unforum

[graywings]

Personally, what turns me off of a series are twofold- quality and 'other'. If a series sucks, it sucks, and although I'm willing to plow through a marathon session to get to the good bits- there has to be good bits to get to. Take TribeTwelve- it takes a while to get good, but once it gets there, I'm hooked and the next thing I know it's three in the morning and I just marathoned the entire thing, again.

That said, there's this nebulous 'other' category that just- there needs to be something that gives me interest in keeping up to date with it. Something that will make me watch the next video, keep up with the twitter, check the forums. A lot of the shows I've tried just didn't captivate my attention. It was all of the same old things I've seen countless other times. 'Oh noes, someone's following me! I shall spend the next thirty minutes of your time showing you my feet as I run from sirens that will kill anyone watching this with their headphones in!'

Something I would love in a series is, well, something new. A new take on slenderman, a new take on his targets, something, anything other than vaguely college aged white boys running around in the woods. A new location, a new protagonist, a new age group- something. I would love to watch the tale of a beat cop tracking down a child kidnapper, or a miniseries about one of the kids Slenderman supposedly takes, or even just a vaguely college aged chick running around in the woods.

[Magic-Josh]

If I were to give Slender Man a weakness, it would be his own proxies. Ones that had broken free of mind control and can now use his own power against him and invade his dimension. I think that'd be a cool idea.

[The Condor]

Lack of commitment.

[zbeeblebrox]

[thisistheend]

I love reading this thread and thinking, "Hey, I am doing this kind of stuff right now dammit."

[Magic-Josh]

[knifebladepresents]

To tell you the truth, I'm not scared so easily. So when a slenderman series aims for scares but not any good story, it just doesn't affect me.

[Peppercorn]

What most bad series forget about distortion is why it's even there in-universe: the Slender Man causes it because he's something alien. It honestly does work when thought is put into its usage, but a lot of people half-ass it and just end up making an eyesore instead of making a point. The same goes for Slendersickness.

[PostIt]

Right. As peppercorn said, everything needs to be driven by purpose. Look at, say, Silence of the Lambs. It's a great movie, but more than that, everything everything has a purpose. Every shot, every line, every set piece is there for a reason, which is what makes it so damn good. The same goes for a Slender Series. Distortion can't just be a 'boo slenderman' deal.

You have to consider the 'why's'. Why is there distortion? What purpose does it serve in this scene in particular? What does it tell the audience? What does it mean? I like the series that use distortion as a sort of voice for the slender man. Which is not to say he should be talking, but when the distortion is there to say something about why the slender man is there, and what "mood" he is in, (as much as he can have "moods"). Same goes for the slender sickness and operator symbols. I don't mind them, so long as they have a reason to be there.

[zbeeblebrox]

Exactly, PostIt. Distortion is, at its most basic, the Jaws Theme of a Slenderman series. Ignoring the in-universe (lack of) logic for a second, distortion should at least seek to achieve that: becoming a narrative flag that causes the viewer to dread whatever's about to happen next.

[Matoyak]