Blair Loveday
At this point I hope every Kiwi has seen Wellington Paranormal.
I mean it is only one of the greatest comedies that has come out of this great country so we owe it to ourselves to see it. Well, if you missed your chance to check it out on TVNZ On-Demand you can now pick it up as a sweet DVD collection.
For anyone who somehow hasn’t seen this glorious series, it is set in the Wellington office for the police. Sergeant Maaka lets two of his Officers, Minogue and O’Leary, into his secret office. Here they discover that there are paranormal crimes all over the city and need to nip them in the bud as they pop up.
Every episode is a tightly contained monster of the week which is regularly based around Kiwi myths and legends. Everything from Taniwha to the tooting tunnel in Welly to ward off ghosts is the source of crimes that the team need to investigate. This grounding in our local history mixed with other episodes with generic enemies in grounded Wellington locations makes it that much more special to us.
But of course, a paranormal crime show in Wellington is all well and good, but it is the comedy that makes this show a must watch. The comedy won’t appeal to everyone, but holy hell I can’t believe it landed 4 series with such a high caliber. There is a balance of slapstick comedy, absurd situations, Minogue and O’Leary being dumb at times with no self awareness, and some dry kiwi humour. This balance allows it to be consistently funny throughout appealing in so many different ways. Even in Season 4 it seemed like the writers hadn’t come close to running out of material.
The DVD collection contains all 4 series, and each series has a selection of special features. They are all relatively short but it gives a really enjoyable slice of what happened behind the scenes. We get things like TV spots where characters are explaining what’s up, to short moments with the show’s creators talking about the things they did to get the show filmed and how they made it feel authentic.
If you haven’t seen Wellington Paranormal then you owe it to yourself to check this incredible gem out. The Complete Collection DVD is as good a way to watch it as any, so watch it. Like now.
