#To parallel my headcanons about tims dad being a shithead

[ngage2003]

I could make a whole post about it but my clonidine is kicking in right now so I am going to just summarize some thoughts real quick.

Alex Kralie is a character that seems, to me, to hold some level of toxic ideals relating to masculinity.

"What the hell are you on about?" Well, he seems to hold (and to have always held) some unhealthy ideas about control and other people, which can be seen pretty much anytime he is on screen.

The first you might think of is how at the start of the series, he was domineering and controlling on set, being easily agitated along with belittling and rude to his cast members. We know these traits have been worsened due to his repeated Operator exposure, but I believe it is implied/shown that he always had these traits, with how he tends to be very particular about details relating to his film and a bit of a needy visionary even when his ideas are extremely unlikely or even close to downright impossible. (I.E. In Entry 54 he talks vaguely about the fact he wanted to make original music for the Marble Hornets trailer despite Tim just having learned the ukulele and Alex seeming pretty blind on playing the piano.)

Now, I do not think Alex Kralie is a bad person, but his intense need for control, to be responsible for everything himself, along with his developed habit of harshly belittling other people that only worsens over the show and his inability to fully trust even his best friend—these are all traits very associated with men who cling to masculine ideals to the point of it being damaging to their health.

I think to some degree Alex always held them, not to the degree we see in the series but he honestly just seems like he has a long history of teasing people a bit too far, being pushy, and being the sort of perfectionist who bites off more then he can chew. It is just due to his torture at the hands of the Operator, his more redeeming parts of himself—his guilt, his connections to other people, his trust—ended up getting peeled away by it, leaving this big raw wound of a person in its wake.

I think this fact is a really important facet of Alex Kralie's character and honestly grounds him in reality and the time period of Marble Hornets, and I think the fact people sometimes brush it under the rug in favor of him just being pure evil from the start is a bit sad and misses some of the most important aspects of Marble Hornet's impeccable writing.

People tend to cite Tim as being the complex one, but really all these characters are and they deserve that recognition, even if it means also recognizing their uglier, human sides.