The Ghost Gallery
is a strange case of Fan Fiction pertaining to the Disneyland and Walt Disney World Haunted Mansion ride. As you may know, the Haunted Mansion ride has no official backstory, and thus, fan theories are all over the place (and that's not even taking into account the licensed but non-canon materials, such as the 2003 movie). The Ghost Gallery was one of the earliest attempts at solidifying the history of the house and giving names and biographies to all its ghosts. It is notable because it was not written by either official Imagineers or by mere fans; it was the work of Cast Members (that is to say, the costumed, roleplaying hosts of the ride, who are officially hired by Disney but are not supposed to have a say in storytelling matters), initially written in a notebook backstage before being shared with the public online. Whether that counts as Word of Saint Paul or Word of Dante is still debated, but either way, Disney has adopted many elements from it in official works, ranging from its names for the Hitchhiking Ghosts to loosely adapting the Master Gracey narrative in the 2003 movie and SLG comic series. Even Tokyo Disneyland's Disney Story Beyond campaign introduced an official in-universe counterpart to the Ghost Gallery notebook in the form of a "Ghost Registry" book kept by the Mansion's staff.
The Ghost Gallery is made of short biographies of various characters, which, being interwoven, form a sort of narrative.
The Ghost Gallery provides examples of:
- Bastard Bastard: Little Leota, heavily implied to be the illegitimate daughter of Master Gracey and Madame Leota, is a serial-killing seductress.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Master Gracey
- Composite Character: Helped to popularize the notion that The Ghost Host, The Aging Man and Master Gracey are one and the same.
- Darker and Edgier: It has been criticized (or sometimes praised) for being this to the original Haunted Mansion.
- Depraved Dwarf: The implication that Gus of the Hitchhiking Ghosts was this is explored. He's been violent since childhood, was sent to an asylum for trying to kill his siblings, murdered his parents after escaping, was found of using his ball and chain to hurt people for any imagined slight and even died whilst trying to drown stray cats in a well.
- Going Down with the Ship: Invoked by Sir Edward Gracey in this version of the the Dynamite Man's story: a wealthy diplomat, he refused to leave his embassy even as terrorists were about to blow it up.
- Mutual Kill: Happens to Étienne Lalaurie and Antoine Germaine, the names assigned to the two Duelists.
- Together in Death: The reason Master Gracey started seeking occult knowledge (and invited Madame Leota to the Mansion) was that he wanted to reach out to the afterlife to meet his Disappeared Dad George Gracey Sr.
