#totheark Program

[sunnytheopossum]

ble

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[brittlebutch]

anyway i think i’ve finally settled on the final title ‘BLEED MORE’ for this fic :3c

[toxik14]

In a world where the internet is such a core part of our lives, for better or worse (its for worse most of the time), found footage has never been more important. we have high definition cameras in our pockets every day, your fucking fridge may have a camera, we define ourselves so much by recording everything in social media, this can be a bad thing, but it can also be a good thing, specially with art. that old critique of "why are they still holding the camera?" doesnt really apply anymore, because we are all so obsessed with recording everything. recordings represent memories, feelings, people, experiences, stories. found footage is such a special medium that i hold dear to my heart. wether its a cctv recording, or a camcorder, or a semi professional camera, or a webcam, or a screen recording, or, yes, a cursed VHS tape, as saturated as that scene is, its special. there's nothing like it. found footage can play around with perspective, both on a story sense and a literal sense, the limitation of 1 or 2 cameras, different recordings, different cameras, different times, different places. blair witch was about an independent documentary by amateur filmmakers REC was about a reporter and a cameraman making a segment for a TV show. Cloverfield is about a group of friends recording their friend's party with a camcorder. Marble Hornets was about a student film and someone investigating it. Everymanhybrid is about a fitness youtube channel. Creep 2 is about a documentarian who uploads to youtube finding a weird guy. and that one tiktok arg was about ghostface or something the genre evolves. and yes analog horror counts too, it's totheark taken to the extreme, it's haunted tapes, as saturated as it is, it can be good. digital horror is also a subgenre, focusing more on screen recordings of videogames or programs. all of these can mix together, eckva has both analog horror elements AND found footage elements, Unfriended as mediocre as it is, has an impresive way of storytelling that i haven't seen been recreated that much apart from like 2 movies (seriously someone make like a webseries where the characters record a discord call with OBS or something), monument mythos isnt even analog horror anymore, it's this strange combination of mockumentary and fucking insane media trickery, its amazing. BDG made a horror video thats a parody of get rich quick tutorials, like go fucking watch Wham City's stuff, this house has people in it is one of the best found footage ARG media in existance, alantutorial is fucking awesome.

So then

GO GO MAKE FOUND FOOTAGE SHIT NOW DO IT NOW TRY NEW THINGS GRAB YOUR CAMERA GRAB YOUR PHONE WHATEVER BUT DO IT NOW!!!!

[perfectbllues]

MH edit

↳Favorite TTA Videos.

[kekisu]

[bbeeohazardd]

totheark is just a witness protection program

[antivirus-mh-au]

Antivirus - Chapter 2

TW: None Chapter 1 here Ao3 link If you like this, please leave a like, reblog, or send me an ask! It encourages me so much.

He blew the smoke from his mouth around the cigarette, the morning sun catching all the particles as they floated into the air. Tim drew the J on top of the fresh carton and dropped the pen onto the dashboard. Pulling the cigarette from his mouth, he drew in a deep breath of fresh air, fresh as you could get at a gas station by a highway. Looking around the parking lot, at the people filing in and out, he shook his head and gave a wry smile. Hard not to be in a good mood when you got some decent sleep for once.

Becca and Lukas were okay. Lukas's leg had been taken care of, and the two had set back off for Idaho, back to the families that loved them. Another success case for Timothy Kane. Another group of people adding to the myth of his existence. Seemed like every month there were more of them. The Operator never tired. The sickness never eased. In fact, it only grew worse.

But like hell was he going to start off a good morning with that depressing shit. He'd gotten paid, gotten rest, and he'd found out where the nearest library was with free internet. He was not going to let a rare moment of peace escape him. He'd lost too much for that.

The library wasn't far away from the gas station he'd refilled at. By the time he pulled into the parking lot, it was open, as were the windows on the front of the building. He spoke briefly to the clerk at the front desk, making sure he understood their internet rules and that it was okay for him to bring in his thermos of coffee, before finding a convenient spot by a power outlet. 

His laptop was getting old, it took a while for it to boot up. As Tim waited, he thumbed through a newspaper. Experts predicting a war with China for the third time in as many years, conflict in the Middle East, the royal family in Britain getting roped into some scandal or another. That was why he didn't read the news much, it was always the same. By the time he got to the comics (never his favorite part of the newspaper), his laptop had finished, and Tim traded the two without a second thought.

He could and did check his email on his phone but he was old-fashioned and preferred to use his laptop when he had the chance. Earlier Becca's mother replied to his report about her daughter returning home, a message he'd saved in a special folder he looked at when he felt particularly shitty. 

Another email was waiting for him now, from a 'Meridith Frederickson'. Another client, looking for her son and his missing best friend. He replied to that one, offering to schedule a Zoom meeting later that same day. By now he knew all too well what happened if he wasn't on top of his cases. 

And of course, he had new messages in the spam folder. Tim glanced over the subjects of the emails without opening any of them. Some didn't have any, but most were vaguely threatening, the kind he usually got from trolls and kids. 'Always watching', 'there's no escape', 'how could you', and on and on and on. People thought they could get a rise out of him by acting like totheark, but none of them even came close to what Brian had been all those years ago. 

Tim glanced at the tab next to his email, frowning. There was no sense in trying to put it off, even if he hated doing it. Everything on that site made him feel worse, and today had been a pretty good day. But if he didn't look, he'd regret it later, falling into a rabbit hole of updates that was guaranteed to fuck him over. So he opened YouTube.

The videos were taken down years ago, the channels involved with Marble Hornets wiped from the website. But that didn't mean they were gone, just hidden away on Google Drives and shock sites. What was on YouTube was... the fandom.

It made his skin crawl thinking about it. People from all over the world were obsessed with what he and Jay had been through. He'd seen hundreds of articles about the videos, from five minute listicles to long analysises about the events and the people involved. He'd seen other things, too, things he'd rather not remember. Like the fanart...

Out of everything, though, it was the YouTube community that unsettled him the most. The passionate, wide eyed college kids. The naive high schoolers. The older people, with their backgrounds in criminal science and forensics and cryptids and God knew what else. They picked over the videos and tweets and codes like vultures at a pile of bones. Like it was just a fictional web series, like people he knew and once liked weren't dead. And they spread the disease. It didn't take all of them, leaving the YouTubers alone, but claiming their followers. It made him sick thinking about all the people he couldn't save, the people who had no one left to try and find them, the people who vanished into Rosswood Park and were never seen again. It made him sick, watching these ignorant people talk about his pain as if they were all insects under microscopes.

But if he didn't pay attention, who knew what might happen. The Operator was watching all of them. One slip up was all it took.

He scrolled through both the front page and his subscriptions. The videos were, in the end, all the same. Speculation, discussion, analyzation. Some of them he could watch later. Others needed his attention now.

Tim’s eyes landed on a video, and his heart clenched. The Neophyte was streaming again.

The still image didn’t show much. Neophyte_Calling didn’t put much work into his channel. It was just a shot of what the streams normally showed, pale, unkempt hands poking free from black robes, resting on an old plastic table. That was what he expected to find once he opened the stream.

And he’d be correct, that was what awaited him once he got the courage to click. The hands twitched and clenched and dug at the table. It wasn’t the hands that were special though, it was what the owner of those hands were saying.

“Autumn after firestorm, the nights don’t listen and the butter is on the corn. Ten days or twenty paces of living guts wrapped around an old man’s neck. The water comes up to your waist but you don’t feel the attitude of denial inside the bastard daughter’s heart. Oh, god, eureka, industry was never so smooth…”

Complete nonsense. The ramblings of a man on some kind of drug, or lost to some unknown mental illness. Despite this, the chat flooded with messages. Donations popped up occasionally, attempts to get the Neophyte’s attention. He didn’t notice. He never noticed. He just kept talking. And he would keep talking until the stream ended on its own, or he passed out on the table.

People called him a prophet. Claimed every word he spoke had a double, or even a triple, meaning. They recorded every word he said and discussed them among themselves, coming up with ‘translations’ for his maddening dialogue. And to be fair, they could have a point. Sometimes, what the Neophyte said did seem to foretell events that happened not long after he spoke them. But the god the Neophyte channeled was not one Tim would ever ask someone to worship.

Silence. The man stopped talking, his fidgeting hands resting flat on the table. Dread filled Tim’s body. Speak of the devil, he was doing this again?

The Neophyte spoke again, his voice deeper now. The words came clumsy from his mouth, uncomfortable, heavy, as if he had never spoken before. The emphasis, the tone, it was all wrong. Tim had no trouble understanding them, however.

“You always fight,” It said through the Neophyte’s mouth. “You always resist. You tire, and exhaust, and fall. You continue to fight despite.”

The robes shifted, the head hidden from the camera’s view tilting.

“Tim,” It said. “You are a grain of sand. I am eternal. I am here. I will always be here. You understand. You continue despite.”

On the side of the screen, the chat surged with messages. It raced so quickly, Tim couldn’t have read any of them even if he tried. He didn’t look away from the livestream. 

“Tim,” It said again. “Enough. You have fought hard. You are getting old. That’s enough. It’s time to come home. To us. To all of us.”

The hair stood up on his arms, on the back of Tim’s neck. He shuddered.

“Like hell,” he whispered, and closed the tab.

But even though he closed the livestream, he could swear he heard the Neophyte, the thing puppeting him, whisper in his mind.

“Coward.”

When 2pm rolled around, Tim was back in his van in the library parking lot. Obviously he couldn’t do a Zoom call inside the quiet space, but their internet reached well past the parking lot. He sat on his bed, now folded up like a couch inside the converted van he lived in. His laptop open before him, the program open and ready. Now he just had to wait for her.

Hard to say what this Meredith Fredrickson would expect a private investigator like him to look like, but Tim did his best to look presentable anyway. Hair combed, beard trimmed, leather jacket kept to the side out of her line of sight - leather jackets weren’t worn by authority figures, and that was what he was trying to be right now. Not anyone could do this job, but who’s to say she knew that? If she didn’t like the way he looked, she could try to find someone else to find her son and his friend. And if she did that, by the time she realized only Tim could help her, it would be too late.

Thinking about it that way made him shudder.

Of course, while he was prepared to deal with what she thought he would look like, he wasn’t as ready for what she herself would look like. As the call began, and Meredith’s face came on screen, Tim hesitated. He looked at her closely again. Had he seen this woman before?

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Fredrickson,” He greeted.

The woman shook her head, her curly brown hair tossing around her slim shoulders.

“Meredith is fine,” she said. “I haven’t been called ‘Mrs’ since my husband died. I changed back to my maiden name - my son’s last name will be his, not mine.”

“Of course,” Tim said. Odd information to include, but people tended to ramble when they were nervous.

He looked at her again, at the frown lines developing around her lips, and the worry and pain in her wide-set eyes. Behind her was a normal looking home, a few windows with pale curtains, a kitchen kept clean from what little he saw. Something was nagging at him. What was it?

“Did you fill out the information packet I requested?” He asked.

Meredith nodded.

“Yes.”

The file appeared, Tim half-listening to her as he opened it.

“I know this is a very strange thing to ask from you,” Meredith said. “But circumstances have changed in a way I really didn’t expect. I know it’s hard to believe that after ten years my son could be alive, but I don’t have any other explanation for…”

She trailed off. Tim didn’t look away from the document she’d sent. The names written on the very first line.

Missing People: Jay Merrick and Alex Kralie

Motherfucker, had he been tricked?

Tim shot the woman a sharp glance, examining her expression in seconds. She was not the first person to ask him to track down Jay and Alex, but she was the first he hadn’t screened out before it got this far. Most people were upfront about their intentions, or were obviously trolling, or he otherwise got weird vibes from them. This Meredith had slipped him by, and wasted his time in the process.

“He is my son,” Meredith said. “I’ve included his birth certificate, since I thought you might not believe me.”

“I don’t need it.” A birth certificate? Those weren’t easy to fake, but Tim was no expert on Photoshop either. 

“I would’ve included Alex’s, too,” Meredith continued. “After all the years he and Jay knew each other, you would’ve thought I’d have it too.” She laughed, and there was pain within it. “But his parents died in a car accident about six years back, and…”

“Wait.” Tim refocused. “Alex and Jay knew each other?”

“Since the first year of middle school,” Meredith said with a nod. “I have a lot of photos of them. You know, Jay went through a phase, where he wore all black, and listened to rock music with singers I couldn’t understand. He got a tattoo of one of the bands on his ankle behind my back. I was so angry...”

She laughed again, and her eyes went distant. Tim stared at her, his mind flashing back to all the conversations he’d had with Jay, things that didn’t go into the videos. Being Alex’s childhood friend, since middle school - the phases he went through as a teen - that damn tattoo he was so embarrassed of. None of these were known by the fandom.

Oh god, this woman was the real deal. Even her face, now that he looked at her, was just like Jay’s. The distant look in her eyes as she thought… Jay got that same expression.

“Meredith,” he said, his voice softer, kinder. “Do you know about Marble Hornets?”

“I can’t bring myself to watch them,” she said. Meredith folded her hands together. “But I know what… what was shown on the videos. I know that they are…” She swallowed. “Considered dead by most people. I was one of them.”

His gut twisted. By most people, including her. “But something… changed.”

“Yes.” She took a deep breath, and moved to wipe her eyes. “I got a package in the mail about a week ago. Inside was a flashdrive and a few printed photos. It had been placed in my mailbox - I don’t know who sent it.”

Oh no, Tim thought. Not this again. Please, don’t play this game with people again.

“What were the photos?” He asked, aware of the sound of his own voice more than anything else.

“I’ve included most of them in the document,” Meredith said. “I… I still can’t believe what I’ve seen, but… But they don’t look like they could’ve been faked.”

Dread pressed down on his shoulders. Dread and something else, some kind of energy buzzing through his nerves. Tim looked at the document, scrolled down, and opened the photos.

Some were blurry, taken from a distance and zoomed in before being printed. Some were clear as glass. It took him several seconds to process what he was seeing, what the subjects of the photos were. Tim blinked, looked again, and his pulse quickened.

Alex, standing on a street corner, gray in his hair, exhaustion on his face. Jay in a dark cloth jacket with a hood, looking over his shoulders. Alex, and Jay, Alex, and Jay, in all the photos, in every single one. The clothes were different, the faces aged, but there was no denying what he was seeing, and like Meredith said, no way to fake what he was looking at.

“Oh my god,” Tim mumbled.

Jay and Alex were alive.

[marblehornetsreview]

Introduction - marblehornetsreview

WARNING: From here on out, beware of full spoilers for all Marble Hornets and ToTheArk entries.

Introduction Uploaded 20th June 2009

So, here I am. I'm going to go through every single entry, and every single ToTheArk video. I'll probably do the comics, too. I assume they'll be done before I can get around to writing about all of these. I've read the two that have been released so far, but I'm not telling you what I think about them because that's a spoiler.

Anyway, here's the introduction. An unseen narrator (It's Jay, we all know it's Jay) is uploading raw footage excerpts of a student film called Marble Hornets, directed by his old college friend Alex Kralie. By all accounts the film was terrible, but we don't know that yet. 

The driving footage we've been seeing so far fades to black, as we learn Alex was planning to burn the tapes before deciding to give them to Jay. Alex gave Jay the tapes under the condition that he never mention them again, then promptly moved away. Jay hasn't touched the tapes in three years, but has now decided to go through them and upload anything interesting that he finds. The tapes are all undated and out of order, so we're up shit creek as far as context goes. Should I curse on this blog? Let me know if I should curse on this blog.

How do I feel about this entry? It's simple. It's creepy. It's the introduction video. It sets the pace and tone for what we’re getting in for, at least initially. There's not a lot to say other than I have been programmed to fear white text on a black background by this series, and there's no coming back from that. See you next time. ⨂

[fandomgeeknerd]

totheark color pallet made by @synapse-retrogenesis aesthetic moodboards but it's all about the colors/has nothing to do with totheark, 1st one is impurity 2nd is exit and 3rd one is program (sorry for the @)

[empresslesbiace]

Marble Hornets reaction #5 totheark edition!

Ok so like I said in the last post, I missed all totheark videos cause I totally forgot about them. I managed to find a timeline of the entirety of Marble Hornets. Idk how reliable it is, but I’m trusting it for now. The timeline is here: http://marblehornets.wikidot.com/comprehensive-timeline 

Regards: This was posted after Entry #9 was uploaded but before Entry #10. There isn’t much here just a lot of //// and the word “closely” at the end. 

Operator: This was posted after Entry #10 was uploaded but before Entry #11. “Lakes in stillness will take every life of the night” I think that’s what it said in the text on the video. Apparently this is missing audio from Entry #10? 

Deluge: This was posted after Entry #11 but before #12. No idea what it’s saying. Sounds like “It was” to me. And then “Watching you” in text. So.. “It was watching you” ?? Apparently some of the comments are saying it says Alex backwards but there are a lot of confusing takes. 

Impurity: Uploaded after Entry #12 but before #13. “Begin” with a ton of 0′s. This is binary right? I used to communicate with my friends through binary so I’m pretty sure that’s it. There are flowers and a storm? It’s kinda pretty tbh. A screen of 0′s with letters in some spaces. “There was more” is apparently what it says? Also a comment pointed this out but it says “The operator” right before the flowers cut out. 

Exit: Uploaded after #13 but before #14. Apparently someone filmed Jay when he went to get the battery from Alex’s car. I believe this was happening when Alex had a run in with the Operator and we saw the symbol in clear view for the first time. The flashing words are “Rat He Ore Top” which is actually an anagram for The Operator. At least I’m pretty sure. I didn’t refer to the comments for this one. Then at the end it says “Where is the Ark” Is the ark the red building or is my memory wrong? 

Program: After #14 but before #15. The letter S? Or is that some type of symbol for something? The comments aren’t really helping with this one lol. Bunch of binary again. “Bleed more” is this referencing Alex with his bloody face or the bloody sink in the house?? 

Advocate: After 15, before 16. “Tick Tock” I bet creepypasta fans freaked out over this. Unless Clockwork hadn’t been created at that point? I can’t remember. I know it has nothing to do with her at all but I thought it was funny. Also is that Brian's face? Tons of binary and I think someone in the comments said that some of it translated to “7″ which, apparently, is the entry this clip of Brian is from?? Not sure if its true but it’s worth mentioning. 

Addition: Uploaded after #16 but recorded during the entry itself. Someone recorded Jay’s coughing fit during the video. Rude. Idk what it was saying but the comments say its “Alex, Brian” just slowed down. It’s what Jay was yelling in the entry. It also says “See you” at the end. 

Signal: After 17 but before 18. It says, “Can’t wait till we’re alone together. Then I will tell you something new, something cold, something sleepy, something of cease and of peace on the long bright curve of space. Banish them- refuse to speak, leave them. Go upstairs to your room. I will be waiting for you. I will surround your bed. Close the windows so that none will never again be able to enter” I heard some of it but I got the rest from the comments. It also says “Come back, find me” at the end. Also the clips in the video are from the show Night Gallery, particularly the episode “Silent Snow, Secret Snow” from 1966. Credits to Hawdknoah on YouTube for figuring that out. I have no idea if it’s true or not cause I didn’t fact check this but I’m choosing to trust it for now. 

Messages: Now this was uploaded before entry 19 but took place after the events of entry 19 and the next totheark entry. It says, “Tell us. You have been keeping secrets. Smile for the camera.” And I’m guessing that’s a pic of Tim at the end. A hint to Tim being Masky? 

Imma stop here since I haven’t watched Entry #19 yet so I can’t continue with totheark till I’ve watched it. I’m going in order for everything (In order as in of the upload dates.) 

I have no idea how much of the information is correct or not. These are just my observations and commentary on it. Hope y’all enjoyed tho. 

[halogen-00]

Detailed Marble Hornets Asks

I just rewatched all of Marble Hornets, and I miss the old days where we wrote big critical discussions, theories, and film analysis posts about it, so here are some in-depth asks for stimulating that sort of discussion! :D (I named them after totheark entries because yes)

Regards - Who is your favorite character?

Deluge - Who is your least favorite character?

Exit - Who do you think is most at fault for causing the events of Marble Hornets?

Operator - Do you think Alex Kralie could have responded differently to the presence of the Operator? Why didn’t he act the same way as Jay / why was he so violent whereas the others were more passive? How responsible was he for his own actions?

Impurity - What do you think (character)’s true intentions were? 

Decay - What do you think of Tim Wright? (his character arc, development, etc)

Program - What is your favorite motif in Marble Hornets?

Advocate - What entry impressed you the most and why?

Attention - What entry scared you the most and why?

Addition - Is there an entry you just really like? Why?

Decline - Is there anything you dislike about Marble Hornets? Why?

Inquiry - Is there anything you wish you could’ve seen more of? What questions do you have that you would like to see answered?

Signal - What would you do if you were in Jay’s position in the beginning?

Return - What is your favorite location in Marble Hornets?

Version - When did you first watch the series?

Messages - What do you think “the ark” referred to?

Observation - Talk about a theory you have (bonus points for citing entries)!

Admission - What do you think about the events of entry 83?

Fragments - What moment made you the saddest?

Memories - Is there a moment you can relate to?

Reminder - Do you have a favorite memory watching Marble Hornets?

[foreignlanguagemiddlesummer]

I love how Collective videos have gone from “totheark but with a more expensive editing program” to...this

[eckvanet-discussions]

Thoughts on Eckva7

I haven’t been online in forever :0 I can’t wait to see what comes of this as it’s starting to push the plot forward even more. “House call dispatched” is an interesting way for that to end and I’m sure we can expect more soon. I think that the image highlighting part of the brain is similar to the totheark video “Inquiry” where the image is pointing to the part of the brain associated with personal identity (I’m so grateful for @nick-nocturn​ because I’m forgetful as heck and could never be so detailed). All I have as of now is that the video is highlighting what seems to be the temporal lobe (honestly I can’t remember anything from psychology so google is my best friend until I find my notes, if I can that is) which in short controls hearing, memory, emotion, and is the part of the brain used for understanding speech. I think that this and the following screen saying “input error” is just to add to the message that one recording the broadcasts (our main character) really isn’t seeing what the person behind them intends to be processed. Maybe we missed something and this is intended to tell us that. There are parts of this I haven’t really been able to look into but I think it’s safe to say that the main character we have yet to see is being depicted as our little doodle friend here and probably referred to as alis. Alis pastry could be something else still and our main character might just be the main character of whatever alis pastry is or what it stands for. This feels like the broadcast is sort of mocking our main character the way the members of totheark did? I wish I had more evidence than speculation but I just hopped on it as soon as I had access to a computer. I should really figure out what programs could be helpful in this but for now it’s just google ad my good old habit of overthinking everything. Please let me know if I’m making any mistakes or if you have anything to add. These are all just my first impressions after all, but still feel free to add or correct things. (sorry for typos, this was done in a rush)