Although CBS’s Ghosts has its own unique appeal, the U.S. remake of a UK sitcom did borrow one clever adaptation trick from an earlier cult classic. It can be hard for American remakes to capture the tone and appeal of their predecessors. Humor is famously subjective and often reliant on cultural context, so jokes that were hilarious in an English TV comedy can fall flat when remade for an American audience. However, 2021’s Ghosts proved this isn’t always true when the sitcom reworked the BBC’s 2019 series Ghosts with a new cast and characters.

2021’s American version of Ghosts borrowed the basic premise of the UK series. Sam and Jay are a young couple who unexpectedly inherit a remote country home. After a near-death experience, Sam gains the ability to see and talk to the ghosts that inhabit the house. That’s where things begin to change, as the ghost characters in CBS’s Ghosts are almost entirely different from their UK inspirations. Sam and Jay fulfill much the same function as the original show’s Allison and Mike, but few of the ghosts Sam communicates with bear a resemblance to the UK version’s characters.

CBS’ Ghosts Changed Almost Everything From The UK Series

Samantha and Jay Are The Only Characters Left Unchanged

CBS’s Ghosts wisely followed The Office‘s approach to remaking a UK sitcom when the series remake took the name and basic premise of the original show, but dropped everything else. The Office was originally a cringe comedy that centered on Ricky Gervais’s delusional middle manager David Brent, but the U.S. version of the series was a warmer, less cynical show that focused on Steve Carell’s sweeter Michael Scott. Both Brent and Scott had blatant character flaws, but their personalities diverged completely. Similarly, the supporting characters who staffed the office itself were very different in the U.S. version of the show.

Ghosts clearly learned from The Office as the series ensured that the UK show’s central conceit remained intact but didn’t import many main characters. While Sam and Jay are often effectively carbon copies of Mike and Allison, they are also the show’s human characters. Almost all the ghosts are unique to the new show, much like The Office’s inhabitants. This explains how Ghosts has borrowed The Office’s successful strategy for translating a TV comedy from Britain to America. The basic setup stays the same, but new supporting characters allow for fresh storylines and a unique, original tone.

Ghosts and The Office Were Wise To Change Their Supporting Casts

American and British Comedy Styles Require New Characters

Admittedly, not all the ghosts in CBS’ Ghosts are totally unrecognizable. The characters of Pete in the U.S. show and Pat in the UK show are basically the same, right down to the arrows protruding from their necks. Meanwhile, Hetty is similar to the original show’s Fanny, although she and Fanny share more differences than Pete and Pat. However, the rest of the large cast of CBS’s Ghosts are different for the same reason Scott differs from Brent. Namely, the U.S. remake’s sense of humor is warmer and less cynical than the original show’s classically British comedy style.

Compared to the likes of The Thick Of It or Peep Show, Ghosts is about as accessibly bright and cheery as UK TV comedy gets. That said, the series still has a darker sense of humor than its American counterpart, despite CBS’s Ghosts featuring more cliffhanger endings than the original show. This explains why characters like Flower play a bigger role in the U.S. show since the naive, sweet hippie wouldn’t be quite as at home among the UK show’s ghosts. Similarly, although Sass has his moments, he is nowhere near as bad as the British show’s Thomas.

Failed British Comedy Remakes Generally Miss Ghosts’ Best Trick

The Inbetweeners and IT Crowd Remakes Stuck To The Source Material

While CBS’s Ghosts has fared well when it comes to the show’s ratings, the same cannot be said for every attempt to remake a classic British sitcom in America. In 2007, Richard Ayoade reprised his role as Moss in a remake of The IT Crowd. However, the pilot’s poor reception resulted in the show never making it to air, and the leaked episode proved that this was because the series stuck far too close to the original show’s sense of humor, pacing, tone, and style. MTV’s short-lived and critically derided remake of The Inbetweeners suffered the same fate.

While Ghosts season 3’s unsolved mysteries prove the series isn’t perfect, the remake has largely avoided this issue. CBS’s Ghosts began confidently altering elements of the original show’s setup from the beginning, turning knights into ‘50s greasers and a caveman into a Viking. As the series progressed, the differences between the original show’s characters and their replacements resulted in dynamics that were nowhere to be found in the original show. Much like The Office’s Dwight and Jim feud doesn’t have an identical eqivalent in the UK show, the relationship between Isaac and Nigel is unique to the US show.

Ghosts Still Borrows From The UK Show

Isaac and Trevor Are Inspired By The Original Show’s Captain and Julian

That said, there are plenty of areas where CBS’s Ghosts doesn’t outright ignore the British show, but doesn’t replicate it verbatim either. The two most obvious cases are Trevor and Isaac, who are loosely based on the original show’s Julian and The Captain. The Captain and Isaac aren’t all that similar despite their shared backstories, with The Captain acting comically self-serious while Isaac is pretty shamelessly self-serving. Similarly, while they both died in similarly embarrassing ways, Trevor and Julian share some pivotal differences. Julian’s backstory makes him less sympathetic than Trevor, which is impressive considering Trevor’s origins.

While Trevor was an amoral stockbroker with a playboy lifestyle, Julian was a corrupt politician who constantly cheated on his wife. This darker style of storytelling explains why CBS’s Ghosts has Flower and the BBC series doesn’t have an equivalent character, since its sense of humor is slightly more bleak. As such, it was a clever choice for the U.S. sitcom remake to jettison many of the elements of the original show that didn’t translate well. Like The Office, Ghosts transcended its origins as a remake and built an identity of its own after finding inspiration in an earlier hit.