Slender Man: Descent

Full title: A Wall Drawn In Descent Into Madness by the Slender Mans Victim
Finally! After way longer than it should've taken, here it is! And done in time for the deadline I proposed to and ! Here it finally is! My tribute drawing to the Slender Man! - the one thing that has managed to give me sleepless nights in a decade!

Well... almost done. You may notice his lack of feet.

For those who don't lurk around the darker parts of the internet, the Slender Man was created in a forum called Something Awful and since then he has become very infamous, to the point of an urban legend. Some people claim he is real, especially those who have genuine pictures of him ([link] [link] [link] for more, just search "Slender Man" or "Slender Man sightings" and you should get a whole lot of pictures showing him). There are genuine cases featuring elements very similar to this creature, which in turn have started to convince more people of his existence. One of the most popular would be the interview of Thomas Nealy concerning the dissappearance of his daughter ([link]). Whether I believe in him or not I'll leave to your (and my) judgement, but in either case all stories and videos surrounding him are pretty scary.

Slender Man is described, as the name suggests, very tall and slender. His height varies - most commonly he's very tall, maybe eight feet, but there are cases of him being described as ten feet or higher. He wears a black suit with a red tie and he is very pale, in fact his skin is white. He is almost always described as not having a face but in the original Something Awful version he has a face. Should you (for some indefinably stupid reason) look for him your best shot would be a forest, for it is often claimed to be his most natural environment, presumably for how easy it would be for him to blend in among the trees, or to go out on a foggy day, for when he actively hunts the fog covers him well. All attempts at consciously catching him on a photography or video is often failed because electronics seem to either malfunction per automatic, or he has the ability to make them fail, as seen on many videos on YouTube. That said, it is possible to catch him on tape or photo, though it's often by accident.

As most of you know or may notice I am a big aficianado of Lovecraftian horror and few things are as Lovecraftian as the Slender Man. He can extend his limbs and body, he can grow more arms or sprout tentacles from his back, very little is known about him and at times he appears to be able to bend the space/time continuum. Sometimes referred to as the Operator he has servants that are virtually insane. It's possible they are his former victims, though there is no proof of that.
Slender Man is also very Lovecraftian in the effects he has on his victims. In close proximity to him (ranging sometimes from ten to a hundred feet) his victims often experience what is called the Slender Sickness - they feel suddenly nauseated and experience an extreme headache, and in some cases they start to spit blood. Another common side effect is extreme paranoia and panic which lasts for days, though since this usually don't manifest until the victims see him it's not certain it's a part of the Slender Sickness.
Finally, his most Lovecraftian trait is the way he drives his victims to the edge of insanity before he takes them. The most common description given by his victims is at first he stalks them from afar, letting them see him from time to time, letting them know he is watching them, slowly to grow more aggressive, letting his minions torment his victims as he grows more and more aggressive, hunting them, appearing close to them.
Truth be told, I think it's very possible for Slender Man to be described as one of the thousand masks of Nyarlathotep!

The original idea of Slender Man was that he would go after children. Only children is supposed to see him and they're either terrified or they're drawn to him. It's believed that Slender Man can control the minds of his victims to some extent, which is why some children are drawn towards him. However, more and more cases keeps appearing where grown men (though usually very young - between eighteen and thirty) claims contact with him. What he does with his victims is unknown. Some says he merges, assimilates and absorbs them, others say he kills them and a few claims he takes them to a dimension beyond our own - it's difficult to know for sure when no bodies are ever found.

Possibly, and very likely one of the main reasons Slender Man has become so infamous is because of the videos posted by YouTube users like MarbleHornets ([link]), totheark ([link]), and TribeTwelve ([link]), for they all post videos where they claim direct contact with him, although they rarely call him Slender Man, but seems completely uninformed on what he/it is. In these videos (with the exception of totheark, who seems more like he is one of Slender Mans minions) the users show how they are stalked and tormented by the Slender Man in a found-footage style of camera use. This has caused several stories and movies concerning Slender Man to come in the works, the first one being a scool project called Windigo, where Slender Man is claimed to be a windigo ([link]). Windigo was a direct-to-DVD-release, but a feature length movie featuring Doug Jones as Slender Man will come to selected theatres this August ([link]).

As for my drawing, like I said, it took much longer than it should have, but I'm quite pleased with the result, not counting his lack of feet - while I picture him in nice, fine shoes there aint a single picture showing his feet and try as I might I couldn't get the shoes right, so I decided to ignore them for now. I will however update this later on with his shoes.
This drawing features most prominently Slender himself, standing in a room, leaning against a wall full of cluster graffiti with words and messages concerning him. The two symbols circle prominently around Slender Man, the circle with the cross being the Operator symbol, which often is a positive indication that he is near or is coming, and the other is the Observer symbol.
The Observer only features in the TribeTwelve videos, where he is the only genuine minion of Slender Man and seems to have powers similar to those of Slender Man himself (most prominently his ability to dissappear and reappear), probably bestowed upon him by his master.
The tentacles were by far the trickiest part of this drawing. I wanted to give him tentacles, but I didn't want to risk messing up what I already had done and it took me a while to figure out how to solve it - by making the tentacles part of the carvings/graffiti instead of his actual tentacles. Also, it took me a few attemts to figure ot how to draw them. At first I just wrote the text and then drew the tentacles, then I thought of first drawing a "writhing" line and then writing along it, and finally fill in the other line, forming the tentacle. The text is the lyrics for the Slender Man song by ZipZapper: [link]
"Slender Man, Slender Man,
All the children try to run.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
To him it's part of the fun.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
Dressed in darkest suit and tie.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
You most certainly will die.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
His branching arms are for collecting.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
His face is empty of expressing.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
He won't let you say goodbye.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
You most certainly will die.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
Sometimes hums a lowly drone.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
He will wander 'round your home.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
Blends in well within the trees.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
In the fog he's hard to see.

Slender Man, Slender Man,
Dressed in darkest suit and tie.
Slender Man, Slender Man,
You most certainly will die."
The texts are to some part inspired by videos and texts I've read about Slender Man and some of it is what I'd imagine someone driven to the edge of insanity by Slender Man would draw/carve into a wall. Most of it is inspired by the videos posted by TribeTwelve, which are my favorites of the videos. While TribeTwelve is the one who is most obviously faked I still prefer these videos because Slender Man is much more active in them than, say Marble Hornets. I will hereby list what comes from where, and what it says, for those who can't quite see it:
"Who is more foolish? The boy that is afraid of the dark or the man that is afraid of the light?" "OBEY" [link]
"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT?!" [link]
"ABANDON ABDICATE SUCCUMB SUBMIT" [link]

Slender Man belongs to no one and therefor this drawing belongs to me.