Building A Realistic Slender Video Series

I recently introduced myself here and discussed my series, "Decoders", a parallel prequel to some of the events of Marble Hornets.

It was at that time that someone said to me,

"There's a lot of intense entries, is there anything left for the later part of the series?"

And while it has received praise, as I am building the scripts towards the end of the series(always write before you record, never do both at the same time), I began to wonder what makes a good series?

We've seen a lot of these take time, IE Marble Hornets having passive entries, Darkharvest and EverymanHybrid taking months with small episodes, and while we do understand entries do not override life, and people get busy, I also feel like series moving forward should not take the, and excuse me if this sounds any bit discriminatory or racist, "White Clueless Guy" route.

Let's take a look at Paranormal Activity for a sentence. In this movie, a guy finds out that his house is haunted, and that he's seen everything creepy on camera, and instead of leaving, he stays to figure it out. That makes NO SENSE. The reason why I enjoy making my series have many intense moments and a quick moving plot is because LIFE ACTUALLY WORKS THAT WAY. I don't sit around figuring things out, I want this to be OVER with, ASAP. If something looks scary, I'm not sticking around, I gather friends, I'm not alone for most of this stuff. 

What do you think? Do you think series in the next few years should take the approach of a real life decision making cast, or should it become more dramatic and film like?

Hmm i think you are not so wrong with it, maybe it should be a mix of both?

If characters don't investigate a question then nothing would ever happen.

ShadowTurtleInc wrote:

If characters don't investigate a question then nothing would ever happen.

Yeah, we know to investigate. But logic tells us not to do it alone. Not to go unprepared. Jay has gone into that forest without people for the longest time. I know the backstory tells us he can't tell the police, or that he can't have anyone else hurt, but my god....there's no need to rush into this unprepared.

Tim went to kill Alex with A KNIFE. Logic says if you're going after someone, get a bulletproof vest and a gun, try something other than that little weapon. Tim had the pills, that's logic. Jay didn't even want to take them. Things like that. 

I investigate everything in my series, but I don't walk into it alone or not smart enough to understand that this isn't something I can do on my own, you know what I mean?

Decoders wrote:

ShadowTurtleInc wrote:

If characters don't investigate a question then nothing would ever happen.

Yeah, we know to investigate. But logic tells us not to do it alone. Not to go unprepared. Jay has gone into that forest without people for the longest time. I know the backstory tells us he can't tell the police, or that he can't have anyone else hurt, but my god....there's no need to rush into this unprepared.

Tim went to kill Alex with A KNIFE. Logic says if you're going after someone, get a bulletproof vest and a gun, try something other than that little weapon. Tim had the pills, that's logic. Jay didn't even want to take them. Things like that. 

I investigate everything in my series, but I don't walk into it alone or not smart enough to understand that this isn't something I can do on my own, you know what I mean?

Writing this really tired so let's hope I can words good yes.....
Something I say that should be kept in mind always is that people don't always think logically. Paranoia can make you do really stupid and irrational things, even including running off into a seemingly dangerous situation alone, even unprepared with no way to defend yourself. It makes no sense to us because we sit here with clear minds, but the person behind the camera isn't in such a good state of mind. He could have literally not thought of bringing a weapon each time, or even saw no point in it and put his hope in his camera that if something happened, people would know. It makes no sense to us, but to the character, it could make perfect sense.
Keep in mind the mental state of your characters too, and throw in some irrational thinking, and that some times people just do stupid things. (Or they themselves have a pretty dim light upstairs)

I completely understand that, and that's why I enjoy writing my own series as well as just "found footage"/Elemental Stories in themselves. We can ask questions because we're not under that stress that they are, and it can create different pathways for characters. Then you can see X is clearly smarter than Y, but Y get his/her answers faster and more clearer than X. I appreciate that response, as well as all of them