Ghosts spin-off earns 'glorious' verdict in first Guardian review

The BBC's haunted house comedy "Ghosts" returns as a feature film on 21 October 2026, and the first review calls it "glorious." "Ghosts: The Possession of Button House" is the spin-off of the long-running BBC sitcom that ended with its final episode in 2023. The Guardian's verdict on the film is unambiguous: the format change has not dulled the material.

The reviewer describes the parent show as "one of the finest family television shows in recent memory." The film itself, the review states, is "every bit as warm and comforting as the TV sitcom." That is the kind of line that tells existing fans the wait has not been wasted.

Why the longer format may have helped

The reviewer's central argument is structural. "Breaking out of the 30-minute episode structure seems to have freed up the writers to unleash new levels of giddiness with added spoonfuls of silliness," the review states. "The jokes keep coming."

British sitcoms that have stretched to feature length have, historically, struggled to maintain their density. The reviewer names the problem outright: "Often when British sitcoms get a spin-off what happens is the gag-to-runtime ratio dips." Possession of Button House, on this evidence, has avoided that dip. The 30-minute sitcom is its own disciplined form, and simply giving the same writers more minutes does not, in itself, generate more jokes. The Guardian's reviewer is reporting a positive result, not a guarantee.

What the review actually shows of the film

For viewers who have not watched the parent series, the review offers almost no translation. "What on earth is happening at Button House?" the reviewer asks, before listing a sequence of apparently unrelated beats: "Kitty has tasered a police officer. Fanny is pulling down her capacious Victorian drawers to show off her bottom. Robin the caveman has fallen in love with a crusty eco activist (to be fair she looks quite a bit like him)."

The reviewer concedes the limitation directly. None of the above, the review notes, "will make the slightest bit of sense" to a viewer arriving fresh. The film, on this evidence, is built for existing fans of Button House rather than pitched at newcomers.

What does this change for the franchise?

For the BBC, the film's release tests whether a beloved British sitcom can survive a feature-length outing. Any rights-holder would welcome the Guardian's verdict — warm, comfortable, gleefully silly — as a first review. Whether that converts to ticket sales, or to a sequel, is a question for the box office to settle.

For audiences, the immediate question is whether the film requires familiarity with the parent series. The review's answer is yes. The Possession of Button House is, by the reviewer's own account, a continuation rather than a reboot, and newcomers will be left outside Button House's front door. For the converted, the review's enthusiasm suggests the wait since 2023 has not dulled the writers' appetite for silliness.