The Life and Times of Esther Greene
Sam needs to find a way to increase book sales, and it requires her to reconcile with Todd, the historian with a weird obsession with Alberta. Plus, Alberta lets the ghosts and Sam know about a section of her past where Todd can’t find any information.
Warning: Spoilers Ahead
Alberta Breaks Out on Her Own
The episode starts back in the 1920s, with Alberta threatening an unknown figure, saying she couldn’t break out as a singer with him around. You can hear a voice begging her not to do anything to him, before she takes an ax and starts hacking. It appears Alberta has killed a man with whom she was working prior to becoming a famous jazz singer.
Bertrand Calmeau/CBS
n the present, Sam is on a zoom call with her publisher who says her historical fiction book about Isaac’s life is not performing well. The publisher says more won’t be printed unless sales see a major turn. The publisher brings up Todd Pearlman as a potential avenue. Todd was first introduced as an Alberta Haynes historian until it was revealed he wasn’t just a history buff but was obsessed with Alberta. Sam and Todd later hosted a podcast together about Alberta’s life until Todd discovered that Sam and Jay found him to be creepy. However, he now has a very successful podcast that the publisher thinks could help with sales, if Sam can reconcile her relationship with Todd.
The Todd Pod
Todd comes out to visit and talks about how finding out that Sam and Jay found him weird caused him to rethink his life. He chose to shift his focus away from Alberta for a bit and channeled his energy into The Todd Pod, a very successful podcast. He mentions that there’s a section of Alberta’s life that remains a mystery. He was able to piece together her early life in the South before going to New York to strike it big. He knows what happens when she becomes famous. However, he doesn’t know what happened during the time that Alberta was a struggling artist. It’s clear he’s still got a focus on Alberta, but Sam needs Todd to focus on her.
Bertrand Calmeau/CBS
Sam and Jay offer to take Todd to lunch at Jay’s restaurant, so that they can convince Todd to feature her on the podcast. Todd doesn’t seem to be too interested in the pitch, so Isaac pulls Sam away to try to convince her how to woo Todd. Meanwhile, Bela sees Todd, and already knows him. She avoided him in college, but now that he’s rich, she’s willing to give him a shot. Todd and Jay are talking and Todd is sold on the idea of an episode about Jay and his restaurant. Jay wants to back out of it, but Mark learns about it and pushes Jay to go on it to promote the restaurant.
Esther Greene
The ghosts were in the room when Todd mentioned the information gap and that got Thorfinn to thinking about how Alberta once mentioned that her real name is not Alberta Haynes. He confronts her where Alberta tells Thor she once killed a man, and it’s embarrassing. Thorfinn thinks she’s embarrassed that she only killed one man, since he’s a viking who killed many. Alberta asks Thorfinn to keep it a secret, and he promises to do so.
Bertrand Calmeau/CBS
Of course, Thorfinn was lying about keeping the secret and he goes to Pete to tell the boy scout leader ghost that Alberta is a murderer. Pete goes to confront Alberta who tells him she doesn’t want to talk about it. Pete discusses his marriage and how Carol’s family kept him in the dark about working for the mob. He wants to be in a relationship with her but can’t be with someone keeping secrets. Alberta reveals to Pete her real name is Esther Greene. Success didn’t come easy, so she became a ventriloquist to make ends meet. But audiences didn’t want to see jazz singers during ventriloquist shows. She decided to cut up the dummy with an ax and went as a solo jazz act under the name Alberta Haynes.
The Hot Mic
Jay is getting ready to appear on Todd’s podcast and Sam is upset. This was supposed to be her shining moment and she won’t be featured. Meanwhile, Jay isn’t excited about it either as he doesn’t want to spend four hours having a conversation with “creepy Todd.” Unfortunately, the podcast equipment is set up in the room and the mic is already on meaning Todd has heard everything they just said. Todd cancels the podcast appearance and warns them he will send his followers out to “review bomb” their efforts. This means negative reviews for the bed and breakfast, the restaurant and the book, all their sources of income.
Bertrand Calmeau/CBS
Sam and Jay are desperate and Alberta has the key. She tells Sam that she will give Todd the information he seeks on her life. Sam uses the information and gets Todd to call off his followers and host both Sam and Jay on the podcast to talk about all their businesses and hopefully give them a boost. Sam reveals Alberta’s ventriloquist past on the pod. The episode ends with Alberta working as a ventriloquist with Pete serving as the dummy and Thorfinn attacking Pete for things Alberta says.
What’s Next?
This episode gives a glimpse at how well Sam and Jay are together when they work together. They want to succeed on multiple fronts but have been struggling everywhere. Plus, it brings back one of their best recurring characters, “creepy Todd.” Of course, it also brings in one of their worst recurring characters right now, Bela. If Todd were around as much as Bela, he would become annoying too. She was better when she recurred less often. Hopefully, we see more of both of them in the right intervals for them to add to the story rather than detract. Still, Ghosts delivers on all cylinders once again.
Check out Ghosts on CBS and Paramount Plus.
Article Written By: Jeremy Brown for Stelmach Brown Media 2025
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