Slenderman and the Art of Internet Horror

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Are you ready to taste the demon time? We're assembled again. All right, Spooky. [00:00:17] Speaker B: People of Sun Mo. [00:00:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it's super cool, man. We're super spooky. Yeah. You know, in these dark times, you know, as fascism looms over America, we're here to talk about the Slender man, obviously, the most important thing imagine most. [00:00:31] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:00:32] Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah, that being the case, welcome back to Demon's House, the well podcast for Death Wish Poetry magazine. I am King Loki, your host, and with me are my co hosts. We've got Adrian. We've got Jack. [00:00:50] Speaker C: Oh, howdy. Yeah, I thought we wasn't my turn yet. [00:00:53] Speaker A: Well, you know, we've got Erica. [00:00:57] Speaker D: Greetings and salutations. [00:00:59] Speaker A: We've got Brittany, mystical, wise, and erudite. These are your hosts for the night. [00:01:05] Speaker E: So winning at life right there. Your hosts are fantastic. [00:01:12] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys are pretty cool. That's why I hang out with you. Before we get started, Jack, I have a question for you. All right, like, you've got to answer for something, sir. Like, what the fuck is this? Like, what is this? Yeah, this just showed up. This just showed up in my house. Like, I know. I know. You traffic in the. You traffic with these. You traffic with these creatures. These. Evil, demonic little brother. Yeah, they're brothers, so I actually. [00:01:37] Speaker C: They're all best friends. [00:01:39] Speaker A: Yeah, I actually threw Sprint. Love them. Yeah, it sits, but it sits. You know, I. I threw sprinkles in the trash, and while I was doing dishes, I. Look. Look there. And he's right there by the sink. You know, I threw him in the trash again, and he. He showed up on the. On the mantelpiece. I. Apollo was playing with him. And I know Apollo's not smuggling clowns in here, so. Yeah, if you're gonna be mailing clowns. Yeah, well, Jack is apparently mailing clowns out, so, you know, spreading. [00:02:05] Speaker C: Can I be naturally haunted ones. [00:02:07] Speaker A: I'm gonna be on the mailing list. Jack, are you down with the clown till you're dead in the ground? [00:02:15] Speaker C: Depends if that's a band reference. [00:02:17] Speaker A: It's a. I know you're a Juggalo. You can't lie to me, Jack. I know you. [00:02:24] Speaker C: I guess I am. [00:02:27] Speaker D: Best answer. [00:02:29] Speaker C: I was there for that episode. [00:02:30] Speaker A: Dead dirty carnies, dead Juggalos walk in hand with a dead carnival. Well, that being the case, so, you know, creepy clowns notwithstanding, the Slender man is certainly not a creepy clown. What is the Slender man? [00:02:46] Speaker C: Like, kind of the antithesis of a creepy clown, if we're thinking about It. [00:02:51] Speaker A: He doesn't have much to say, does he? [00:02:54] Speaker C: No face paint, no funny jokes, similar involvement with children. So. [00:03:02] Speaker B: So very business oriented. [00:03:05] Speaker D: Very business. [00:03:06] Speaker C: Very business, huh? Slender man is the front of the mullet. Clown is the back of the mullet. [00:03:15] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:03:17] Speaker D: That feels spot on. And I'm here for it. [00:03:22] Speaker A: I think that's a. I think that's a T shirt. And Jack. Jack Jackson. Jack should get proceeds from any sale because that's amazing. [00:03:30] Speaker D: I am in full support of this. [00:03:32] Speaker A: Yeah, Adrian, remind me of that. [00:03:33] Speaker C: I love money. [00:03:34] Speaker B: I will. If Slenderman is the front of the mullet, can laughing Jack be the back of the mullet? [00:03:39] Speaker D: Yes. [00:03:40] Speaker C: Oh, yes. Our boy. [00:03:44] Speaker A: You know, boy. [00:03:46] Speaker C: That's what they call me when a joke. [00:03:48] Speaker D: Same way his nose is. [00:03:51] Speaker A: Slenderman is part of a genre of fiction called Creepypasta that doesn't exist without the Internet. Or does it? Am I wrong? [00:04:01] Speaker B: You're not wrong. Creepypasta is something born solely of the Internet, essentially. And Slenderman is the father of it all. Essentially, yeah. [00:04:09] Speaker A: Slender Man, I think, is the first one. Now, you have things today like, welcome to Night Vale, which is fictive. It is not pretending to be. It's not giving you a sense of versa militude. You know where. Oh, this is real. Fuck. Slenderman was just sort of posted on something awful, which is for. For anyone younger than us. You guys know something awful, right? My college kids. You do? Okay, yeah. Okay. [00:04:33] Speaker E: You don't even with me, Daniel. [00:04:38] Speaker A: Well, before there was 4chan, before there was Reddit, there was something awful where people would go to post anonymously about whatever Narishkite. And these creepy pictures were just sort of posted of a tall, imposing, mysterious, faceless creature wearing a suit with tentacles very near to children. And there was no. [00:04:59] Speaker C: I have some secret knowledge about this. [00:05:02] Speaker B: Did you give me the secret knowledge, Jack? [00:05:03] Speaker A: Were you. Were you the child? [00:05:06] Speaker C: I was the child. I. I was the child. So I'm so sorry, but it. He wasn't randomly posted. Slenderman was created by Eric. Yeah, sure, I'll spell his name wrong in my notes. Nudson. For a Photoshop contest. They were like, hey, give us a spooky ghost. And Eric was like, ah, here's tall guy. [00:05:39] Speaker A: Okay. [00:05:40] Speaker C: And everyone was like. [00:05:43] Speaker B: And something about the contest too. His photos actually stood out because most people just uploaded photos that they had photoshopped and created, but he actually uploaded the photos with captions. One of them. I have everything pulled up here. The first caption read, we didn't want to go. We didn't want to kill them. But its persistent silence and outstretched arms horrified and comforted us at the same time. 1983. Photographer unknown, presumed dead. I'll forward these photos to you specifically. I'll make sure to do that. But, yeah, that's what really made it stood out to a lot of people because he posted the captions along with the photos. [00:06:26] Speaker A: So, okay, so there was a context where it was clearly not real, but people suspected it might be real or. [00:06:32] Speaker C: They knew it was fake. But it's one of those things where you go along with the bit. So you're like, oh, yeah, here's this cool concept. I'm going to expand on it, and in my expansion, I'm going to pretend that it's real. [00:06:45] Speaker B: And it snowballed from there. [00:06:47] Speaker C: It kind of significantly. [00:06:52] Speaker E: It snowballed into this whole thing until you had girls, like, really believing in it, and then they actually. Yeah, right, Jack. [00:07:02] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:07:03] Speaker C: Like, it was like a whole say, right, Jack? Like, I did it. [00:07:08] Speaker E: Like, you know, I'm sorry, Jack, but you're the. Like, you're the one. You are the golden child. [00:07:16] Speaker A: Wait a minute. I just realized that the Slender man and Jack are never in the same room at the same time. [00:07:21] Speaker E: Oh, my God. Wait, Jack, are you. Are you like Slender man but, like, Supernatural style? [00:07:29] Speaker C: I wish, because then I'd be over 5 foot tall. [00:07:36] Speaker E: I feel you so hard. [00:07:39] Speaker C: No one's ever been tall. It's not real. [00:07:43] Speaker A: Don't worry about women who only want to date tall men. Like, sex isn't real either, you know, Just saying. [00:07:50] Speaker C: That's true. I've never had sex. [00:07:52] Speaker D: Nobody has. They're all lying about it. [00:07:56] Speaker C: Nobody has. [00:07:57] Speaker A: It's as mysterious. It's. It's as mysterious as the Slender Man. [00:08:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:08:03] Speaker E: Kills children. Why we should not be talking about sex. Because Slender man is, like, the antithesis of sex. [00:08:11] Speaker C: And clowns. [00:08:14] Speaker B: And clowns. [00:08:15] Speaker A: Well, then there's the Splendor Man. I mean, what. You know, is he part of. [00:08:18] Speaker C: Please don't bring up Sexual Offender Man. [00:08:22] Speaker D: I have so much trauma surrounding that. [00:08:27] Speaker E: What is Erica? I want to hear it. [00:08:33] Speaker D: Okay, so we were discussing earlier about, like, mid. Our creepypasta phases, just getting super into characters, right? And when I was doing my deep dive on Slenderman, I found out that he had a whole family, including Splendorman, his flamboyant sibling. And then, as James mentioned, Sexual Offenderman, who does not. He did not earn that name. For no reason. For no reason. [00:09:03] Speaker A: So there's no, like, the Splendor man can just appear randomly in a story that someone's writing or in a picture. But that doesn't necessarily mean that Sexual Offender man is there too. Right. [00:09:13] Speaker D: It's simultaneous and everything is canon. [00:09:19] Speaker B: Exactly. That's the thing with the epitome of the creepypasta community in the mid-2000s to, like, the early 2010s. As somebody who lived that, and I feel like a lot of my co hosts could agree, it was very much a community that felt like a sanctuary for the outcast kids, for the goth kids that wanted to have that kind of escape. And that was. And so it was exactly like Erica said, it was something that was canon completely and also not canon at all because it was so unique to each person's experience. [00:09:56] Speaker A: So basically, Sonic the Hedgehog rules where every game and every comic book is simultaneously canon and not canon. [00:10:02] Speaker B: Yes. [00:10:03] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly. [00:10:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah. Okay. [00:10:06] Speaker C: And everyone is sega. [00:10:07] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah, that. That little. Yeah, everyone's Sega. And that little. That little squirrel girl is also part of this, right? Like, you know, from. From Sonic. Sad am. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. [00:10:18] Speaker D: Just popping in every once in a while. [00:10:20] Speaker C: Sure, I'm sure. [00:10:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. An Alf too, right? [00:10:26] Speaker E: Oh, my God. You and your elf. [00:10:28] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:10:29] Speaker E: God. [00:10:30] Speaker A: I think. I think ALF is scarier than the Slender Man. [00:10:33] Speaker B: An actual creepypasta. I read that was about a character named alf. I thought we were talking about an actual. [00:10:40] Speaker A: I mean. No, Alf is real. He's not. He wasn't on the Muppets because the creator didn't want people to think he was a Muppet because he's real. [00:10:46] Speaker C: Like, Muppets are also real. [00:10:50] Speaker A: They are. [00:10:50] Speaker E: They. [00:10:51] Speaker A: They actually are. If you watch the Muppet Movie, Kermit the Frog rides a bicycle. You can't make a puppet ride a bicycle. He pedals the bicycle. No. [00:10:59] Speaker B: Yeah, the frog was on the Masked Singer. He. Kermit the Frog is a real celebrity. [00:11:05] Speaker A: Kermit Piggy. Me and Justin, we figured out that Kermit, Piggy, Fozzie and Elmo Gonzo. Ah. I've never seen Gonzo's feet. [00:11:17] Speaker E: You have two Gonzo in space. [00:11:19] Speaker A: Whatever. That's not canon. [00:11:23] Speaker D: I am also apocryphal that Elmo is alive. [00:11:28] Speaker A: He is. [00:11:28] Speaker D: He rode a bike on zest. Itty bitty red body can harbor that much hate for Rocco and not be alive. [00:11:35] Speaker A: I agree. [00:11:36] Speaker D: And honestly, almost. [00:11:38] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. [00:11:38] Speaker D: Elmo has good reason. [00:11:40] Speaker C: Otherwise he'd be a hypocrite. [00:11:42] Speaker A: So. [00:11:43] Speaker B: This is so unhinged. [00:11:44] Speaker A: So. [00:11:45] Speaker C: Dude, my worm is gone. [00:11:46] Speaker A: So. So this. So this is kind of amazing to me because, like, the marble hornets, right? Like, I didn't. I didn't watch it. I watched a bunch of videos about it. It's my understanding that much like wwe, if you want to get into it, you have to watch like years and years of content that is not worth your time. Yeah. But the thing is, it's a found footage horror and it's very effective at times. Did people think that was real? Yes. [00:12:13] Speaker E: The Blair Witch thing, and most people thought it was based on a real thing. That was one of the first big, like, exposure horror film. But it was. [00:12:26] Speaker A: I just wanted to make the distinction that the Blair Witch Project was a theatrically released movie. I'm aware was found footage, but it was like there were trailers for it and marketing and all this gnarish kite where. And I know that the dumb people thought it was like, oh my God, did they really kill someone in a movie? But, like, what I'm trying to say is that, like, Marble Hornets was just uploaded to YouTube, you know, it just existed. [00:12:48] Speaker C: It was uploaded 10 days after the original Slender man image. Troy Wagner came up with this in 10 days, uploaded the first video, and before that, or before or during the production, they started putting up missing person posters of the characters in the town where they were filming. And they're like, have you seen this man? So, yeah, for sure. They. They sold it. They sold it incredibly well, plus all the ARG elements. The community was involved in trying to solve this mystery. That's why Marble Hornets is so special. [00:13:29] Speaker A: Yes. [00:13:30] Speaker C: I think it's the ARG elements make it amazing. [00:13:33] Speaker B: And Marble Hornets is really what opened the door of opportunity for it to actually become a fandom because they introduced the characters like Hoodie and Masky. [00:13:44] Speaker C: The idea of proxies. [00:13:46] Speaker B: The idea of proxies. And that's what kind of spurred the fandom even further. It was so. It was revolutionary, honestly, it was really, really revolutionary for Internet horror. [00:13:58] Speaker D: I will say, for as non canon as most everything is, I feel like there is a set group of characters that are just largely considered canon regardless, I. E. Masky and Hoodie. Then we get into like Slenderman and Jeff. I feel like having Marble Hornets definitely solidified their importance and their role in the fandom and then opened the door for people to be like, where can we go? How weird can we get? [00:14:27] Speaker A: How weird can we get? So. So okay, you guys saw the video. I'm gonna roll it here of my friend Chris, my dear friend Chris on his channel, running into a proxy of the Slender man now. [00:14:39] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:14:40] Speaker A: It was. It's horrifying. [00:14:41] Speaker C: Your dead friend, Chris. [00:14:42] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Rest in peace. [00:14:44] Speaker E: Love you. [00:14:46] Speaker F: What's up, fam? I'm continuing my journey into the countryside. I'm at an undisclosed location. I keep traveling further and further west. Oh, I am at a state I've never been to before. I can't tell you where it is, but. Oh, my God, this scenery. The scenery. I'm out in the middle of literally nowhere. There's no one for miles. Oh, my God, look at the. Look at this fog. This is like. Like, welcome to Silent Hill. Like, look at this fog. You can't see anything. It's so dangerous to even drive these roads. You can't. You can't see, like, 10ft in front of the car. Oh, my gosh. Should I go this way? No, that's gated off. All right. Why don't I just head back to the car? Yeah. No, so far, so good, my little plan. I thought that, you know, there's no way that he can follow me here because there's no Internet access. I'm sure he teleports around, you know, using the wi fi in the air. So there's no Internet. So that means Slenderman can't even approach me. I finally gotten away from Slenderman. [00:15:53] Speaker A: You thought you could escape the clutches of Slenderman? [00:15:55] Speaker F: Oh, my God. Oh, God. What are you Are. [00:15:59] Speaker A: You can't hide the clutches of Slenderman. [00:16:02] Speaker E: There's proxies all over the country in every state. [00:16:05] Speaker A: Oh, no. [00:16:05] Speaker F: I found this proxy. Oh, no. Oh, oh, oh, don't stab. Don't stab me, fam. Don't stab me, fam. Oh, God. Oh, God. [00:16:14] Speaker B: Oh, oh, oh, oh. [00:16:17] Speaker F: Oh, God. [00:16:18] Speaker A: Yeah. Rest in peace. [00:16:20] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:16:20] Speaker A: I mean, he's watching this from hell, but, you know. [00:16:25] Speaker E: We love you, Chris. [00:16:27] Speaker A: Yeah, sort of. Anyway, but my point, God bless Chris is a good. He's a good person. Check out his channels. Slender Boy 2024. It's a. It's a terrible channel. I don't recommend it, but watch it anyway. But my point is, he ran into a proxy of the Slender man and that person was yelling and out of shape and. And very scary and had two plastic knives. Is that very typical for how the proxies would appear? Like, what's their normal appearance? [00:16:58] Speaker B: So proxies. So proxies, they. In my mind, proxies have two definitions. You have the canonical definition of what a proxy is, and then you have the fandom definition. So the canonical definition of proxy is the idea that when you are encountering Slender man, proxies are essentially people that two things either they become so hypnotized by him that they become his servants, or they willingly give themselves to him as his servants. Now, in the fandom definition of Proxy, it's the same thing, but in the fandom, people who are fans of creepypasta will often call themselves proxies. And so, yeah, it's the idea that in the lore and in the myth itself, that's essentially what a Proxy is. It's somebody who has dedicated themselves to Slender man and is, like, doing his bidding and doing evil and killing people. So that's essentially where the whole thing comes from. [00:18:09] Speaker C: Against or not against their free will. When we look at characters like My Beautiful Boy on the Wall. You meant your character. [00:18:20] Speaker A: You meant your mask, right? [00:18:22] Speaker C: Yes, I meant my mask. [00:18:23] Speaker A: Okay. [00:18:23] Speaker C: I was talking about the mask. The mask that belongs to Masky, which is not what the creators wanted their character to be named. It was the masked man and the hooded man. And then the fandom's like, Masky and Hoodie. That's their names. And they were like, you wanna. You wanna come up with something cool? They're like, no, no, that's their names. But they are getting into that. That's why my proxy name is Plaid Shirt Guy. [00:18:54] Speaker A: Damn. Damn. That's. [00:18:55] Speaker C: That getting. Getting into that. [00:18:58] Speaker A: That's horrifying. That's horrifying. [00:19:00] Speaker C: Yeah, it is. I'm a very scary guy. [00:19:03] Speaker A: Yeah. I thought. I thought I was cool coming up with care. I thought I was cool coming up with characters like Cruciform Sam. [00:19:10] Speaker D: Is your preferred method of unaliving people via strangulation with said plaque? [00:19:20] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, That's. That's how I get them as I take off my shirt and they're like, whoa, you're transgender? And then I strangle them. [00:19:31] Speaker A: I mean, that's what they. I mean, that's what they get. Honestly. I mean. [00:19:36] Speaker E: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:19:36] Speaker A: I don't see a problem here. [00:19:38] Speaker C: Tim Wright, the guy who is Masky, got. He got under the Slender Man's control as a kid because he got sick with what they call Slender Sickness, and he takes pills to try and avoid seizures and ellipsey, but also becoming his alter ego, Masky, who stalks his roommate or whatever. [00:20:04] Speaker A: That's horrifying. [00:20:05] Speaker C: You know, chill things. [00:20:06] Speaker A: It's dangerous. [00:20:07] Speaker C: Yeah. I've got my own theories about Hoodie and why Hoodie was trying to steal Tim's medication. I don't think Brian wanted to be a Proxy either. He just kind of got dragged off in, like, the third episode, and they're like, bye. [00:20:22] Speaker A: Huh? [00:20:23] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:20:24] Speaker E: But how do you guys feel about, like, people claiming, like, real life things with Slenderman now? [00:20:35] Speaker B: Wow. [00:20:37] Speaker E: An episode of Scared to Death, and they were talking about this woman who wanted to, like, this really. Podcast or not podcast, she wanted to do this really cute birthday party where she was, like, doing this whole, like, treasure hunt at night with Slenderman. And she had two, but then there were three, and one of the kids went missing, and it was like. Like, the mythology taking form. Like, how do you. [00:21:03] Speaker A: What are they? Like, Bigfoots, where there's just lots of them now? [00:21:06] Speaker E: Like, they just, like, multiply. I don't know. I'm old, guys. [00:21:12] Speaker C: Maybe they're like, I'm an expert in Slender Man. He's actually a form of fungus. Oh, the Slender man that we see is the fruiting body. The mycelium of the Slender man is actually all throughout. That's why he's associated with woods, is because it's a. It's a parasitic tree form of fungus. I did just make all of this up, by the way. That's not why he has long arc. [00:21:36] Speaker A: I was. [00:21:37] Speaker D: Can we get a fact check on that? [00:21:43] Speaker A: If that's true, then the movie got it right, because he's a tree in that movie. But. Okay, I'm trolling. [00:21:51] Speaker C: I hate to tell you, boss, but trees and mushrooms are actually different creatures. [00:21:55] Speaker A: What? No. That's a fucking lie. Get out. Get out. Get the fuck out. [00:22:02] Speaker C: Okay. [00:22:05] Speaker E: He needs to watch more of the Last of Us, and I think he'll get it. [00:22:09] Speaker A: So Adrian asked, like, what do we think about people, what, claiming to have real experiences with the Slender Man? [00:22:16] Speaker E: That is what I was asking. [00:22:17] Speaker A: Is it, like, the Wendigo or something like that now where there are just, you know, organic legends popping up about the Slender Man? Is that what you mean? Because, like, what I'm trying to say is everyone knows. Everyone knows that Slender man is something that popped up on something awful, had a terrible movie made about him in a YouTube series, and it's something a bunch of kids basically made up. No one actually, like, thinks the Slender man is real. That's what. [00:22:45] Speaker E: Because we literally kill people over it. [00:22:50] Speaker A: Okay, we will get to that. Is that where we're going? [00:22:53] Speaker E: Well, no. What I want to know is, like, okay, so we're old. We live in 2025 now, and I feel like creepypastas and all of this stuff is, like. Are almost like we're creating new folklore, but it's folklore, right? So that's, like, super interesting. So I. I'm like, that's what I was Asking. [00:23:18] Speaker D: Okay, the folklore thing is where my thought process was going with that too, because depending on your age range or like, when you get introduced to these forms of media, you're not getting all of the context and some things are lost in transaction. So, like, when I first got introduced to the realm of creepypasta, I didn't know about Marvel Hornets or anything that was on something awful until I got further into the fandom. So a lot of the stuff that I was reading could very easily be taken at face value as a child. And then when you're so involved and so interested in, like, other similar folklore that has, like, roots in your area, it becomes very easy to draw parallels and be like, okay, I can see this becoming or being like a real thing. [00:24:11] Speaker E: Yes. [00:24:12] Speaker A: Okay, okay, so. Right. So that's fair. I think that because my. My cut off. My. The reason why I've always looked at these things kind of slant eyed is because, like, to me, it's like the wet. The Wendigo or Adrian. Give me, give me, give me something. Folkloric leprechauns or something, right? [00:24:33] Speaker E: You. I love you. It's Red Cat. [00:24:59] Speaker C: It's me. [00:25:01] Speaker A: It's you. [00:25:05] Speaker E: All the way. [00:25:05] Speaker A: Well, my point is that, like, I. [00:25:09] Speaker D: Would welcome the friend into my home to get warm now. [00:25:13] Speaker A: I mean, I'm living with it. It keeps. It keeps breaking glasses. It's really. It's really not all. It's cracked up to me. But my point is that what it comes. Sorry. Thanks, Jack. But what it comes down to is like, to me, it's like, oh, I know the Slenderman originated on something awful in YouTube and whatever, and kids just make this stuff. However, yeah, I have the benefit. I have the privilege of being Thur. I was there when the magic was written. You know what I mean? Other people maybe not. Oh, is the Slenderman real? Oh, did you hear? A little girl killed another little girl because the Slender man told her to Adrian? Is that what you're saying? [00:25:48] Speaker E: Kind of. [00:25:50] Speaker A: Okay, Erica, what are you saying? Go ahead. [00:25:52] Speaker D: I think that's kind of where I was going with that, because I was around the same age as those girls when that story broke. And it was really surprising to me because it was like, okay, I can draw parallels here and differentiate and realize that this is a work of fiction, but for someone my same age who might not have had all of the information I had, they're like, no, this is a very real thing and I'm going to engage in it so I can further myself in this world. [00:26:22] Speaker B: Exactly. Especially for and this is also speaking from my own experience, but, you know, being that age, when that came out, there was a lot of young girls and young children that they were taking this stuff at face value as being real because it was a form of escapism. A lot of people, a lot of these kids, myself included, we weren't really growing up in, like, the best situations, and we were looking for places that we could escape to. And that's what the appeal of Creepypasta was, I can tell you. Almost every single person that I knew, myself included, always had this dream of, like, I want to be a proxy. I want to escape to the forest and live in the Slender Mansion and escape away from all of my trauma that I'm currently growing up with and going through. And so a lot of kids really took that and believed it to be real. And I feel like that's what essentially happened with those girls is that, you know, it was that. And also mixed in with all of the other trauma that could be included in that too. [00:27:28] Speaker E: Health issue as well. [00:27:30] Speaker B: Exactly. Exactly. [00:27:33] Speaker E: So my daughter is 13, and she's obsessed with Slender Man. She's also obsessed with, like, Siren Head and all of SCS's or whatever. Like you guys SCPs? Yes. [00:27:50] Speaker B: SCPs. [00:27:51] Speaker E: SCPs. That's it. She's flipping obsessed with them. Right. She thinks they're real. Like, she thinks they're real. Like, it's a thing. So what I'm wondering is if in the age of technology, we're not creating our own folklore right now. [00:28:09] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:28:11] Speaker E: Like, we have these people and we're creating these stories about these, like, amazing creatures and monsters and all of this stuff, if we're not actually making them real in, like, this weird sort of, I'm gonna be honest, like, really messed up way where it's like something that. I mean, in every generation, we always want to believe in monsters, right? [00:28:37] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:28:38] Speaker E: But thing, like, there's always the bad guy. There's always the monster. You either find out how to be friends with it or make it or, like, run away from it or fight it. Right. So what is happening? But it's like, Internet based. [00:28:57] Speaker A: Okay, fair enough. Here's my question. Okay. Mothman. Yes, Everyone knows the Mothman. Everyone loves the Mothman. You know, a winged creature terrorized Point Pleasant for several months. [00:29:08] Speaker C: Probably an hour. [00:29:09] Speaker A: Probably an hour. People saw it and, like, people were like, it's probably living up at the old TNT mill, like a Scooby Doo villain. Right? And a bunch of stuff happens. And then a bridge fell and people were like, Shit. The Mothman was trying to warn us. Right. There was a narrative there with the Slender Man. Right. There's a lot. There's a lot of these things. We've mentioned a bunch of them. You know, there's also, like, Nara. Like what? Jeff. Jeff the Killer? Like, I. I don't. There's, you know, the. The siren head. Right. But none of them are like the Slender Man. And is it. Is it purely because of those two little girls who lured their friend into the woods at the Slender Man's behest? Is that what turned the Slender man into a character with more resonance and relevancy in a folkloric sense? [00:29:55] Speaker D: I feel like it's an amalgamation of. [00:29:57] Speaker B: Things of itself before her, before that case. And I also. I don't mean to interrupt, but I also do want to clarify. She actually never died. It was an attempted murder. She was actually able to get help, and she survived that. [00:30:12] Speaker A: Okay. [00:30:13] Speaker B: And it's something. [00:30:13] Speaker A: I'm glad to hear that. [00:30:14] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:30:16] Speaker A: Okay. [00:30:17] Speaker B: The folklore. [00:30:19] Speaker A: Yes. She was. I know she was stabbed 19 times. So pretty awful. [00:30:23] Speaker C: Pretty. [00:30:24] Speaker A: Pretty. A lot of times pretty horrific and pretty pathetic that Hollywood studio would make a movie about that, you know? So. Okay. [00:30:33] Speaker D: I certainly think it had a large role to play in sensationalizing it. But like Britney was saying, there was definitely, like, a very rich history there already. And I feel. I feel like since he was so cataclysmic in creating this universe, that it's kind of an inevitability for him to be such a prolific figure in it. [00:30:59] Speaker C: I think far more important. Well, not important. God, that's the worst way to word that. More influential on the popularity of Slender man is the ARG element. Marble Hornets is not the only Slenderverse arg. There is tons of them. Everyman hybrid is another big one. Tribe 12 was big. Might still be big. I don't watch it anymore because the guy turned out to be an. But there's this whole expansive universe, and not only does each individual series involve its audience with these alternate reality game elements, but it's not a narrative. It's something that anyone can take and create a narrative out of. It's a boogeyman. And anyone can create one of these series focusing on this boogeyman. [00:31:59] Speaker B: I think the biggest thing that sensationalized Slender man, other than Marble Hornets, was the Slender man, the Slender man game that came out. You had all of these big creators like PewDiePie and Markiplier and Jacksepticeye, all of these huge gaming creators that really kicked off their Platforms as horror creators because of the Slender man game, because of how big and how creepy it was, and it really. Even that game. That's a whole other conversation of how it really changed horror games, period. I could go on about that, but that was a really big thing that brought it out into the Internet even further. [00:32:40] Speaker A: So here's my. Here's my thing, though. Okay. I'm gonna keep hammering on this point because something about the Slenderman doesn't go. In my opinion, and I'm trying to explain what I mean. So Slenderman and the Loch Ness Monster are not the same to me. Does that make sense? [00:33:00] Speaker E: Yes. [00:33:00] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. [00:33:02] Speaker A: Okay. How are they different? [00:33:07] Speaker C: Slenderman originated on the Internet. That's a big one. And that because of its. There I go, miss gender Slender Man. Why don't I. Because of his connection to the Internet, I think he loses credibility. The Internet just does not have that credibility that, like these old legends do. [00:33:28] Speaker A: Let me phrase it a different way. Let me phrase it a different way. Go ahead, Erica. [00:33:33] Speaker D: I'm sorry. I was thinking along the same track, just the opposite way. Things like Loch Ness and like the Jersey Devil or La Llorona, they're very close to home for a lot of people, and they go back so far as oral tales above all. [00:33:50] Speaker B: First of all, the Loch Ness and La Llorona and Jersey Devil and Mothman, it's all. The common denominator across the board is two things. The first thing is cultural significance. The Loch Ness Monster or the Banshee. Banshee is a type of Irish Fae. Like, this is something that goes back years and years and years and has a lot of deep roots in the cultures that they come from. But even the second thing I was going to say is word of mouth. Loch Ness Monster and Mothman, everything is word of mouth of, I saw this. This is something that I experienced. While Slenderman being completely born of the Internet, we have very, very little people actually coming out and for realsies saying, I actually saw something. I'm not just adding to the lore. Does that make sense? [00:34:45] Speaker D: And at this point, it's so hard to distinguish when people are being genuine because it has that history of just being Internet lore. [00:34:53] Speaker B: The Loch Ness Monster is a legend. The Slender man is a character. [00:34:59] Speaker E: Yes. [00:35:01] Speaker A: So I think that the Slender man is more analogous to Dracula than he is to Bigfoot. Now, let me ask my question, and you can take it or not, but what I do, you have more respect for people who say they think Bigfoot might be real or who think Slender man might be Real honestly. [00:35:21] Speaker D: Bigfoot. There you go. [00:35:25] Speaker C: I have so much beef with Bigfoot. [00:35:27] Speaker D: What ifs there? [00:35:29] Speaker A: That's what I'm trying to say. [00:35:30] Speaker E: You're gonna get me in this whole, like, go crazy thing. [00:35:35] Speaker A: Do it, do it, do it. You want to be a war machine? Take the shot. [00:35:40] Speaker E: Okay, that's. [00:35:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:35:41] Speaker E: So we're about to go crazy, create monsters, and we put the worst of ourselves in everything, and we make it fucking legend. And I think that's what the Internet is doing right now. I think we're creating shows and, like, crazy folklore and stuff. And it's kind of exciting to see new folklore being created because everything is, like, really old. And I'm. I think you guys know at this point, I'm a huge folklorist. It drives Daniel crazy, and it's a thing. But, like, we're literally in this age of, like, Internet connectivity where, like, people's brains are connecting and creating horrifying things and people are acting on. Right. Which is cool and all of that kind of stuff. But, like, if you want to go, like, full deep in, like, tulpas are like this thing where we create something and, like, it's like this collective belief. It's something. Britney is like, yeah, it's Tulpas. [00:36:52] Speaker B: Tulpa. Yeah. It's essentially Tulpas. It's something that is being created by common belief, by multiple people believing in one thing, and then that thing becoming real. But it. Exactly. Okay, I have a small story. [00:37:12] Speaker A: Story time with Brittany. [00:37:13] Speaker B: And I promise, I promise it's relevant. I actually had an experience with. I had experience with this recently. So my younger brother, he's a senior in high school this year, he loves Minecraft. He is obsessed with Minecraft. He's been obsessed with it since it came out. And he was playing the other day, and he calls me and he's like, hey, sis, I have something weird going on with my game. And I'm like, what's up? And he knows all of the ins and outs on how to mod everything and everything like that. And he's like, I haven't added any type of horror mods to my game. And I'm having all of these different horror things happen. Like, I'm seeing this weird creature, like, in the distance, and it's crashing my game. Like, he actually was sending me screenshots of his game being fully crashed and then him going into it, and it had, like, a crash code he had never seen before. And he's like, I haven't added any horror mods to my game. This is really creepy. What's going on? And I look up the horror. The, like, crash code. And it was a creepypasta. It was a creepypasta called Null. And it was like a whole. Yeah, it was like a whole thing in the. It had its own lore and everything. And he's freaking out. He's, like, terrified because he's like, what's going on? I didn't add this. I don't know what's happening. And so it was like a really. It was a real thing for him. And he was like, if I get possessed, I'll be sure to let you know. But okay, so, no, he was. [00:38:46] Speaker E: And my stepson all had this whole moment where he, Robrine, and all of his monsters, like, came into Minecraft and they were afraid that he was going to possess the PlayStation and, like, recap. So what I did was have them plug in a remote control and I sprinkled salt, like a circle of salt around the remote control. Because let's be honest, guys, belief is everything. So if they believe, like. And it's not about telling them that it's not real, it's about, like, no, this is how you fix it. This is how you contain it. This is how you fight it. So we did the whole. Around the remote control and, dude, they had the best time. It was crazy. There were crazy monsters and they were like, oh, my God. Oh, my God. Like, it was. It was crazy. But, like, that's. That's what I did for mine. [00:39:51] Speaker A: That's like winning at parenting. [00:39:52] Speaker E: Yeah, it is. [00:39:54] Speaker C: Isn't that cool? [00:39:55] Speaker B: Very much mom of the year, mom of the century. [00:40:02] Speaker E: Sometimes I feel like most. [00:40:05] Speaker A: As someone who. As someone who advocates for people who, like, have religious trauma, you're not. It's more productive to work with people on their level, especially children, rather than just going, monsters aren't real. Shut up. [00:40:22] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:40:24] Speaker E: And I was a monster hunter. I was like, no, Mom. I've got wooden stakes sharpened and put underneath my, like, bed pillow. [00:40:32] Speaker C: Well, you're gonna be prepared if there's a Dracula. [00:40:34] Speaker A: That's the thing. [00:40:35] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:40:36] Speaker E: Yeah, but it's not empires in general. [00:40:40] Speaker A: I mean. But yeah, I mean, to be. I. I mean, to be honest, I live in the hood, and Dracula wouldn't get too far out here. That's all I have to say. The mean streets of Philadelphia. You don't want to. [00:40:49] Speaker D: You gotta worry about the leprechaun at that point, bro. [00:40:53] Speaker A: Yes, yes. [00:40:54] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. [00:40:55] Speaker A: Leprechauns are known to prowl the hood. [00:40:59] Speaker B: The reason I share that story the reason I share that story is because it's, it's exactly that. [00:41:05] Speaker E: It's. [00:41:05] Speaker B: Belief is the main thing that's real. And when it comes, the belief is what makes it real. And when it comes to these creepypastas, majority of these creepypastas, aside from Slenderman being Internet born, a lot of them have to do with technology. Like we're looking at been drowned, we're looking at Herobrine, we're looking at Null that I just discovered. And a lot of it, the common theme is some kind of haunted or possessed game ruins your life and makes you haunted or possessed or killed, unalived or whatever. And so that's the thing is that is truly belief that makes the thing real. I mean, I just experienced it with my brother the other day. He was, he was distraught. [00:41:49] Speaker D: Your brother's experience reminded me of when I first learned about Ben drowned and got around to playing with Cleverbot when I was a kid. And when things started getting funky and weird, there immediate perception that Ben was talking to me through Cleverbot and was going to possess my computer and then subsequently my gold Majora's mask cartridge and I was gonna die because that's how my little 12 year old. [00:42:15] Speaker E: Okay, well, my oldest kid is 13 and it's like, dude, put salt under your pillow. Like you just teach the kids how to like fight that stuff. [00:42:26] Speaker A: So, you know, so. Okay, yeah, I think that that's true. I think that this is an interesting genre of literature, mostly because it is dependent on its medium. Right. Similarly to how a good comic book like you could adapt Watchmen into a novel. [00:42:49] Speaker E: You can take a really good series. [00:42:53] Speaker A: No, no, no. Well, okay, I'm not, I'm not talking about that though. I'm saying the, the text of Watchmen. Yes, the comic book. You could take the events of it and you can transcribe them into words. You can, you can hand it to Stephen King or Brian Aldiss or something and let them write it, you know, and you'll, you'll lose the Dave Gibbons artwork. You'll lose a lot in the translation. Right? And it might not function as well because now it's not a comic book. Similarly, the Slender man thing, I don't think it works as well once you take it out of that context of, oh fuck, what's this picture? Oh, oh no, I'm watching this series and there's a spooky bookity outside wearing a suit, you know, with no face. You know, case in point, I keep mentioning it. There was a terrible, terrible, terrible movie I think it came out in. I have no idea when it came out. I'm a fraud. It. It doesn't matter. [00:43:44] Speaker B: It's like the 2000 and tens. It's a piece of early 2000 and. [00:43:46] Speaker E: Tens, mid-2010s, and Jack knows what I'm talking about. You have the episode of Supernatural where they make fun of the Slender man, kind of. And it's not like it's these Internet hacks trying to not lose what they have and they create this myth and then it goes further than what they were. [00:44:08] Speaker C: So is that the Tulpa episode? [00:44:10] Speaker B: It is the Tulpa episode. [00:44:13] Speaker A: So. [00:44:13] Speaker B: With the Ghost Facers. [00:44:15] Speaker E: So yes, the ghost faces. [00:44:17] Speaker A: So that's my point though, right? Like. Like they do it on, on Supernatural. And. And it's a. And it's a funny episode because the. [00:44:24] Speaker E: Slender man, it started funny, but then it was like super serious. And it was one of the most like. But the heartfelt episodes of the. [00:44:31] Speaker A: But the Slender man wasn't the serious part. [00:44:36] Speaker E: He was the fake part. [00:44:38] Speaker A: That's my point. So my point is that Slenderman is only really compelling and all this stuff is only really compelling when you read it on the Internet. So case in point. Okay, I'm gonna read you a bit of one of my favorites. It's called the saga is called Nine Mother Horse Eyes. Yes. So basically what this was was you'd be on our computers or you'd be on R Pokemon or RPC Gaming Master Race, right on Reddit and you're just like reading a thread about whatever and like, oh, okay, I'm trying. I'm looking for advice on updating my processor and everyone's posting things and then suddenly you get to a rant, a comment that says, in Vietnam, the US government tried to pacify the country village by village using the Strategic Hamlet program. Basically creating villages where there was no or little Viet Cong influence. They tried more extreme experiments where they completely isolated villages or groups of villages, allowing absolutely nobody to enter or exit for periods of up to four years. In some of the villages, people simply starved to death. In other, more self sufficient villages, the people managed to scrape by. It was noted that in many of the villages where this technique was tried, messianic or millenarian movements sprang up. In 16 separate incidences. Villages were able to independently invent flesh interfaces and non electrical portals. And it was surmised that these villages were being collectively dosed with LSD for long periods of time. And their intellectual mutations allowed for these advances. The flesh interfaces were eventually destroyed by The North Vietnamese army at a terrible cost in lives. And people are just like commenting like, wow, this is the funniest spammer ever. And then you're, you know, you might be on our music or our hip hop heads and suddenly see the Soviets designated like, you know, you're reading about Kanye's latest meltdown, you're like people making jokes, posting pictures, and then boom. Nine mother horse eyes leaves this epic. The Soviets designated large portions of the Ukraine countryside as harvest populations. Basically their food and water supplies were dosed with LSD until they achieved what the Soviets called integration. This meant that the local populations had independently invented flesh interfaces. The Soviet army would then quarantine the area and try to remove the flesh interfaces for their own use. This was usually without success and with great loss of life. Many of the soldiers and scientists were segmented, as often happens in an incident zone. So they ended up with people missing limbs, cut in half, etc. What's interesting is that the people could live for quite some time despite segmentation. This is what led the Soviets to believe that their missing body parts still existed albite in some unknown place. So one of the leading theories of the time was interdimensional. Interdimensionality. Quite mistaken. And like there's, there's hundreds of these. And like, what I'm trying to say is I've read these in a mega thread and they're very well written, they're very spooky, they're very fucking Lovecraftian. Lovecraft would be pissed if he saw this because this guy's this, this mystery person. I don't want to gender them beating him at his own game, but my point is that like, if you saw one of these in the wild, you would get worse chills than I'm getting just reading it, like in a mega thread, you know, and that's, and that's the cool thing about Internet horror, man. It's a genre of literature and multimedia. It's a multimedia genre that exists in like. Yeah, it's like a fungus. You know, Jack was talking about how the Slenderman is a fungus. And I agree. I mean, maybe not in the lore, but this stuff is viral, man. It's cool. [00:48:12] Speaker E: Well, and they're legal. Like you can use it however, like you can look at something like Channel Zero, right? [00:48:20] Speaker A: Yeah, great, great, great show, by the way. [00:48:23] Speaker E: It is phenomenal. It is so crazy. But they take creepypastas and they turn it into like these amazing stories because there's no like legal repercussions, there is no like, it's literally a free for all. Like, any of you guys could write a creepypasta today. You could create your own folklore. Like right now. Like, just do it. Like. What? It's crazy. [00:48:53] Speaker C: That's what I was going to do with the Skinned man originally, with the way the skinned man. [00:49:01] Speaker E: Yeah. No Jack ever gonna create a creepypasta? Like, you're the one. [00:49:08] Speaker A: I mean, you should. [00:49:09] Speaker C: Thank you. [00:49:10] Speaker A: You should. No, no. [00:49:12] Speaker E: Like, that's like. [00:49:14] Speaker C: You've read the Skinned Man. [00:49:15] Speaker A: I think I. Well, Jack is a very talented writer. I've read a couple of his stories. They're super rough, but his ideas are really strong and his. His character work is fucking dynamic as hell. [00:49:28] Speaker E: Oh, that means I would love your work because I only care about the characters. [00:49:35] Speaker A: Right. [00:49:36] Speaker C: After one time in 1 million years. [00:49:40] Speaker A: Jack, why don't you tell us what an ARG is? Because I know, but our viewers might not or listeners might not. [00:49:45] Speaker C: Yeah, I probably should have explained that before using the word 20 times. An ARG stands for an alternate reality game. And the basis is we are all pretending that it's real. And it involves real world puzzles, real world codes, ciphers, all sorts of things where the audience is interacting with the creator in a meaningful way to solve mysteries. Most of the time doesn't have to be mysteries. What the audience might be familiar with is the cipher hunt in Gravity Falls where there was a real statue hidden in Oregon. And if you solved all the clues, you can go see the real statue that was hidden. That is an arg. That's a great example of one. [00:50:30] Speaker A: That's really cool. So that being the case, that's the kind of thing that really, really drove the. The engagement with the Slender man idea. Right. And made it more of a. A phenomenon. Right? [00:50:43] Speaker C: That and the video game for sure. I think probably more the video game. I like the args. [00:50:50] Speaker A: And when you video game, you're talking about Slenderman, the missing pages, right? [00:50:56] Speaker C: Am I? [00:50:58] Speaker B: I think the original game was just called Slender Man. [00:51:01] Speaker A: Oh, really? I think. See, I don't know anything. I'm a fraud. Okay, never mind. [00:51:05] Speaker C: The eight pages. The eight pages originally titled Slender. [00:51:09] Speaker A: There you go. Slender. Yes. [00:51:10] Speaker B: Slender. Yes. That's what I was thinking. [00:51:12] Speaker A: I downloaded that from like a creepy website and played it like, you know, it was super interesting. You know, I like it. It's a good game. Have you guys seen the 2016 documentary, Beware the Slender Man? Yeah, I have not, Adrian. [00:51:24] Speaker C: Oh, no, you have not. [00:51:26] Speaker B: I don't think I've seen that one. [00:51:27] Speaker A: I'm familiar okay, it sucks. I don't like it. But here's what it does. It tries to build a case that there is something about the creepypastas that led to these girls attempting to kill their friend. And it doesn't do a very good job because what it does is it shows the courtroom where basically, you know, it seems like the girl was very much not just a child, but also kind of schizophrenic. Like, I don't think there's anything about the Slender man that actually makes people kill each other. Otherwise you'd be hearing about it all the time, right? Yeah. Yeah. So that being the case, are we content to say that that Slenderman has more in common with Dracula than the Loch Ness monster, or is he a different thing altogether? [00:52:16] Speaker D: I feel like he fits into his story. [00:52:21] Speaker A: Okay, Adrian, what were you saying? [00:52:24] Speaker E: I think he has more in common with Sasquatch. Like, it's like the folklore because we use. Like we're a technology based people, and so we're creating our own folklore based on technology now, as opposed to, like, earth woods, like, where we live stuff. It's all culturally based. [00:52:48] Speaker A: So. Okay, I think the disconnect is coming from the fact that you're using folklore in a way that I'm not using it. So. So to me, folklore is something that might have been considered real at some point, but is now just something we pass down as a story. Slenderman doesn't seem to ever have had that kind of vital existence. [00:53:06] Speaker E: It's the opposite. [00:53:07] Speaker A: It's the opposite. [00:53:08] Speaker E: Okay, if you start from the back and go to now, it's like you're creating your own monsters. [00:53:18] Speaker D: Basically. [00:53:19] Speaker A: Like the mullet. You start from the back, you go to the front. Right, Exactly. [00:53:22] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:53:23] Speaker A: We brought this. We brought the script. Full circle. [00:53:25] Speaker E: Yeah, yeah, same thing. [00:53:29] Speaker A: Okay. [00:53:32] Speaker C: Sorry. [00:53:33] Speaker B: Oh, go ahead. [00:53:34] Speaker C: Speaking of bringing the script full circle, it's been bothering me for. How long have we been recording? An hour. It's been bothering me for one hour. Slenderman did not invent creepypasta. What's theorized as the first creepypasta came out in 2001. It's called TED the Caver. And he had a blog where he would post about going into caves. And his family was like, God, I hate that you do this. That's so freaky. You're gonna die in that cave. And he was like, you know, it would be the funniest thing if I made up a monster that got me in the cave and killed me dead. And he did not tell his family that it was a Prank for a while, and it blew up on the Internet. And everyone was like, oh, my God, this is the coolest thing. And he was like, oops, Damn. [00:54:26] Speaker B: There's also a piece of Internet horror that I've been wanting to bring up and talk about that I don't think we've ever touched on. Do you remember the. I can't remember what they're called, but it was basically the bad luck email trends. Like, you would be sent something. [00:54:47] Speaker C: Yes. [00:54:48] Speaker B: Yeah. It'd be like a creepy picture. And it was like, no. [00:54:53] Speaker E: When I was a kid, you wrote them in hand. But it's the same bad luck thing. Like, you write a thing because someone wrote it to you and they passed it to you, and you have to write it to, like, 12 different people and pass them off. It's the same thing. [00:55:09] Speaker C: So it's not funny. I'm sorry I laughed and. [00:55:12] Speaker E: No, don't be. It's hilarious. [00:55:13] Speaker C: It scared the hell out of me when I was a kid. [00:55:15] Speaker E: I know. Pitch. I cried the first time I got one for all. [00:55:19] Speaker B: Not quite. I brought up the email chain thing because I feel like that is a very integral part of creepypasta culture. [00:55:29] Speaker C: That that's where the name came from. Because it's a copy paste. [00:55:34] Speaker B: Because it was a copy paste. Yeah. So it was. It was a really big part of how creepypasta became what it was. But I also feel like that is a big part as to why people started believing a lot of it to be real. Because it was this copy paste thread of, oh, if you don't pass this on to 10 people, then masky is going to get you in the middle of the night, you know? And that's what really led people to. Actually, it was kind of like. [00:56:03] Speaker A: It's. [00:56:04] Speaker B: How do I. How do I put this? It preyed on people's superstition. That's what I'm trying to get at. It preyed on superstition, which thus created it to become a folklore of its own. And that's why I feel like so many people started really believing in it. [00:56:20] Speaker D: I think praying is the best way to go about explaining that too. Everybody loves a good copy pasta. That spooks you. [00:56:29] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:56:31] Speaker E: I love you, Erica. You're amazing. [00:56:35] Speaker A: Erica is. Is truly amazing. I agree. Erica, your makeup is. Is super cool. Okay, well. Is there. So. All right, so with that in mind, with that being the case, I think that's the Slender Man. Is there anything else to talk about before we transition to our conclusion? [00:56:59] Speaker C: I don't think I've Got a story. [00:57:01] Speaker A: Go ahead, Jack. Story time with Jack. [00:57:03] Speaker C: Now, when I was two apples tall instead of three. Also not 20. Yeah. Instead of three, two apples tall. I was in one of those terrible situations that we were talking about earlier, you know, being a sad child. And I would unknowingly role play with people on the Internet pretending to be creepypastas. And I didn't realize it was fake because I was an incredibly stupid, stupid child. So one of them was like, hey, come meet me in the woods. We'll hang out. And I was like, okay, sure. Really lucky that that's as far as it got. So I go into the woods and there's a guy in a hoodie sitting on a log. And now that I'm an adult, I think it was just somebody that didn't have a house and was hanging out. But when I saw that, I freaked out and I was like, I changed my mind. I love my family. I'm sorry, I can't talk to you anymore. And this poor guy was just role playing hoodie on wattpad.com. [00:58:22] Speaker E: And you were like, two apples tall. [00:58:27] Speaker C: I was two apples tall. [00:58:30] Speaker E: Like, dude, that's scary. And going out into the woods. I played in the woods all the time when I was a kid, and there were some moments, you know, like, no, that's not you. That's just a thing. [00:58:44] Speaker C: It was just a funny story and tangentially related. [00:58:47] Speaker A: Tangentially related. So, yeah, I think we can all agree that Slender man is a compelling character. He is an important character. He is definitely a monster. He might appear on Monster Fang someday. But more pressingly, Internet horror itself is a true genre that can only exist in the modern age, and it seems to be thriving. I mean, there's the no Sleep subreddit, which is fantastic. Nine Mother Horse Eyes is still going on. No Sleep. [00:59:17] Speaker E: Well, and you have shows like Channel Zero which are entirely creepy to base. [00:59:24] Speaker A: Yeah. And that's a good example of taking the elements of a creepypasta and adapting it correctly, you know, because, like, yeah, it has the artifice of like, okay, this is a show, whatever, and as the kids. But, like, it's presenting the story in a. In a compelling way. And it's. Channel Zero is really cool. I recommend it. I can't recommend it enough. It's fantastic. But yes, the cool thing. [00:59:51] Speaker B: Just to something. Something to throw out there that maybe we could wrap up the podcast with. If there was one creepypasta that everybody would recommend our viewers to read, which would be your creepypasta you would recommend. [01:00:07] Speaker A: Well, I Am obviously recommending nine Mother Horse Eyes because it's a wild, very dark and insanely create. It makes me. It makes me feel inadequate about my writing, you know, because I'm a fantasy. I'm a dark fantasy writer and I'm like, I didn't write anything this creepy. So nine Mother Horse Eyes. Go to the subreddit. Just read the mega thread. [01:00:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I think mine would be 1999. [01:00:33] Speaker D: Most definitely. 1999 is good. 12 year old me, die hard Ben Drone fan. But older me would also say go to no sleep. Give me a moment to dig around and find one of my favorite threads. Someone else can answer. In the meantime, handle Cap. [01:00:57] Speaker C: I've been listening to a lot of no Sleep recently instead of creepypasta and I'm really struggling. No End House is a classic. [01:01:10] Speaker E: Oh yeah, it's. [01:01:13] Speaker C: It has no End Houses. [01:01:14] Speaker A: It has an episode on Channel Zero. It's really good. [01:01:17] Speaker C: Good. I also. [01:01:21] Speaker D: That one got me feeling weird. [01:01:24] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. [01:01:26] Speaker C: I. I also Recommend Marble Hornets. 97 episodes. That's a lot of episodes, huh? [01:01:33] Speaker D: I feel like if people. [01:01:35] Speaker C: There was a comic book. There's a comic book. Read the comic book. [01:01:39] Speaker A: Oh really? Oh, cool. [01:01:41] Speaker C: Yeah, read the comic book. [01:01:44] Speaker A: We should do Abandoned by Disney as an. As an episode or something. [01:01:47] Speaker C: We should. [01:01:49] Speaker D: I found the Reddit thread. If y'all go to no sleep, I would definitely recommend reading. Is Lucid Dreaming dangerous? [01:01:58] Speaker E: That sounds like something. [01:02:00] Speaker C: Oh man, the right Left game is my favorite, actually. I love the right Left game. I think that's it. It's so familiar to me. [01:02:14] Speaker B: If it's what I think, if it's the same one that I'm thinking of, then yeah, it's really, really good. [01:02:25] Speaker A: So were there any others to recommend? [01:02:30] Speaker D: I think I'm done. I also go in. [01:02:35] Speaker B: We could. [01:02:44] Speaker A: So I. I'll propose a toast to the Slender man and his creepypasta brethren. [01:02:54] Speaker E: I mean, we got some things out of. [01:02:57] Speaker A: We did. So, you know, if you like us, do like. If you like us, do like and subscribe. It'll make us smile and you know, it helps us in the algorithms do follow our Patreons. I. I post the raw footage up there. And there is other exclusive content, so check that out. Follow us on YouTube. Death Wish Poetry Official Spring edition is opening soon, so follow us on Instagram for updates on that. I'm a novelist. I. I do write dark fantasy books. I just knocked all my toys over, but here's my first book, the Demon Struggle for his Infernal Soul. It's a dark fantasy novel About a demon prince who. Adrian did the COVID Yeah, he does horrible things. So do read it. Do read it. I torture him. What else? Yeah, Erica, did you have anything to promote? [01:03:53] Speaker D: I finally started kind of sort of writing again. If you want to find dark, sad, sappy poetry, you can find my writing on Monstrum Exemplum on Instagram. I'm also going to start posting short stories there. I finally started working on like a body horror mental health exploration piece that I'm excited to start posting. [01:04:14] Speaker E: That sounds magical. Like, so exciting, honey. [01:04:17] Speaker C: I love Body Horror. [01:04:19] Speaker A: Links will be below. Body Horror is cool. Adrian, did you want to. Did you want to promote anything? [01:04:29] Speaker E: So I do the Horror Film Art Society where we watch horror films and artists make art out of whatever I choose. It's ridiculous, but it's really fun. Next month is the one year anniversary. [01:04:48] Speaker A: All right. Jack, do you have anything to promote? [01:04:49] Speaker C: Working on a novel Now, I don't know if I shared Antler man with you. That's the one that won the award. And then I was like, this is so bad. I'm not gonna show you after I edit it. And I didn't edit it, so I didn't show you. I think that's what happened. And I'm three chapters in. [01:05:08] Speaker A: So, you know, three chapters in. Well, okay, so a couple things. I do have a workshop group, but if you just want to send it to me and let me read it because you don't feel like sitting with a workshop, I would love to read it. So if you want feedback, just send it to me. I'll fucking read it. But also, also I do do a workshop and you know, if you want to send it, if you, if you want to be part of that, just hit me up. Okay. But yeah, I will. Antler man coming soon. Brittany, do you have anything to promote? [01:05:41] Speaker B: A couple things. So I'm a tarot reader by trade. I have nothing new really going with there, but with wtcw, my paranormal team that I investigate with, we have a new video coming out as of today. It will be coming out on March 31st where we investigated a haunted antique and oddity store. And we had some really cool stuff. It was called Vintage Trixies. It's in Chesapeake, Virginia. And it was a really cool experience. We had some really good back and forth conversations with spirits through some of our technology that we had. So that is coming out March 31st and we have two videos uploaded right now that I am currently a part of. There's plenty of other WTCW videos before that. That we have. My first investigation was with the Smith family, and then my second investigation with WTCW was at the haunted Demonic Bel Air House in Ohio. So we have a bunch of really cool videos if viewers want to go check that out too. [01:06:43] Speaker A: This will be up before then, so that's awesome. And you're still. Do you do readings over the Internet? I'm not sure I can. [01:06:52] Speaker B: I am available to do virtual readings, so if I. If anybody wants to get a reading from me, you can find me @cunningfolktero on Instagram. You can hit me up there and we can schedule a reading. I do tarot and I do psychic mediumship readings. [01:07:07] Speaker A: Links are below. Yeah, do check out our. Yeah, our digital magazine, deathwishpoetry.com the winner edition is still being promoted, but the spring edition will be coming soon. So if you're a writer, I mean, follow our Instagram again. And. Yeah, just one more shout out. Of course. I just want to, you know, shout out to Ashley over at Tucson Media, our social media sorceress. She is fantastic. She is very talented. She does a lot of. Yeah, yeah, we love her. She does all the images. Yeah, she does all the incredible images for this podcast and she does a lot of the visual work on the Instagram. So, you know, if you need anything done, Tuxan Media's got you covered. Link below too. So that's about that. Write poetry, make art. Love your demons a stay spooky. Love your monsters a Satanis. Cool. [01:13:32] Speaker E: Really, just do that.