Current State of Affairs for the Dead Fear Group, reviewed by DJay32

What the fuck was this garbage. Archangard has gone down in quality. Sad! Very sad!

Graham, Positive, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Graham, Positive is a twenty-five post blogella written by DarkShadows, and can be read here (cw: disease). Its primary Fear is the Plague Doctor.

This story is framed as a blog kept by an epidemiologist named Richard Graham for the purpose of educating the public about ways to stay safe from disease. Graham sticks to educational posts until he’s called to respond to an outbreak of an especially deadly strain of MRSA.

Graham, Positive was inspired by the public panic over the Ebola outbreak of 2014. In addition to the subject matter, the author’s own experience in lab science plays a big role here in making the story feel believable, which is what, in my opinion, makes it a good piece of horror. Despite the fantastical elements in the story, there really could be an outbreak of a deadly, antibiotic-resistant bacterium in the real world. On a smaller scale, any of us really could contract a terminal disease at any time, no matter how hard we work to minimize our chances. This is the kind of horror that serves to make us feel aware of the actual danger we are in, right this minute, in real life, and that is very, very effective.

I do wish there’d been more foreshadowing regarding Wahlberg, if he was indeed the person who crashed Allison’s dinner party. He was introduced only one post prior to that, which made the ending feel rather abrupt. Even if Wahlberg wasn’t an Oathbreaker, I feel that the story would flow more smoothly if he had been present in earlier posts, or not present at all. Elsewhere, the author does an excellent job of foreshadowing events and making them feel natural.

This is a great piece, and fairly short as well. Highly recommended. 

The All Seeing I, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Burn the Sky is a blogpasta written by Omega, and can be read here. Its primary Fear is the Convocation.

The themes of Burn the Sky, while certainly not unusual, aren’t ones that we see a lot in the Fear Mythos, and I think that makes it interesting. Environmental concerns are very good for provoking guilt, which is its own special kind of horror.

The prose is interesting, too – it’s got a flavorful noir atmosphere, and the story is told through transcripts of emails, telephone conversations, journal entries, and newspaper articles. It’s very well-paced and economical. None of the posts felt out of place or unnecessary. It could perhaps have benefited from a little extra proofreading, but overall it’s a very, very solidly written blogpasta, and I recommend it highly.

Twelve Days, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Twelve Days is a fifteen-post blog written by DarkShadows, and can be read here (cw: death, terminal illness). It features many Fears. Spoilers ahead.

The story’s about the emotional journey of Michael Zarkoff, whose wife Andrea is diagnosed with an aggressive, fast-spreading breast cancer. The doctors say she has a good chance of survival with chemotherapy, but Michael and Andrea are both, understandably, terrified. Michael’s Fears begin haunting him during this period of emotional disturbance.

Twelve Days is notable for multiple reasons, the foremost of which is its poignant depiction of Michael’s grief, fear, and guilt. It was almost emotionally taxing to read (I’ll admit I teared up at one point – I’ve grown soft in my old age), and I can only imagine how difficult it must have been to write, since it’s inspired by some of the author’s own life experiences. DarkShadows has done an excellent job of making the reader empathize with Michael’s experience.

The blog also features some interesting portrayals of Fears. Michael’s demons manifest in many different ways – from a surgeon at the hospital where Andrea’s staying to a priest at his church. I think the blog’s message is one of survival – of grief, of mental illness, and of life. After Andrea’s death, the Man and the Girl insist that Michael tell them what he’s going to do next. Michael’s response is that he doesn’t know, but he thinks he has to get through today first. As someone with mental illnesses, this really hit home for me – this sort of one-step-at-a-time, slow healing process is something I used for years. It’s implied that Michael suffers from an anxiety disorder in addition to his grief, so Twelve Days works on two different levels, both of which jive very well with one another.

I’d most definitely recommend this blog. It’s truly excellent.

Urban Malefic, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Urban Malefic is a 38-post blog by TheSomnambulist, and can be read here (cw: some sexual content). Many Fears are present in the story, but the primary one is the Empty City. Spoilers ahead.

The blog is about a man by the name of Portnoy Augustus, who wakes up in a strange room with inward-pointing corners and then falls into the sun. As he journeys through the Empty City, he learns that the Fears have brought him here for some kind of test. His thoughts are transcribed by a device called the PsiMe, hence the stream-of-consciousness narrative. It feels almost like a science fiction story at times, which I found interesting.

I think Urban Malefic’s greatest strength is its creativity and description of the City’s bizarre architecture and events. The first post got me interested, and my interest was sustained to the end of the blog. I was very curious about what was going to happen next, and how it would end. I’d call it very well-written in that respect.

The grammar wasn’t the best, but I actually think it worked well with the stream-of-consciousness flow of the story, and there were only a couple of points where I found it distracting. There were a couple of things I didn’t understand: how did Portnoy become godlike at the end of the story? Sheer resolve? I wasn’t quite clear on that. Also, why would the Fears go to the trouble of implanting the PsiMe and creating the blog for it? What do they gain from that? I think the story would have been improved if the author had included explanations for these things. As usual, I apologize if I missed something.

I liked Urban Malefic, and I’d recommend it because it’s engaging, creative, and weird. Weird is good.

EDIT: TheSomnambulist has informed me that Portnoy had some kind of connection with the Empty City, enabling him to gain control over it at the end of the story, and that this is further explored later in the Amalgam Saga, of which Urban Malefic is a part.

Burn the Sky, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Burn the Sky is a blogpasta written by Omega, and can be read here. Its primary Fear is the Convocation.

The themes of Burn the Sky, while certainly not unusual, aren’t ones that we see a lot in the Fear Mythos, and I think that makes it interesting. Environmental concerns are very good for provoking guilt, which is its own special kind of horror.

The prose is interesting, too – it’s got a flavorful noir atmosphere, and the story is told through transcripts of emails, telephone conversations, journal entries, and newspaper articles. It’s very well-paced and economical. None of the posts felt out of place or unnecessary. It could perhaps have benefited from a little extra proofreading, but overall it’s a very, very solidly written blogpasta, and I recommend it highly.

A Place for My Head, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

A Place for My Head is a blogpasta by Apostate, and can be read here (cw: suicide, self-injury, child abuse, graphic violence). Its primary Fear is the Unnamed Child.

First, let me say that I love this blog’s portrayal of the Unnamed Child. I’m under the impression that it’s one of the more difficult Fears to work with, but A Place for My Head pulls it off beautifully. The imagery in the last post is genuinely disturbing, and I especially loved Paula’s soliloquy at the very end. There were a handful of typos, but not enough that they were distracting.

I don’t think I have any legitimate suggestions for improvement. It might have been interesting if we’d had more time to explore the relationship between Paula and Allie (I’m a little curious as to how exactly they met? Just in an internet chatroom?), but the story works perfectly well as it is; we don’t necessarily need all the details.

I’d recommend A Place for My Head for its innovative, poignant portrayal of the Unnamed Child.

My Soul is on Fire, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

My Soul is on Fire is a blog by Acelegin, and can be read here. Its main Fear is the Dying Man.

This blog is interesting because it felt more like an action-adventure story than a horror story. It reminded me of a Japanese fighting game such as Soul Calibur, as it’s filled with superpowered characters fighting outlandish battles with one another. While I appreciate Fearblogs outside the horror genre, I felt that in this case the execution was sorely lacking.

My first major complaint is that the plot was very unstructured and didn’t keep my attention. It seemed to drag on and on without actually getting me invested in the story or characters, like I was listening to Estren say “…and then this happened, and then this, and then this, and then, and then, and then…” Details started to blur and I had to go back and reread parts on multiple occasions. I still can’t figure out exactly why Estren and HELLFIRE decided to look for Silvermist or who “future guy” is.

My second complaint is that that the characters all felt pretty much the same. HELLFIRE was the only one who stood out at all, and even then he didn’t feel quite consistent. Characters’ motives were often unclear. HELLFIRE seems to have an ulterior motive when it comes to finding the Godslayer, but why is Estren going along with him? And why is Amy sticking around? Supposedly Estren “owns” her, but the Game Master used to and she switched to Estren’s side over a bet. She could easily take off. The characters in this story felt like puppets rather than people, like they were only doing things because the plot demanded it.

I think My Soul is on Fire could have been an interesting blog if the execution had been better. I’m sure there are plenty of people who’d be interested in Fearblogs of this genre. I think the blog could have been improved if the author had paid more attention to his characters, who they were, and why they were doing what they were doing. The plot would have naturally become more interesting and engaging if I had been invested in the characters. Additionally, there are many typos throughout the blog that could have easily been caught with a bit of proofreading. This may seem like a minor thing, but I strongly believe that if such issues can be fixed, they should, as error-free prose makes a story seem more professional and improves flow.

Prestidigitation, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

Prestidigitation is a blogpasta by TheSomnambulist, and can be read here. Its main Fear is the Choir.

This blog’s protagonist is Marcinius Trowess, who starts blogging in-story as a school project. He begins hearing strange things at night: first skittering noises, then footsteps and slamming doors. He runs away from home when he overhears his parents plotting to kill him, but the Choir continue to manipulate him.

I thought it was interesting how easily Prestidigitation lends itself to an alternate interpretation. The Choir only manifests within the text as sounds and voices heard solely by the protagonist; one might come to the conclusion that Marcinius had simply developed an unusually destructive case of schizophrenia. I’m not sure if this ambiguity was intentional on the part of the author, but I found it intriguing. I also liked the ends to which Prestidigitation uses the Choir – straightforward yet chilling.

I didn’t care for the use of Morse code in the final post. For one, I felt that it was unnecessary to make readers go to the trouble of decoding it, especially in a blog that hadn’t previously used codes or ARG elements. There was also no in-story explanation given as to why Marcinius was suddenly posting in Morse code when he’d never done so before. Also, throughout the blog, commas are practically never used when they should be. It’s possible that this was a stylistic decision made to give Marcinius personality, but I found it distracting (my inner grammar policeman is showing here).

Overall, I have a mixed opinion of Prestidigitation. On the one hand, I liked the way it used the Choir and the ambiguity therein; on the other, many small stylistic issues prevented me from enjoying it fully. I would recommend it to those interested in the Choir, but not to those who find grammatical errors as distracting as I do.

The Neon Gospel, reviewed by Hexillith

[Editor's note: This review was written externally and copied to the Mythos Review by its author.]

The Neon Gospel is a blogpasta written by Apostate, and can be read here. Its main Fear is the Dying Man.

This is a polished and well-written piece chock full of body horror. The protagonist, Hector, is a bitter young adult who resolves to “get busy living or get busy dying” after witnessing his grandfather’s death to cancer. Well, not exactly – those tumors were actually caused by a Dying Man shard by the name of Capricorn, who’s now possessing Hector. This manifests first in what Hector thinks is somnambulism, but soon he’s missing time and finding himself in strange places with no clue how he got there, and the same kinds of tumors he saw on his grandfather are appearing in his own body.

I think The Neon Gospel’s greatest strength lies in its strong plot and smooth storytelling. In reading it one gets the impression that the author knew exactly where the story was going to go and what needed to be done to get it there, resulting in nearly seamless flow. It also has that sense of creeping dread which is so important in the horror genre, and has it in spades. My only complaint is that a few details seemed vague or unclear. For example, Capricorn claims that Hector ‘let him in,’ but there’s nothing in the account of his grandfather’s death that would suggest that. This is, admittedly, probably not something that most people would notice or care about on a casual read-through (and I apologize sincerely if I missed something).

This is an excellent blogpasta and certainly makes my list of favorites. I would very much like to see more of Capricorn, although The Neon Gospel shines on its own.

Slender Won't Back Down, exegesis by Christoph Magreat

[Editor's note: This piece was not written for Mythos Review, but the author has submitted it to us all the same.]

This week, on The Feart Critic, we will take a look at the blog Slender Won’t Back Down. This blog is still ongoing, but of the existing posts we think there’s a substantial possibility for critical exegesis once textual deconstruction is applied.

Slender Won’t Back Down, on the surface, is the blog of Christopher Lloyd, a thirteen-year-old boy who attempts to answer questions about the Slender Man Mythos but finds his life distraught by a coalition of proxies working for the Slender Man. His girlfriend is threatened, his friends’ lives fall apart, and the proxies on multiple occasions succeed in kidnapping him, though they have yet to successfully convert him into a proxy. The writing style is fluid, brief, occasionally informative but usually rather stream-of-conscious. However, there are recurring moments in the blog that seem to suggest a deeper interpretation.

Chris at one point posts a history of the Slender Man’s relationship with proxies. A very recent era is titled “The Deconstruction of Proxies.” Now, understand that deconstruction is strictly a post-structuralist linguistic and philosophical concept– it is a method of approaching texts, of approaching the concept of meaning. Deconstruction argues, through differance, that a text by definition conveys its own intended meaning as well as multiple simultaneousopposing meanings– a text is its own contrary evidence. There is no other definition for “deconstruction,” so by bringing up such a clear philosophy in this post, Christopher is pointing us in the direction of approaching his text in this manner. He wants us to interpret it, to break it down and see what it is saying. And that is precisely what we do.

So. According to that post, it is not just any deconstruction but the deconstruction of proxies. In the blog, the proxies are a constant opposing force for Chris, but a key element to post-structuralism is that opposing forces serve a sort of symbiotic relationship. You cannot have “good” without “bad” (and vice versa), you cannot have “meaning” without “nonsense” (and vice versa), you cannot have “proxies” without “Chris” (and vice versa). That is the conclusion drawn by breaking down his use of words– all that just in “The Deconstruction of Proxies” (placed in a central location, drawing attention to itself, begging for analysis, insisting importance). So we have established that: Chris and the proxies are opposing forces, and so they need each other to survive. There are many ways to interpret this, but we will call for more textual evidence first.

Early on in the blog, Chris gives a list of his accounts, with a consistent number in a lot of them being “111.” When he discovers the blog of Proxy, the url given is “legendary111.” The two characters share the same number. If we go on legendary111, we will find among its posts this telling quote: “WE HAVE CHRIS HES IN STASIS FOR HIS SHIFT AS PROXY WHICH IS ME”

His shift as proxy which is me. It’s almost as if Chris and Proxy are two conflicting Parts of the same Whole– perhaps fragments of the same psyche, battling for control (their “shift,” as it were) over the body.

Further support: A recent update shows photographs of the coalition of proxies. Aside from a couple of images taken from copyrighted material, the majority of proxies are clearly played by the same actor as Christopher himself. We don’t believe this is a coincidence. We believe this is a deliberate ploy: Christopher is all of the proxies. They are all battling for their “shift.”

Aside from the proxies, there is also the question of other characters– namely, Chris’s friends. The most important is his girlfriend Sierra. A blog is linked to early on, described as hers, but the blog is empty. As Sierra’s presence inSlender Won’t Back Down rarely becomes apparent, we can deduce that Sierra might not exist either, that perhaps she too is another fragment of Chris’s psyche– a missing one, his mythical “goal” to protect, his “baby girl” (a telling description). What this implies, who can tell? For now we’re only giving the evidence.

In fact, very few characters in the blog get much presence. Some of them might be real people, marginalized in the theatre of singular experience. We think it’s more likely, and bear with us here, that all characters are Chris. This blog is the pained story of one blogger’s wrestle with unity, with mind.

Then what of the Slender Man? Of all characters, his presence is the most often felt. Chris describes him as an ancient entity originating in 2300 BCE, whose “Golden Age,” back when “he knew what he was doing,” consisted of the moment the Slender Man sought cults for himself, but whose reign has died down in recent years for reasons never truly stated but implied to be related to proxies. If we recall that “proxies” are fragments of Chris’s psyche, this can be read as Chris attaching a nostalgic significance to a past before his was a mind torn. To connect this with the Slender Man almost seems a red herring, but clearly at some point he ceased to know “what he was doing.” If the Slender Man is the one who instigates, who recruits proxies, he must have some connection.

A constant question on the reader’s mind while reading this tour de force is “Does the Slender Man truly exist as a character, or is this meant to be a running commentary on mythos conventions?” This question is first raised in an early post, where Chris introduces himself as “knowing his away [sic] around The Slender Man Mythos, The Fear Mythos, The Willow Mythos, and The Cthulhu Mythos.” All four are known and established communities of fiction, so if Chris knows his way around them, he must be aware of this. But now that we have begun approaching the text with the psyche interpretation in mind, a third option opens up: The Slender Man is also a fragment of the same psyche. This early post, this mark of awareness of the four separate mythoi, seems almost.. an acknowledgement, a poignant cry for help. “I exist in four mythoi. I am fact and fiction. I am a mind torn,” it seems to say.

One last motif of conflict is this strange association of geography with terms of feminine appearance. Cleveland, Ohio, is described as “beautiful.” Hollywood is associated with “Whore.” A character named Bailey who moves from “beautiful” Ohio to California turns out to be a proxy named “Deformity.” Coincidence? You decide.

So. To recap: Everyone in Slender Won’t Back Down is the same person. The conflict is one of a boy’s mind at war with itself, possibly suppressing memory of some past event. The plot, then, opens up immensely. Proxy, once an obvious beacon of evil, now looks morally ambiguous. Chris, once a blatant source of good, now comes into question. In one post, Proxy posts the famously cryptic “BOOP BOOP BOOOOP” followed by an admission that he will listen and be good now. Chris denies him his chance of redemption– Chris knows the two must oppose, that (to use an analogy) if Shem were to become Shaun, Shaun must then become Shem. A profound philosophical subject covered so subtly in a Slenderblog, affixed so iconically to a series of boops. Archangard had to cover his face at this point in the reading, he had tears in his eyes.

We have obviously only covered a portion of the text, and we have only introduced this interpretation; we have not gone far. That is left up to you. You have all the tools. We will leave you with this: While the question of what split Chris’s psyche has yet to be answered, a fairly recent post gives these dark and telling implications: “Murder and me don’t go together well.”

Breathtaking. Where Slender Won’t Back Down is going, only its author can know, but Archangard and I await future posts with baited breath and recommend its psychological turmoil to all.

See you on the other side, Fear Mythos.

All Roses Wilt, reviewed by NoFourthWall

For reference, All Roses Wilt was written by Acelegin and can be read here.

Before we perform our latest blog autopsy, we need to go into the background of this blog or else you'll have no clue what's happening in it.

You see awhile ago a Fear Mythos fan about his idea for a Fear, The Meetaldroid the Fear of weapons. Needless to say this idea didn't become a Fear but the writer of this blog didn't want the creators work to go to wast and the Meetaldroid was recreated as the Mercygivers, a bunch of weapons that rid their wielders of their emotions and force them to kill people.

That being said this was the first blog they were in. That's all that can be really said about this blog, the only thing it has going for it is that it's the first appearance of Mercygivers. Without this fact it feels extremely rushed and pointless. I can literally describe the blog as this:

The main protagonist Diana Rose gets bullied by the popular girls for (and this is in the characters own word) being ugly and fat, Diana finds sword in the woods and learns how to use sword, she kills the bullies, and then she runs to prevent the cops getting to her.

Yep that's all that happens folks. Now that said I think this idea has potential and it would have been interesting to see how the Mercygiver Diana got affects her mind over a period of time but it isn't done well. This blog would have been much better if we had gotten to know Diana more before the Mercygivers got dumped into the plot because really that is the biggest problem with this blog.

We know next to nothing about this character and she's rather unlikable. Yes she was treated like crap by them but I can't sympathize with her at all. Without character development someone that kills other characters is a villain. Diana is nothing more than a cold blooded killer!     

This is defiantly not one of Acelegin's better blogs, in fact out of all of them this one is probably the worst. The only reason I would recommend it is because Diana appears in Daniel and Friends and without this blog you'll be extremely confused as to who she is.

Misery Always Knows, reviewed by MrWillis

Collen has written a blogpasta called Misery Always Knows. The story is of a girl called Misery who finds out that the Burning Bride has taken a keen interest of her. 

And that is greatest bits of the story for me, as we slowly began to realize (and affirm) that who this mysterious entity called Eris is called. From the very beginning you can sense who Eris is, or if you’re new she is seriously faking that smug smile she has, yet Collen builds up the tension through each one of the post along until the big reveal of who Eris is and what she has in store for Misery. 

After that point my personal opinion and objective opinion diverse, so I will give my objective opinion instead. 

After the Caves of Luminescence, the rebuild up of the tension starts, with Misery frantically trying to figure out on how to stop Eris, since her options are pretty shitty with them being either join her and be a mindless slave or die, as the decision point is coming near. At this part I wish Collen could’ve once again made more post to build the tension up a little more since it didn’t have same feeling as the first one however that ran the risk of blogpasta becoming redundant so I forgive that. 

Next we have the climax, we Decision Point which is one big blog post cut into smaller pieces for the reader’s pleasure. Here the final confrontation between Misery and the Burning Bride is a logical and reasonable discourse that is lackluster because the tension wasn’t nearly as big leading up to it when compared to the reveal and the fact that it felt uneventful with Part I being a sign off, Part II a set up phase. Part III and Part IV are a recapping of why Misery was chosen, how the events leading up to this point were set in place by the Burning Bride, then Misery retorting back to Eris how she is wrong about her. Decision Point Part V is where the actually conflict comes a point, Misery grabs the ring, knocks Eris off the roof and that’s it. There is one more blog post of what happened afterwards and it is done. 

As you can see the conflict point doesn't get touched until part V where…well…it is anti-climactic. Not saying it doesn't make sense or that it seems like a deus ex machina because it isn't. The reasoning behind the post are quite sound. It just doesn’t come off as a superb, even though I want it to. 

Conclusion 

Here is my final overview. Misery knows all is overall a well done piece that has no illogical inconsistencies; everything makes sense. It for the most part is well-handled in the built up of tension and dramatics. The only gripe I have it the ending felt rushed for the lack of a better term. 

That being said, great short series, worth the ten or twenty minutes of time you’ll need to finish it.

A Fly on the Wall, reviewed by Funden

For reference, I am reviewing A Fly on the Wall, by AmeliaTanaka.

I like this blog. The atmosphere about it is... hard to describe, but I like it. I like how it started as someone who already knew the Fears, but wasn't some pretentious jerk who thought they could discover exactly what they are or how to beat them. Silent just wanted to research them and see if he could help. This is one of the major selling points of this blog, for me, anyways. Too many blogs have been made recently with people attempting to study the Fears and have all the answers.

The plot progression went pretty well, though I think the plot with the Quiet and Silent's friend committing suicide were kind of... abrupt, is the only word I can think of. The Quiet plot was dropped a little to quickly, in my opinion, and the question of why his blog was never affected was never really answered.

Secondly, I saw a lot of relationship tease between Silent and Tallie, so the sudden death was sort of jarring. I feel like a lot more could have been done between the two.

But I digress. The rest of the plot has been moving at a good pace, and very smoothly. Yuki was a nice addition, as well. The character has some interesting motivations, most of which I'm sure haven't come to light yet. I'm looking forward to the next act as well. I'm sure that all of the questions being asked, plus is eye (the hell is with that, anyways) lead to a significant plot point.

Anyways, I'd definitely recommend this to others, though. A great blog, all in all.

*Note that I recognize this blog is ongoing and the contents of this review are subject to change

This Could Be Heaven, reviewed by DJay32

For reference, This Could Be Heaven was written by RedRockingHood and can be found here.

RedRockingHood wrote another short blogpasta, this time it's eight-post This Could Be Heaven. It tells the story of The Captive, a homeless woman who wakes up in an empty and surreal copy of the city she's used to. She observes life in this strange city, noting shadows wandering around, hearing a distinct breathing-esque rhythm under the ground, sees streets change and weather behave as temper tantrums. She eventually sees a younger girl and murders her, content in living alone. The blog ends with her declaring her happiness and refusing to leave the city.

Throughout the story, The Captive refers to the city as a "She," often using metaphors to personify the city's actions (a cafe floor is compared to a scarf, for instance). This gives the story a sort of surreal love feel as the narrator grows more and more content with her location, which I find was a nice touch.

The blog can be much commended for its brevity; eight posts is more than enough time to convey the characterization of The Captive and the city. It can also be commended for its layout, very simple with a black and yellow colour scheme, with a cityscape background being appropriate to the content.

Really, the only thing I wasn't sure of was how quickly and lightly the murder of the girl was played, but even that isn't a legitimate criticism; it's characterization of The Captive, helping to foreshadow her being content to stay at the end.

With a fascinatingly surreal story, a simple length and blog display, and no actual criticisms of mine, This Could Be Heaven was well-written and speaks highly for RedRockingHood's writing talent. This is definitely a story I'd recommend reading; it can be read in a matter of ten minutes or less.

(Edit: Turns out the gender of The Captive was actually never given within the context of the story. Or out of it. My bad, I suppose I assumed Captive was a female.)

Vincent (from Pyre for the Heart), character analysis by RedRockingHood

I've chosen to analyse the infamous main character, Vincent, from 'Pyre for the Heart', written by Fearblogger Malus. To give some background, Pyre is an not-yet-complete blog of our villain protagonist, who is putting a girl's diary up for the world to see after she scorns him. And they say women are the ones to beware, come the whole scorning-thing...
As he types up this girl's diary and he gives up glimpses into his own life, we start seeing some recognisable faces - hey there, Red Cap and Brute! - so it's shaping up to be an intriguing Fearblog. My focus, though, is on Vincent himself.

(Note: this analysis/review will be as spoiler-free as possible.)

From the get-go, we see a lot of evidence that Vincent isn't a character that we're meant to be cheering for. He's hurt, he's angry, and he's being quite petty about it. Vincent was spurned by a girl named Lois last semester, and to get revenge he starts putting her personal journal online for their entire school (and the rest of the Internet) to read. Already, I have to give kudos to Malus - there is a very distinct shift in the way both characters write.
Vincent will throw in his input as we read about Lois's accounts, and we get to see a bit more of his jerkass side. He's hypocritical, saying things out of spite that are completely contrary to the his initial self-portrayal; he claims he's on the high ground and ignoring the fact that he's wrestling through the mud.
As his posts continue to go online, he attracts the attention of some of our well-known (and lesser-known) Fearblog commenters, who proceed to leave cryptic comments (the way any good commenter would). There are two options the writer has, when this occurs: to ignore the comments for the sake of the plot, or have the character respond and let the plot proceed naturally.
Malus avoided the trap of having comments shape the plot by having the events Vincent/Lois documented occur last semester - that leaves Vincent plenty of room to talk to his commenters, and he does so in the style of any anonymous guy sniping back at the people seemingly trolling him. In fact, he takes an entire comedically-done post to snark at them.
The last bit of fact taken from the blog is this: one of the girls Lois writes about, Vivian, turns up in a post that's entirely Vincent's. Here's where I avoid the spoilers. The conclusion is - we see a glimpse into Vincent's life that doesn't involve him sniping at a would-be girlfriend or people who disapprove of him. Vincent has friends. He's liked by a group of people, in his life away from his keyboard.

So, my conclusions about this character?
I love that I don't love Vincent. When I say 'his life away from his keyboard', I mean that I can believe he has one. Vincent is flawed; an emotional, spiteful teenager who lashes out and hurts people in the way so many teenagers do. Over the Internet.
A guy like Vincent is believable. His actions aren't so monstrous that you recoil, and they never go beyond the capability of an angry teen - considering we've got Fear influence at play, any overpowered acts of spite could be hand-waved away. The way Vincent is written, though, such a thing isn't necessary.
He's a bully online, he has friends in real life, and he gets in trouble for his actions. He's a hormonal jerk - and weren't we all in high school? I, personally, can compare Vincent's attitude to my own when I was in ninth grade.
Boiling it all down, Vincent is horribly and beautifully human, and I look forward to reading more about him.

Lacuna Urbis, reviewed by DJay32

For reference, Lacuna Urbis was written by Funden and can be found here.

Lacuna Urbis was a 43-post blog(ella?) about "Benzene," a character who sets up an idle blog to talk about life and Team Fortress 2 only to shortly wind up in the hospital, where the story takes a significant turn down the rabbit hole, becoming a mystery/adventure story about exploring this strange new empty city and learning about a medical conspiracy. Benzene is a subject in what seems to be an experiment with "Herr Doctor's" eldritch medicine and an organization focusing on him. The blog ends as Benzene finds an exit to the city and uncovers information about the organization before being apprehended.

Admittedly, I don't know all there is to know about this plot. The medical experiments were detailed in textdumps throughout the latter half of the blog, and definitive answers were rarely given. This, coupled with Benzene's capture at the end of the story, leads me to suspect Lacuna Urbis to be either incomplete or to be expanded upon in a later blog. The current story is.. well, it works for what it's worth, but it's not particularly compelling. Personally, I found the most interesting and memorable part of the story to be the former half of the story, wherein Benzene explores the surreal and empty city. The idea of exploring an odd location, never sure of what or who you'll find, appeals to me. But I feel this section of the story didn't last long enough before switching to a lot of letters and documents with deliberately vague and cryptic messages.

There was a subplot regarding Benzene entering the city with a group of other travelers, but he leaves them early on and finds them dead later. This could have worked with a bit more effort; the story didn't give us much reason to care for these characters, especially not considering Benzene was so quick to leave them. Their deaths had no significant impact on the story, which doesn't say much when they're the only characters who aren't antagonists or the narrator.

Regarding the antagonists, there was a "Beakman" character who was seen from time to time and actually provided a nice antagonist for the early posts. He seemed just ambiguous enough to pose a threat to the group of protagonists, but then Benzene left and the threat of being in close quarters with an ambiguous menace was dropped. The rest of the story didn't even have much of an impact, as the antagonists were almost entirely conveyed through letters and documents left behind.

There wasn't that much of a conflict here, I suppose is what I'm trying to say. Benzene is lost in a strange city, but we find out that the city he's in isn't even much of a threat; it's the doctors experimenting on him who are. But he doesn't seem that threatened by them for most of the story; the focus is on exploring and reading documents that have been left behind. The ending of the story, where Benzene finds himself in a facility of the antagonist doctors, probably has the most suspense of the whole story, as he is legitimately threatened and in enemy territory there. But he's apprehended in a matter of a few posts, ending the entire blog.

This sort of exploration-focused story can definitely work, but Lacuna Urbis didn't feel as if it was written to work that way. I think it needed to be longer, to spend more time on the exploration and the antagonists. Where there's no conflict, spend some time using descriptive imagery to immerse the reader in the mysterious environment. Where there's a conflict, keep it going.

On the positive side, the blog's design is very easy to follow and the background is creative enough to make the blog stand out on its own. I felt almost compelled to keep reading simply because it looked original and accessible! Funden did a great job with that.

I did not dislike Lacuna Urbis. Funden seemed to have been trying for some interesting things that he simply fell short on. Writing isn't the kind of thing you get perfectly every time; it takes patience and persistence, so I have faith in him as a writer. Hopefully we can see more from him in the future, and hell, I'd love to see him work more with the "exploring mysterious locales" concept, where the focus of the story is on the location rather than anything else.

Notes from the Condemned, reviewed by DJay32

For reference, Notes from the Condemned was written by MesserTod and can be found here.

Notes from the Condemned is the 79-post tragedy of Thomas Blake, a man with a confusing life. He starts the blog out complaining about hearing noises in his home, only to discover evidence of an eldritch horror known as The Choir affecting his perception. Posts are spent performing tests to document the pattern and behaviour of the phenomenon, to better help Thomas remain sane as his senses are obfuscated, and many posts later on are commented on by the enigmatic figure "The Advisor," who does not give much information about himself but claims to have methods to help Thomas out.

Over the course of the blog, Thomas descends into insanity, comes back out of it, uncovers hints of a link between The Plague Doctor and The Archangel, and is hunted by The Eye before going on the run and killing himself, thinking The Archangel's afterlife would be the best choice. The Advisor takes over the blog for the final stretch, vowing to avenge Thomas by staging several assaults on The Archangel's cults while posting documents from The Plague Doctor's servants in keeping with the blog's focus on research and few kept secrets. The blog ends with a eulogy for the late Thomas Blake, as given by the Advisor.

As a Fearblog, Notes from the Condemned has some interesting plot points. The complexity of the Plague Doctor/Archangel alliance is fascinating, and the way that the blog is told means that the majority of confusing questions given earlier on get satisfying answers by the end. Though the details of the Advisor are not part of the answers, it feels like that fits well; this blog is about Thomas, and thus it ends when he is avenged properly. The revelations given by the documents in the endgame are all relevant to him and him alone, giving an appropriate catharsis to the mystery-filled story.

On another note, the character of Thomas's girlfriend was incredibly likable. She was an admirably generous woman, often supporting Thomas even when he was at his lowest point and listening to him and assisting with his tests. As a result, her death felt like one of the most significant turning points for the story. By that point, it just made sense for the blog to end with Thomas's death. So this was well done on that part.

But now we come to my criticisms. I will allow this blog's heavy focus on comments, as that was established as early as the first post and remained fairly consistent throughout. But as a result, the progression of the story felt awkward. Thomas learned of The Choir alarmingly fast, between two single posts early on. I feel there could have been a better introduction to them rather than just a link in a comment. And a lot of the comments directly lampshaded hidden text during the more confusing bits, which is all well and good, but Thomas's replies often bordered on narm. I know it's more realistic to have a blogger reply to a comment if he doesn't remember writing a post or a passage, but I really think it would have been more effective simply to not have Thomas respond at all. At the very least, to the ones regarding the hidden text. The writing, itself, made it fairly clear that Thomas did not consciously write it; lampshading that is spoonfeeding it to us.

Furthermore, the subplot featuring The Eye towards the end felt, frankly, like it had no place in the story. It just came out of nowhere; there was no mention of The Eye in the blog before this, no hint that The Eye might possibly want to observe and punish Thomas, and it really just came out of nowhere. It lasted for such a lengthy period of time and featured, from what I recall, the death of Thomas's girlfriend, so it was clearly a significant plot point, but it came out of nowhere! There was no precedent! It was, as it were, anticlimactic.

Then there's the issue of the blog's design. A default layout, not exactly giving the blog bonus points, but at the same time I can easily forgive this, considering Thomas doesn't strike as the sort of character to put that much effort into designing his blog. So it's.. a design. Neither good nor bad.

Notes from the Condemned was far from a bad blog, I stress. It had some great points to it, some well-written characters and some events that I found thematically excellent. But it still had too much of the "average blog" feel to it, by which I mean there was such a clear focus on realism and comments that often stood dissonant to the plot itself. As this was MesserTod's first Fearblog, this doesn't speak anything bad for him! Notes provided a good read overall, and if he should choose to release further blogs, I'll be glad to read them.

LITTLE SLICES: THE INSOMNOBLOG, reviewed by DJay32

For reference, LITTLE SLICES: THE INSOMNOBLOG was written by Buliwif and can be found here.

LITTLE SLICES was a 39-post blog about Thomas Jameson, a man with insomnia who chronicles his attempts to get a full night's sleep as well as the strange events of his town. He goes through various different sleep techniques, and homeopathic pills seem to work until he begins getting dreams of a faceless man. His local news gives reports of missing children, and Thomas even sees what he thinks are the ghosts of two missing children from fifteen years prior. He also hooks up with a girl he'd been eyeing for a while, and the two of them try to help a friend when her husband disappears entirely, only for the friend to disappear as well. Thomas finds their bodies strung up in the woods and calls the police, only for his girlfriend to disappear as well, whereupon Thomas crafts two makeshift explosives and follows the beast into the woods, where he watches his love interest be dissected. He pulls the pin and sets the forest ablaze, only to survive and post in his blog that the faceless man is still alive and waiting outside his door. The blog ends.

The story's fairly standard Slender Man blog conventions, though it's written creatively enough to stand alone well. Thomas is a believable character with good merits and bad merits, the plot points that happen all happen with precedent, and the Slender Man is written with enough surreal nature to give me goosebumps. The side characters, whenever they come up, are minor enough not to annoy, but still likable enough to care when they disappear. And for what it's worth, this story is just the right length before it starts to get boring! Really, this story checks out on all the elements of a solid blog.

But then the ending is kinda really unnecessary. If the blog had ended on the previous post, it would have been clear that Thomas had died trying to save Steph from the Slender Man, and it would have been subtle enough to give chills. But instead we get a detailed action post with a dissection and with hints of the Slender Man having some inner appearance that the faceless man is just a facade for. There's no hint of what this is, so this claim is utterly meaningless and only served as narm for me. We also get a full shot of tentacles, tentacles which had had no precedent in the story and again only served as narm. Without this last post, the Slender Man is a mysterious horror creature. With the last post, he's a tentacled eldritch abomination who I can rather easily predict the conventions to. Plus, the last post expects us to believe Thomas survived an explosion of 4,000 degrees, only for the entire post to be rendered pointless anyway by the fact that the Slender Man survives. The blog still ends on a faux-ambiguous note of Thomas going out to the Slender Man with a grenade, except now there's no mystery left to any of the plot points.

Now, don't get me wrong. There are blogs that can pull off detailed action posts with the Slender Man well. But they don't do it on the final post after a full blog of realistic horror. The action posts go in the middle so they don't come out of left field.

While I'm criticizing things, I feel the need to bring up the post titled "SLENDER MAN." In this post, Thomas comes back from finding Cynthia and Steve's bodies in the woods, and he decides to look up this faceless being on the internet. He then finds out all the stories of the fictional Slender Man as well as its Something Awful creation. I.. yes, I found this narmy as well. Incredibly. The idea that the protagonist is being pursued by a fictional creature can work, but not when it's only suddenly brought up right at the end of a blog. This reveal needs clues and hints, established motifs! As it stands, it feels more like the blog arbitrarily decided to link itself to the rest of the mythos rather than staying standalone like it had been setting up all this time.

One more criticism, though this one is far more minor! The characters Wednesday and Pugsley were also the source of much narm for me, but I fully admit that this one is entirely just my opinion. Their introduction actually made sense (as much as that's possible with surreal ghost children), and their actions bordered on creepy. They were good characters to include; I just personally hate kids.

Finally, there's the point of the blog's layout. It's a default look, standard, nothing special. But the background provides an unnecessary dissonance from the content. The background is that of a snowy mountain seen through condensated lenses, which of course has nothing to do with the story itself. Yes, this is just a default background, so I suppose it works with Thomas' "Average Guy" personality. But he's not even an average guy; he has distinct quirks and even speaks to the blog as if it's a separate character. I feel the customization was a missed opportunity in this case. Doesn't take any points away, but still missed.

LITTLE SLICES: THE INSOMNOBLOG is a good first blog. Buliwif shows clear understanding of the art of making a story realistic while maintaining creepiness, and even the controversial action bits themselves were written very well. I think he needs to work on his representation of eldritch antagonists, but things like that come with practice. I have much hopes for him, and I can say I enjoyed reading this blog.