Don't Look Under the Internet
Don't Look Under the Internet
DLUTI 156 - Beyond the Slenderverse: An Interview with Alex Hera
This week we have a VERY special guest - a person who knows many things about the creepily fun parts of the internet!
Watch their content: Alex Hera - YouTube
From murderers to money launderers, thieves to thugs – police officers from the...
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Speaker 4:We're doing the damn thing.
Speaker 3:Sync, sync, sync.
Speaker 2:I know damn well, there's housekeeping, there is, there is housekeeping is.
Speaker 4:I was gonna get to it. I just wanted to sync up the audio and video.
Speaker 1:We haven't even cold opened. It doesn't matter.
Speaker 3:I think that's just what's happening now. Yeah, I guess I think.
Speaker 2:Welcome to don't look under the internet. There it is. You know us from such things as Really Tall Podcast. Yes, the more popular podcast.
Speaker 1:There's at least three or four that we're a part of Today's a special episode.
Speaker 2:Welcome everyone to.
Speaker 4:Don't Look Under the Internet, Mike why are you being so quiet?
Speaker 1:Save us.
Speaker 4:I'm going to just get us out of whatever the fuck that mess was.
Speaker 3:We're going to just keep talking.
Speaker 4:Mike usually doesn't stop, so welcome everyone to Don't Look Under the Internet, the internet horror comedy podcast starring yours truly, such as Doug over there. Hello, there's Matt.
Speaker 2:He's sitting in his house. There's Jason here.
Speaker 4:Hello, hello, there's me here.
Speaker 2:There's me here, hello.
Speaker 4:You're going to notice super special. Fifth guest appearance.
Speaker 2:The one and the only.
Speaker 4:Ladies and gentlemen, this is a deluded honor on our end. We have Alex Hara in the building.
Speaker 5:Honor to be here. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 4:The honor is mine, alex, don't you worry.
Speaker 1:Insert clapping track.
Speaker 2:Do you want to just mention some of the things that you've've done? I'm sure most of the people that listen to this podcast have at least heard your name before but sure, uh, yeah.
Speaker 5:So, hi, my name is alex harrah. I'm a writer and director. I've done a uh, an arg, and I've done a couple of documentaries, which is what I'm most well known for, including the history of analog horror and, most recently, slender verse, a documentary film series.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, and all the things that alex produces are fantastic. They're so fucking good.
Speaker 4:If you haven't watched any of them, you should go watch all of them you should, I would personally mark you down as probably like the internet's historian on on analog horror weird internet spaces if it's a thing that needs like an overarching like this is how it came to be analog horror, I feel is it definitely needed that and you definitely supplied it. In my opinion, the best manner are possible.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I appreciate that. I've been watching the analog horror history video I've seen it once but now I'm just going to sleep to it, because it's just great watching.
Speaker 2:It's like the March of the Penguins, but it's the March of the Internet Nerds.
Speaker 3:Yeah that's true 100%.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Now, before we get too deep into why Alex is here, I'm gonna go ahead and just cut us right into our diluty housekeeping above your head. So for those of you first tuning in for some reason probably because you saw Alex was on you and you're like, oh shit oh yes, this is worth listening to now this is what we're listening to now.
Speaker 4:Got him housekeeping is when we go over the little itty bitty things, that uh small updates and whatnot of the show, like, for example, the patrons and uh members that became members of our website oh yeah so if you don't, know, patreoncom, slash, julie pod or dilutycom, you can becomea member there. Uh, you get all all types of extra bonus content merch discounts, uh, uh, specific, like merch is like, exclusive to members of the website so, oh yeah, get a beans peens mug.
Speaker 3:Yeah, get your beans and peens mug.
Speaker 4:So we like to play a game called Is the name good or bad?
Speaker 2:This is where we haze our people that pay us money.
Speaker 4:We ridicule our patrons and they love it because they're still here. They keep coming. They do keep coming, paying us money.
Speaker 3:They do keep coming back, it works I know we haven't said it out loud on air, but I hope everybody knows that this is all in jest shut up.
Speaker 4:Good fun, okay all right, I'll go fuck myself, I guess so we're gonna start off. We have uh, nika, I like it short, sweet, to the point.
Speaker 2:Okay in terms of like real people names it's a decent name, but in like keeping with tradition. You've used your real name and that's not allowed here you could have picked any name it's no bigfoot sister bitch, it's not bigfoot sister bitch fat.
Speaker 1:That is very true, big jug hot or big jug hot cheese.
Speaker 4:So the bar is set real high. Oh yeah, so nico, sorry sounds like you got. You got to change your name. I don't make the rules Up. Next we have a Monochrome 808. I'm here for it. Kind of sounds like a synth band.
Speaker 1:It's a little music.
Speaker 4:I'm here for that one. I'm here for that one. I feel like this is like a 2008 gamer tag.
Speaker 2:You just need to throw a couple X's on the front.
Speaker 1:Yup.
Speaker 4:Lowercase and uppercase, uppercase, uppercase. Alright, you're good, you did it Monochrome.
Speaker 2:Last but not least, you should ridicule our patrons too. They're not paying you money.
Speaker 3:Actually, let's give Alex the last one. How about that?
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, yeah, alright so what are you?
Speaker 2:thinking alex, good name back, I love it, loving it all right. I get the impression that alex doesn't have a like an evil bone in their body, so I'm not the right person
Speaker 3:just grateful and non-shitty through you got lucky curbs.
Speaker 2:We'll put it that way, don't don't don't come back next week, I spared you um, and really, that's really gonna be it for housekeeping.
Speaker 4:I don't really have any other updates besides that guy going on I think we have more important things to talk about anyway, exactly.
Speaker 4:so, yes, leaving housekeeping. Um, I do want to bring up that. Uh, alex, you recently had a multi-part documentary series come out, a three three-parter, where the last part just came out to us a couple days ago. To whenever this drops, it'll be roughly around a week About 11 days ago yeah, about 11 days ago, and it was basically touching on Slenderman and the histories and doings of and the verse in which he resides?
Speaker 1:Yes, exactly.
Speaker 4:So we've basically compiled a list of a couple questions that we wanted to ask Alex and kind of see if we can get a little bit more behind the scenes information on the production of that documentary and, I guess, how it also affected you during its creation.
Speaker 5:Oh, absolutely. There's a lot there, for sure.
Speaker 5:I will say that I learned a lot from these documentaries because I I thought I knew things about slenderman and then I watched all three of these documentary parts and was like, oh, I didn't know anything about slenderman I knew zero yeah I marketed the whole thing as the untold history of slenderman for a reason, and there were people in my comments on the trailer going there's no untold history of slenderman for a reason, and there were people in my comments on the trailer going there's no untold history of slenderman.
Speaker 3:We know the history of slenderman and for the entire like week leading up to the first part, I was like oh, you don't even know how little you know, seriously, absolutely I'm coming from a vein of, like I grew up like when that whole era was happening with, like you know, social media just kind of gaining traction on the internet and seeing slenderman kind of come out of that like holy fuck, this is horrifying and me being who I am, I try to go on a research rampage. You know everything I possibly can about the things I'm interested in and, armed with that knowledge, even going into your three part series, I felt like I was a complete fucking amateur I was honestly like how could this possibly be six hours long?
Speaker 4:I don't understand how there's any content yeah and I feel like a lot of people were in the same boat as me, where a lot of the information that I knew about slenderman just came from the eight pages video game outside of that I was like that was my introduction to slenderman.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's just like the cultural osmosis. Right, yeah, I feel like that was kind of the main, like what brought it into the mainstream. Because then you got I know you mentioned, and you know we might get down to it a little bit later but that's when, like the let's players, when the big let's play boom started taking over and that was the big game to play and that's yeah what got it into mainstream.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm kind of sad, though I'm not gonna lie, I didn't get in on any slenderman stuff when I was, uh, like in that 2009, like area um, because I was like fresh out of high school being a degenerate college kid and I missed all of that. Like I came into it super late and I'm really sad I did, because my first introduction was marble hornets and I've loved marble hornet since, but like I almost didn't even realize how many other there were, out there that I could look into it and that blew my mind.
Speaker 1:I also really loved that. It almost felt like I was watching. What was it like? E True Hollywood story at some points in this I was like, wow, all these people have like some crazy drama going on.
Speaker 2:It's really good stuff. I think we should let. Alex talk though.
Speaker 1:I know we got our gush out of the way, Doug.
Speaker 4:It looks like you are starting us off with some of these questions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we'll start off real simple here. How were you first introduced to Slenderman?
Speaker 5:So I was first introduced to Slenderman when I believe was six years old, though I may have been eight. It was Holy shit. I think I think I was eight. It was right around the time the eight pages came out because I was too young to be like hardcore looking into ARGs in my free time.
Speaker 4:But I was, but I do.
Speaker 5:I do that like YouTube was, was around and so.
Speaker 5:I was exposed to it through people who found out about the 8 Pages and then found out about Marble Hornets from there. So my first exposure wasn't the 8 Pages, it was through Marble Hornets. But I only found Marble Hornets because the 8 Pages made it so much more popular than it already was. So after that point point I discovered it immediately was like oh my god, this is incredible started watching all sorts of slenderman stuff, reading slenderman stories online, googling everything I could about slenderman I I lived in a, a rural town with only like a couple hundred people, uh, as the entire population as well, uh, which I think had a big role to play in why it appealed to me specifically so much because it was like literally going outside, I was like looking at forests everywhere. So I was literally living in Slender Man's woods, like all the time and I was just like oh, yeah, sure, I mean, that's literally like he could be outside right now.
Speaker 5:All the stories I'm watching look exactly like where I live. How strange. So me and my friends uh, my elementary school friends we started going out into the woods looking for slenderman, like literally like four to five like you know, six to nine year old kids trampsing through the forest with like flashlights and like shitty cameras, like trying to find evidence of slender man.
Speaker 4:uh, this is a regular like stranger things no, it's a regular like stephen king. What's it?
Speaker 3:where they find the body. Oh, uh, yeah, fuck, what's the name of that?
Speaker 5:I don't know. I know what you're talking about. I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 3:Yeah straight out of a fucking stephen king novel.
Speaker 5:You want to see a dead body my, my, yeah, my whole life is kind of a weird like horror story, except just it's all the parts before the horror happens. Luckily I haven't gotten to that part yet but we'll see, uh, but yeah, so, so traipsing through the woods looking for slender man and, like you know, also writing some little slender man stories, just because I always wanted to be like a novelist, uh, and then later I decided I wanted to be a filmmaker, but I I wrote these little like slender stories and whatever.
Speaker 4:I think the novelist part does show in the way that you're able to write the writing. Oh, thank you.
Speaker 5:Yeah. So that was my first exposure and then from there, just Slenderman went into the pop culture consciousness and kept showing up. And I got into ARGs a bit later and was like, oh wow, Slenderman was such a bigger part of this whole ARG thing that I now also love. Slenderman's just been following me for my entire life.
Speaker 3:Damn, that's a terrifying sentence.
Speaker 4:Kind of really cool to say though.
Speaker 2:I understand that feeling because I used to live in a house that was just literally in the middle of all cornfields and if you open the front window of the house you were just staring into a cornfield that was probably like half a mile long and I would imagine sometimes that there was just like Slenderman standing on the other side of that cornfield, just like staring back at me. That's horrifying. I love it.
Speaker 3:I remember one night I was in my car waiting for someone and I had just learned about the fact that the more you know about Slenderman, like the more that he comes for you. And I remember just getting a shiver down my spine. It was like midnight in my car and I'm waiting for someone. There's like one streetlight behind me and I'm like checking my six over and over again. I'm like fuck.
Speaker 4:I'm horrified right now. Yeah, I so scared when I see my reflection in the window sometimes.
Speaker 5:So this is not this doesn't work well for me.
Speaker 4:None of that was my experience first time. I remember slenderman. I was like I'm turning the game off, shut the laptop, I'm done here, I'm gonna put on cartoons I'm like 18, I don't care come on, grab your friends we got a lot of questions to get through, though we do okay this is just what we do.
Speaker 3:We tangent so, in the vein of this, why did you focus so heavily on, like on Slenderman for this three part documentary? Why not do something like Cicada or something that has more of like a I don't want to say a specific following? I'd say cicada almost covers all of these like weird internet tropes, whereas slenderman's kind of like this very specific, like cookie cutter, creepypasta built world building exercise, more or less like what was it about the slend man mythos or everything around it that made you focus on that versus something that had a little bit more like heft to it to begin with?
Speaker 5:Sure. So I mean there's a couple different factors why I decided to make Slenderverse my next project following the history of analog horror. I think, first and foremost, the easy answers to get out of the way are, like it felt like a very natural continuation of that previous documentary where the history of analog horror does touch on the Slenderverse a little bit, and the way I envision it is currently I'm telling the history of unfiction in reverse order. So, like I did the analog horror, which is the most recent chapter, and then I did Slenderverse, which was like the chapter right before analog horror. That like set all of the groundwork for analog horror to exist. And then what I do next is going to be a chapter before the slender verse that set a lot of groundwork for the slender verse. Not going to talk about what that is yet, but so that's the. That's sort of like the, the filmmaking answer, I guess, uh.
Speaker 5:But there's also a huge aspect of like I didn't want to focus on, say, like a single project, uh, and just do a documentary about that. That wasn't that interesting to me. And Slender man had this whole universe, you know, the Slenderverse surrounding him, uh, and so it was a way to, you know, not just lock into like one piece of art, but to lock into an entire artistic movement again, same as analog horror. And then, you know, just for me me personally there's so many reasons that I wanted to do it. Like, as I was just saying, my my first exposure to him was when I was so young and I've been, you know, having him kind of in my brain for my entire life and always, always kind of wanted to do a story or something with him. Uh, and you know, beyond that, also just the opportunity to meet a bunch of the creators that, like you know, had inspired me so heavily when I was young, because being exposed to Slenderman so young was a huge reason that I was so interested in horror and in storytelling from such a young age.
Speaker 5:I was interested in storytelling before I was exposed to Slenderman, but really when I found Marble Hornets and all the Slenderman stuff online, that was what really kicked it into high gear, and especially when it came to like filmmaking. Later on, when I really got into like ARGs and web series, marble Hornets and Neverman Hybrid were like the two series where I was like, oh, I want to like do this forever. So so, just for me personally, I was like, oh, I really would love to like, talk to these people and like and tell this history properly, right, because there's so many different versions of slender man's history and people have tried to explain it before. But, like, as someone who was there on the ground, I'm like I know you guys aren't doing this right, so let me, let me, let me.
Speaker 2:I got this absolutely a passion project for you oh yeah, through and through.
Speaker 5:There's no way.
Speaker 3:I spent 18 months on this and it's not a passion, you know that's very fucking fair, so this is simply because you have a lot of knowledge, a lot of passion and just a lot of experience in this vein. That was kind of the determining factors for you to be like why, why am I doing this?
Speaker 5:yes, absolutely.
Speaker 4:And then also again like it felt like a very natural continuation of my previous documentary yeah absolutely okay, you also answered just a random, one-off question I had, which was how long did this thing take to film? 18 months, oh my gosh, that's 18 months from.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so we did the the research, starting in january of uh, of 2023. Uh, I guess we did like some preliminary research in 2022 but we weren't like really hardcore to the research yet. But yeah, so, like January 2023 is when we really got into the research, started doing interviews a couple months later, did interviews until I want to say like May, I think, and then into like the writing phase, and then we did all the shooting in August and September and then it was just editing from then on.
Speaker 2:You can definitely tell that you spent the time on it. Oh my god, yeah, I wanted to do it right.
Speaker 3:You did it right, that is for fucking sure.
Speaker 2:My next question that I had here, I think you've basically already answered and you won't answer it because you said that you're not going to say what you're working on next.
Speaker 5:Are there any big projects?
Speaker 2:or big topics that you would like to do, that you are willing to talk about well, there are many topics I want to do.
Speaker 5:Whether or not I will get to them at some point, I don't know, uh, but I just I love this stuff so much. I love horror. I love internet horror specifically, I love arogs. So, like I, I'm always thirsting for knowledge and I love talking to artists and learning about their process. So there are so many things I want to at some point get to. I don't know exactly how it will play out, but I already have my next documentary project in the works and again, I won't spoil the topic. You could probably guess it in like 10 guesses.
Speaker 4:It's us, but I'm not going to confirm it. Yes, I'm doing this officially.
Speaker 5:I'm making a three-part docuseries about Don't Look Under the Internet.
Speaker 1:I'm how they're the worst, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:All the IQ points you will be compensated for.
Speaker 1:Not out of our pockets, oh gosh, no, I can't afford. Not out of our pockets. Some class action lawsuit will have you listened to Delutti in the past 12?
Speaker 3:months, you're entitled to compensation. Peter Francis Geraci fucking commercial.
Speaker 4:So with any of these other like big I guess other ideas or other topics that you would want to cover, do you foresee yourself keeping uh primarily doing documentary styles or do you have any I guess ideas or want to go at a different uh storytelling direction or uh just another direction in general?
Speaker 5:sure this is a great question. So one thing I I will talk about. I won't talk about my next documentary project because I'm I'm the type of person I came from the, you know, the Todd Howard School of how to announce projects, which is wait until they're done, basically, and then just be like, oh yeah, we've been doing this the whole time. Nothing to say about the recent Bethesda project. But at a young age I was like, oh, that's cool, I'm going to do that. And so I've continued to do that, because I don't really like people, like the public, being like when's the next project? I'm like, just just wait, I'll tell you when it's ready. But I will talk about, uh, the product, the very next project I'm doing, which is not a documentary. I'm doing a narrative feature film shooting in three weeks, um, so that'll be a found footage feature um, I won't say too much more about it, but that is it's.
Speaker 5:It's happening, it's it's going to be shot in the next two months and it's a narrative, it's not a documentary. So I've always I've always wanted to tell narrative stories. The documentary thing just kind of happened accidentally and then I went wait hold on. This is really fun and also people seem to really enjoy when I do this. Maybe I'll keep doing it, but I'm at the point where it's like now I'm balancing both right, as I have the narrative path and I also have the documentary path and I'm sort of like alternating between the two I think it definitely helps that you, uh I don't know if it was on purpose or not, but definitely capitalized on, uh, I think, your your history of like analog horror.
Speaker 4:Was it two years ago that one came out? I want to say, uh, that was around that time when like long form media on youtube was starting to become more rampant and successful. So I think that was like lightning in a bottle. You grasp that. Oh yeah, the perfect time as well, and it just hit out the gate, because I mean that that's a very good video of yours too. It's got well over.
Speaker 5:I want to say like two million views on it if I'm not mistaken, Funnily enough it was not a hit on release. It like positively was received, but like I think we did like 5,000 views in the first week or something Like it was not huge. It was only like I think, like six months later that the algorithm was finally like wait, hold on.
Speaker 1:This is a really good video.
Speaker 5:You just got that YouTube check in the mail, like what they're? Like wait, we missed this Four dollars. Then it blew up, which was insane, because we were already in pre-production on the Slenderverse documentary at that point and we were like, oh, it's just going to be seen by like five, ten thousand people, it's fine. And then it's like no, actually you have an audience of like two million people now potentially. It's like, oh, yeah, okay, it's insane I
Speaker 5:absolutely foresee the slingerman documentary blowing up too, because I hope so no, I've I've long believed that youtube is going to be a home for documentary creation in the future. I mean it already kind of is. But I really think like at least I have my fingers crossed that we're going to see a huge explosion of like proper documentary, independent documentaries, on youtube. I think, I think it's the place for it, I think it's the time for it, I think independent films on the rise I think it's, I think it's going to happen, I hope so what's the reasoning for thinking YouTube is going to be the spot for that?
Speaker 5:Well, I think younger generations in particular are really into YouTube as a space for nonfiction content it's. It's really interesting the way the younger generations perceive it, because I think, like millennials, really perceive Netflix as the space for that, with true crime documentaries and things like that. But in recent years they seem to have really kind of fallen off in terms of, like I don't see Netflix documentaries going viral on like Twitter or Instagram or whatever. Like people aren't. People aren't making tick tocks about the newest Netflix documentary. They are making tick tocks about the newest Jenny Nich documentary. They are making tick tocks about the newest jenny nicholson video right, like you know youtube.
Speaker 5:Youtube, non-fiction content is going places and non-fiction content from studios is not, and I think there's a couple reasons for that. I think it's, you know, the the stuff that studios are putting out maybe aren't the most like super. They're not, they're not that bold. I think is is what's going on. I think, like also, as we're in a, in a point in culture where people's interests are getting more and more niche, that you know, a studio isn't going to dedicate millions of dollars to doing a professionally produced documentary about, say, slenderman, but they, but you know, a youtuber will, and so it'll appeal to that audience, which is big enough to sustain a youtube audience, but not big enough to sustain, say, a netflix audience and yeah like that tracks, like you said, you get kind of closer to the source of the people who understand the topic.
Speaker 2:because, exactly, and yeah, you bring this up in the slenderman documentary actually, but the, the documentary that was made about slenderman and, yes, you know some certain topics surrounding it was done really poorly and so a lot of the documentarians and stuff that work for big media companies don't have the knowledge necessary to actually make good content on some of these topics.
Speaker 5:It just depends on if they're going to put in the effort. There are really good documentaries made by studios about really interesting artistic topics and things. It can happen. It's just like I feel like a lot of the time they they don't put in the full effort a few and far between.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, well, it's all cash cow, cash grab and that's all this they need to make their money back, yeah well, I guess I'll ask um right quick, since we're kind of still on the topic here um, was there anything with all of your researching for the documentary? Was there anything that you learned that was new and fresh to you about, uh, slenderman or any slenderman lore that was out there? We're just like, oh you have no idea.
Speaker 5:Cool, oh, you have no idea. I I went into this project expecting to make a two-hour documentary and I came out of it with five and a half hours of content.
Speaker 5:So, yeah, no, I uh I went into it kind of knowing about the main slender verse series, like all the. All the series that get like a spotlight in the documentary were the ones I knew about. I didn't really know that much about like the blogs, so that was a whole new like chapter of lore for me. Like I knew a little bit of it but it was really digging deep into that and then like realizing that oh, this isn't just like a thing to dig into, this is like the deepest rabbit hole of like slenderman lore I have ever seen. Like I still don't know everything that happened in the blogs because it's just so mad like I do not have thousands of hours to read every blog, like literally it's that big, so learned a lot there.
Speaker 5:Uh, I did not know about, obviously, the slender verse creators group, because that was a very shocking secret no one knew about that really, besides the creators themselves, and so that was a huge moment where, when I learned about that and I started learning how, how intricate it was and how much stuff happened there, that was like the big turning point where I was like okay, this is, this is a series now.
Speaker 1:This is not a single documentary that that, uh, that chat they had was like one of the craziest parts of this to me I was like holy shit, like that is so smart of on their part to do like how in the like I don't know, more people need to do that to like get their shit together I guess, but like it was smart it was very smart.
Speaker 3:I feel like people don't work together enough to like do that. I feel like it's all all a competition, whereas, like, this is one of those areas and it's not really that way today anymore. Um, and that fucking sucks, but it feels like all of these different slenderman slenderverse creators had each other's backs and were like that's so fucking cool what you just made. That gives me an idea. I'm gonna make something now. It was never like fuck you, mine's better, like it was never anything about that, but now you see that all over the place yeah, I was gonna say I think that's a kind of the problem that you see nowadays.
Speaker 5:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Once someone capitalizes on a topic, it's their topic. Now you know what I'm saying, Like so it's mine. It's okay, but yeah, no, I don't know it's. It's interesting, I think it's smart. It reminds me of the Lovecraft, like mythos a little bit where a bunch of people are coming together to write the same universe just less terrible life views yeah that's for sure it really was a mythology and it really was like.
Speaker 5:I love the term chaotic fiction because it's something that I thought was only like an academic concept for so long. And then I discovered the slenderverse blogs and I was like, oh wait, no, this is a real thing, like it actually happens, like this is this is chaotic fiction this is it. This is pure chaos yeah, exactly no, it's it's. It was great, it was a, it was a beautiful time in the internet, and things are not the same.
Speaker 1:That's that's for certain, so I would agree with that so speaking of chaotic, how was it working with so many creators at one time?
Speaker 5:It was. It was interesting. You know there was a lot of a lot of emails, a lot of messages, a lot of scheduling conflicts, but mainly it wasn't. It wasn't that like difficult in a particular sense Once I actually got in contact with them. That was. That was the hard part for some, because a lot of people were especially like Evan Jennings, for example, like just does not check any messages or anything because of like past horrible experiences with fans.
Speaker 5:There's a lot of interviewees who were like just really not into the idea of being interviewed, just in a general sense. So you know, it was. It was very fortunate that I got a couple people early on to agree to interview with me and I got them to trust me and then they vouched for me for the other interviewees. So it really was like even the creation of the documentary itself was a community creation, because I wouldn't have been able to create the documentary and get access to all the people I got access to without the community coming together and basically being like okay, we'll trust you to make this documentary damn all right, yeah, so that kind of leads into a follow-up question I had, which was and you kind of already mentioned it was how did you actually get a hold of all these people?
Speaker 2:were there some people that were exceptionally difficult to get a hold of? And like, as an extension of that, you mentioned, or several people mentioned in the later parts of the documentary, that they sort of left the scene and disconnected because of some of the toxicity and the how uncomfortable they were being a public face in the scene, and so were some of those people apprehensive at first about coming back to work on the documentary.
Speaker 5:Very much so. Yes, I was like there were, there were a handful of people that were very open early on and those were like the very first interviews I did. But then, as I mentioned, there were, there were people who I wanted to talk to that I just wasn't getting responses from, and then, like out of the blue, I would get a response from them and then I would talk to them and be like oh yeah, dylan vouched for you, so that's why I'm talking to you, or you know like like yeah, shout out to Dylan.
Speaker 5:Or like there were, there were some I didn't even get though, like Vinny from Everman Hybrid. I tried so many times and I had people vouch for me and everything and he was just like no, I'm done, like that's it, I'm not, I'm not coming back for this and like totally respect that 100 percent, like I get it, but I get it, but that's really. The Slenderverse ended so badly for some of those people that really they were just done, or this was like their one final return where they were like I'm putting this to rest by doing this interview.
Speaker 4:Was it upsetting that you couldn't get Ron Browse, the artist behind Gimme $20, on the documentary? I was wondering what you were looking up. I forgot his name.
Speaker 5:You know, I should've, I should've. It's my fault.
Speaker 1:So what you're saying is you can vouch for us now, when we want to interview them. I got these guys, I totally understand that and I respect that.
Speaker 2:Just being like I'm done. I'm never talking about this again.
Speaker 3:Oh, abso-fucking-lutely, I'm never talking about this again. Yeah, oh, absolutely, absolutely. Some experience in that?
Speaker 1:vein. There were a few people that you could kind of tell like this was huge for them. This was an incredibly emotional adventure, like the whole documentary, and it had a lot of heart behind it and I liked that.
Speaker 5:Yeah, no, it was emotional for a lot of the interviewees just talking about a lot of these topics. Uh, some of those interviews were were real intense. I will say um, and then also like hearing a lot of them reach out to me again now that they're the documentaries have been released and be like you have no idea how utterly bizarre and strange and disorienting and emotional it is to see like five and a half hours that are basically just reenacting my life.
Speaker 2:I have to imagine that's super strange.
Speaker 5:Oh, it's gotta be so weird for them, I feel so bad, but, like you know, I feel like even if you feel bad.
Speaker 4:It's a story that I feel had to be told oh, yeah, and I don't think anyone else could have done it. No, with more fuck. What's the word for? Uh, respect, gusto, respect and passion?
Speaker 5:yes, well, and that's the other thing. Right, they would be like this was very weird and strange and also like and bizarre. But also, this is the most like, respectful of the story I've ever seen and I'm so happy you did this, like that's the reactions I've been getting oh my god, yes, yes, yes, yes, and that's actually what I was thinking throughout the entire time.
Speaker 3:I do have a question getting more into, like the how everyone kind of works together. Was there any kind of criteria that you had free going into the deciding a that this was going to be a three part series, not just a one to our video, our video but did you have any criteria that related to who you were gonna have in the documentary? Was there anything that like negated people? Was there anything that made them like put them up on a pedestal? Like what was it?
Speaker 5:sure. So the decision process for who ended up in the documentary was sort of a mix of a very purposeful decisions and a mix of not very purposeful decisions, like, okay, you know, I, I I had my like set list of people I really wanted to talk to, and so those were the people I reached out to first, and then those people would often suggest more people that I should talk to, and then I would go research those people and decide, like, okay, should I bring them on? You know, so that's how the people like that's generally the decision process. There was one of the big rules I had was I didn't want like more than two people from each from any particular project in the documentary, which is why, like, I still feel bad that I didn't have Alex Madden from Dark Harvest in the documentary, because he so deserved to be there with the the no more blog segment.
Speaker 5:I was like I was like it's gonna be a little silly if there's three people from Dark Harvest and, like every other series has like one person like.
Speaker 2:I really makes a video called no more documentaries and it's that exact same vibe I really enjoyed that part of the documentary and it like hearing some people get riled up again about something that happened like 10 years ago.
Speaker 5:Start campaigning again they're still pissed like.
Speaker 5:That was the funniest thing about the out of game streams and we did finally bring alex madden on because that was part of the the. The live streams after live streams was I really wanted to get a chance to talk to those people who, like, should have been in but weren't, like just for time constraints and just for you know, the reasons I mentioned, weren't in um. So we got alex madden in there and like, yeah, he was, there was still some, there was still some sparks flying, uh, which was really funny, but but yeah, I know, so that was that was the decision process. There were a lot of people I wanted to get and didn't get. Uh, you know, uh, most particularly, like I didn't get the eight pages creator, um, and you know, I I did invite markiplier, he didn't respond too, busy playing naff?
Speaker 1:yeah, I didn't see that on the live stream.
Speaker 4:We invited markiplier.
Speaker 5:He never showed we invited him to the after show too, and again he did not respond fuck you, markiplier.
Speaker 4:We also noticed not only the, uh the physical bodies in the documentary, but uh, some of the voice acting, like, for example, um, one of our admins and, uh, honestly, huge supporter uh of ours uh, jason death. How do you you go about getting people for these voice acting parts? What was the role like there?
Speaker 5:Sure. So I mean the, the voice acting stuff was just another in a series of escalations and how big the project was getting, cause it went from like just interviews and monologues to then having all of this, these, these live action, like reenactments and narrative segments. And then on top of that I was like, oh, what if we also have like some, some voice actors here? Like what if we get some of these, especially the blogs? I was like man, we should, we should really get some of the blogs like voice acted. And so I just put out a bunch of calls.
Speaker 5:I did a call on on my instagram and on discord and a couple discord servers and I got some people who were like, hey, I really liked your analog horror documentary, like what's up, what are you, what are you looking for? And I'd be like I'm doing a slenderman thing. And like 90 of the voice actors I got were like, oh, my god, I fucking love slenderman. Like they were so excited. So, uh, it was, it was really fun. It was like I wasn't expecting that. I was expecting to just be like, oh yeah, I'll do you a favor, like sure, why not? But no, people got like the voice actors. A lot of them got real into it and they were like dude. I'm so happy to be a part of this so that was that was fun.
Speaker 5:That was very cool nice, I'll ask too.
Speaker 4:Uh doug, sorry, I'm gonna skip over you just a smidge but, rude.
Speaker 4:I've been, I've been. I was curious because we've been talking about what it's like to have uh, to be working with all these creators voice acting uh. But I'm interested as well like you see them in the documentary, um, you see them obviously in the credits and everything, but you had a relatively a decent sized uh cast of people just running shit in the background. Yes, uh, have you, I guess, managed this many people before on another project? How was that for you too?
Speaker 4:because I know that probably wasn't the most fun thing in the world.
Speaker 5:No, so this was my in terms of like, the, the filming stuff, all of the like, live action segments. That was the biggest project I've ever done in terms of anything film related. Uh, I mean, I, the way I envision is we basically shot a feature film, like you take all those live action segments and you smush them together. That's like, you know, one and a half to two hours of live action like scenes. So we, basically I, I got a feature film crew together and shot a feature film worth of of footage. Um, so yeah, that was, that was a big. That was a big thing.
Speaker 5:There were like at least 20 people involved overall in terms of like making all of that happen, and I'm so extremely grateful to all of them. Like Bardia, samia, the director, photography, incredible, doing all of the camera stuff. You know, also, lana Hagog and Brian Todd were the assistant cameras we had. You know, melody Williams was the production designer and behind-the-scenes photographer, which I should release some of those behind-the photos because they're really good. Of course, darvin Acevedo and Elijah James, the assistant directors so many people were involved in this.
Speaker 5:The, the, the I call it the slender nomicon I don't know if it's going to be in the community, but but those were done by two incredibly talented artists, uh, mariana Acosta and Carmen Everett, both just so. I was blown away because I reached out to them and I was like, hey, I'm doing the Slenderman thing. Do you guys want to like draw some art for this? Like, would you be cool with that? I'm going to give you like this book. And they were like, yeah, sure, why not? And then they they like give it back to me three weeks later and it's that like insane artwork. Yeah, I was like no way. Like what the hell? Like, how did this happen?
Speaker 5:uh, so I was, oh my god, yeah, no, really one of the most insane experiences of my life by far, for for many reasons, just in terms of getting that whole crew together, like and doing all of these, like bringing 15 people out through, like you know, a 15 minute hike through the woods with our to our filming location, like with slenderman hiking alongside us like at 9 am like or, you know, getting getting the slendernomicon pages all like just bringing, like taking all of this weird slenderman stuff I've been into since I was like eight years old and then being like, yeah, now it's like coming to life in front of me and there's like 20 people here helping me bring it to life like wild, wild stuff childhood you would be throwing a fucking party for one just going throwing a party fair, fair so, uh, during the time on this, were you able to work with any of the creators in person, or did you do all of your interviews, uh, purely online?
Speaker 5:no, so all of the all of the interviews were online. Um, you know, I there were a couple reasons for that. I mean, first of all, it wasn't very practical to do in-person uh interview shoots. But also I really like the aesthetic of having all the interviewees be online. I think it it feels true to the spirit of the thing in a way that I think is really interesting and it makes it as like a documentary about online content and having the interviews themselves also be online I think adds an interesting like layer to that. But yeah, so exactly it feels again, it feels like it's in the spirit of the thing. And yeah, so I didn't. I didn't meet any of the interviewees in person. I did meet one of them later in person, funnily enough, just over the course of the production unrelated to actually making the documentary. You met him at Walmart.
Speaker 1:Hey, no, but yeah.
Speaker 5:No, it's been wild, though, because I keep in contact with a lot of them like a surprising amount of them, Actually, I keep in contact with, and so now I'm like I know I'm making plans with them. I'm like, oh, what project are we going to do next? Like hey, do you want to come be like a producer on my next documentary? Like you'll see, you'll see, that's fucking awesome. You've cultivated like a community around yourself, seed.
Speaker 4:I'm like fucking great. The the late addition to the slender verse creators group. Yeah, there's a part. There's a part in the uh the, the last, uh uh, the, the final chapter of your documentary, where you mentioned how they all went out to go see the, the movie, yes, and they invited like nick nocturne and all that.
Speaker 3:That's gonna be you here soon exactly. You're gonna be invited to movies by a bunch of strangers you've never met before I'm so excited, I can't wait.
Speaker 3:I see nothing that could go wrong, nothing at all I feel like meeting nick nocturne in person would be the most intimidating thing ever yeah just that voice, the voice, and just like the clout, like, oh, that's a presence to be in a room with, um, but speaking with the people that you did get to work with, um, who? Who did you work with on the slender verse project specifically? Um, that you were kind of most excited about working with and I don't, I don't want to like put everyone who's your favorite?
Speaker 3:pedestals but like who's your favorite was there somebody that stuck out to you personally, that made you go.
Speaker 5:Oh my god, I am so fucking excited to interview this person to talk to this person, to work with this person there's a couple for sure. Um, and it's not necessarily who you would expect every time either. Like, obviously I was very excited to get tim sutton.
Speaker 4:That was a huge like kind of a surprise I was.
Speaker 5:I was not really expecting to get Tim Sutton. That was a huge, like kind of a surprise. I was. I was not really expecting to get anyone from Marble Hornets, um, and I was. I was really happy when Tim was like oh yeah, sure I'll do it. That was crazy. I was like whoa, hold on, we're like this just leveled up Um yeah, so so that was that was one moment.
Speaker 5:Um, also, you know, getting like Kay and Jules Dapper. I was so excited to meet them just because I respected them so much as creators and I was like I just want to nerd out about Slenderman with you for like an hour, like can we do that? And we did, and it was great. But also like two of the two of the ones I was really excited about, one was Trevor Henderson, which again another one I didn't really expect to come in on it, but I sent him an email and he was like, yeah, sure, why not? I'll come talk about Slenderman with you, and that was really cool. And then the other one would be Julie Becker.
Speaker 5:You know, I got in contact with Neil Cicerega and I was like, hey, I'm doing this documentary, I want to talk about Slenderman you know the parody video and he was like we should talk to Julie because she's the one who actually wrote it and directed it and everything. And so, one, I was just really excited to talk about Splendorman. But then, two, I was like, oh my God, I get to talk to the person who actually made it. And now in this documentary, I get to set the record straight, because everyone thinks Neil Cicero made Splendorman and it's like no, that's not true. You guys are wrong.
Speaker 2:And I know here that must be so satisfying to be able to be the person who's like, hey, you guys are wrong, and this is how this actually happened.
Speaker 5:You have no idea, behind every scene in that documentary I will never do it on screen in the film itself, but behind every scene there's me just kind of cackling to myself and going like, haha, I get to set the record straight.
Speaker 4:I get to tell you the truth, just flipping off the audience.
Speaker 2:You can take everybody and just like force them to sit down and watch it.
Speaker 4:In this six hour three, part docuseries.
Speaker 5:I will tell you how you are wrong, I am right.
Speaker 2:So taking a break maybe from Slenderman for a second um, is slenderman your favorite, like unfiction or analog horror-esque topic, and if not, what is?
Speaker 5:uh, I think it. I think it probably is my favorite topic just because I I had such a young exposure to it and also, like, as I've, as I have come to research it and spend so much time around these creators, I've only come to love it more. Like it's one of those things where you'd expect to get sick of it. Uh, you know, after spending 18 months intensively like researching it and spending quite literally spending every day thinking about Slenderman for 18 months, you would think like, yeah, by the time you're done With that, you probably don't want to think about Slenderman Anymore. But I'm over here Just like dude, I want to do more Slenderman stuff. Can I do more Slenderman stuff? Can I keep talking about Slenderman?
Speaker 2:Did you have any Slender based nightmares? A month and a half we were tired of that.
Speaker 5:Slender based. I have not had. I don't think I've had any Slender man based nightmares. No, that would be interesting. He'd get in my brain. Docuseries part 4.
Speaker 4:You're welcome, it's just me.
Speaker 5:In the middle of the night, like ranting about my dreams.
Speaker 4:It's just your phone camera, you're just like so. I had a really weird dream.
Speaker 3:Flash is right in the face. Hey, you film that, we will cover it. So what is your favorite topic?
Speaker 1:I'm advocating for part four. Sorry, Matt, I didn't mean to cut you off.
Speaker 2:Every single time one of us asks a question, somebody else asks a question. Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 1:I was just saying I was going to advocate for the fourth part being like a blooper reel or something That'd the fourth part being like a blooper reel or something that would be good.
Speaker 5:Well, I do have ideas for a fourth part. I won't say any more than that.
Speaker 2:Ooh, what is your favorite topic that isn't Slenderman? Oh, that isn't.
Speaker 5:Slenderman.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:You're legally obligated to tell me right now.
Speaker 5:I will give you my third favorite.
Speaker 5:I suppose which is it's just going to be, I think, creepypastas. More generally, you dive into the Rake and things like that. That stuff's really interesting to me. And also, I guess this might actually take precedence over that. Even is the Millennium Horror going on right now and I still refuse to use the phrase digital horror because I think it's wrong but millennium horror, which is like the you know, morley grove and and that kind of stuff.
Speaker 5:I think it's really interesting and I think we're we're really just seeing the start of it, uh, which is really exciting because you look at what analog horror did and how that sort of evolved, uh and got into a place far different than what it was when it started, uh yeah, and and you look at like the way people are now using the digital aesthetic of like the 2000s to to create horror, and not even necessarily.
Speaker 5:Not even necessarily to create horror, but really just using the the 2000s digital aesthetic in general to tell stories, like it doesn't even have to be horror, just in general, like I feel like that's such an untapped market because we're seeing a lot of like films now that are sort of purposefully using like old, like film stock or, you know, making themselves look like vhs tapes and things like. We're seeing a lot of that, uh, using the analog aesthetic for some really interesting stories, not just horror, but again like dramas and mysteries and things. Uh, and I think digital is going to have that same sort of sort of renaissance and I'm really excited to see what kinds of new stories come from that what is, uh, I guess millennium.
Speaker 4:I've never heard of that before uh, well it's.
Speaker 5:It's just digital horror, it's just my pretentious name for it I don't even.
Speaker 4:I'll have never heard a digital horror either.
Speaker 5:It's uh it's it's like the, it's like the new generation of analog horror. I I envision it as the next evolution of analog. A lot of people seem very dead set on saying it's entirely different.
Speaker 5:It's not entirely different just because it doesn't follow the powerpoint presentation it's the same exact vibe as analog horror, like stylistically, it's just the execution is slightly different. So it's like it's it's. It's the same exact vibe as analog horror, like stylistically, it's just the execution is slightly different. So it's like it's it's, it's it's. It's very much along the same lines as analog horror, but it's just a different, different time period, right? Because analog horror is very situated in the, you know, late 1900s, and then digital horror, millennium horror is situated in their very early 2000s.
Speaker 2:I've seen in analog horror discords people sitting around arguing over whose project is an analog horror and what's digital horror.
Speaker 3:They're missing the point, so hard they're missing the point so hard?
Speaker 5:Just make art guys, Just make stuff.
Speaker 3:It's cool, don't put it in boxes.
Speaker 5:Stop putting boxes on things.
Speaker 3:The fucking same thing happened to the heavy music scene. There are so many labels for what, like oh, this is finished singing russian funeral, doom metal like okay this is just making metal.
Speaker 5:You want to make right.
Speaker 2:I want this whole thing to like. Meta itself to death, so like 20 years from now. There are people who are trying to make horror based off an aesthetic that is like 2020, but the 2020 aesthetic is so laced with analog horror and digital horror that it just like it, just like starts collapsing in on itself.
Speaker 5:I can't, I can't wait for, for analog horror, horror it's a horror story.
Speaker 3:Someone making an analog dead stream, but yeah, um q matt is breaking into this like segment with tire screeches going let me tell you something about analog I also think mike might literally snap in half if we don't let him ask this question. Yeah I can feel the tension, so he's violently shaking.
Speaker 4:Right now we've sort of covered this question before, so I'm going to change it up a little bit. So I guess is there a certain like dream topic or like, uh a dream circumstance of yours where if like money, time there, nothing, there's no restrictions uh, you, you had free range, do whatever you want. What would be that thing for you? Would it be like, kind of like how right now you're making like a more of a uh fit like a, like a feature-length film, uh would, would it be something like that? Would it be more of like a like a full-blown series? Like what would be your dream ideal scenario with no constraints?
Speaker 5:so good, I have so many. That's the problem is is like I'm I'm very much, uh, an artist who focuses on what's in front of me. Uh, I I try not to like not that I don't dream big, because I certainly do I have all sorts of, as I just said, like huge ideas of things that are like, oh, I need like 500 million dollars to make this. Like that's not gonna happen. But, like you know, I I try not to like really go in depth on like planning those things. They're like kind of hypothetical ideas, um, but but in terms of those ones there are, like there's a couple I'd love to do like a fantasy trilogy someday, like a lord of the rings type thing. I, I have this.
Speaker 5:I have this like cosmic horror film rattling around in my head, this like real, real Lovecraftian like insane like it's basically like event horizon and the thing like crossed and like it's gonna be, if I can make it, it's gonna be wild. And then, of course, there's also the more recent one, which is, god you know, I, I would really love to do a big budget slenderman movie.
Speaker 3:Fuck yeah make, make what make the one that's worth watching exactly oh, you have I.
Speaker 5:I have ideas for what this slenderman movie would look like, and it's like the most insane it's. You would not recognize it as slender man.
Speaker 3:Uh, on the outset you, you have got to stop tantalizing my fantasies with these fucking ideas.
Speaker 5:You just hit all of my buzzwords. Get someone to give me a blank check.
Speaker 3:I'll do it all right, I can't, we're working on it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I only just now found out that event horizon was like a war. Was a warhammer movie in its essence or kind? Of lovecraft, lovecraft no, I heard it's like a warhammer movie in essence, what the warhammer has some cosmic horror lovecraftian elements to it, but I haven't really heard that specifically yeah, I don't think, I don't know, I mean, tell you you're wrong
Speaker 4:I don't know yeah, I don't know if I'm going to say anything about this I just watched a random video on it last night. It made no sense, but the guy's like in the Warhammer community. They talk about Event Horizon, how it's got such great ties.
Speaker 1:I'm like I don't see how, but maybe I mean maybe just in the sci-fi sense. This is the first I've heard of it. You made a connection I couldn't see. Fine, whatever, it's got way more biblical references than. I'd say 100 or hammer, but yeah, yeah, I don't know, you know I almost wore my event horizon shirt today well, you should have I should have. What was I thinking you?
Speaker 3:done, did fucked up doug all right back on track. Um, I'm surprised we've made it this far and remained this on track, that is very fair it's probably because less alcohol yes, uh, all, right, so here's here's one.
Speaker 1:Uh, so what is it that you want people to take away mostly from this documentary? Like, what is it that you want the people to know?
Speaker 5:uh, first of all, slenderman's really cool and you guys shouldn't let it die, you guys, you guys shouldn't have done that. Keep making slenderman stuff. Yeah, it's, it's good, he's cool. Don't stop, uh. But I think I think more seriously, though. The.
Speaker 5:The things I really want people to take away from this documentary are number one go make art and just do it. Just don't, don't let anything stop you. Don't let rules stop. You don't let rules stop. You don't let equipment stop. You don't let money stop. You like, just go out and make the thing. You have a phone in your hand, you have ideas in your brain. Go out, make it like it doesn't matter. If it's good, who cares? If it's good, then you don't even have to post it if you don't want to. But make it right, make it for you. Make it because you need to get that art out into the world in any capacity. And yeah again, there are no rules, there is no gate. Someone can tell you you're doing it wrong and it doesn't matter. You could just do it because you want to do it that way.
Speaker 3:You can't be doing it wrong if nobody knows what you're doing.
Speaker 5:There is no way to do it wrong. If you want to make money off of it, yeah, no way to do it wrong. Like, if you want to like make money off of it like yeah, sure, I guess, but like that shouldn't be your first thought just go make it like that's that's, that's the core of that entire series and it comes in in all three episodes is just make 100.
Speaker 5:You don't know what will come of it. You don't know like your skills will improve. You'll find do stuff that you love while doing it. Maybe it'll somehow put you on an entirely different life path. Maybe you'll meet people who become like your found family for the next three decades, like you never know what will happen and nothing is stopping you from just going and doing it today.
Speaker 4:I'm always on the side of saying something doesn't have to look incredibly good as long as the story is there to pick up where the other pieces can't lift. You have Blair Witch Project, for example, a movie that Matt doesn't like, but it was just on a shitty handheld camera the budget for that movie was tiny when the plot can't keep up where your tools can't that's another thing I'll reference back.
Speaker 4:I feel like YouTube is an excellent medium for that as well, because it's just full of it's the place where you can go and just put your idea out there and you'll have creators like Jules Dapper, daisy Brown, who you know. Fantastic story the puppet was you could tell was literally just paper mache, but that doesn't matter because the plot keeps it going. I can look past that, because it's the fact that this is a story driven, the story drives it.
Speaker 2:I don't care if that thing doesn't look real. There are many things we've looked at where it's like technically this is not great, but it's creative and I just appreciate this for the fact that you can see how they creatively use what was available to them and yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 5:You know, I feel like young creators get so caught up in like what a film should look like, or what an argy should look like, or like what does the audience want? Like, like what is I need to make this for, like the next year, and it has to have this very specific goal at the end of it. And it's like why there's no writer. The more I learn about film and the more I experience art just in general, looking at art in history or looking at independent art scenes now, the more I just come to realize there's no right or wrong way to do art. You can say, oh, hollywood films, that's the right way, wrong way to do art, like you know.
Speaker 5:You can say like, oh, hollywood films, that's the right way to make movies. But that's not true. That's just one way to make movies. Maybe maybe it's the most profitable way to make movies. I mean, maybe it's not, maybe it's just they decided to make movies that way and people just are accustomed to that. Now, maybe if independent films were the type of films Hollywood made, maybe those would be the most profitable movies. I don't know. That's not the point. The point is there's no right or wrong way to do it. You can tell your story however you want to tell it, in whatever medium, whatever style, whatever bizarre editing and cinematography. As long as you're telling a story that people care about in any sort of way, that's what matters.
Speaker 3:Oh my god.
Speaker 2:We're telling you, nobody else cares about whatever.
Speaker 3:Yeah, fuck it, you care about it. Just hearing, hearing you talk about passion like that, is it it, literally it it. It warms my heart, simply because a lot of the media that we've seen I've seen anyway I can't speak for these fine gentlemen, but a lot of the media that I've seen lately it seems like it's almost like a cookie cutter, cash grab type, like I'm doing this to make money and you just do not feel like the resonation of the, of the passion, and like all the emotion that you dump into it, whereas when I literally watched you on screen talking about how fucking awesome Slender man is and how you're going to talk to all of these different creators about it, you can feel just the, the, the, the electricity and the emotion from it, and the effects that were a part of it made it just incredible.
Speaker 3:If those effects weren't there, I think the, the effect of the, the three-part series, would have been the same, simply because you managed to pull out so much fucking emotion between yourself and some other creators. And that's really as somebody who is a sucker for a story fuck the special effects if you have a good, solid core of a story. You've got me 100%, and so that's what I kind of latched on to. Um, speaking of the story and considering we're talking about Slenderman. Yes, do you ever kind of foresee that slenderman is gonna like have a second wave, almost like a, a re-comeuppance?
Speaker 5:you know, I it's interesting because we're kind of seeing something like that now. It's weird, like I can't it's too early for me to say that we're in a slenderman resurgence because, like we don't know how it's going to play out in the next couple of months. But you look at what happened in June of 2024 and you look at the documentaries came out. Marble Hornets did a fundraiser for a new book with a new video. Dark Harvest came back. Like you, you have all of the like three major pillars of, like you know, slenderman, three major Slenderman based projects, kind of all coming back at the exact same time. And then you know the the community really flocked around the documentaries.
Speaker 5:In a way I didn't expect because, like I went into the release of the documentaries kind of expecting like mild enthusiasm from a pretty dead fandom, of expecting like mild enthusiasm from a pretty dead fandom, and instead what I got was like everyone from like every corner of the slenderverse, like from the last 10 years, came back and was like wow, this is really exciting.
Speaker 5:Like I can't even tell you the number of comments or tweets I've gotten of like your documentary has inspired me to go make a slenderman story. I started making it yesterday. Like hundreds of these comments that are like I'm making a new slenderman story I started making it yesterday. Like hundreds of these comments that are like I'm making a new Slenderman story right now because of your documentary. So like literally there are hundreds of new Slenderman stories that just started last month and if that's not a resurgence, I don't know what it is there's someone in our discord that just posted that they started a Slenderman thing, so honestly, if we don't end up covering marble, hornets or slenderman related things in the next like month, I'd be fucking shocked and like that's simply because of what you put in front of our heads.
Speaker 3:Don't make promises.
Speaker 2:Saying this because I get excited about this we'll only do it if Alex promises not to listen to it and tell us everything that's wrong with it.
Speaker 1:No, we'll have you back.
Speaker 5:I'll listen to it and tell all my friends behind your back. No.
Speaker 3:I'm kidding, we just have Alex back.
Speaker 1:It's just Alex on the episode. Yeah, we're just a takeover, yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh man. So more on the topic slender man. What does so you cover that slender man is represented in multiple different ways and each person has their own interpretation of it, going so far as it's mentioned that in a lot of the slender man media there is kind of this unwritten rule that you don't actually call him Slender man and that you make up your own interpretation and visage of him. What is your, not only what is your favorite vision or interpretation of Slender man, but what does Slender man mean to you?
Speaker 5:Ooh, that's good. So my favorite interpretation is still, to this day Gorilea tap from dark harvest. I I love it so much for so many reasons. Uh, I guess the. The main two, though, are one I love his shambling walk.
Speaker 5:It's so creepy like it's just it disturbs me so deeply on a fundamental level, in a way that like slenderman standing still and like doing other shit is still scary, but like the way he he's like this bizarre malformed, like he's like being that's like, yeah, he's like he's. It's like slenderman is always conceptually like some sort of strange being. That's just like shoved into a weird misshapen like man shape. But I think Dark Harvest, more than anything else, captures that because he doesn't just look like a man but wrong, he walks like a man but wrong and it's like that just scares me it's that scene from Men in Black 1.
Speaker 3:Yeah, with Edgar. He's walking down the street and he's like that's so true yes, it's exactly like that.
Speaker 5:And then also I just I love that, I love the cult aspect of it, I love the idea of slenderman being like painted as a god uh it's like it's the lovecraft mythos, but with slenderman literally it's so lovecraftian but just slenderman and yeah, like, and especially the way chris does those scenes, like with the cultists and everything Like, it's just so cool, like I just I can't help but love it. Yeah, but yeah.
Speaker 3:Oh my god, I fucking hear that Red tie or black tie, which one's better?
Speaker 5:I won't give a canon answer to this, but I will say the way I approached it was red tie was the fake one, black tie was the real one.
Speaker 4:So you can do with that information what you will, but yeah confirmed.
Speaker 5:You heard it, it's confirmed 100% someone someone record this disclaimer I am not speaking in an official capacity as a Slenderman historian my own interpretation, my own interpretation.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we have a lawyer on retainer, don't worry, we always preface this with don't listen to anything that we ever say, because we're not fucking experts and we're very stupid sometimes, so you don't have to worry about anyone taking that too seriously. Yeah, yeah no, uh.
Speaker 5:As for what slenderman means to me, though, I mean I think the the way I approached him in the documentary, uh, and I mean, if I was approaching him in a, in a horror story specifically, I think the way I would, I would envision what Slenderman is would be different. But the way what Slenderman meant to me in terms of the story I was telling in the documentaries was Slenderman was an icon representing, like, in some senses, artistic creation, but in other senses, what I had him represent was Slenderman himself, like. There was this Reddit comment that weirdly caught on I mentioned this in one of the out-of-game aftershows that there was this Reddit comment that weirdly caught on I mentioned this in one of the out-of-game aftershows. There was this Reddit comment about the Star Wars sequel trilogy that was like the reason the sequel trilogy feels weird is that it's looking at Star Wars through the lens of Star Wars, whereas the original is looking at it through the lens of Star Wars, the universe through the lens of a Western or through a fantasy story or whatever, and again saying nothing about the whatever, um, and again not not saying nothing about the sequel trilogy. I'm not saying that that interpretation is right, but that comment.
Speaker 5:That idea of like looking at a pre-existing property through the lens of the pre-existing property was really interesting to me. Like what if you did that on purpose, instead of like just doing it accidentally for like nostalgia bait? Like what if you did it on purpose to like critically analyze the property through its own land, so like. So that's how I approached slenderman was like in in the first episode slenderman kind of represents what you, what you typically expect slenderman to be. Like it, slenderman represents the idea of what slenderman is supposed to be. And then in episode two he gets unmasked and so slend Slender man in that episode represents the community around Slender man. And then in episode three, when the quote-unquote real Slender man comes back, it's kind of like representing the virality and Slender man represents the death of Slender man.
Speaker 3:It's very meta and confusing but it makes sense in my brain. It makes sense as long as you've seen it. That makes a hundred percent sense yeah, that kind of.
Speaker 2:So I had like some tag on questions here and that is kind of. One of my questions was the documentary. So you mentioned the people. Um, like, is this documentary more to you about slenderman or is it about the community and the people that made slenderman?
Speaker 5:oh, it's about the community.
Speaker 5:A% I mean, I think, especially after you get past the first episode of the documentary, because that one, you could argue, is a little bit more just about Slenderman's lore and development. But even in that sense you have the community aspect coming in with the Marble Hornets crew and what they experience with them going to cons and stuff. Then you have the Everman Hybrid crew and what they experience with them going to like cons and stuff. And you have the everman hybrid crew and they're talking about how much it meant to them to like do this for eight years. And then you have the blogs, which is all about how it was. It's about the mythology and the lore, but it's about the mythology and lore through the context of the community collaborating in this very chaotic way to create that mythology and lore. So even the first episode is very central about community. It's just what's at the forefront is maybe a little bit more of the lore and mythology, but episode two and three, the community is front and center the entire time. I think episode two that's very prominent because it's like you have these bits about Dark Harvest and Stan Frederick and all of this. But even in the context of those they're always talking about, like, oh, this is what it was like to enter the community and make this project in the context of the community. And then, of course, the creators group. All about the community.
Speaker 5:Episode three like we're looking at the eight pages and we're looking at the stabbing and we're looking at the movie, but, like almost nothing in the documentary actually talks about what the game or the movie or the or the like anything what the event actually was beyond, just like the context you need.
Speaker 5:Almost every single one of those segments is just about how the community reacted to that thing. So, like it's very much about the community. Uh, and that was something that just developed over the course of production, because it was originally supposed to be a much more cut and dry historical doc about, like, here's slenderman, here's how slenderman evolved, okay, bye. And then, like I, I, I actually like dug into the story and learned all the story and heard all of these creators and I was like, well, this isn't a story about slenderman, this is a story about people yeah, yeah, and I think that's what's going to be more interesting to a lot of people is because you're sort of pulling back the curtain on the things that you can't find online, like there's no, there's no unfiction thread anywhere that you could be able to find, or anything that actually explains these interactions between the creators.
Speaker 2:This is all stuff that they only know, so exactly, yeah I think exclusives. Um, so does anybody else have anything else you want to ask, alex, or can I combine two of my tag-along questions into the last question? Yeah, go ahead, yeah, go ahead, man, yeah yeah, so my last question that I wanted to ask you was just what inspires you as a creator in general? And then, would you ever consider making a documentary of this style about something that isn't unfiction or internet horror?
Speaker 5:Sure. So answering the first part first, what inspires me? You know it's interesting, there's many different things that inspire me. Right off the bat, I could say music is a huge inspiration to me. I listen to music constantly. I listen to it when I'm brainstorming, I listen to it when I'm writing, I listen to it when I'm not doing, I listen to it when I'm writing, I listen to it when I'm not doing anything, and then the ideas just kind of come and I'm like, oh, where'd that come from? I guess it's from the music, uh. And then also, what inspires me is definitely just consuming films and art. Uh, I, I, I aim to watch like a movie a day, or at least a couple a week, uh, and I, I post all of them on letterboxd because you know I'm a pretentious filmmaker.
Speaker 4:But you know, so I'm going to need your Letterboxd app.
Speaker 5:It's a Hera, go follow me.
Speaker 1:I'm going to follow you right now.
Speaker 5:Hell yes, you get a request incoming from Ben right now.
Speaker 3:I use Letterboxd all the time, yeah. Nice, we talk about movies on this podcast almost fucking constantly Too much. We'll podcast almost fucking constantly too too much.
Speaker 4:We'll also blur that out. If you don't want anyone else, oh no, go ahead, I don't care, but um yeah, so, so movies are a huge inspiration to me.
Speaker 5:I I especially in recent years. I I finally got myself out of like just watching like popular or well-known movies and I'm like foreign movie from the 60s hell yeah like movie shot on 16 millimeter that like only played in weird art house theaters. Like hell yeah. Experimental film told in a non-linear fashion with like no dialogue. Fuck yeah, like.
Speaker 5:And those like those actually inspire me so much more than watching like any sort of contemporary movie, for the most part like and I do love contemporary movies too like I go to the theater probably once a week, uh to see new stuff that's coming even after covid yes, even, even then uh it's just as theaters are like a sacred space to me. I can't explain it.
Speaker 3:I just I love them. I've noticed that there's the people that view theaters as, like this sacred space for the, for films and movies, and I see the people who are like I can just watch it at home, fuck this. Yeah, I just want to know which side you're on.
Speaker 5:Yeah, no, it's a cultural divide, for sure, but theaters are very special to me and so I make sure to go as often as I can. But, yeah, so movies, huge inspirations for me, all types of movies, and that's my recommendation to any filmmaker who wants to learn more or to be inspired is just go watch all sorts of movies from all different years and styles and genres and countries and everything, um. But then also, more generally, I think what inspires me as a storyteller most of all is just people. Honestly, like I like just learning stories from people, learning their life stories, learning what they're interested in, like talking to people, uh, getting to know people, learning about weird cultures and and different cultures and you know different like communities and all sorts of things.
Speaker 5:Like I'll go and just research different stuff, different groups of people, or different like someone's life or whatever. Or I'll go talk to someone for six hours, like, and then at the end of it, at some point I'll be like writing a story and I'll think of it and I'll be like, oh, there's, there's a piece of inspiration and so like, yeah, just just telling stories about people is is really important to me, and so therefore, just learning from people is really important to me, uh, and a big inspiration yeah, I think that's one of the best things you can do as a documentarian is like, uh, finding the people whose stories are worth being told and make sure that they get told in the way that they need to be told well, and even the, even people's stories that aren't worth being told from like an entertainment perspective or anything like.
Speaker 5:Everyone has a story to tell and and it might not be the most interesting or unique story, but everyone's got one right like and there's, there's something to grasp onto in every single one of them, somewhere, somewhere in there.
Speaker 5:Um, but, yeah and uh, and as for the, the second part of the question, if I would ever do a documentary, not about unfiction or internet horror, yes, I, I definitely would.
Speaker 5:Um, you know, I, I I have a couple ideas for documentaries that I want to do uh, that are about more general horror topics or about kind of I mean, I guess this is cheating immersive media more generally, but like, even outside of anything related to this field, anything even tangentially related to this field, I would love to do documentaries about, like some more like quote, unquote, like real world topics, like I would do that at some point I don't know when, but it's definitely something I enjoy doing, like doing the Slenderverse docs, but, uh, it's definitely something I enjoy doing.
Speaker 5:Like doing the slenderverse docs, getting into the real like, uh, you know personal dynamics and the you know the, the more like real world incidences in the third episode and stuff. Like I really felt like I was in my element there even more than I was in the like internet horror stuff and I was like whoa wait, this is like really fulfilling to talk about like real world, like real real shit uh. And so like I think in the future, definitely if I have the opportunity to do a doc about, uh, more like you know, real world subjects and less focused on like internet stuff and less focused on like horror specifically, like absolutely I would I think it's really interesting that you mentioned that, uh, a lot of the stuff that inspires you is not anything that's even remotely in the same realm as this not even close.
Speaker 2:I find that that's pretty common with people who do things really well. I've seen that a lot with music, like metal artists, who are like I don't listen to metal. In my free time I listen to classical music or rap.
Speaker 5:Yeah, like absolutely reggae or like yeah no, I I often like, when I'm doing horror, I often don't draw inspiration from other horror movies. I'll draw inspiration from dramas and comics and, like you know, and, and all sorts of other genres and like, uh, you know, and even in the, in the documentaries, like all of the the film segments, like I mean, I did draw from horror movies a lot like I drew especially from like evil dead and stuff, and and a lot of those scenes, um, but like the thing I drew from most when doing all of the live action segments, all of the stuff we filmed was music videos, uh, which I think people might not like initially, think like oh, how is that connected?
Speaker 5:But like literally every scene is structured like a music video where it's all. It's all visual and it's all like a lot of it's metaphor and a lot of it like, if you watch it as a linear narrative, it doesn't necessarily hang together but like, aesthetically and thematically it makes sense as a narrative somehow. And like even like my monologues, like I literally view that as like in a music video when you cut back to the singer, like lip syncing, like that's literally how I view, like the moments where the camera's on me and the monologue that final scene with you and slender man's behind you is very like 80s pop music, like like on top of a mountain, lip-syncing to the song kind of aesthetic, so I can see that I can definitely see that.
Speaker 2:That's really interesting. I think that's how you keep innovating and keep things fresh and keep things from becoming derivative, because if you only draw inspiration.
Speaker 5:Yes, it came, came before you then yeah, exactly it's same vein inspirations yes, exactly like it. Just it just turned into a like self repeating cycle at a certain point, like you gotta bring in new ideas from other places, and there's always, there's always resonances and places to merge things together from different spaces okay, super, I would agree.
Speaker 3:Well, that that's.
Speaker 4:I think Mike had yeah I just have a weird, random one. This is off topic for a lot of babies come from.
Speaker 3:Yeah, wait, if you have life insurance this is important. It's legal for you to die that's what I've been told. Yeah, well, you were told right, we were confirmed, yeah we also got it confirmed by a lady.
Speaker 4:So you created your own analog for Walker Creek.
Speaker 5:Oh yeah, oh, we're going there. Justice Mitch, I'm not going to dive too in. No, no, no, I'm down.
Speaker 4:I'm not diving too much because, full disclosure, I haven't looked a huge, huge amount into Walker Creek. But looking at the documentaries and everything, I do want to, I guess, ask you what gives you the right?
Speaker 1:No, Waiting to pull that one out for a whole fucking episode.
Speaker 4:I was waiting to hear it, I guess what I guess spawned you wanting to create your own analog horror, like, obviously you have the creative mind, but were you just sitting there one day like, oh, that's a great idea, oh my gosh, I could make this a full-blown thing. How do I go? Like, what were the steps in your brain to get to, I guess, making this analog horror?
Speaker 4:and then creek finale and then going and then I guess maybe like flipping the switch to documentaries a little bit sure, all right, let's just go through the whole.
Speaker 5:We'll go through my, we'll loop back to the first question and we'll just get the second half of my backstory, because I gave you the first half.
Speaker 5:I'll give you the second half now. So, yeah, so after discovering slenderman, uh, and then fast forward a couple years, I I was interested in, I did some youtube stuff and then I deleted it all, um, and then I got into args and I was like, whoa, this is like the coolest form of storytelling I've ever seen in my entire life. I want to do this now, uh. And that's when I got into like everman hybrid, and then daisy brown and hi, I'm mary, mary and a bunch of other args, uh, and I I wrote like an english research paper on them and then then I tried to make my own. It was called this Town has no People and it never actually materialized.
Speaker 5:But one year after that, so that was like 2019 when I tried to do that one, or maybe 2018. And then, during 2020, we were in lockdown and I had already like tried once to make an ARG and it was already in my brain and I already was like this is the coolest form of storytelling I've ever seen. And now I was. I was at that point on the path to becoming a filmmaker, I was in film school, um, and so I was like, okay, what do I? And I just try to make an an ARG, and I was watching a lot of analog horror stuff at that time. Uh, I into local 58 and then I got huge into gemini home entertainment.
Speaker 5:That was like one of the biggest huge one that I was like whoa, this is so cool and I think I could also probably make my own just like this. And so I did, uh, and then over the course of that it went from like kind of a little bit of a just sort of replicating whether people were doing an analog horror to like trying to make it more of a full-fledged arg, and then it was like this really I still think it was kind of cool. It was like this combo analog horror, real time, arg with like Internet puzzles, and then from there it then expanded again into like having full on like every man hybrid type, like found footage, vlogs and everything. And then you get to the end, which is like it's like four videos that comprise the finale and it's like an hour long. If you put them all together, it's basically like a found footage movie, um, and it's so. So that was like just the over the course of that project I just kept escalating more and more into like arg and found footage production. And then I got to the end of that and I made making an arg walker creek, which is a feature documentary about the creation of Walker Creek, and that people were like this documentary is better than Walker Creek.
Speaker 5:Number one, ouch, but like, but number two. I was like, oh well, hold on. I really liked making the documentary as well, and also I got like some some attention from some people in the unfiction community at that point who invited me into this discord server with some, uh, some relatively well-known names, uh, and that like kind of gave me a little bit of a base to like. Then I was like, well, I want to do like maybe a analog horror history video, and so then I started, I talked to some of the people in that server and then I started getting the ball rolling on that. That's how I met my producer, rain, and we started working together on the analog horror documentary, which again started pretty small it was just going to be like a video essay kind of thing and then I added the interview, the interviews, and then I added the live action stuff, and so it got progressively bigger as well. At the end of that then I was like, okay, now we do the slenderman thing all right damn.
Speaker 5:That's the complete encyclopedia yeah, this is the alex documentary now.
Speaker 2:It's very interesting, I think, right, yeah it's very funny, though the the documentary is better than the series.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you found your uh, your calling Cause again from what we've seen, the, the, the shit that you've put together is just top fucking notch, and so we we started doing this whole thing over the pandemic. Um, I know we've talked about this a couple of times on the show, but Doug and I would just send random ass videos back and forth to each other. That's on the show, but doug and I would just send random ass videos back and forth to each other. That's where we saw a lot of nexpo, a lot of nexpo. We went through the entirety of ash vlogs and actually the reason this podcast even exists is because doug and I wanted to get mike on a recorded medium and just trying to present that to him like it was real and get his like raw reaction of like this real thing existing on the internet, and then it just kind of turned out. You know what? There's a lot of this shit. We actually really like this we've gone full off the rails since full off the fucking rails.
Speaker 3:But no, that's I'm.
Speaker 3:I'm like a giddy fucking school girl, right like I feel like I know so much about you as a person, and especially watching the slenderverse into the slenderverse uh, documentary, documentary, docuseries that you did it. Just I don't know credit is due for sure, because the passion is very fucking apparent and that is something, at least for me, that has been missing in a lot of pieces of media lately, and that's why I see new things and I'm just like, meh, it's okay, whatever, but seeing you present this shit like you've lived it, it's oh, I don't know, it was refreshing, it was fucking awesome. So thank you for that.
Speaker 5:I appreciate that my whole platform is just I talk about everything really excitedly and run into everything I do head first with just immense passion and, uh, it seems to have worked out so far.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, thank you for blessing us with your time and thank you for having me for doing what you do.
Speaker 2:I keep it up because I think, please, there are um a lot of weird things on the internet that just kind of disappear over time, and it feels like there was at one point this collection of people who were very well versed in it and kind of took it for granted, and then nobody actually bothers to actually document it and make a lasting record of what happened. And I think what you're doing is very important very.
Speaker 5:The internet is forever until it isn't and then you realize actually it's not forever at all you're the criterion. Collection of youtube you know what I'll take that the Disney vault the Disney vault of youtube.
Speaker 4:Um yeah, this is. This is the point of the show where I just kind of uh, we wrap it up and I just kind of uh plug all our shit before I do that, I was gonna say yeah, alex, do you want to do a shameless plug, uh, where people can find you and all?
Speaker 5:that good stuff or a shameful plug either one yeah, thank you very much. You can find me at youtube. What a shameful plug. Either one, thank you very much. You can find me at youtubecom slash at AlexHera underscore. That's where I post all of my videos and documentaries, and I have probably every social media that you can think of, so just go to the YouTube and then all my links are there.
Speaker 2:Is there anything else you want to say? Just generally.
Speaker 3:Impart to the people.
Speaker 5:Go watch the Slenderverse Perfect. Is there anything else you want to say? Just generally, impart to the people Go watch the Slenderverse documentaries and go make Slenderman videos or any videos. Just go make art, go do it. Go make shit. That is my core philosophy. Go make stuff, that's the important thing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I like it.
Speaker 4:I like it. I like it. I would say similar to what Alex said youtubecom slash.
Speaker 3:Add to the pod there's our shameless plug similar to what they said as well.
Speaker 4:Linktreecom slash dilitypod. We're on all socials dilitypod and everything just google dilitypod but here's the fun thing our google phone number 630-909-9366. Uh, you can go there. You gotta let me say it at least once, otherwise the people don't know you keep saying that I have to let you do things I think, we may actually be breaking it, though, because nobody's left his voicemails in a while so
Speaker 3:yeah, so let me do it let's, let's see what happens next week if I will not touch it nine zero nine, nine, three, six, six.
Speaker 4:Once more, that's six three zero. Nine zero nine, nine, three six six. Hey, rules of three six, three zero. Nine zero nine, nine, three six, six leave us a voicemail.
Speaker 3:Might be the first time he's gotten it out, all three times.
Speaker 4:No, I don't even know, uh leave us a voicemail played at the end of the show, much like you might hear here and or text us and we'll respond because yeah, we got no no's going on.
Speaker 1:Man text us, it'd be cool aka mike has nothing going on uh inquiries go to dilutypod at gmailcom.
Speaker 4:I don't know why I made that a business structure, but I did. Uh and yeah. Linktreecom, slash dilutypod. You can find our links to everything there uh, I will also say yeah at the way tocom. Uh, once again, thank you so much for come on, alex. Uh, you have no idea. When you sent that email, I literally stopped oh fuck what I was doing. And I messaged in our chat and I was like motherfucking alex harrow just emailed us and we were all like it's happening it's happening.
Speaker 5:I'm so happy to be on. This was a blast.
Speaker 4:Uh, so much fun I, I knew like there's a moment on twitter that you followed us like months ago and I was like oh, fucking shit god damn. I never thought anything else would come from it. And then here we are.
Speaker 5:You know what's so funny is I was waiting for an email from you guys. I expected one at some point. When you followed me, I was like oh, they're gonna, they're gonna, they're gonna ask to talk to me at some point oh no, we know our place in the world.
Speaker 2:We don't have that kind of weight
Speaker 4:honestly, it was like that. I was like I was combating myself so much like should I just d dm alex on on twitter? No, because they probably get like 40 000 dms a fucking day from people just like us. Just hey, you want to be on my show, you want to be on my show, and then you reach out.
Speaker 4:I'm like I could have done this the whole time, so now like brb, I'm just gonna message fucking night mind and next real quick see who else wants to just hop on if my slenderverse doc proves anything, it's that you can just email people and sometimes they'll respond.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I will say I've been very bad at this. We did have.
Speaker 4:Kay. I reached out to Kay a while ago, kay is so cool. She was very nice and she's very, very cool and she's like oh yeah, I'd love to get on, Just let us know when, and the timing has just never come up. I'm hoping we can get something going on that route as well.
Speaker 1:We've been kind of talking about getting more interviewees on so same with Turkey. Uh, turkey, I love that guy.
Speaker 4:Yeah. He's very, very fun. Um, but I just want to thank you so much for coming on with us. It really does mean a lot to us. Uh, and the docuseries as a whole, just chef's kiss, so very good. I'm dedicating my goodbye speech to just thanking you.
Speaker 2:Normally it's some form of smooching a father figure or what you should do with your genitals yeah, today it's just.
Speaker 4:Thank you very much for coming on thank you again for having me. Do you have anything you want to say, jason, before we leave off?
Speaker 3:I mean, yeah, I will, as I always say, stay fucking paranoid, but this time it's not staying paranoid about fresh content. You just go check out Alex Hara, anything they've created on YouTube. Just fucking go watch it. It's so captivating. It's really really fucking good. So, please, go show Alex some support. They could use it just like we could, as Mike said, in our housekeeping earlier. But, yeah, stay fucking paranoid, please, dungless oh well, alex, thank you?
Speaker 4:are you gonna fluff, alex, though you've been a?
Speaker 1:pleasure to talk to and we appreciate it. And uh, as I always say, uh, take your peens and if you can find whatever slenderman's working with, slap yours against theirs. It'll be a good time, I promise Matt yeah, thanks for being on again.
Speaker 2:Keep doing what you do. It's very important and I don't have a catchphrase your catchphrase is this is what's wrong with analog horror. These days I've been my tongue this entire time, because I have a lot of opinions that Alex, I think, would find very upsetting, jarring so I'm proud of myself for keeping that wrapped up we're all proud of you, matt.
Speaker 3:We are so proud of you well, thank you so much, everybody.
Speaker 4:You have a really great rest of your night and goodbye. We love you. Goodbye, bye.
Speaker 2:Don't look under the internet.
