👻

Creepy Images and Stories

Jul 22, 2024

Summary of the Lecture on Creepy Images and Stories

The Rake

  • Origin: Emerged in early 2000s on 4chan forums.
  • Description: Humanoid creature with pale features, long limbs, and large eyes.
  • Photograph: Notorious night-time forest image with a creature having glowing white eyes and a skinny body.
  • Truth: Image was part of marketing for the video game Resistance 3 (2011).
  • Impact: Contributed to the popularity of creepypasta, expanding its mythos.

Teletubbies

  • Television Show: British children’s show from late 1990s, created by Anne Wood and Andrew Davenport.
  • Creepy Photograph: A hospital image with Teletubbies having black, lifeless eyes.
  • Origin: Appeared on Reddit; possibly taken in a Dutch hospital; designed deliberately to be spooky.
  • Context: Initially posted by user JF1984, little more is known about the specifics.

Smile Dog

  • Origin: Linked back to 4chan, particularly the X board.
  • Description: Image called smile.jpg - a husky with a human hand in the background.
  • Legend: Viewing the image compels the viewer to share it to avoid being haunted.
  • Mystery: Exists in three versions; only one has some background information.

Mickey Mouse Basement

  • Description: Distressing photo of a man in a frightening Mickey Mouse costume taken in a dilapidated basement.
  • Popular Theory: It’s a cursed photo or a staged image meant to scare.
  • Mystery: Limited information on origins, but likely a fabricated creepy image for the internet.

Stairs in the Woods

  • Origin: Popularized on Reddit in 2015 by user search and rescue Woods.
  • Description: Unexplained stairs found deep in forests, involved in SAR (search and rescue) tales.
  • Reality: Actually an art installation by Bruce Allen in 1988, called The Observatory.
  • Artwork: Stairway leading to nowhere, painted black for forest contrast.

Conclusion

These images and stories, often stemming from forums like 4chan and Reddit, highlight the intersection of internet culture with traditional storytelling. Many of these myths have mundane origins but significant impacts on online folklore.

Full transcript