1x09 Chapter 9: The Ghost

Frida, just learn to clean your room!

#Summary

"The Ghost" is about a poltergeist that haunts Frida's room. The episode begins with Hilda and David rushing to Frida's house. Frida lets them both in and shows them her room. It's a mess. Hilda takes a look around the room and declares it was a ghost. To catch it, David brings in his old camera and to watch Frida's bedroom a night. But when they go to check the footage in the morning, it turns out Frida was the one making all the mess.

She admits to the mess but reveals that she thought rooms cleaned themselves. It turns out, the ghost haunting her bedroom, cleaned up the mess instead of making it. The next day, Frida has an encounter at school and begins to fall apart. At home, she breaks down and repeats throughout the episode how her "perfection and organisation" was her whole identity. Hilda tries to convince her she's the same person, but Frida doesn't listen.

To figure out who the ghost is, they head to the library. It was cool to get a bit more from the Librarian. Hilda asks her about a book on ghosts, and the Librarian asks Hilda if something went missing. It turns out, Frida's favourite book was missing, and it belonged to someone called Craigie Williams.

They head to the cemetery, meet Craigie Williams and learn why he left. Like Frida, it was his favourite book, so he read it every night while she was asleep and cleaned her room in return. But when the book disappeared, he had no reason to go back. Eventually, they learn that Craigie's sister, Engilbjort, had his book. Hilda gets the gang to wrestle the ghost for the book. They lose. Right after the match, Hilda learns that the ghosts have to back in their graves by sunrise. So, she puts herself on top of Engilbjort's grave (kind of disrespectful of the dead, but she did steal and wrestle you guys). Engilbjort gives the book back, but it's the wrong one.

The gang head home, devastated. Hilda talks to Alfur on whether or not she is a good friend, and Alfur comforts her saying she's a great friend for trying. But when Frida fails to show up at school, Hilda rushes to Frida's house and confronts her. Frida lashes out on David and Hilda, blaming Hilda for giving her false hope and making them wrestle with a ghost. In the end, she said she wished Hilda never moved to Trolberg. And the episode ends (with the Nisse shown stealing Frida's stuff).

#Thoughts

Both Frida and David seem very out of character in this episode. For one, David picks on Frida a few times (which he has never done. He's always praised her, and teasing doesn't seem to have built their relationship). And two, Frida keeps lashing out and attacking David. I know she's having an identity crisis, but it's still really out of character. Sure, she chased the Vittra when it stole her sash, but she never tried to hurt it (at least I don't think so, and if she did, I can't see her wanting to hurt David). But maybe it's this logical fallacy that makes Frida's breakdown so terrible and believable. I've got mixed feelings about this. But David picking on Frida is out of character.

They say when your character is under heavy pressure, it will force them to make choices that reveal their true nature. Frida is a terrible person. She's so reliant on her identity of "perfection and organisation" (which kind of reveals her one-dimensional character, but we'll ignore that), she's willing to do anything to get back to normal. She is ready to compromise all of her relationships (and life) to be her false image of herself again. These things aren't necessarily bad writing, but it shows the struggle Frida is going through.

##TL;DR
Frida's logic might be flawed, but it works to show her mental state (and perhaps depression?). Both David and Frida seem out of character (one who picks on his friend, the other who attacks hers). This episode is bolder and more challenging, but I still have mixed feelings.

7/10