| Marble Hornets | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Genre | Alternate reality game Psychological horror Surrealism Drama Mystery Thriller |
| Created by | Troy Wagner Joseph DeLage |
| Based on | Slender Man by Eric Knudsen |
| Written by | Troy Wagner Joseph DeLage Tim Sutton |
| Directed by | Joseph DeLage Troy Wagner |
| Starring | Troy Wagner Joseph DeLage Tim Sutton Brian Haight Jessica May |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 3 |
| No. of episodes | 133 (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Producers | Joseph DeLage Kirill Baru Troy Wagner |
| Editor | Troy Wagner |
| Running time | 1–15 minutes |
| Production company | THAC |
| Original release | |
| Network | YouTube |
| Release | June 20, 2009 – June 20, 2014 |
| Related | |
| Clear Lakes 44 ECKVA | |
Marble Hornets (abbreviated as MH) is an alternate reality game YouTube web series inspired by the Slender Man online mythos.[1][2] The first video was posted on YouTube on June 20, 2009, following a post that its creator, Troy Wagner, created on the Something Awful forum the previous day. It was the first web series to be created around the character, with the first episode premiering exactly 10 days after the appearance of the original images of Slender Man on the Something Awful forums, and the first Marble Hornets affiliated post being 9 days after the character's creation.[3]
To date, there are 92 videos on the main channel (87 entries).[4] The series also has 38 accompanying videos from a side-channel, "totheark". These videos, as well as the eponymous "totheark", have been featured multiple times throughout the story.[5][6] As of December 17, 2022, the principal channel has over 113 million views, with over 600K subscribers. The cryptic side channel "totheark" has over 100K subscribers, and 15 million views.[7] It was filmed in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and other nearby areas.
On August 3, 2015, a follow-up series titled Clear Lakes 44 was uploaded onto the Marble Hornets channel. In April 2016, Clear Lakes 44 was cancelled after the members of the creative team went their separate ways, as confirmed by Wagner.[8] On October 16, 2016, a successor to Clear Lakes 44, titled ECKVA, was launched.[9] On December 27, 2017, Wagner posted a new photo to his Twitter page, teasing a comic related to Marble Hornets slated for a 2018 release.[10] The first issue released on February 25, 2019, with a total of six being slated for the series, with 5 main story comics, and a special "totheark" comic.[11] Five have been released as of 2023, the latest being Issue 4: Can You See Me, published on March 31, 2023. The series is illustrated by Canadian artist Jackie Reynolds.
In 2015, a film spinoff Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story was released. Critical reception was overwhelmingly negative.[12]
Plot
Season 1
The series follows Jay Merrick (Troy Wagner), a young man attempting to find out what happened during the filming of Marble Hornets, an unfinished student film project helmed by his friend, Alex Kralie (Joseph DeLage).[13] Alex abruptly ended the project after only three months of production, left the tapes of raw footage with Jay, cut contact with him, and transferred schools.
Three years later, Jay decides to watch the tapes, and begins uploading them to YouTube as "Entries". Through the footage, he discovers that the filming of Marble Hornets was hampered by the menacing presence of a humanoid figure known as "The Operator".[13] The Operator appears to have constantly stalked Alex, including while he was on set with his actors, walking his dog to the park, and at his own home. Its presence seemed to cause Alex to develop coughing fits and severe paranoia. As a result of the paranoia, Alex became more stressed, irritable, and aggressive towards cast members Tim Wright (Tim Sutton), Sarah Reid (Mary Kathleen Bishop) and camera operator Seth Wilson (Seth McCay).
Jay discovers that Alex began to constantly film himself with the hope of catching The Operator on camera. He also finds that Alex's tapes have severe periodic audio and visual problems such as static, distortion, missing footage, and occasionally missing or inaudible audio. He speculates that Alex may be responsible for some of these problems.
After Jay becomes more involved with the case, The Operator begins invading Jay's personal life. In response, Jay also sets up constant video surveillance in his home and begins posting the recordings to YouTube alongside the footage from Alex's tapes. His uploads often net cryptic and threatening responses from another mysterious YouTube channel named "totheark", who posts videos with cryptic ciphers or messages, and utilizes the 'video reply" feature to try and get Jay's attention.
Jay meets with Tim to seek answers about Alex's disappearance, before visiting the abandoned house of another cast member, Brian Thomas (Brian Haight). Jay finds Brian's home vacant, in severe disrepair, without functioning lighting, and with a bathroom sink full of dried blood. Throughout his exploration of the house, Jay hears unexplainable noises and briefly has a severe coughing fit. He finds and takes several items of interest, including a bullet casing, pill bottle, and several cryptic drawings. In a response video, totheark reveals that they were responsible for the noises Jay heard while investigating Brian's house and that they were watching Jay the whole time.
Among the tapes, Jay finds footage of himself, Alex, and Tim filming a scene from Marble Hornets, where The Operator is seen watching the men through a window. Jay notes that he is disturbed, as he has no memory of the events in the footage happening.
Totheark uploads a video telling Jay to come back to Brian's house, and Jay decides to return in hopes of finding a lead. At the house, he has a brutal encounter with 'The Masked Man', who tackles Jay to the ground. After the attack, The Masked Man, unofficially dubbed as 'Masky' by the fandom, has a seizure. Jay wakes up the next day in his car with no memory of the previous night, the knife he brought to the house now missing.
Jay eventually tells viewers that, like Alex, he has been filming himself constantly and uploading the footage to a hard drive. His cameras capture The Masked Man breaking into Jay's home and watching him sleep, before he and Jay both disappear for multiple hours. After Jay shares this entry, totheark posts a response video showing where Jay was during those missing hours.
Jay analyzes the items he found during his first visit to Brian's house. He finds that the pill bottle he had taken is now empty, though it was full when he found it. He also finds that bullet casing he had taken is missing. He suspects that The Masked Man is behind this. On the back of one of the drawings he took is a message that mentions a tower.
Jay visits the park where some filming from Marble Hornets took place, and finds a hidden tape in a red tower there. Footage on the tape shows Alex leaving Seth behind in an abandoned building after being attacked by The Operator. Later on the tape, Alex says that all of the cast and crew of Marble Hornets are "gone". Jay attempts to return to Brian's house for any other possible clues, but is attacked and chased by The Masked Man, and finds himself trapped within the house. Jay is teleported to the place where Seth was abandoned, and is attacked by The Operator, which breaks Jay's camera.
Jay uploads another clip from his security cameras, which shows him disappearing for multiple hours after stepping through a doorway. Totheark hacks the Marble Hornets channel, and threatens Jay in a video featuring The Masked Man, telling him that this is no longer a game for them, and that they will be coming for him.
Totheark's threat causes Jay to flee his house and stay at nearby hotels. While at a hotel, he finds out that his apartment burned down shortly after he had fled, and Jay decides to quit. When leaving his current hiding spot, Jay finds a package with a tape at his door that contains footage of Alex and his girlfriend, Amy Walters (Bethann Williams), at Amy's home. The Operator appears in the tape, causing Amy and Alex to run. Jay uploads this tape as 'Entry #26', explains that he has changed his mind about quitting, and promises to find Alex.
Season 2
Seven months after 'Entry #26' is posted to YouTube, an amnesiac Jay wakes up in a hotel room in an unknown location, with a chest-mounted camera. He learns that he was initially only booked for one night in the hotel, but decides to stay longer to get his bearings and gain information about the hotel and its surrounding area.
At the hotel, Jay encounters a young woman, Jessica Locke (Jessica May), who is initially very curious and inquisitive about him. He becomes suspicious of her after hearing strange noises coming from her room. In a later conversation with Jessica, Jay is caught in a lie about why he is staying at the hotel, causing Jessica to grow suspicious of Jay. In another conversation with Jessica, she reveals that she also woke up in the hotel with missing memories. Jay realizes that he and Jessica are having similar experiences and encourages her to gather her belongings so that they can leave the hotel together.
Jay enters Jessica's room while he thinks she is preparing to leave, only to find the room empty. He discovers a slip of paper with a combination on it. Jay uses the combination to unlock the safe in his hotel room, where he finds a large amount of video tapes and a hard drive. The Masked Man appears and attempts to attack him, but Jay is able to escape the hotel with all of the tapes and the hard drive. The tapes and hard drive in the safe are revealed to contain footage from the previous seven months that Jay has no memory of.
The first few tapes reveal that Jay went to the return address shown on the package he received in 'Entry #26". While there, he runs into Alex for the first time in nearly 4 years. The Masked Man interrupts the reunion, and they wrestle him to the ground and unmask him, discovering he is Tim, one of the core actors in Marble Hornets. Alex breaks Tim's leg with a rock, and the two flee. Jay and Alex form an alliance to try and find Amy, who went missing following the attack in 'Entry #26".
On subsequent tapes, Alex calls Jay and tells him to meet up the next day at Rosswood Park, an area near the hotel that Jay awoke in at the start of the season. While Jay is sleeping in his car, a hooded figure passes by his car with a camera. Jay goes to Rosswood Park, and decides to walk through the woods while waiting on Alex. While in the woods, Jay is attacked by The Operator and drops his camera while fleeing. The camera is later picked up by someone wearing a black mask and beige hoodie (The Hooded Man, or by the fandom, 'Hoody') who returns the camera to Jay's car.
Jay looks through the hard drive and realizes it belonged to Alex, and has footage Alex shot on a chest-mounted camera.
In another tape, Alex meets with Jay go to the house where Amy disappeared, but find nothing. Alex calls Amy's roommate, Jessica, to see if she has any leads on Amy's location.
While looking through footage on the hard drive, Jay finds a clip where Alex calls Jessica and tells her he found Amy. However, none of Alex's footage shows evidence that this is true. The footage shows Alex is also being frequently visited by The Operator. In one of the hard drive files, Alex notices The Hooded Man outside of his house, and chases after him. The Hooded Man leads him to a forest, where Alex is jumped by both Tim and The Hooded Man, but the two suddenly run off.
In the next tape, Jay breaks into Alex's apartment due to his distrust of him, but Alex catches him. Their arguement is cut short by The Operator appearing in the apartment, and Jay flees while Alex stays. The two meet in a parking lot, where they have a argument and quit working together. Jay forces Alex to give him Jessica's phone number. Jay calls Jessica to ask her about where Amy is, in the process realizing that Alex had been lying to Jessica. This causes Jay to begin stalking Alex.
The tapes show Alex visiting Rosswood Park regularly, but Jay doesn't follow him into the forest for most of the visits. On one occasion, Jay follows Alex in, but runs away when he thinks Alex notices him. The footage from Alex's body camera shows him bludgeoning a stranger to death with a rock after mistaking them for Jay. After Alex kills the man, The Operator appears and seemingly teleports the body away.
A while later, Jay breaks into Alex's apartment again and steals a tape, which is from when Marble Hornets was in production. On the tape, Alex and Brian go to an abandoned hospital to film some scenes. While there, they are attacked by The Operator, and Alex disappears. Brian picks up Alex's camera and begins searching for him, but instead he finds Tim laying in a room in a coughing fit. Brian is attacked by The Operator again, and the last bit of footage shows Brian's body being dragged away.
The last tape shows Alex luring Jay and Jessica into the woods at the park under the guise of showing them something related to Amy's disappearance. After leading them onto the upper floor of an abandoned structure, Alex holds the two at gunpoint. Before he shoots them, he is attacked and subdued by Tim in his masked disguise. Jay and Jessica escape and book rooms at a hotel, where they suffer an attack by The Operator and sustain memory loss as a result.
Jay concludes after seeing all of this footage that he shouldn't trust Alex, but he still wants to find him. While downtown, Jay sees Tim outside of an antique shop. Jay tells the viewers he will keep them updated, and that he has a plan.
Season 3
With no leads in finding either Alex or Jessica, Jay tries to track down Tim. When he is able to speak to him again, Tim seemingly remembers nothing of the events in Season 1 or 2, besides Jay's interview with him. Jay returns to the pretense of the interview, and tells Tim that he wants to work with him to finish Marble Hornets. Tim tells Jay that he shot some behind the scenes footage during the production, and gives him the tapes after finding them.
Most of the tapes contain general BTS footage, but in one, Tim mentions knowing of an abandoned hospital where they can film. One of the last tapes shows Tim and Alex going to the hospital. While there, Alex and Tim get into an argument when Tim refuses to go to an annex building. Alex becomes aggressive towards him, but still agrees to explore the hospital. While there, Alex attacks and knocks out Tim with a pipe. The camera falls from where it had been put down and The Operator is seen.
The last tape picks up the same night, when Tim wakes up and explores the abandoned building in complete darkness. He escapes, but instead of going home, he goes to the annex. While hiding there, he spots Alex with another pipe, but Alex doesn't find him. Tim suffers another coughing fit, a frame of The Operator appears, and the camera glitches out. Jay notes that the annex is identical to the hospital in Season 2, where Brian was attacked.
A few days after, Jay and Tim meet up once again and decide to go to the hospital per Jay's suggestion of scouting out abandoned buildings for filming locations. When they arrive, Jay backs out and wants to go to the annex instead. Tim agrees unwillingly. While exploring, they hear debris falling, which makes Jay increasingly paranoid. They encounter The Hooded Man, and Jay chases after him, but loses him near a maintenance tunnel in an adjoining building. Tim convinces Jay to not go into the tunnel, and they leave.
A few nights after the exploration, Tim calls Jay, saying that they need to talk. When they meet up, Tim punches Jay in the face, furious at him. He explains that he found the Marble Hornets YouTube account, and now knows Jay's true intentions. He blames Jay for everything that has happened, saying that he was getting better before Jay met with him. The argument ends with Tim saying he wants nothing to do with Jay anymore.
Totheark uploads a video response, entitled 'Reference', which is shot inside of the maintenance tunnel with the audio being distorted clips of Tim yelling at Jay. The Masked Man's mask appears in the darkness, and the text "TRUTH WITH LIGHT' appears, with the code 'LIES IN DARK'. The video drives Jay to return to the maintenance tunnel by himself, as he has a hunch that The Hooded Man led him there for a specific purpose. While in the annex next to the tunnel, he finds a message written from The Hooded Man, which says "HE IS A LIAR. FOLLOW ME."
While exploring in the tunnel, he finds a folder with the text 'LIAR' on it, which has medical documents about Tim inside. Jay is attacked in the tunnel by The Operator, but manages to get out with everything. In the next entry, he shows the documents in the folder, where were some of Tim's old medical records. The records reveal that he suffers from seizures, a history with headaches, insomnia, and depression. A picture was also left in the folder of Tim and Jay arguing, with the text "WATCHING" written on it. Jay decides to take a break, due to being at a dead-end.
Totheark hacks the Marble Hornets channel and uploads footage of The Hooded Man breaking into Tim's house and stealing his medication, causing Tim to have a seizure and a psychological breakdown. Afterwards, Tim slowly limps his way out of the room, and text on the footage from The Hooded Man tells Jay that this is his fault, and that Tim has gone somewhere.
Jay goes to Rosswood Park to try and find Tim. While exploring, Jay encounters Tim in his masked state. Tim chases Jay for a while, ultimately catching him and dragging him off. The Hooded Man picks up the camera. The screen distorts, and the footage jumps to the next morning, where Jay and Tim wake up in a decrepit shack in Rosswood.
Totheark uploads 'Isolation', where The Hooded Man tells Jay and Tim to 'meet again soon'. Jay and Tim do indeed meet up in the next entry, and discuss everything. They form an alliance under the condition that they'll work together to deal with Alex, so long as they find Jessica afterward.
Tim and Jay head back to Rosswood Park, with Tim wearing the chest-mounted camera. Tim confirms to Jay that he does not remember anything while in his masked state. After being unable to find the shack they had woken up in, they decide to investigate the tunnel from Season 2, where Alex killed a man. While in the tunnel, Alex calls Jay and tells him to leave. Tim falls to the ground in a coughing fit, and The Operator attacks them. Jay is unable to drag Tim away, and leaves him behind. When Jay makes it back to the parking lot, Tim is somehow already in his car, and he drives away without speaking to Jay.
The next Entry is from Tim's chest-camera footage. After Jay leaves Tim, Tim is teleported to multiple places, including a seemingly endless body of water where he isn't able to come up and breathe, a forest, hanging upside down from trees, a concrete world where he finds the body of the man whom Alex killed. After Tim somehow manages to escape, he is teleported into his car and, seemingly in a dazed state, drives to the annex. While there, Tim suffers schizophrenic and psychological breakdowns. In an attempt to stop his breakdowns, Tim overdoses on his medication. He passes out after finding the message on the wall from The Hooded Man calling him a liar.
Tim calls Jay, and the two meet up. Tim gives Jay the chest-camera, and asks him if they can go to the annex one last time, to discuss things. While there, Tim reveals that he was formerly committed to the mental hospital when he was a kid due to hallucinations that he fears were caused by The Operator. He also fears that he's the reason why The Operator sickness and attacks spread to everyone on the set of Marble Hornets.
Jay and Tim search the annex for any remaining information before they leave the hospital for good. While searching, they encounter The Hooded Man, but he doesn't see them. Tim and Jay trail him, and in the process find a tape he left in the building. The tape shows the aftermath of Tim passing out in the annex due to the pills. The Hooded Man dragged Tim out of the building and began trailing Alex, who showed up at the annex. The Hooded Man knocked Alex out with a pipe and tied him to a chair. Tim, who had since woken up, and was presumably in his masked state, beat Alex to the point of near unconsciousness. The Hooded Man searches Alex's pockets and finds his gun, but The Operator appears before The Hooded Man is able to shoot Alex.
A few days later, Jay and Tim leave to drive to the old filming locations for Marble Hornets to see if they can find any clues left there. While at the red tower from Season 1, Jay claims to see someone watching them, although Tim does not see anyone and no one is captured on camera. While leaving, they find burned tapes left in a sink hole. Later, Jay is able to get two of the tapes to work. The first tape reveals that Alex had been planning to transfer to the school that Amy was attending. It also shows him encountering and trying to tackle The Operator, much in the same way Jay did in Season 2. The second tape shows that after giving Jay the Marble Hornets tapes in 2006, Alex had tried to attack him. Jay does not remember being attacked and begins to doubt his memory.
Jay and Tim go to Alex's old house, where Jay had been attacked. Jay thinks he sees the Operator outside a window, but again Tim doesn't see anything and nothing appears on camera. Tim tells Jay they should get him evaluated, but Jay refuses, telling Tim he's fine. While investigating the basement, the two realize it's now dark outside, and The Operator appears and attacks them. They make it outside, but the two are separated. When Tim makes it back to Jay, who is having a seizure near the house, The Operator attacks Tim, but he stands up to him. The Operator disappears, and Jay and Tim make it back to the car, with Jay seemingly in a permanent dazed state.
The Hooded Man uploads footage showing him running out of the stolen pills. He breaks into Tim's house to take some spare pills from his bathroom. He also finds a tape in Tim's living room, but before he can take it the attic door opens and Alex begins coming down the steps. The Hooded Man escapes the house without being caught.
Back at the hotel, Tim and Jay have a discussion about what Jay doesn't remember. Tim assumes that The Operator backed away because of Tim's medication, which he says he's been giving to Jay. Jay is angry about this and tells Tim he doesn't want any more of his medication. The two decide to return to Tim's house, as Tim is running low on pills and he doesn't want Alex in his house.
When they return to Tim's house, Alex is gone. They find a sleeping bag and a photo of Amy in the attic. Some writing on the back of the photo implies that The Hooded Man had kidnapped Alex and brought him elsewhere. Tim finds the tape from The Hooded Man's video, and hides it from Jay, but Jay realizes what Tim is doing and takes the tape. Tim tells him that he shouldn't watch the tape yet, but Jay leaves and watches it anyway.
The tape shows that Tim (in his masked state) and The Hooded Man were behind Jessica's disappearance in Season 2. They brought Jessica from the hotel into the woods, and Tim went back to the hotel to get Jay. Jessica and The Hooded Man encountered Alex, who shot at but didn't hit The Hooded Man. Alex pretended to be an ally and led Jessica to the tunnel, where he then attempted to shoot her. She stole the gun from him, and the Hooded Man returned to beat up Alex. Jessica ran into the woods to hide and was attacked by The Operator.
Jay returns to Tim's house with a knife and zip ties. Tim gets the jump on him and ties Jay up with his zip-ties, and takes Jay's knife and camera. Tim says that he's going to the address on the back of the Amy photo, a college campus, without Jay. While gone, The Hooded Man enters Tim's home and gives Jay a camera and a knife to free himself.
Both Jay and Tim go to the college campus separately. Jay runs into The Hooded Man but loses him. He follows Tim into a basement, where he finds hostage photos of Alex, and a note saying that Alex has been moved to one of the buildings, Benedict Hall. Jay is unable to get into the building, with all the entrances locked, so he settles in a neighboring building to keep a watch on Benedict Hall. The next morning, Jay sees Tim run out of Benedict Hall. He goes into the building to explore, but is found and shot by Alex, fatally wounding him. Jay escapes to a random room, where he is taken by The Operator. Tim finds Jay's camera and discovers what has happened.
Tim, now on his own, finds Jay's car and takes his laptop. He finds a video file on the laptop that shows Jay the day after getting the Jessica tape, exploring Rosswood Park to retrace Alex and Jessica's steps. Jay calls Tim and leaves a voicemail telling him he is sorry, and that he wants to work together again, before being attacked by The Operator. Tim notes that he never received the voicemail, and that the Operator attack must have changed Jay from an apologetic to violent state.
While at the college, Tim runs into The Hooded Man, who taunts him with pills and his mask, before both of them are attacked by The Operator. The two are teleported to multiple places, all while Tim chases the Hooded Man. Tim is teleported to his house, where he sees Jay's dead body surrounded by papers covered with the operator symbol and text saying "your fault". Tim and The Hooded Man are teleported back to the college as the chase continues. In the end, The Hooded Man dies after falling from a window seal.
Tim gets a tape and a bottle of pills from The Hooded Man's pockets, but the Operator shows up before Tim can unmask him. The tape shows Alex's auditions for Marble Hornets. Brian arrives with Tim, and they try out for the movie. The hoodie that Brian wears is the same one that The Hooded Man wore, confirming to Tim that Brian had been The Hooded Man.
Tim, realizing all of the deaths are in some way Alex's fault, attempts to lure him to his home. When Alex arrives, he pours accelerant throughout the house, verbally berating a hidden Tim all the while. Alex tells Tim "if you want to settle this, come find me," before setting fire to the house, forcing Tim to flee.
Tim returns to Benedict Hall to confront Alex. The two are teleported multiple places as Alex reveals that he wants to kill anyone who has ever come into contact with The Operator, as he believes this will prevent the spread of The Operator's influence. He also reveals that he has already killed Amy, Sarah, and Seth in addition to Jay, that he knows that Brian is dead, and he believes that Jessica is also dead. This makes Tim Alex's last remaining target, after which he intends to kill himself. In the ensuing struggle, Tim manages to kill Alex by stabbing him multiple times. Before dying, Alex tells Tim that if he knows of any others who have come into contact with the Operator, then he should kill them and then kill himself as Alex had intended to do.
A few days later, Tim disposes of his mask and reunites with Jessica, who survived the Operator attack, unbeknownst to Alex. Tim had kept her hidden to protect her from any further danger. Jessica mentions that she is also on medication, and asks about Jay. Tim tells her that Jay has moved away, and that he will also be moving away from the area. Tim lapses into a coughing fit as the camera distorts and then cuts to black. When the footage resumes, Tim is alone, driving away. He stops at an intersection, able to turn either left or right, while sirens can be heard in the distance. The footage cuts to a text card that simply states: "Everything is fine".
Characters
- Jay Merrick (Troy Wagner): The man behind the "Marble Hornets" channel and the primary protagonist of the series. After rediscovering tapes given to him by former friend Alex Kralie, Jay begins uploading entries in an attempt to discover exactly what happened during the filming of Alex's student film Marble Hornets.[14] He is shot and mortally wounded by Alex in Entry #80.[15] His body is used to taunt Tim by The Operator before finally having his body removed from this dimension.[16]
- Timothy Wright / The Masked Man (Tim Sutton): A former actor from the Marble Hornets student film, he is the primary protagonist of season 3 of the series and one of the members of Totheark (up until season 3). He collaborates with Jay starting in Entry #59[17] and then becomes leader of the "Marble Hornets" channel following Jay's death in Entry #80[15] until the series' conclusion in Entry #87.[18] He makes several appearances in the Entries and on the Totheark channel wearing a mask and he is unveiled as the masked man in Entry #35.[19] The Masked Man makes his first appearance in Brian's house during Jay's investigations in Entry #18.[20] It is suggested that Tim is under the influence of The Operator during the times he wears his mask, as backed up in his monologue to Jay in Entry #59.[17] It is also suggested that Tim is the cause for The Operators appearance in everyone's lives,[21] due to his history with Operator induced hallucinations and memory loss in his youth.[22] Tim is one of the two remaining alive characters, other than Jessica based on Entry #87, the last entry uploaded.[18]
- Alex Kralie (Joseph DeLage): The director of the original Marble Hornets student film project and one of the series' primary antagonists. Alex used to attend the same school as Jay, but transferred to a different one following the wrap on filming of Marble Hornets. A large portion of Season 1 consists of tapes he filmed for personal use and for his uncompleted student film Marble Hornets. In Entry 86 he reveals that he killed Sarah Reid, Seth Wilson and Amy Walters.[23] He is stabbed and killed by Tim in Entry #86.[23]
- Brian Thomas / The Hooded Man (Brian Haight): Brian was the lead actor in Alex Kralie's project and serves as the series' second antagonist. He appears throughout most of the Entries and on the Totheark channel as a hooded figure who works against Alex. He falls to his death during a confrontation with Tim in Entry #83.[16]
- Seth Wilson (Seth McCay): The cameraman for Alex's film, Marble Hornets. He makes sporadic appearances throughout the series and is hinted to be the founder of Totheark. Alex leads him to The Operator at the abandoned building in Entry #22,[24] and Alex states in Entry #86 that he killed him.[23]
- Sarah Reid (Mary Kathleen Bishop): An actress from Marble Hornets. She appears in front of the camera only once in Entry #9.[25] Alex confirms that he has killed her in Entry #86.[23]
- Amy Walters (Bethann Williams): Alex's girlfriend. She appears in front of the camera only once in Entry #26, after Jay receives a package with a video tape of her and Alex being attacked by The Operator.[26] In season 2, Alex lies to Jay that his motivation is to find out what happened to Amy so Jay will continue collaborating with him. Alex confirms that he has killed her in Entry #86.[23]
- Jessica Locke (Jessica May): A woman who Jay meets in the second season of the series. She is somehow connected to Jay as she has an adjoining room with him in the hotel, and consequently is somehow connected to Alex and The Operator. It is later revealed that she is the friend and roommate of Amy. Alex believes her to be dead prior to his own death in Entry #86,[23] but she is revealed to still be alive in Entry #87.[18] Jessica is the main character of the Marble Hornets comic sequel, where she works as a delivery driver in Rosswood Park while still haunted by her experiences with the Operator. She is one of only two characters (the other being Tim) that are confirmed to have survived the events of the series.
- Totheark: An anonymous group who makes cryptic video responses to the Entries throughout the series. While seemingly antagonistic, their goal is to take revenge on Alex, as they believe him to be the source of The Operator, and use Jay (and later Tim) to get closer to finding Alex. Their identities are never revealed throughout the series and it is heavily suggested that the channel is owned by a group of people (particularly in season 3), as opposed to an individual. It is confirmed that Brian is a member of the group, along with Tim (up until season 3).
- The Operator: An entity of unknown origin who begins appearing to Alex during the shooting of Marble Hornets, and one of the series' primary antagonists. When Jay personally investigates Alex's disappearance, he starts to encounter The Operator as well. It is later revealed that Tim was the first person associated with Marble Hornets to have come into contact with The Operator, and thus the Operator's contact with other characters may have occurred via him. The Operator displays the ability to teleport or otherwise move in a logically inconsistent manner, to move people in a similar way, and inflict permanent amnesiac states in people. While the Operator rarely physically threatens the cast at any point, its presence is shown to have a harmful effect on the human body and psyche, causing the various hallucinations and fugue states of the characters. Repeated exposure to the Operator is associated with a hard, painful coughing sickness. There is no indication as to the intent or goals of the Operator.
Episodes
| Season | Episodes | Originally broadcast | Total Length | Ave. YouTube views | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First aired | Last aired | ||||
| 1 | 44 | 20 June 2009 | 18 April 2010 | 1 hour, 30 min. | 1,510,000 |
| 2 | 37 | 23 November 2010 | 13 November 2011 | 2 hours, 22 min. | 630,000 |
| 3 | 52 | 10 March 2012 | 20 June 2014 | 5 hours, 30 min. | 340,000 |
Season 1 (2009–10)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Duration | Original release date | YouTube views | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | "Introduction" | 2:00 | 20 June 2009 | 5,208,000 | |
| Shots out the window of a car are shown as someone drives. Text overlaid on the footage explains that in 2006, the channel creator's college friend, Alex Kralie was filming a student film titled Marble Hornets. The cast and crew complained about his increasing stress and irritability. Alex eventually stopped production and left the film unfinished. Jay convinced Alex to give him the film's raw footage, as Alex wanted to burn the tapes. Alex moved away and Jay forgot about the tapes. Jay has now remembered them and decided to upload them online, to keep a record of anything interesting he finds on the tapes, which are unnumbered and missing timestamps. | ||||||
| 2 | 2 | "Entry #1" | 0:48 | 20 June 2009 | 7,199,000 | |
| After going through several normal tapes, Jay finds a tape that is missing its audio and was not filmed on the set of Marble Hornets. The tape, which has visual tearing, shows Alex filming in his house. He sees The Operator through a window, and the figure notices him before Alex turns and runs away. | ||||||
| 3 | 3 | "Entry #2" | 1:36 | 21 June 2009 | 4,064,000 | |
| Another unusual tape shows Alex driving on a desolate road in the middle of the night. He explains that he was walking his dog near the set of Marble Hornets when he noticed a really tall man standing in the middle of the road, not moving. The dog became very upset so Alex took him home, but decided to drive back to where he saw the man to investigate. When he arrives he cannot find anything. Jay notes that the man Alex described sounds similar to the one that appeared in Entry #1. | ||||||
| 4 | 4 | "Entry #3" | 2:29 | 23 June 2009 | 3,369,000 | |
| Jay explains that the majority of the tapes have nothing to do with Marble Hornets, and presents clips from a dozen different tapes showing Alex going about his life. Some visual tearing is present. Jay notes that while none of these tapes have anything substantial on them, it is clear that Alex wanted to film himself at all times. | ||||||
| 5 | 5 | "Entry #4" | 0:46 | 25 June 2009 | 3,082,000 | |
| Jay finds another tape with its audio removed, showing Alex roaming around an empty playground at night. A swing-set and other equipment moves on its own, and The Operator is seen briefly. Jay notes that he now suspects that the missing audio from both this and Entry #1 may have been removed by Alex. | ||||||
| 6 | 6 | "Entry #5" | 3:35 | 29 June 2009 | 2,736,000 | |
| Alex and Jay are location scouting in the woods before the filming of Marble Hornets began. Audio distortion and visual tearing occur throughout. During the latter part of the video, Jay notices a red tower near the edge of a field. In the present, Jay notes the visual tearing is similar to previous entries, and that he may have missed some in his initial viewings. | ||||||
| 7 | 7 | "Entry #6" | 0:44 | 4 July 2009 | 2,950,000 | |
| Jay comes across a clip which he believes might be a continuation of Entry #1. In it, Alex runs around inside his house and peers outside through his front windows. He sees The Operator and flees further into the house. The Operator is seen looking into the house through the front door. | ||||||
| 8 | 8 | "Entry #7" | 2:01 | 7 July 2009 | 2,596,000 | |
| Alex and Brian, Alex's friend and lead actor of Marble Hornets, are sitting in Alex's car, rehearsing some of Brian's lines for the film. Upon completing their rehearsal, Brian leans back in his seat and Alex sees The Operator standing in the distance through the car window. Brian, unaware of The Operator's presence, asks if they are going to continue the rehearsal but a frightened Alex tells him they are done, turns the car on, and drives off. Jay comments that someone was following Alex. | ||||||
| 9 | 9 | "Entry #8" | 0:37 | 12 July 2009 | 2,086,000 | |
| Jay notes that he doesn't see any visual tearing on this tape but that the audio seems to cut out towards the end. In the video, Alex sits at a table in his house drawing The Operator and phrases such as "Sees Me", "Finds Me", "Speaks to Me", and "Help". The audio cuts out, and Alex, seemingly alarmed, grabs the camera and walks over to a lamp. Jay explains that the rest of the tape is too dark to see and the audio never returns. | ||||||
| 10 | 10 | "Entry #9" | 3:36 | 19 July 2009 | 2,056,000 | |
| A tape shows Alex filming a scene for Marble Hornets with two of his actors, Tim and Sarah, and his cameraman, Seth. Alex becomes irritated by Tim and Sarah's acting and that Seth briefly turned off the camera, as Alex wanted the camera on at all times. After berating his cast and crew, they return to filming. Jay suspects that Alex's attitude shift was caused by whatever was following him. | ||||||
| 11 | 11 | "Regards" | 0:11 | 22 July 2009 | 713,000 | |
| The first Totheark video, with a message that reads "LOOK CLOSELY.". | ||||||
| 12 | 12 | "Entry #10" | 1:32 | 28 July 2009 | 2,129,000 | |
| Alex runs through the woods, while being chased by his mysterious stalker. | ||||||
| 13 | 13 | "Operator" | 0:22 | 31 July 2009 | 616,000 | |
| Totheark video with a message that reads "Lakes In Stillnesss will Take Every life of the Night." The capital letters spell out "LISTEN." | ||||||
| 14 | 14 | "Entry #11" | 1:58 | 9 August 2009 | 2,050,000 | |
| Jay finds another clip of The Operator and Alex. Alex is lying in bed. Visible on his wall are numerous black scribbles and drawings. Alex gets up, grabs the camera, and runs to the window downstairs before returning to bed. Once he is in bed, a shadow is seen moving across the drawings on the wall. | ||||||
| 15 | 15 | "Deluge" | 0:16 | 11 August 2009 | 518,000 | |
| Totheark video which contains the words "Watching You" and a reversed, slowed down voice calling out for Alex. | ||||||
| 16 | 16 | "Entry #12" | 1:00 | 29 August 2009 | 1,887,000 | |
| Another scene for Marble Hornets is filmed, but with some visual and audio distortion, and later an appearance by Alex's stalker. | ||||||
| 17 | 17 | "Impurity" | 0:34 | 1 September 2009 | 519,000 | |
| Totheark video with a thunderstorm and a message that reads: "THERE WAS MORE." | ||||||
| 18 | 18 | "Entry #13" | 1:29 | 10 September 2009 | 1,839,000 | |
| Alex and Jay are in the woods shooting for Marble Hornets. While Jay goes back to Alex's car for more tapes, Alex goes exploring, and finds a strange symbol and his stalker. | ||||||
| 19 | 19 | "Exit" | 1:07 | 15 September 2009 | 535,000 | |
| A Totheark video shows Jay walking to his car (referenced in Entry #13), and a hidden message that asks "WHERE IS THE ARK". | ||||||
| 20 | 20 | "Entry #14" | 1:59 | 23 September 2009 | 2,131,000 | |
| The Operator enters Alex's room, but seems to disappear when the lights turn on. Alex then appears with blood trickling down his face. Jay decides it's time to find Alex. | ||||||
| 21 | 21 | "Program" | 0:18 | 26 September 2009 | 438,000 | |
| A Totheark video with a shot of a house with rain and the words "BLEED MORE". A decoded message reveals that Alex hid what truly happened in Entry #14. | ||||||
| 22 | 22 | "Entry #15 – Interview with Tim" | 5:01 | 3 October 2009 | 1,572,000 | |
| Jay tracks down Tim, a former cast member from Marble Hornets, and interviews him about the events that occurred during the production three years prior, including Alex's behavior and indirectly about The Operator's presence on set, under the pretense of starting the film up again. Jay learns about another cast member, Brian, who was friends with Alex. | ||||||
| 23 | 23 | "Advocate" | 0:22 | 12 October 2009 | 438,000 | |
| Distorted footage of Brian is used, while "TICK TOCK" appears on the screen and a countdown in binary is shown. | ||||||
| 24 | 24 | "Entry #16" | 7:57 | 16 October 2009 | 1,689,000 | |
| Jay receives an anonymous tip about where Brian can be located and finds the house that he was last known to be at. He enters through the back door and finds signs of a struggle as well as dried blood in a sink, a bottle of pills, a bullet casing, and some of Alex's drawings before leaving. | ||||||
| 25 | 25 | "Addition" | 0:16 | 21 October 2009 | 444,000 | |
| Totheark video reveals that the person behind this account was in the house with Jay in the previous entry. And the audio is a slowed down version of Jay when he was in the house calling out for Alex and Brian. | ||||||
| 26 | 26 | "Entry #17" | 1:51 | 2 November 2009 | 1,480,000 | |
| Jay uncovers footage from the filming of Marble Hornets, including The Operator watching the cast rehearsing for a scene from some trees in the distance. As they go to usher him off camera the tape ends. Jay once again doesn't remember any of these events ever happening. | ||||||
| 27 | 27 | "Signal" | 0:31 | 4 November 2009 | 454,000 | |
| Totheark video that features a man's voice and imagery from the 1966 short film Silent Snow, Secret Snow and the words "come back" and "find me" in text at the end of the video. | ||||||
| 28 | 28 | "Entry #18" | 3:37 | 10 November 2009 | 1,899,000 | |
| Jay returns to the house at night. This time, the house seems to be more of a mess than before, as there are shreds of unknown items on the floor, and the couch is overturned. The closet is seen to have been inhabited recently. When Jay continues to explore, he finds a doll with unusually long arms and legs. He turns around and there is a person sitting on the couch, now right side up, watching him. Jay calls out to see if it’s Alex, and the person sprints directly towards him. The person is wearing a mask. He attacks Jay and audio distortion occurs, before falling to the ground in a seizure. Jay walks over to him to try to take off the mask and the man shouts "No" and tries to grab Jay again. Jay starts running out of the house, before collapsing again onto the floor in a violent coughing fit. He later escapes, but wakes up the next day with no memory of the events after and the same audio distortion at the end of the video. | ||||||
| 29 | 29 | "Messages" | 0:26 | 21 November 2009 | 496,000 | |
| Totheark video with Pearl Harbor footage, an ominous warning, and a photo of Tim. | ||||||
| 30 | 30 | "Entry #19" | 2:23 | 25 November 2009 | 1,840,000 | |
| Jay reveals that he has been filming himself like Alex, and finds out that the masked figure from the previous entry knows where he lives and has been entering his apartment whilst he has been sleeping. | ||||||
| 31 | 31 | "Return" | 0:11 | 2 December 2009 | 627,000 | |
| A shot of Jay, The Operator and the words "FOUND YOU" and "forever" appear in the next Totheark video. | ||||||
| 32 | 32 | "Entry #19.5" | 3:10 | 9 December 2009 | 1,303,000 | |
| Jay runs through the items he found in the sixteenth entry, revealing that some items, the bullet casing and pills, are missing. He examines the drawings and finds "Sees Me" written on the front and "At the tower" written on the back. Unsure of what this means he decides to continue looking through the rest of Alex's tapes. He expresses that if something doesn't come out of them the trail might have gone cold. | ||||||
| 33 | 33 | "Entry #20" | 3:18 | 15 December 2009 | 1,388,000 | |
| The last of Alex's tapes begins with an unknown cameraman filming Alex and Jay discussing Marble Hornets at Brian's house. Tim shows up looking visibly ill and then has a coughing fit before taking some medication that seems to stop it. Once again Jay explains that he doesn't remember any of this happening but notes that the bottle of pills Tim had looked similar to the ones he found at Brian's house in Entry #16. He concludes that "At the tower" is referring to the red tower from Entry #5 and decides to go there soon. | ||||||
| 34 | 34 | "Version" | 0:10 | 16 December 2009 | 372,000 | |
| An inverted image of the red tower, with Morse code spelling "Operator", some fast-moving words that translates to "Precedes Trees", which is an anagram for "Deeper Secrets" and the sentence: "Waiting for you", ending with a shot of a tiny, red "X". | ||||||
| 35 | 35 | "Entry #21" | 5:24 | 21 December 2009 | 1,327,000 | |
| Jay goes to the red tower and finds a tape. | ||||||
| 36 | 36 | "Entry #22" | 6:46 | 22 December 2009 | 1,450,000 | |
| The tape found by Jay in the previous entry is shown. The footage shows Alex and Marble Hornets cameraman Seth come into contact with The Operator, before cutting to Alex speaking to the camera and revealing that everyone else connected with Marble Hornets is now gone. | ||||||
| 37 | 37 | "Attention" | 0:14 | 10 January 2010 | 433,000 | |
| A Totheark video with old footage and the words "Return to us. Wake up." Then a series of jumbled up words, that when arranged form the sentence "Awaiting your arrival". | ||||||
| 38 | 38 | "Admission" | 0:43 | 15 January 2010 | 398,000 | |
| Someone is inside a house, and the sentence "there are doors unopened" appears in this Totheark video. | ||||||
| 39 | 39 | "Entry #23" | 7:54 | 28 January 2010 | 1,335,000 | |
| Jay returns to Brian's house during the daytime and finds it in even more disarray than the previous two times he was there. He finds the same doll from his last visit pointing into the bathroom. The dried blood in the sink is now gone and Masky appears. Jay chases him but keeps teleporting to different rooms while day instantly turns to night. After finding Masky's mask hanging from a door he is transported from the house to the basement where Seth was in Entry #22 and encounters The Operator himself. Jay explains that he woke up at home the following day with no memory of that night and that his camera no longer works. He resigns to never go back to Brian's house and that he doesn't want to know the answers anymore. | ||||||
| 40 | 40 | "Warning" | 0:43 | 3 February 2010 | 519,000 | |
| The final Totheark video of Season One has quotes from the previous videos repeated along with footage of the Masked Man. | ||||||
| 41 | 41 | "Entry #24" | 2:54 | 16 February 2010 | 1,140,000 | |
| Jay continues to film himself the same way that Alex had during his initial encounters with The Operator and has set up surveillance cameras around his house. During the night they catch him somehow leaving his house without his knowledge, despite the exits being blocked, and then returning as if he had never left. | ||||||
| 42 | 42 | "Entry ######" | 0:27 | 5 March 2010 | 1,223,000 | |
| The "Marble Hornets" channel is hacked by totheark. They tell Jay that they will wait no more and that control is being taken away from him. In the beginning it was a game for them but not anymore. They are coming for him. | ||||||
| 43 | 43 | "Entry #25" | 1:54 | 24 March 2010 | 1,156,000 | |
| Following totheark's previous video telling Jay that they are coming for him, he flees from his apartment and decides to stay at a hotel until he feels it is safe to return home. However, he explains that the previous day he received a phone call from someone he knows telling him to watch the news which he recorded on his camera. The news story shows that a fire has destroyed a building and Jay explains that it was his apartment that was burned down. | ||||||
| 44 | 44 | "Entry #26" | 5:17 | 18 April 2010 | 1,735,000 | |
| In the season finale, Jay explains that since distancing himself from his investigation into what happened on the set of Marble Hornets in 2006 and the fates of its missing cast members his health has started improving. He decides to quit and move far out of state. Shortly after he gets a text message that reads "41810" from an unknown number. It turns out to be the date he is uploading this entry and as he was leaving his current hotel he found a box with a single tape inside with a label that says "Watch This" on the case. The tape begins with some distortions before showing Amy, Alex's girlfriend, filming with his camera she found in their closet. Alex is not happy and insists she stop recording and put the camera away. As she turns she sees The Operator and runs upstairs with Alex following. The Operator follows them while Alex tells Amy to escape out of a window. The tape freezes and a plea for "Help" is written among some distortion. Jay explains that the video was dated two weeks prior and that the package had a return address on it. He concludes that Alex is alive and sets off to find him. He explains to the viewers he doesn't know when they'll see him again but thanks them for their help. | ||||||
Season 2 (2010–11)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Duration | Total Length | Original release date | YouTube viewers (millions) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 45 | 1 | "Entry #27" | 6:14 | 6:14 | 23 November 2010 | 1.01 | |
| In the second season premiere, Jay wakes up in a hotel room seven months after the last entry, with no memory of those months. He decides that he's going to lay low, and discover what has happened in the intervening time. | |||||||
| 46 | 2 | "Entry #28" | 4:52 | 11:06 | 3 December 2010 | 0.88 | |
| Jay searches his hotel room for clues, and meets a girl named Jessica in the adjoining room who may be connected to Jay's current situation. | |||||||
| 47 | 3 | "Entry #29" | 1:07 | 12:13 | 16 December 2010 | 0.90 | |
| Jay finds a video hidden on his hard drive entitled "noentry" and discovers that it shows a tunnel with blood on the ground and The Operator. | |||||||
| 48 | 4 | "Entry #30" | 3:29 | 15:42 | 21 December 2010 | 0.84 | |
| Jay meets Jessica again, and notices some weird camera activity when she's around. That night, he hears weird noises coming from her room, but when he confronts her she denies the existence of the noise. | |||||||
| 49 | 5 | "Entry #31" | 7:34 | 23:16 | 4 January 2011 | 0.82 | |
| Jay goes looking for the place shown in Entry #29, but is concerned when a stranger appears to be following him. Later, he talks to Jessica again, where she reveals she may have been affected by The Operator. | |||||||
| 50 | 6 | "Entry #32" | 3:02 | 26:18 | 12 January 2011 | 0.80 | |
| Jay gets confronted by Jessica, who is also having memory loss. The two decide to meet in her room to discuss the issue, while Jay uploads the entry in case something happens. | |||||||
| 51 | 7 | "Entry #33" | 2:46 | 29:04 | 18 January 2011 | 0.86 | |
| Jay goes back to Jessica's room, but finds that she is missing. He also finds the combination to the safe in his room. After recovering the contents of the safe, the masked figure appears and attacks him. Jay says at the end he'll be going to a new location where he'll be going through the tapes. He says that he won't be going back to the hotel alone. | |||||||
| 52 | 8 | "Entry #34" | 4:32 | 33:36 | 8 February 2011 | 0.80 | |
| Jay begins going through the tapes, starting with one from April 21st, which shows him going to the return address of the package he was sent. | |||||||
| 53 | 9 | "Fragments" | 0:18 | 33:54 | 10 February 2011 | 0.26 | |
| Totheark returns with a video of torn-up pictures of Alex, and the words "you are broken" and "you cannot be fixed". | |||||||
| 54 | 10 | "Entry #35" | 2:14 | 36:08 | 15 February 2011 | 0.88 | |
| Jay goes back to the building with Alex, revealing that the two may have been working in collaboration with one another recently, and the two are attacked by the masked figure, who is revealed to be Tim. Alex breaks Tim's leg using a rock before Jay and him leave. | |||||||
| 55 | 11 | "Broadcast" | 0:15 | 36:23 | 26 February 2011 | 0.26 | |
| Totheark video which has a person looking down into a body of water with a jumbled up voice in the background saying "Enjoying watching you suffer. Do you know me? I will always know you." | |||||||
| 56 | 12 | "Entry #36" | 2:15 | 38:38 | 2 March 2011 | 0.79 | |
| Jay finds corrupted footage at the end of the tape from the last entry, and discovers that Alex was the one who sent the package to him. | |||||||
| 57 | 13 | "Sidetone" | 0:18 | 38:56 | 15 March 2011 | 0.24 | |
| A Totheark video which opens with a shot of a phone focused on the Operator button, followed by a quick shot of the word "Ring" backwards, followed by Alex's voice mail and a coded message which decodes into "LIES". | |||||||
| 58 | 14 | "enttry #37" | 1:08 | 40:04 | 23 March 2011 | 0.87 | |
| The channel is hacked again, and we see birthday footage of Alex as a child, with some strange things added into the tape. | |||||||
| 59 | 15 | "Entry #38" | 3:29 | 43:33 | 4 April 2011 | 0.78 | |
| Jay finds an unlabeled tape that has him and Alex walking through the woods, while Alex tells him a story about those woods. Jay is uneasy about how Alex acts. | |||||||
| 60 | 16 | "Entry #39" | 3:03 | 46:36 | 12 April 2011 | 0.74 | |
| Jay gets a call from Alex about a week after the last time they met, and Alex says to meet him at Rosswood Park. Later that night, outside Jay's car, a hooded figure is seen looking in at him while he sleeps. | |||||||
| 61 | 17 | "Forecast" | 0:41 | 47:17 | 21 April 2011 | 0.24 | |
| A Totheark video that starts with old distorted footage of dog's lungs being pumped in a lab, with numbers spelling out in alphanumeric order, "AM I A PROPHET", which can be anagramized to "APPEAR TO HIM" followed by a quick shot of a face with Operator Symbols for eyes, and the words "Here is something I have wanted to show you" and then the video shows that Totheark was the one outside Jay's car, and that something sinister is going on. | |||||||
| 62 | 18 | "Entry #40" | 5:22 | 52:39 | 3 May 2011 | 0.97 | |
| The day after Jay gets the call, he goes to Rosswood Park and can't find Alex. As he walks around, he encounters The Operator. | |||||||
| 63 | 19 | "Intermission" | 0:32 | 53:11 | 16 May 2011 | 0.25 | |
| A Totheark video that shows images implying that he was in the forest with Jay, and the message, "Did you see me? I saw you." | |||||||
| 64 | 20 | "Entry #41" | 3:23 | 56:34 | 25 May 2011 | 0.78 | |
| After 15 minutes of silence on the tape from Entry #40, the camera is picked up and taken back to Jay's car, where it's revealed that the hooded figure was the one who brought it back. | |||||||
| 65 | 21 | "Indicator" | 0:26 | 57:00 | 2 June 2011 | 0.35 | |
| A Totheark video which is shown in complete black and white with a child's doll and messages such as "MESSAGES EVERYWHERE, SIGNS EVERYWHERE, YOU WILL NEVER BE FREE". The telephone button for the number 0 (Operator) is in one of the eyes of the doll. | |||||||
| 66 | 22 | "Entry #42" | 5:31 | 1:02:31 | 9 June 2011 | 0.72 | |
| Alex makes it to the park and finds Jay hysterical, after coming into contact with The Operator. Jay later finds his camera in his car, with no idea of how it got there. | |||||||
| 67 | 23 | "Memories" | 0:23 | 1:02:54 | 20 June 2011 | 0.22 | |
| Totheark video which includes the ominous message: "Years wasted. You've done nothing. So much more than time has been taken". | |||||||
| 68 | 24 | "Entry #43" | 7:04 | 1:09:58 | 27 June 2011 | 0.81 | |
| Alex and Jay go back to Amy's house to look for Amy, but find nothing. Later, Alex goes to the woods alone and meets The Operator. | |||||||
| 69 | 25 | "Inquiry" | 1:01 | 1:10:59 | 7 July 2011 | 0.29 | |
| Another Totheark video about remembering who a person is. With an image of a brain and an arrow pointing at the area of the brain that controls memory, with Totheark asking, "Look at you. You are who you are. You are you. But who are you? Who are you? Who are you?" A hidden message is then shown, that when deciphered reads "Do I help or do I kill?" | |||||||
| 70 | 26 | "Entry #44" | 4:09 | 1:15:07 | 15 July 2011 | 0.73 | |
| Alex is alone at home when he starts coughing, drawing pictures involving The Operator symbol, and then seeing The Operator himself. | |||||||
| 71 | 27 | "Entry #45" | 3:12 | 1:18:19 | 23 July 2011 | 0.71 | |
| Alex is at home, when he suddenly chases after the hooded figure outside. Tim (as the masked figure) appears and overcomes him, revealing that he and the hooded figure appear to be acting together. | |||||||
| 72 | 28 | "Entry #46" | 3:47 | 1:22:06 | 2 August 2011 | 0.80 | |
| Jay follows Alex to his house and sneaks inside, finding a tape before Alex catches him and retrieves it. The Operator appears, and Jay escapes, taking Alex's spare house key with him. | |||||||
| 73 | 29 | "Classified" | 0:18 | 1:22:24 | 15 August 2011 | 0.25 | |
| Totheark video which asks the question: "Do you know what he did? I saw it". It also has a series of numbers, that when translated reads "The Twins", referring to the Hooded Figure and the Masked Man, implying that this video came from a different person. | |||||||
| 74 | 30 | "Entry #47" | 7:40 | 1:30:04 | 18 August 2011 | 0.63 | |
| Alex confronts Jay about the break-in, which leads to Jay and Alex dissolving their partnership, but not before Jay gets Jessica's phone number. He calls Jessica, who tells him that Alex has informed her that he had previously found Amy. | |||||||
| 75 | 31 | "Entry #48" | 6:42 | 1:36:46 | 31 August 2011 | 0.60 | |
| Jay starts following Alex, and eventually discovers that he's been going into the woods, and to the same tunnel from Entry #29. He decides to look at Alex's footage to get a clearer idea of what's going on. | |||||||
| 76 | 32 | "Sidenote" | 0:28 | 1:37:14 | 1 September 2011 | 0.19 | |
| Totheark video that has a description that reads "Remain seated I will find you". We see the hooded figure's silhouette with Alex's face saying "You've done nothing, but make everything worse", with Totheark then possibly telling whoever they are working with and not to the viewer to "be silent", and that "this is the best part". | |||||||
| 77 | 33 | "Entry #49" | 6:37 | 1:43:51 | 6 September 2011 | 0.65 | |
| Alex goes to the tunnel as shown in Entry #48. A man in the white shirt follows him and when he confronts Alex, Alex kills him. The Operator then takes the victim's body. Alex tells Jay to meet him at Rosswood Park. | |||||||
| 78 | 34 | "Extraction" | 0:30 | 1:44:21 | 27 September 2011 | 0.22 | |
| Totheark video connecting Tim with his alter-ego the masked figure. This video shows Tim with his mask on limping towards the camera, a reference to when Alex broke his leg in Entry #35 and an indication that Tim's injury is healing. Toward the end of the video showing the words "How much do you hate? It is not enough." | |||||||
| 79 | 35 | "Entry #50" | 14:07 | 1:58:28 | 30 September 2011 | 0.65 | |
| Jay and Alex go to Rosswood Park, but end up finding nothing. Jay sees the masked figure. He gives chase but the Masked Man gets away. The next day, Jay sneaks into Alex's apartment again using the key he took on his previous visit, and steals the tape that Alex recovered during Jay's previous break-in. | |||||||
| 80 | 36 | "Entry #51" | 8:55 | 2:07:23 | 12 October 2011 | 0.66 | |
| The tape that Jay stole ends up being more footage from Marble Hornets. The truth about what happened to Brian comes to light. | |||||||
| 81 | 37 | "Entry #52" | 14:33 | 2:21:56 | 13 November 2011 | 0.75 | |
| In the second season finale, Jay and Jessica meet with Alex, who leads them to a building in Rosswood Park. Upon entering the upper floor of the building, Alex pulls out a gun and attempts to kill Jay and Jessica, who are rescued by Tim in his masked state. Jay and Jessica escape Rosswood Park and regroup at the hotel that they were staying in during this season. They decide to store all of the relevant video tapes in the safe in Jay's room for safe keeping, and agree to set the code to the safe to "1102" as both of them can remember it (as it is the last four digits of Jessica's phone number). The Operator attacks both Jay and Jessica in their hotel rooms during their first night, causing the memory loss that both are afflicted with. | |||||||
Season 3 (2012–14)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Duration | Total Length | Original release date | YouTube viewers (millions) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 82 | 1 | "Entry #53" | 8:27 | 8:27 | 10 March 2012 | 0.55 | |
| Jay tracks down Tim at a mental health clinic, and they swap phone numbers. Later, Tim tells Jay that he has some behind-the-scenes tapes from Marble Hornets, and they arrange to meet up and exchange them. | |||||||
| 83 | 2 | "Reminder" | 0:29 | 8:56 | 15 March 2012 | 0.16 | |
| A Totheark video which shows that Totheark was stalking Jay during Entry #53. The text reads "Do you remember me? I have not forgotten". | |||||||
| 84 | 3 | "Entry #54" | 7:00 | 15:56 | 25 March 2012 | 0.52 | |
| After getting to the clinic, Jay meets Tim and he gives him the tapes he promised. He explores one tape which shows the Marble Hornets crew arriving at Tim's apartment from out of a rain storm. Jay and Seth depart whilst Alex and Brian remain at Tim's apartment and the three hang out. Following a power cut in the apartment, The Operator arrives and apparently attacks the three present. | |||||||
| 85 | 4 | "Decay" | 0:57 | 16:53 | 4 April 2012 | 0.25 | |
| A Totheark video which exemplifies Totheark’s hatred for Alex with the messages "You caused this. YOU WILL NEVER BE FORGIVEN. He will lead me to you. Lead me to death. Lead me to the ark", with the last line having numbers spelling out "NO CHOICE". The video also contains a creepy animation of a face with the words "Always watching", ending with a close-up of Jay's eye, with flashing colors overlapping, and audio that, when run through a spectrogram, spells out "TODAY IS YOUR LAST BIRTHDAY". | |||||||
| 86 | 5 | "Entry #55" | 4:01 | 20:54 | 9 April 2012 | 0.47 | |
| Alex, Brian, and Tim are walking in a neighborhood towards a shoot location for Marble Hornets. Tim recommends an abandoned building he knows that they could use as a shooting location. After taking some footage, Tim confirms a doctors appointment over his phone, mentioning he has a history of psychological disorders. | |||||||
| 87 | 6 | "Entry #56" | 5:59 | 26:53 | 25 April 2012 | 0.50 | |
| Tim leads Alex to the abandoned building mentioned in Entry #55. Alex is dissatisfied with the state that the building is in but notes that there is another building nearby which looks better, although Tim is reluctant to explore the other building. When Tim puts down the camera to relieve himself, Alex attacks him with a metal pipe, knocking him out. | |||||||
| 88 | 7 | "Entry #57" | 8:11 | 35:04 | 6 May 2012 | 0.51 | |
| Tim wakes up on the night following Alex's attack in Entry #56. He makes his way outside into the woods and suffers a coughing fit. Tim then enters the building Alex had previously noticed and spots Alex walking around, still armed. Tim suffers another coughing fit and attempts to hide from Alex in a room of the building. | |||||||
| 89 | 8 | "Session" | 0:37 | 35:41 | 14 May 2012 | 0.14 | |
| Totheark video of an old black and white footage of children in a classroom watching a film that appears to be about nature. With messages that read "One day you will understand. Secrets everywhere. Liars everywhere. Look closely and you will know. See you soon". At the end there is a flash image of the Operator with the message "He's watching". | |||||||
| 90 | 9 | "Entry #58" | 13:37 | 49:18 | 21 May 2012 | 0.52 | |
| Tim shows Jay to the abandoned buildings at Jay's behest, but becomes irritable when exploring the building that he was uncomfortable entering, which appears to be a hospital of some kind. Jay spots the hooded figure within the building and gives chase, but loses him down a maintenance tunnel, at which point he agrees with Tim to leave the site. | |||||||
| 91 | 10 | "Entry #59" | 5:24 | 54:42 | 14 June 2012 | 0.48 | |
| Tim angrily confronts Jay over his investigations after discovering the "Marble Hornets" channel online. He refuses to work with Jay any further in light of this revelation. | |||||||
| 92 | 11 | "Reference" | 0:24 | 55:06 | 22 June 2012 | 0.15 | |
| Totheark video that start with the words "Look to the origins" and an audio clip of Tim's angry confrontation with Jay, showing that Totheark was there watching. A quick image of the masked face, and with the message "Truth with light". And then a number sequence which translates to "His lies in the dark". | |||||||
| 93 | 12 | "Entry #60" | 10:07 | 1:05:13 | 30 June 2012 | 0.70 | |
| Jay returns to the abandoned hospital building and follows messages left by the hooded figure to enter the maintenance tunnel. In the tunnel he finds Tim's medical records, and hears footsteps in the building above him. As he is leaving the tunnel, The Operator appears behind him and chases him to the exit. | |||||||
| 94 | 13 | "Entry #60.5" | 6:47 | 1:12:00 | 14 July 2012 | 0.49 | |
| Jay goes through the information he has recovered in Tim's medical records. | |||||||
| 95 | 14 | "Observation" | 0:44 | 1:12:44 | 1 August 2012 | 0.16 | |
| Totheark video showing that Totheark is spying on Tim in his home. | |||||||
| 96 | 15 | "entry" | 5:55 | 1:18:39 | 8 August 2012 | 0.10 | |
| The "Marble Hornets" channel is hacked once again, and a video is uploaded showing the hooded figure break into Tim's home and steal his pills, with the effect that Tim suffers a seizure. When Tim recovers, he leaves home to go to an unknown location with the hooded figure following him out and speculating as to where Tim may have gone. This video was later made private. | |||||||
| 97 | 16 | "Entry #61" | 6:44 | 1:25:23 | 8 August 2012 | 0.55 | |
| The previous entry re-uploaded by Jay, with his own commentary and speculation as to what is going on. | |||||||
| 98 | 17 | "Entry #62" | 9:01 | 1:34:24 | 31 August 2012 | 0.68 | |
| Jay located Tim in his masked state in Rosswood Park following the events depicted in the previous entry. Tim chases Jay and eventually catches him and knocks him out. Jay wakes up afterwards in a shack in Rosswood Park, with Tim waking up at the same time outside the shack. | |||||||
| 99 | 18 | "Isolation" | 0:46 | 1:35:09 | 15 September 2012 | 0.14 | |
| Totheark video showing the woods and the shed that Jay and Tim woke up from together. With text asking the questions "Who is he? Who is she? Where is he? Where is she? Who are you? Meet again soon." And a figure standing in the woods who appears to be the Hooded Figure. And then a quick flash of the Operator with the message "Follows all". | |||||||
| 100 | 19 | "Entry #63" | 5:30 | 1:40:39 | 25 September 2012 | 0.49 | |
| Jay and Tim meet up following recent events and Jay returns Tim's medical records to him, after which the two agree to work together. | |||||||
| 101 | 20 | "Entry #64" | 11:49 | 1:52:28 | 2 October 2012 | 0.59 | |
| Jay and Tim explore the building in Rosswood Park where Alex tried to kill Jay and Jessica, and then explore the tunnel where Alex killed his victim in Entry #49. Following a phone call to Jay from Alex where Alex tells them to "leave now", the pair are attacked by The Operator, and only Jay escapes. He returns to the parking lot to find Tim already in his car. Tim drives off from the park at speed, despite Jay's protestations. | |||||||
| 102 | 21 | "Display" | 0:37 | 1:53:05 | 25 October 2012 | 0.15 | |
| Totheark video that appears to be addressing Tim and Jay. With messages saying "Remember. You abandoned him. He (Alex) is searching for you". | |||||||
| 103 | 22 | "Entry #65" | 14:11 | 2:04:16 | 19 November 2012 | 0.59 | |
| Video uploaded from Tim's chest-mounted camera of the events in Entry #64. After being attacked by The Operator it is revealed that Tim suffered a sequence of traumatic events, several of which involve Tim being underwater. He also came across the corpse of the man Alex killed in Entry #49. After eventually waking up in the parking lot, Tim got in his car and drove to the abandoned hospital, where he suffered more ill effects and eventually passed out. The entry ends with Tim meeting Jay and informing him that they need to return to the hospital at the earliest possible opportunity. | |||||||
| 104 | 23 | "Surveillance" | 0:52 | 2:05:08 | 30 December 2012 | 0.18 | |
| Totheark video demonstrating that all major characters are being watched by this anonymous figure. With numbers at the end that translate to messages "Truly your fault. She's out there. Continue on. I am watching". | |||||||
| 105 | 24 | "Entry #66" | 13:49 | 2:18:57 | 23 January 2013 | 0.40 | |
| Jay and Tim return to the hospital where Tim reveals that he was a patient in the hospital as a child and as concerned that he may have brought The Operator into the lives of all of the Marble Hornets cast and crew. Whilst looking for more information in the hospital, the hooded figure arrives and inspects a tape he had previously left. Jay recovers the tape, but the hooded figure manages to escape into the woods from Jay and Tim. | |||||||
| 106 | 25 | "Entry #67" | 7:58 | 2:26:55 | 15 February 2013 | 0.39 | |
| Footage taken from the tape recovered in Entry #66. The hooded figure drags an unconscious Tim out of the hospital before returning to the building. He hides after spotting Alex, and then knocks out Alex after Alex heard Tim coughing. Alex is then tied to a chair where he is attacked by Tim. The hooded figure is about to kill Alex with his own gun when The Operator shows up and apparently saves Alex. The remaining footage shows the hooded figure, still with Alex's gun in his possession, at night, and Tim waking up in the woods next to his mask. | |||||||
| 107 | 26 | "Entry #67.5" | 4:19 | 2:31:14 | 2 March 2013 | 0.37 | |
| Tim and Jay leave their present location in order to prevent Alex from locating them. | |||||||
| 108 | 27 | "68" | 4:53 | 2:36:07 | 10 March 2013 | N/A | |
| The "Marble Hornets" channel is hacked once again, and a video is uploaded showing the hooded figure living in a shack in some woods. He is attacked by Alex who questions him on the location of Jay and Tim. He escapes from Alex. The end of the video shows messages including "you are trapped" and "we are trapped". This video was later made private. | |||||||
| 109 | 28 | "Entry #68" | 4:53 | 2:41:00 | 10 March 2013 | 0.36 | |
| The previous entry re-uploaded by Jay, with his own commentary and speculation as to what is going on. | |||||||
| 110 | 29 | "Decline" | 0:47 | 2:41:47 | 4 April 2013 | 0.16 | |
| Totheark video with past footage of what the characters had been through, with messages "Everything is normal. Everything is fine. I worry about nothing because nothing is on my mind". There is an image at the end with numbers in a sequence with the Operator symbol drawn above, with the numbers translating as "He will pay". And then a hidden audio message that when decoded reads "Have you made me a liar? Or is he gone?" | |||||||
| 111 | 30 | "Entry #69" | 9:17 | 2:51:04 | 12 April 2013 | 0.36 | |
| Jay and Tim have returned to the area where Marble Hornets was originally filmed. Whilst returning to the red tower to look for more tapes, Jay believes on several occasions that he sees The Operator, but on further inspection of the video footage they find nothing there. Whilst returning to the cars Jay accidentally falls in a hole, and on closer inspection by Tim the hole is revealed to contain several of the Marble Hornets tapes that Alex previously tried to destroy, two of which are not irreparably damaged. | |||||||
| 112 | 31 | "Entry #70" | 5:45 | 2:56:49 | 28 April 2013 | 0.36 | |
| In the first tape recovered from the hole in Entry #69, Alex is driving whilst taking a call from Amy. Later in the video he is walking through the playground seen in Entry #4 when he is confronted by The Operator. | |||||||
| 113 | 32 | "Entry #71" | 6:11 | 3:03:00 | 15 May 2013 | 0.31 | |
| In the second video recovered from the hole in Entry #69, we see footage of the occasion when Jay collected the Marble Hornets tapes from Alex. As Jay attempts to leave Alex's residence, Alex attacks him, and later leaves him in a wooded area. Jay claims to have no recollection of the events of the tape after collecting the tapes. | |||||||
| 114 | 33 | "Entry #72" | 14:11 | 3:17:11 | 9 June 2013 | 0.47 | |
| Jay and Tim explore the house where Alex was living during the recording of Marble Hornets. They find some of Alex's drawings before Jay hallucinates that he sees The Operator in the field outside, before The Operator is actually seen in the field when neither Jay nor Tim are observing the camera. After returning to Tim's car to retrieve their flashlights, they inspect the basement, only to find that a period of time has passed and it is now nighttime. The Operator then appears behind them, forcing them to escape the house via climbing over a gate into the field. Tim takes Jay's camera and then loses Jay, who collapses in front of the house. Tim rushes to Jay's aid and faces The Operator. Once The Operator leaves the scene, Tim assists Jay in getting to the car and they then leave. | |||||||
| 115 | 34 | "entry #73" | 9:27 | 3:26:38 | 10 July 2013 | 0.34 | |
| A video posted by the hooded figure following another hack of the Marble Hornets channel. The hooded figure walks through several shacks in Rosswood Park and retrieves both Alex's gun and some of Tim's pills that he previously stole. As he has run out of pills, he returns to Tim's house and manages to locate some more pills in Tim's bathroom. The hooded figure then shows the location of a tape hidden beneath some plastic bags in a wooden box in Tim's living room. He then escapes from the house as someone is revealed to be descending from their hidden position in the attic - the person is revealed to be Alex. | |||||||
| 116 | 35 | "Entry #74" | 6:45 | 3:33:23 | 1 August 2013 | 0.28 | |
| Tim collects some supplies from a local garage, before returning to the motel where he and Jay are staying to find Jay wandering around outside. Tim brings Jay back into their room and informs him of recent developments - how Tim was able to stand up to The Operator in Entry #72, that he has given Jay some of his pills in the time since they escaped The Operator after realizing that they helped to counteract The Operator's effects, and that the hooded figure had uploaded entry #73 which showed Alex hiding in Tim's house. The pair decide to return to Tim's house due to the necessity of resolving the Alex situation and Tim's need for more pills, and have a meal of the food collected by Tim from the garage before they set out. | |||||||
| 117 | 36 | "Conversion" | 0:53 | 3:34:16 | 12 August 2013 | 0.13 | |
| Totheark video with more past distorted footage of Jay and Tim, and the words "Who are the liars? Are you one of them? Are you both of them? Remember to look behind you." The end of the video has a numbered code which translates as "Undefined". | |||||||
| 118 | 37 | "Entry #75" | 10:16 | 3:44:32 | 23 August 2013 | 0.29 | |
| Jay and Tim return to Tim's house and look for Alex. They find evidence that Alex had been hiding in the attic for a while but he's no longer there. A photo of Amy is found amongst Alex's things with an address written on the back. Returning downstairs Jay looks for the tape seen in the wooden box in entry #73 but finds that it is no longer there. However, he notices a suspicious looking bulge in Tim's pocket and deduces that Tim recovered the tape whilst Jay wasn't looking. Jay confronts Tim about the tape but Tim denies having it, leading to a scuffle where Jay manages to retrieve the tape from Tim. Tim explains that he was going to show Jay the tape but later, as the contents would cause problems for their working relationship. Jay ignores Tim and leaves with the tape. | |||||||
| 119 | 38 | "Entry #76" | 10:57 | 3:55:29 | 12 September 2013 | 0.31 | |
| A video taken from the evening that Jessica disappeared in Season 2. The hooded figure is recording the footage whilst Tim in his masked state is removing an unconscious Jessica from the hotel to the nearby woods. Tim returns to the hotel to fetch Jay whilst the hooded figure keeps watch over Jessica. Alex arrives and frightens the hooded figure off and convinces Jessica, who has no memory of the events from Entry #52, to trust him, after which he leads her to the tunnel in Rosswood Park. Alex turns the gun on Jessica, but she manages to overpower him and take the weapon, before the hooded figure arrives again and fights Alex. Whilst trying to escape Jessica inadvertently runs into The Operator who disables her and takes her away. | |||||||
| 120 | 39 | "File" | 0:24 | 3:59:53 | 10 October 2013 | 0.16 | |
| Totheark video commenting on Alex's continued failure to kill Jay and Jessica. This video was later made private. | |||||||
| 121 | 40 | "Entry #77" | 4:50 | 4:04:43 | 16 October 2013 | 0.24 | |
| Jay attempts to attack Tim in his home in response to the contents of Entry #76, however Tim is anticipating an attack from Jay and subdues him. He informs Jay that he has worked out where the address written on the back of the photograph of Amy found in Entry #74 is and intends to go there alone, as he cannot trust Jay at the present time. He takes Jay's camera with him and leaves Jay tied up on the floor of his living room. | |||||||
| 122 | 41 | "Entry #78" | 2:47 | 4:07:30 | 1 November 2013 | 0.23 | |
| The hooded figure enters Tim's house and leaves Jay with both the camera in his possession and the means of liberating himself from Tim's bindings. Jay succeeds in freeing himself and leaves with the camera, spotting the message "last chance" left by the hooded figure on a mirror prior to leaving. | |||||||
| 123 | 42 | "Entry #79" | 14:01 | 4:21:31 | 21 November 2013 | 0.25 | |
| Jay heads to the school campus located at the address on Amy's photograph and looks around. He runs into the hooded figure but loses him again. After tracking Tim onto the maintenance floor of one of the buildings, Jay finds a room with photographs of Alex tied to a chair and a message from the hooded figure telling him to go to Benedict Hall and "find Alex, find the ark". Finding that he cannot get into Benedict Hall, Jay sets up a lookout point upstairs in an adjacent building, and maintains a vigil whilst waiting for something to happen. | |||||||
| 124 | 43 | "Quadrant" | 0:37 | 4:22:08 | 3 December 2013 | 0.13 | |
| Totheark video indicating that Jay and Tim should hold off from attacking Alex, and that Totheark themselves is feeling a certain level of doubt regarding events. | |||||||
| 125 | 44 | "Entry #80" | 6:21 | 4:28:29 | 5 December 2013 | 0.28 | |
| Jay is maintaining his vigil when he spots Tim running out of Benedict Hall. Jay enters Benedict Hall and explores the basement area before running into Alex, who promptly shoots Jay, fatally wounding him. Jay manages to barricade himself in a room from Alex, but The Operator appears in the room and takes him away. Tim finds the camera later, and after discovering what happened to Jay via the footage, frantically tries to find him. He sees the hooded figure and tries to give chase, but loses him after he exits Benedict Hall. | |||||||
| 126 | 45 | "Entry #81" | 14:26 | 4:42:55 | 9 January 2014 | 0.25 | |
| With Jay gone, Tim now continues running the Marble Hornets channel alone. This entry shows the actions of Tim between Entry #77 and Entry #80. After thoroughly exploring the school grounds, Tim finds a way to get into the locked Benedict Hall via a maintenance tunnel. After gaining access to Benedict Hall Tim spots Alex and makes quick his escape. He returns to his car to retrieve his pills but finds that they are gone, and passes out in the back seat. After waking up, Tim returned to Benedict Hall and found Jay's camera, as was seen in Entry #80. | |||||||
| 127 | 46 | "Entry #82" | 10:01 | 4:52:56 | 6 February 2014 | 0.25 | |
| The entry commences with Tim giving a status update on his health following the loss of his pills. He locates Jay's car and finds Jay's laptop inside. He watches footage that he has not seen before. After watching the tape uploaded as Entry #76, Jay returned to the tunnel in Rosswood Park and finally walked to the other side. Finding a load of decrepit buildings, including the shack where Jay and Tim woke up after the events of Entry #62, Jay leaves Tim a voicemail to apologize for his recent actions and states that he is worried about the effect of recent events on his own health. He sees The Operator several times, and has a severe fit whilst The Operator is standing over him. Tim comments on the fact that he never received Jay's voicemail and that he realizes it was the effects of The Operator that caused Jay to turn violent in Entry #77. | |||||||
| 128 | 47 | "Null" | 0:41 | 4:53:37 | 20 February 2014 | 0.22 | |
| The final video from Totheark. This one suggests the discovery of the location of the ark is near at hand. | |||||||
| 129 | 48 | "Entry #83" | 7:14 | 5:00:51 | 6 March 2014 | 0.27 | |
| Tim is exploring the building in which Jay set up his vigil and comes across the hooded figure. After the hooded figure taunts an ailing Tim with the pills he stole, The Operator appears and a chase sequence ensues, with both Tim and the hooded figure being teleported constantly between the major locations of the series. After seeing Jay's corpse lying on a load of Alex's drawings in Tim's own home, the teleportation stops with Tim attacking the hooded figure who is hanging from a ledge in the building they were originally in. The hooded figure falls to his death, after which Tim recovers a tape and his pills from the body. Tim attempts to discover the hooded figure's identity but is prevented by a reappearance of The Operator. | |||||||
| 130 | 49 | "Entry #84" | 9:41 | 5:10:32 | 1 April 2014 | 0.26 | |
| This entry is the footage from the tape Tim recovered from the hooded figure's body in the previous entry. The footage is of Alex's original casting shoot for Marble Hornets, at which only Brian and Tim show up. The video reveals that Brian was the hooded figure. Tim comments on the fact that he had no way of knowing that the hooded figure was Brian beforehand and bemoans the fact that Alex has been the cause of another friend's death. | |||||||
| 131 | 50 | "Entry #85" | 9:11 | 5:19:43 | 14 May 2014 | 0.26 | |
| Tim returns home and waits for Alex to attack him. Knowing that Alex is watching him, and realizing that Alex will not attack until Tim makes a mistake, Tim attempts to lure Alex to his house by setting up a look-out post from down the street and not returning home. Eventually Alex appears and breaks into Tim's home, dousing the entire floor with gasoline and setting the place alight. | |||||||
| 132 | 51 | "Entry #86" | 13:23 | 5:33:06 | 15 June 2014 | 0.47 | |
| Tim returns to Benedict Hall to finish the conflict with Alex. He looks for Alex but Alex spots him first and tries to shoot him. After Tim falls through some floor boards, The Operator appears and starts teleporting Alex and Tim in the same way he teleported Brian and Tim during their fight. Alex explains that he has been killing the other Marble Hornets crew members to prevent those who have been in contact with The Operator from spreading his effects to anyone else, and that he has already killed Amy, Sarah, and Seth to accomplish this goal. To this end, once Alex kills Tim he intends to commit suicide. The confrontation ends with Tim fatally wounding Alex by stabbing him in the throat. Alex's final words to Tim are that if any of the others who had come into contact with The Operator are still alive, that Tim should kill them first and then kill himself to end the contagion of The Operator's influence. | |||||||
| 133 | 52 | "Entry #87" | 5:18 | 5:38:24 | 20 June 2014 | 0.60 | |
| Tim disposes of his mask, and meets Jessica in a parking lot. After a brief discussion, Tim suffers a coughing fit and there is disrupted audio on the recording, indicating the presence of The Operator. Tim is then shown driving away with a serious expression on his face, whilst the sound of an ambulance siren can be heard in the background, before the words "Everything is fine" are seen on screen. The ultimate fates of Tim and Jessica are unknown, as The Operator's final attack may have been beaten by their medication. | |||||||
Development and reception
Wagner and DeLage began working on the webseries after reading about the Slender Man mythos and because both liked the ease of creating a YouTube series.[27] The initial budget for the series was about $500, which the two used to create the first 26 episodes.[27] They decided against making a set time for each entry, as they both determined that the characters filming the entries would not consider the length of the episode and that the random entry times would help add to the realism. The entire series was edited with the software Sony Vegas Pro and Adobe Premiere.[28]
After its release the series' popularity grew,[29] drawing comparisons to Lonelygirl15 and iChannel.[30] In 2013, Dread Central named Marble Hornets one of their "Top 10 Horror Fan Films", noting that while it "isn’t technically a film" it still contained an "interwoven examination of the mythical Slender Man" and that they felt it was "what quality fanfare and found footage is really all about."[31] Early during the airing of season 1, the series received praise from Roger Ebert.[32]
In May 2014, the developers launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for the DVD release of the third season. The response was overwhelmingly positive, with the original goal of $8000 in donations being exceeded by $76,271.[33] These funds went towards further projects, including a box set and new supplementary material in the form of scenes from Alex Kralie's Marble Hornets.
Film adaptation
In February 2013, Variety announced that plans were underway to produce a film adaptation of Marble Hornets.[34] They also announced that the script would be written by Ian Shorr, that James Moran would direct, and that Doug Jones would be portraying the Operator in the film.[35][36] In October of the same year, Wagner announced on his blog that the movie had finished filming and it would not be a continuation of the YouTube series but would be set within the same universe.[37]
The film, titled Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story, was released on video on demand on April 7, 2015, starring Doug Jones, Alexandra Breckenridge, and Alexandra Holden. The film opened in select theaters on May 15, 2015.[38] Critical reception for Always Watching was predominantly negative.[39]
References
- ↑ "History of Slender man". Anomaly Info. 6 July 2016. Retrieved 1 December 2019.
- ↑ "YouTube Horror Series Marble Hornets Will Bring Slenderman To Theaters". Cinema Blend. 26 February 2013. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ "Creepy Things That Seem Real But Aren't: The Marble Hornets Project". Crushable. Archived from the original on 1 June 2013. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ "Marble Hornets". YouTube. Retrieved 7 May 2017.
- ↑ "totheark". Youtube. Retrieved 7 May 2017.
- ↑ "Marble Hornets". audienceseverywhere. Archived from the original on 27 July 2020. Retrieved 7 May 2017.
- ↑ "Marble Hornets". YouTube. Retrieved 16 June 2019.
- ↑ "Announcement". Archived from the original on 9 November 2017. Retrieved 25 April 2015.
- ↑ "eckvanet". YouTube. Retrieved 4 November 2016.
- ↑ "Smile for the camera". Retrieved 12 December 2017.
- ↑ ""It's finally here! Marble Hornets Issue 1 is now available for download!"". Retrieved 26 February 2019.
- ↑ "ALWAYS WATCHING: A MARBLE HORNETS STORY (2015)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved October 9, 2015.
- 1 2 Kelly, Makena (2019-06-22). "One of the creepiest series in YouTube history is now a decade old and can't seem to die". The Verge. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
- ↑ Introduction, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 Entry #80, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 Entry #83, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 Entry #59, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 3 Entry #87, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #35, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #18, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #66, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #60.5, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 Entry #86, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #22, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #9, retrieved 2021-04-02
- ↑ Entry #26, retrieved 2021-04-02
- 1 2 Nolfi, Joey (24 August 2011). "The 'Marble Hornets' Web series becoming a smash on 'Net". Post-Gazette. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ "Webseries interview: Marble Hornets creator Troy Wagner". Hypable. Archived from the original on 21 December 2013. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ Powell, Kathryn. "Stalked by Slenderman: A review of "Marble Hornets"". The Gargoyle. Archived from the original on 9 November 2011. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ Alexander, Bryan (7 April 2011). The New Digital Storytelling: Creating Narratives with New Media. ABC-CLIO. pp. 87–89. ISBN 978-0313387500.
- ↑ Molgaard, Matt (13 December 2013). "Dread Central Presents: The Top 10 Horror Fan Films". Dread Central. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
- ↑ Ebert, Roger. ""Marble Hornets," a YouTube serial. A forsaken indie film meets "Paranormal." All episodes to date". Retrieved 28 January 2014.
- ↑ "Marble Hornets Season 3 DVD". Kickstarter.com. Retrieved 25 June 2014.
- ↑ "Mosaic adapting horror web series". Variety. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ "WEB SERIES MARBLE HORNETS FLYING TO BIG SCREEN". JoBlo. 26 February 2013. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
- ↑ "Web Series 'Marble Hornets' Getting Its Own Movie". Spill. Archived from the original on 27 November 2013. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
- ↑ Wagner, Troy (31 October 2013). "So about that movie". Troy Wagner. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
- ↑ Clow, Mitchel (8 April 2015). "'Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story' movie review: Tell, don't show". Hypable. Retrieved 26 September 2015.
- ↑ "ALWAYS WATCHING: A MARBLE HORNETS STORY (2015)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 26 September 2015.