bark / Her sails are full, though the wind is still, / And there blows not a breath her sails to fill." A footnote adds: "The above lines were suggested by a superstition very common among sailors, who call this ghost-ship, I think, 'the flying Dutch-man'."

Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832), a friend of John Leyden's, was the first to refer to the vessel as a pirate ship, writing in the notes to Rokeby; a poem (first published December 1812) that the ship was "originally a vessel loaded with great wealth, on board of which some horrid act of murder and piracy had been committed" and that the apparition of the ship "is considered by the mariners as the worst of all possible omens."

According to some sources, the 17th century Dutch captain Bernard Fokke is the model for the captain of the ghost ship. Fokke was renowned for the speed of his trips from the Netherlands to Java and was suspected of being in league with the Devil. The first version of the legend as a story was printed, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine for May 1821, which puts the scene as the Cape of Good Hope. This story introduces the name Captain Hendrick Vanderdecken for the captain and the motifs (elaborated by later writers) of letters addressed to people long dead being offered to other ships for delivery, but if accepted will bring misfortune; and the captain having sworn to round the Cape of Good Hope though it should take until the day of judgment.

“She was an Amsterdam vessel and sailed from port seventy years ago. Her master's name was Van der Decken. He was a staunch seaman, and would have his own way in spite of the devil. For all that, never a sailor under him had reason to complain; though how it is on board with them nobody knows. The story is this: that in doubling the Cape they were a long day trying to weather the Table Bay. However, the wind headed them, and went against them more and more, and Van der Decken walked the deck, swearing at the wind. Just after sunset a vessel spoke him, asking him if he did not mean to go into the bay that night. Van der Decken replied: "May I be eternally damned if I do, though I should beat about here till the day of judgment. And to be sure, he never did go into that bay, for it is believed that he continues to beat about in these seas still, and will do so long enough. This vessel is never seen but with foul weather along with her".

There have been many reported sightings in the 19th and 20th centuries. One was by Prince George of Wales, the future King George V. During his late adolescence, in 1880, with his elder brother Prince Albert Victor of Wales, he was on a three-year voyage with their tutor Dalton, temporarily shipped into HMS Inconstant after the damaged rudder in their original ship, the 4,000-tonne corvette Bacchante was repaired. Off the coast of Australia, between Melbourne and Sydney, Dalton records:

“At 4 a.m. the Flying Dutchman crossed our bows. A strange red light as of a phantom ship all aglow, in the midst of which light the masts, spars and sails of a brig 200 yards distant stood out in strong relief as she came up on the port bow, where also the officer of the watch from the bridge clearly saw her, as did the quarterdeck midshipman, who was sent forward at once to the forecastle; but on arriving there was no vestige nor any sign whatever of any material ship was to be seen either near or right away to the horizon, the night being clear and the sea calm. Thirteen persons altogether saw her ... At 10.45 a.m. the ordinary seaman who had this morning reported the Flying Dutchman fell from the foretopmast crosstrees on to the topgallant forecastle and was smashed to atoms.”

Malevolence
?/10
It’s a mystery.  There are reports of it being punished for a crime or in league with the devil, but there’s little to confirm.  However, as a portent of doom, it should be avoided.

Spookiness
9/10
There is something deeply unsettling about the boat and the knowledge that something bad is going to happen.

[Johnny Unusual]

 

Number 6

The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come

(75 points on 5 of 12 lists. Top Vote #6 Imrahil)

The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, also known as The Ghost of Christmas Future, or sometimes just Christmas Future (if you are dumb and lazy) or Pointy the Spooky Pointing Ghost, is the ghost that haunts the miser Ebenezer Scrooge, in order to prompt him to adopt a more caring attitude in life and avoid the horrid afterlife of his business partner, Jacob Marley.

Scrooge found the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come the most fearsome of the spirits; he appeared to Scrooge as a figure entirely muffled in a black hooded robe, except for a single gaunt hand with which he points. Although the character never spoke, Scrooge understood him, usually through assumptions from his previous experiences and rhetorical questions. The Ghost's muteness and undefined features (being always covered by his robe) may also have been intended to represent the uncertainty of the future

When the Ghost made his appearance, the first thing he showed Scrooge is three wealthy gentlemen making light of a recent death, remarking that it will be a cheap funeral, if anyone comes at all. One businessman said he would go only if lunch is provided, while another said he did not eat lunch or wear black gloves, so there was no reason for him to go at all. Next, Scrooge is shown the same dead person's belongings being stolen and sold to a receiver of stolen goods called Old Joe. He also saw a shrouded corpse, which he implored the ghost not to unmask, and a poor, debtor family rejoicing that someone to whom they owed money was dead and thinking his successor creditor wouldn't be as harsh as the deceased creditor was. After pleading to the ghost to see some tenderness connected with death, Scrooge is shown Bob Cratchit and his family mourning the passing of Tiny Tim. Scrooge was then taken to an unkempt graveyard, where he was shown his own grave, and realized that the dead man of whom the others spoke ill was himself.

Moved to an emotional connection to humanity and chastened by his own avarice and isolation by the visits of the first two spirits, Scrooge was horrified by the prospect of a lonely death and by implication a subsequent damnation. In desperation, he queried the ghost:

“Before I draw nearer to that stone to which you point,” said Scrooge, “answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that will be, or are they shadows of things that may be, only?”
Still the Ghost pointed downward to the grave by which it stood.
“Men’s courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead,” said Scrooge. “But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change. Say it is thus with what you show me!”

And in an epiphany in which he understood the changes that the visits of the three spirits have wrought in him, Scrooge exclaims:

"I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope! ... I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!”

His transformation complete, Scrooge was ready to re-enter the world of humanity as a changed man as he does in the almost immediately.

Tee-hee.  Intercourse.

Malevolence
1/10
Not evil, just the facts.

Spookiness
10/10
The future can be a scary place

[Johnny Unusual]

Number 5

Large Marge

(79 points on 4 of 12 lists. Top Vote #1 Cole Stratton)

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/RryZV8NK9-Q" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/RryZV8NK9-Q</a>

 Malevolence
1/10
She gives rides and her passenger seat smell like musty blankets and stale coffee.  Nice!

Spookiness
10/10
GAH!  CLAYMATION!

[Johnny Unusual]

Number 4

Samara Morgan/Sadako Yamamura

(88 points on 6 of 12 lists. Top Vote #2 George Harrison)

Sadako Yamamura (山村 貞子) is a ghost who haunts people also over Japan though a videotape and kills them 7 days after they watched it.  There are also ghosts similar to her in Korea and America, though have different names.

Early reports say that Sadako is intersex. It has also been hinted that she is the daughter of some oceanic based entity, making her a quasi-oceanic demigod.

Her Japanese name combines the Japanese words for "chaste" (sada) and "child" (ko).

The American girl who is uncannily like her is Samara Morgan, an otherworldly little girl (Born 1970, died 1978) responsible for the creation of the cursed videotape. Her usual appearance is of a girl with long, dark hair covering her face and wearing a white dress. Samara possesses the power of nensha (thoughtography), capable of burning images onto surfaces and into the minds of others. Using these powers, Samara makes the cursed videotape with her own thoughts, and imbues it with the power to kill the viewer within seven days. She also has other abilities such as possession, water manipulation, and the power to climb out of electrical screens like television sets.  One person tried to prevent Samara's escape from a television set by breaking the screen, but she then tried to emerge through the screen of a video camera as the victim recorded her appearance.

Samara’s mother, a woman named Evelyn, believed that her daughter had a demon inside her and tried to drown the girl, but she was prevented by nuns. Evelyn was sent to an insane asylum, while Samara was put up for adoption.

Samara was adopted by Anna and Richard Morgan, who owned a horse ranch on Moesko Island, Washington. As Samara grew older, her powers burned horrible images into her adoptive mother's mind, nearly driving her insane. Richard banished Samara to live in the ranch's barn, but she used her powers to drive Anna's beloved horses to suicide. At some point, Samara was taken to a psychiatric hospital but the doctors were unable to explain how she created the images. During a family vacation on Shelter Mountain, Anna attacked Samara as she stood before an old well, suffocating her with a garbage bag and then dropping her down the well. Anna then committed suicide by jumping off a cliff. However, Samara clung to life for seven days alone in the well before dying of hypothermia.

Eventually, a set of rental cabins were built near the well, with one on top of it. This allowed Samara to project her visions into a VCR tape, creating the seven-day curse. Samara's curse killed Katie Keller, the niece of journalist Rachel Keller, who investigated the tape's origins. Rachel, her ex-boyfriend Noah Clay  and their son Aidan all watched the video. Rachel met Richard, who warned her to stay away and then killed himself. Rachel and Noah eventually found Samara's corpse in the well and buried it, but this released a corporeal form of Samara's spirit and she later killed Noah. Rachel destroyed the original video cassette in a fit of rage, but used a copied version of the video to continue the curse in order to save Aidan.

Samara deliberately manipulates the tape to get back to Rachel, having decided to make Rachel her new mother. After Rachel burned the tape, Samara possessed Aidan. Rachel drugged Samara and then nearly drowned Aidan to pull Samara out of his body. Samara retreated to a television set, Rachel being willingly pulled into Samara's visionary world and down the well. Rachel climbed out of the well with Samara pursuing her, but Rachel covered the seal on the well just in time.

 Malevolence
10/10
Though, to be fair, this eight year old dead girl is a better film maker than James Ngyen.  And her film made more sense.

Spookiness
10/10
She does go down a few when we see her face.  It’s like an angry monster face, while when it’s just hair covering her face it looks FAR more unsettling.

[Johnny Unusual]

 

Number 3

Slimer

(118 points on 8 of 12 lists. Top Vote #2 Cole Stratton)

Slimer (also known as Onionhead and Little Spud) was a ghost made up of pure Ectoplasm and the first ghost successfully captured by the Ghostbusters. Slimer is well known for his gigantic appetite and the slime he leaves behind when he passes through solid objects.

Slimer was a legendary ghost to all on the original staff of the Sedgewick Hotel. His usual territory was the twelfth floor, but his outings were usually non-violent and simply involved eating food. As a result, the hotel was able to keep a lid on the supernatural problems (for a while). For some reason, Gozer's approaching time of arrival provoked Slimer (and many other ghosts) into being much more active than usual. Eventually the staff couldn't keep the ghost a secret anymore and called the Ghostbusters. However, the Ghostbusters had not yet fully tested their equipment and weren't completely prepared for a full capture. Ray was the first to find Slimer, but missed him and Slimer escaped into the next hall, where he slimed Peter Venkman. After many errant shots and the resulting destruction, Slimer flew into the Alhambra Ballroom where the Ghostbusters made another attempt at capture. Though Slimer is at first tossed around by some more missed shots, the Ghostbusters eventually manage to get him in the streams. Slimer was then caught in the Trap and put in the storage facility. However, he was released with the many other ghosts when the storage facility was shut down. Slimer occupied a hot dog cart on on 1221 Avenue of the Americas in front of the Rockefeller Plaza. When the Hot Dog Vendor opened the cart, he was naturally shocked to see a ghost. After the Ghostbusters defeated Gozer and left Central Park West, Slimer was sighted in the area.

Slimer seemed to be a pet to the Ghostbusters, though it's unknown what he had been doing since the Ghostbusters were put out of business years ago. Slimer did resurface after the Ghostbusters started up again and had apparently gotten much fatter in the span of five years. Throughout the Vigo incident of 1989, Slimer interacted with Louis Tully. The two first met when Louis caught Slimer eating his lunch, to which the two of them fled in fear. On New Year's Eve, Louis decides to take up a Proton Pack and help the Ghostbusters. In an attempt to patch up their initial misunderstanding, Slimer helped an exhausted Louis by giving him a ride to the Manhattan Museum of Art (to which Louis wonders how he got his license). It seems likely Slimer had simply commandeered an abandoned bus from the havoc resulting from Vigo's Mood slime assault.

At some point, Slimer was recaptured and kept in a Paranormal Containment Research Tank in the Firehouse in the lobby. Egon Spengler used him for various paranormal studies (sometimes noted that this is a nod to The Real Ghostbusters shows take on Slimer). On Thanksgiving weekend 1991, Slimer was playing with Peter Venkman's ESP cards inside Paranormal Containment Research Tank.
 
Malevolence
4/10
He can be aggressive, but is harmless and just wants to eat.

Spookiness
2/10
He’s weird looking and gross, but in a cute sort of way.

[Johnny Unusual]

 

Number 2

The Headless Horseman

(122 points on 11 of 12 lists. Top Vote #2 Imrahil)

The headless horseman has been a motif of European folklore since at least the Middle Ages.
The Irish dullahan or dulachán ("dark man") is a headless fairy, usually riding a black horse and carrying his head under one arm (or holding it high to see at great distance). He wields a whip made from a human corpse's spine. When the dullahanstops riding, a death occurs. The dullahan calls out a name, at which point the named person immediately perishes. In another version, he is the headless driver of a black carriage. A similar figure, the gan ceann ("without a head"), can be frightened away by wearing a gold object or casting one in his path.

The most prominent Scottish tale of the headless horseman concerns a man named Ewen decapitated in a clan battle at Glen Cainnir on the Isle of Mull. The battle denied him any chance to be a chieftain, and both he and his horse are headless in accounts of his haunting of the area.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a Middle English poem which utilises a decapitation myth.

The German Legends of the Brothers Grimm (Deutsche Sagen) recount two German folk tales of a headless horseman being spotted with their own eyes.

One is set near Dresden in eastern Germany. In this tale, a woman from Dresden goes out early one Sunday morning to gather acorns in a forest. At a place called "Lost Waters", she hears a hunting horn. When she hears it again, she turns around she sees a headless man in a long grey coat sitting on a grey horse.

In another German tale, set in Braunschweig, a headless horseman called "the wild huntsman" blows a horn which warns hunters not to ride the next day, because they will meet with an accident.

In some German versions of the headless horseman, he seeks out the perpetrators of capital crimes. In others, he has a pack of black hounds with tongues of fire.

The American legend of the Headless Horseman begins in Sleepy Hollow, New York. The Horseman was a Hessian of unknown rank, one of many hired to suppress the American Revolution. During the war, the Horseman was one of 51 Hessians killed in a battle for Chatterton Hill, wherein his head was severed by an American cannonball. He was buried in a graveyard outside a church. Thereafter he appears as a ghost, who presents to nightly travelers an actual danger (rather than the largely harmless fright produced by the majority of ghosts), presumably of decapitation.

It was said that an apparition of an actual headless rider on horseback had once been seen in Winfield, West Virginia. On an unrelated but interesting note, on the third season episode of the TV series Haunted Collector it was confirmed that during the Battle of Stones River in Murfreesboro, Tennessee during the American Civil War, Union Lt. Col. Julius Garesché was actually decapitated by a cannonball while riding alongside Union Major General William S. Rosecrans.

 Malevolence
7-10/10
Though at this point the exact number cannot be calculated, based on his actions it is between these numbers

Spookiness
9/10
GASP!  HE HAS NO HEAD!  GASP!  HE’S ALSO INTO PUMPKIN CARVING!

[Johnny Unusual]

And your NUMBER 1 Pick...

 

Number 1

Beetlejuice

(170 points on 9 of 12 lists. Top Vote #1 Raven, ScottotD)

Beetlejuice, is a freelance "bio-exorcist" ghost who specializes in scaring humans on behalf of other ghosts.  Though he treats it like a job, there is no sign that he “charges” anybody, and is most likely more in it for the pleasure of scaring humans.  He has a very bad reputation in the afterworld, where those who manage it warn people against using his services.  However, most times he is in a powerless forum unless he is invoked.  The only way to summon him is to say his name three times in a row, which is also the only way to banish him (though the latter must be done in his presence).  He is unable to say his own name, but he is not forbidden from given clues.

One of his most famous hauntings (and a cautionary tale to ghosts who would summon him) was being haunted by a pair of relatively new ghosts named the Maitlands, who asked for Beetlejuice to scare away a new family, the Deetzes, who had occupied their house and had attempted to turn the house into a tacky nightmare and the Maitlands into an attraction.  The Maitlands hired Beetlejuice to scare the Deetzes, only to discover that Beetlejuice’s unique brand of haunting too mean-spirited and dangerous. Beetlejuice is summoned once more to save the Maitlands by the Deetzes’ daughter Lydia in exchange for her hand in marriage.  He fulfills his promise and fights the Maitlands in a supernatural battle (sort of) and is forced to return to the afterworld after being eating by a Saturnian sandworm.

Beetlejuice was last seen in the afterworld, waiting for his turn to enter the afterlife, though there are rumours of his return.


 Malevolence
7/10
Though he has never been reported as killing anyone, his style of haunting is dangerous and reckless.  He also seems uninterested in the plight of anyone but himself and is only interested in having fun through extreme haunting.

Spookiness
4/10
Unlike a lot of these ghosts, Beetlejuice is very away about this kind of scale and should he choose to, could easily spike to 10.  When he is talking to other ghosts, he’s at a 4 (off putting and rude, like that drunk guy at a party you don’t know how to deal with), but often spikes to 8 when haunting with shown potential (to the Maitlands) to 10.

[Johnny Unusual]

That's it everyone!  Have a happy Halloween and a delightful Día de Muertos!  Thanks for contributing to the new edition of Tobin's Spirit Guide!  Hope everyone picks up a copy this Christmas.  My next project will be a new edition of How I Did It by Victor Frankenstein.

Now enjoy this spooky short film!

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/7_Okf__vMI4" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/7_Okf__vMI4</a>

[ScottotD]

Thanks Johnny, great work!

1. Beetlejuice (Beetlejuice)
2. The Deadite(s) (Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness)
3. Samara/Sadako  (The Ring)
4. Tomás (The Orphanage)
5. Dr. Malcolm Crowe (The 6th Sense)
6. Large Marge (Pee Wee's Big Adventure)
7. The Headless Horseman (Sleepy Hollow)
8. Santi (The Devil's Backbone)
]9. Alice (Lake Mungo)
10. The Ghost House (Ghost House)
11. The Stewart Family (the Others)
12. The Sisters (A Tale of Two Sisters)
13. The Librarian (Ghostbusters)
14. The Grady Twins (The Shining)
15. The Spirits (Insidious)
16. Rebecca (Rebecca)
17. The Poltergeist (Poltergeist)
18. Miss Jessel and Peter Quint (The Innocents)
19. School Bus kids (Trick ‘R Treat)
20. The Ghost of Christmas yet to Come (Scrooged)
21. The Amityville Ghost (The Amityville Horror)
22. Candyman (The Candyman)
23. Elizabeth Dane crew (The Fog)
24. Bathsheba (The Conjuring)
25. Susie Salmon (The Lovely Bones)

[Tripe]

1.   Ammeline Hamstring (because her brief passage makes me tear up still)
2.   The Flying Dutchman
3.   Jennet Humfrye (The Woman In Black)
4.   Hearne the Hunter
5.   Edgehill : http://www.real-british-ghosts.com/edgehill-ghosts.html
6.   50 Berkley Square : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Berkeley_Square
7.   Timothy Claypole : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rentaghost
8.   Borley Rectory : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borley_Rectory
9.   The Sorrel Weeed House : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorrel_Weed_House (the stuff they tell you on the tour is less spooky than the things experienced by people who’ve owned it, I know a couple of them)
10.   The Winchester Mystery House (since the building has stopped the inhabitation has to have occurred by now )
11.   Miss Jessel and Peter Quint
12.   Old Jeffrey : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epworth_Rectory_haunting
13.   La Llorona : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Llorona
14.   The Headless Horseman
15.   Blackbeard’s Ghost : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbeard%27s_Ghost
16.   “Pipes” : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwatch
17.   Banquo : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banquo
18.   Joseph Carmichael : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Changeling_(1980_film)
19.   The Enfield Poltergeist : http://www.real-british-ghosts.com/enfield-poltergeist.html
20.   Traverse City State Hospital : http://www.michigansotherside.com/Articles/Traverse_City_Hospital.htm
21.   Taskerlands : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stone_Tape
22.   Blake et al : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_fog
23.   Silverpilen : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverpilen
24.   Old Hamlet
25.   Moaning Myrtle (film version only because Shirley Henderson is hot) : http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Myrtle


And here are my selections for the mini-list.

1.   Egon Spengler
2.   Madame Arcati
3.   Dean & Sam Winchester
4.   Madame Flora
5.   Frank Bannister

I think I reddened and bolded all the ones that made it yes?

[MightyJack]

Much fun, thanks for the invite...

Mine...

1.   The Spectre
2.   Samara Morgan (The Ring)
3.   Eva/Alma from Peter Straub’s Ghost Story
4.   Elisa Cameron, Ghost (Dark Horse comic character)
5.   Santi (From the Devil’s Backbone)
6.   Beetlejuice
7.   Bloody Mary
8.   Space Ghost
9.   Fenny Bates from Peter Straub’s Ghost Story
10.   The Stewarts from the movie “The Others”
11.   Spooky, the Tuff Little Ghost (Harvey Comics)
12.   The Canterville Ghost (surprised this didn't make it. Fun Charles Laughton flick as well)
13.   Izabel from the comic Saga
14.   The Ghost of Humphrey Bogart in Woody Allen’s “Play it Again Sam”
15.   Deadman (DC comics)
16.   The Twin girls from the Shining
17.   Dr. Malcolm Crowe (The 6th Sense)
18.   The Dead Boy Detectives from Gaiman’s Sandman
19.   The Black Knight in the Kolchak episode “The Knightly Murders”
20.   The Headless Horseman
21.   The Bell Witch (used to live in Nashville, we heard a lot about this one)
22.   The White Lady
23.   The Pacman Ghosts, Inky, Pinky, Dinky, and Clyde
24.   Hamlet’s Father
25.   Vi from Tormented

Suplimental list
1.   John Constantine
2.   Tangina Barrons (Poltergeist)
3.   Peter Venkman (Ghost Busters)
4.   Father Merrin (The Exorcist)
5.   Adrianne the angry Psychic from Merlin’s Shop of Mystical Wonders

[Darth Geek]

Great list, Johnny. Loved the write-ups.

[Johnny Unusual]

1.   Deadman
2.   Bloody Mary
3.   The Spectre
4.   The Overlook Hotel
5.   The Woman in Black
6.   Roland and Paine, The Dead Boy Detectives
7.   Sai
He's the go (as in the 4,000 year old board game) playing ghost from the manga/anime Hikaru No Go, a go master from long ago who committed suicide after his reputation was ruined when he tried to expose a rival's cheating and was blamed himself.  Since then, he's been only seen by two humans, both who learned from him and became go masters themselves.  The character is great and I love the way the series plays out with the main character (Hikaru) acting as a proxy for Sai, then finding out that he loves the game and decides to play for himself.  This causes problems when a young aspiring go genius who was completely trounced by "Hikaru" suddenly finds his rival's skill take a tremendous drop.  It's a really good series and is drawn by the artist behind Death Note.

Interestingly, the series created a surge in the popularity of Go among young people, which was long considered an old man's game.


<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/qewJwOxXn68" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/qewJwOxXn68</a>
8.   The Winchester Mystery House
9.   Beetlejuice
10.   The Headless Horseman
11.   Candyman
Shame, I was really hoping he would make it.
12.   The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come
13.   The Hitchhiker (as in the Vanishing Hitchhiker)
14.   Emeric Belasco
From the Legend of Hell House
15.   Teke Teke
A Japanese ghost who was split in half in a train accident and hunts people while saying "teke teke" (which is the onomatapeia for a train)
16.   Samara/Sadako
17.   Slimer
18.   Hamlet’s Father
19.   Jacob Marley
20.   Hill House (The Haunting is a pretty great movie)
21.   Vi (Tormented)
22.   Cyrus (The Frighteners)
23.   Candlejack
"I'm going to need more rope."
24.   the High Plains Drifter
To be fair, this is ambiguous, but it is heavily hinted he's a ghost.  He might have been higher on my list if it wasn't for that rape scene that's not played as such.  Icky.  Other than that, you totally revel in his revenge and watch him subvert the usual western tropes.
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Ek9CwmjisLE" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/Ek9CwmjisLE</a>
And if you ever wondered where the recurring reference on MST3k to "WHHHOOOOOOOO ARRREEEEEE YOOOOOOOU!", it's in this.
25.   BOB (AKA Killer Bob)
Even though he was at the bottom, I was really praying Starman would come in and put him on the list.
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/iN02pNRqgM8" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/iN02pNRqgM8</a>

[Tripe]

See I'd include BOB as a demon but not a ghost, none of the residents of the Black Lodge really seem like ghosts.