Why do we obsess over Slender Man so much?

[RagTagBand]

Googled him.

So, it's just some Creepypasta character some bloke thought up?

Meh, anything can be made into a horrifying figure if the story's told well.

He's some new mithos creature spawned on 4chan's /x/.

(Like most original content from 4chan, it is doomed for everyone to forget it's place of origin)

Except that this is just plain wrong. It's *not* original content from 4chan, it was created on SomethingAwful's forums. Fuck, the thread where the slenderman was created still exists so you can go SEE the very first incarnation of the slenderman.

Hell I know you were already too lazy to google the origins of the slenderman so you're definitely too lazy to google them a second time, so HERE

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3150591&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=3

That's the original thread, and the original post (about halfway down), created by member Victor Surge As part of a "Create paranormal images" contest.

 

[GrizzlyLives]

I just want to add a little bit of knowledge to this thread but there's a film called Tall Man its about slender, its quite new and i don't know if its any good but i just thought it was funny that there's already a film about this guy

 

[FreebirdLegend]

All he wants is 20 dollars. But seriously that is a really good question to which all I can answer is he just is scary.

 

[Kermi]

I don't find Slender Man scary, but I do think he's a fascinating creation. I'm really amazed at how it's taken off and how it's fuelled some wonderful fiction like EveryManHybrid and Marble Hornets on youtube, not to mention the recent game - and being the inspiration for the Ender Men in Minecraft.

 

[Something Amyss]

I have literally never found Slender Man scary or creepy. I do appreciate the effort that's gone into the "lore," though.

 

[Don Savik]

Am I so sick of these internet tough guys who clearly aren't fans of horror. Its not hard to understand the fad of a new horror game on youtube bringing in popularity into a topic. Nobody "obsesses" over him, its just popular at the moment.

Its one of those creepy things that you have to be interested in for it to be scary. I could show it to my parents and they would be like "oh its just a guy with no face", but I know Slenderman is more than that, and I've seen him 'in action' (fan videos like Marble Hornets/EverymanHYBRID) so he's scarier to me. I like horror and it interests me, so I go out of my way to look into scary stories, videos, and creepypastas and the like. Someone who doesn't like that shit won't care, but should at least be able to understand why others like it. There's a difference between the kind of people that play Amnesia because they heard it was "super scary game" and the people that go out of their way to find horror game mods and custom games.

Have I made myself redundantly clear yet?

 

[Asuka Soryu]

Because he was awesome in Jack Slenderman.

 

[ThePS1Fan]

Played the game once, read into it a little bit, visited r/slenderman.
Can say this, the game was boring. You walk around the forest until he catches you and you get static. It does jump scares about as well as any modern action horror game, without the action part obviously. I've heard Marble Hornets is good. I haven't seen any of it. I guess it can be about as scary as anything else, when you suspend your disbelieve it's scary and then you get up walk into the forest and give no fucks because you know it isn't real.

 

[RTK1576]

First off, Marble Hornets is good. If you like Blair Witch-style horror, give it a shot.

Second: the Slender Man is intriguing because in most stories that use him he seems to be something otherworldy and unknowable. He's not a conventional killer stalking you. He has a purpose - we just don't know what it is. He has the power to make you disappear, yet he more often than not lets you walk free. Is he a ghost, a byproduct of an insane mind, or something far removed from us?

They're going to make a movie about him someday, I just know it... and it's going to suck.

 

[Korolev]

Beats me. He looks like a basketball player turned IRS agent. Scary for millionaires with off-shore accounts, maybe, but I'm not scared of him one bit. He's just a tall guy in a business suit. What's he gonna do? Examine my bank-statement?

 

[Randomperson9999999]

slenderman is just agent 47 but people never see his face.

 

[xshadowscreamx]

when does the found footage movie come out?... im sure there will be one

 

[xshadowscreamx]

thanks to this thread i found creepypasta.com

 

[Mrsoupcup]

Googled him.

So, it's just some Creepypasta character some bloke thought up?

Meh, anything can be made into a horrifying figure if the story's told well.

He's some new mithos creature spawned on 4chan's /x/.

(Like most original content from 4chan, it is doomed for everyone to forget it's place of origin)

Except that this is just plain wrong. It's *not* original content from 4chan, it was created on SomethingAwful's forums. Fuck, the thread where the slenderman was created still exists so you can go SEE the very first incarnation of the slenderman.

Hell I know you were already too lazy to google the origins of the slenderman so you're definitely too lazy to google them a second time, so HERE

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3150591&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=3

That's the original thread, and the original post (about halfway down), created by member Victor Surge As part of a "Create paranormal images" contest.

My bad, though don't hold it against me for never ever wanting to go on something awful.

 

[TheProfessor234]

He's a nice guy.

This was amazing. Would of been better if they never interacted with it but still a great a laugh.

As for the topic, the whole, "The more you think and know about it, the more powerful he becomes," is what I really like about it. I reminds me of my own opinion of Lovecraft, where if you see the monsters, you go insane but on the same side, you could just be going insane and you are just imagining things instead.

Same with the Slenderman, you could just be researching him, looking into things, and the more you know about him, why the more you see him in the shadows, the more he stalks you... and yet, he was never there.

 

[Gatx]

I think Slender Man works great as an urban legend/ghost story, and love reading bits and pieces about him. My particular favorite is the "Der Ritter" story, gives me goosebumps every time (though the way it ends is kind of "meh"). I think all the "Slender Blogs" are running it into the ground though. I mean, establishing rules on how to run or fight against him, and explaining his origins and what not kills the mystery.

As for Obsession, It's because it hasn't been sold to death Via Hot Topic products or anything else. The moment a movie ends up being made, Slender Man will have been too much.

Too late.

http://theslenderman.wikia.com/wiki/Windigo

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ajmeadows/the-slender-man-movie

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1658837/ (????)

The last link, the Tall Man, actually has nothing to do with the Slender Man. I mean the similarities might be intentional, trying to ride on the popularity of the Slender Man story, but the actually movie ends up being more of a thriller than horror movie.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Nice to know doors slow him down. lol Dont give a shit about the slender man. Only thing i saw was a year or so ago that was a documentary found footage type thing on him online. That was boring.

 

[Jumpingbean3]

Several reasons but here are the main ones (at least for me):

1) His appearance is simultaneously human and non-human. At a distant glance he appears to be an unusually tall human. Then you see his unnaturally long limbs and his faceless head and imagine what it might feel like to have that happen to your body, not to mention the whole Uncanny Valley effect.

2) His lack of a face makes him nearly impossible to read in terms of his intentions and emotions (if he even has any) and that leads into my 3rd reason:

3) We know almost nothing about him. We don't know what he is, what his intentions are, whether he is genuinely malevolent or simply acting upon instinct or even if he is a genuine threat. To take a quote from Batman Begins "You always fear what you don't understand".

 

[Right Hook]

Slender Man isn't scary, I could create something scarier than him on the spot...hmm...little spiders that crawl up your pee-hole while you sleep and eat your wiener from the inside out, you don't notice until it is too late because they secrete an anesthetic. That's like 6 billion times scarier...especially since they are real...

 

[nobodysomebody]

I don't think hes very scary, personally, but I do enjoy some youtube series regarding him, like Marble Hornets for example. That being said though, it does aggravate me that some people only know him because of the game, since there is so much to the "lore" that lots of people take time coming up with, but hey, whatever.
All of my friends find him scary though, like incredibly so- to the point where they vehemently refuse to look at/read anything regarding him.