A Brief History
October 30th, also known as “Mischief Night” or “Devil’s Night,” is usually known for various pranks practiced prior to Halloween by children, teenagers and sometimes even adults. Perhaps instead of going out terrorizing the land, dear reader, you might curl up with a warm computer and watch some of the creepiest videos to appear on YouTube!
Digging Deeper
In the first of our three-part series, we turn to videos concerning topics that may or may not be real. We are of course referring to internet urban legends known as creepypastas. While YouTube is filled with videos on the subject of creepypastas, by far the best compilations of these short stories are those found on the excellent Tats TopVideos channel. While we do not know what kind of video converter Tats used to make these videos, they are of outstanding quality. For a taste of the videos, you should first watch:
The above video reveals the titles of the entries in their stellar series. Next, we recommend watching…
Of the gaming urban legends, the most notable, Polybius, is the only one out of 22 to get its own page on Wikipedia, but what about non-gaming internet urban legends? We first recommend for that you watch the classic version of the list:
Tats subsequently uploaded a revised version at…
On these lists, the only entries to be currently covered in individual articles on Wikipedia are Robert the Doll and Slenderman. The third (or fourth, depending if you consider the non-gaming video lists separate entries) concerns rituals and can be watched below:
These rituals do have a number of world folkloric inspirations that are covered in Wikipedia articles: Bloody Mary, Kuchisake-onna, Tulpa, and Ubume. Moreover, the entry for The Elevator Ritual mentions an actual incident that occurred at Los Angeles’s Cecil Hotel.
Finally, Tats has offered up the longest entry in his series with an exploration of alleged lost episodes of infamous television shows:
Come back tomorrow for the creepiest YouTube videos from talented amateur directors! You can already learn more about some of these directors on our sister site here.
Question for students (and subscribers): What is the creepiest video you have ever seen on YouTube? Please let us know in the comments section below this article.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Davis, Zachary Ryan and David Rosalio Esparza. Creepypasta: Black Edition. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2014.
