A world between all dimensions, home of the Lords in Black, the Eldritch Abominations responsible for most of Hatchetfield's paranormal phenomena.

SPOILER WARNING: Spoilers for the Black and White's role in Nerdy Prudes Must Die are unmarked. Proceed with caution.

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The Lords in Black

As a Whole

The Lords in Black

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Time Bastard" | "Jane's a Car" | "Honey Queen"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lords_in_black_2.png

Hannah: "Those are... her brothers. They're bad."

Out of the depths of hell and back, us spawn of the Black and White
Cover our souls with robes of black and take up the arms of night
Nibbly wants his sacrifice and Wiggly wants his wrath
We dance around the pentagram and take all our kingdoms back
Burble the spell that gets it done, babble it on command
Won't stop until all the blood is drawn the Lords in Black demand

Five brothers who inhabit the Black and White, generally seen in the form of cuddly dolls with squishy tummies.

Arc Words: Incantations and prayers to the Lords in Black always begin with the words "We invoke the names", followed by their five names, always in the same order: Pokotho, Bliklotep, T'Noy Karaxis, Nibblenephim, Wiggog Y'wrath. Even outside of the invocation, any time all five are listed, or displayed one by one, it's in that order.
Atrocious Alias: Part of the joke is that the Lords in Black have "true names" that sound appropriately eldritch and Lovecraftian, but that have all been shortened in practice into cutesy nicknames that fit their appearance as cutesy dolls.
Big, Screwed-Up Family: They're described as "brothers" and their Good Counterpart Webby as their "sister", but what exactly this means for a cosmic Eldritch Abomination (such as whether there are "parents" of any kind) has been left unanswered.
Bright Is Not Good: Their names may be the Lords in Black, but they're mainly associated with bright, pastel colors, evident in their most recognisable forms, their plush forms and their teen forms in Nerdy Prudes Must Die.
Color-Coded for Your Convenience: All of the Lords in Black are primarily associated with one color — green for Wiggly, purple for Blinky, yellow for Tinky, blue for Pokey and pink for Nibbly.
- As a way to complicate this, the Lords in Black as a whole, as the name implies, are associated with black, which is the total absence of color (and their portraits are of them against a black background with a dim eerie glow of their respective colors). The color red is noticeably absent from this list, but as the color of blood seems to be generally associated with their evil acts — Uncle Wiley's presence is announced by a dim red Infernal Background and Blinky's "eye turns red" when he gets angry.
- A few of them also incorporate the others' colors to some degree — the iris of Blinky's eye is purple like his body but the sclera is yellow, and his "bright yellow eye" is referred to multiple times in the text. (Wiggly's eyes, though not nearly so prominent, are the same color.)
Creepy Cute: Invoked. All of them are designed to look like grotesque but lovable stuffed toys, or at least they all have a toylike representation of their "true form". Lampshaded in Black Friday, as the Wiggly dolls considered to be adorable by most of the cast, but Tom later points out that it's actually kind of ugly.
Dark Is Evil: Played with. In their "true form" in the Black and White they definitely play this straight — President Goodman describes their realm as "blackness, endless blackness" — but in their doll forms they comically subvert this by being associated with bright and pastel colors.
Deal with the Devil: Stephanie, Pete and Grace make one with them in Nerdy Prudes Must Die, agreeing that one of them will give up the thing they cherish most in return for the Lords in Black getting rid of Max Jägerman's ghost for them.
Eldritch Abomination: They're all absurdly powerful Reality Warpers whose "true" appearances would obviously be horrifyingly grotesque if they weren't translated into cartoon mascot form.
Evil Laugh: Wiggly, Blinky, Tinky, and Nibbly each display a rather distinctive and unsettling Signature Laugh. Pokey, however, is more subdued than the others.
A Form You Are Comfortable With:
- "The Witch in the Web" finally gives us a vague Hand Wave for why they all have a form as plush children's toys, specifically — Willabella Muckwab makes dolls in their likeness in her dreamscape to try to seduce Hannah into being possessed by her. When the Chosen One and the most powerful human in the world is a child, taking the form of a doll to try to control her makes sense.
- When summoned to the Black Altar at what is now Hatchetfield High School, they appear as human teenagers dressed like stereotypes of high school cliques.
Fur and Loathing: Their teen form costumes all incorporate vibrantly-colored fur accessories, making them partially still resemble their fuzzy doll versions (and perhaps their true selves, which have been vaguely implied to all be fuzzy as well) as well as carrying the menacing and sinister vibes of wearing fur.
Greater-Scope Villain: They appear in roughly half of all Hatchetfield stories, and tend to take the Big Bad role when they do so. It's also implied that their influence is what brings supernatural oddities to the various versions of Hatchetfield, making them responsible, whether directly or indirectly, for the events of stories they're not in.
I Have Many Names: As you'll see in their individual folders, each has their Lovecraftian true name, the cutesy nickname derived from it, and a number of menacing Red Baron titles. In an interview post-season 1 of Nightmare Time, it was revealed that each Lord in Black has one official epithet, along with other unofficial ones applied to them in other contexts.
Lovecraft Lite: They're basically a symbol of the whole concept of Lovecraft Lite — horrifying Lovecraftian Eldritch Abominations reimagined as Super-Deformed cutesy little mascots. How defeatable they are, and therefore how much this is fully Lovecraft Lite instead of a straight-up Cosmic Horror Story, remains to be seen; at least a few people have managed to escape from them, as seen in Black Friday and "Watcher World".
Marionette Motion: Their avatars seen during the summoning ritual at Hatchetfield High look like normal highschool students but move in jerky and exaggerated ways.This creates the impression that the avatars are being puppeted by things much greater that are not used to these forms and don't care enough about Steph, Peter, and Grace's comfort to avoid scaring them.
Meaningful Name:
- Their cute nicknames, in addition to being shortened forms of their true names, also conveniently refer to their appearance and behavior: "Wiggly" for a creature with wiggling tentacles, which manages to be eerie when the song "Wiggle" describes him wiggling his way through a portal to Earth; "Blinky" for The Watcher who manifests as a Cyclops, "Tinky" for a creature who tinkers with experimental devices for time travel and a mysterious golden cube, and "Nibbly" for a creature with a mouth for a face who enjoys devouring sacrifices. "Pokey" is the exception, as it doesn't seem to bear any connection to his appearance or his M.O.
- As far as their real names, for the most part they're just gibberish meant to evoke the Lovecraftian deities they are, and each sounding vaguely like a name in a real ancient language. The exceptions are Wiggog Y'wrath, which has the English word "wrath" right there at the end, appropriate for the Top God of an evil pantheon, and Nibblenephim, the eternally-hungry brother with More Teeth than the Osmond Family whose name begins with "nibble", making it all too predictable that his nickname would be "Nibbly".
Merchandise-Driven: In a self-aware parody of franchises like this, the Lords in Black appear as cuddly dolls, Color-Coded for Your Convenience, which hopefully will become Real Life merch Starkid can use to fund their work.
Mouth of Sauron: All of the Lords have so far had in common that they rarely directly manifest in the real world (all being to some degree Sealed Evil in a Can) and must instead act through human avatars. This is, of course, par for the course for the Cthulhu Mythos.
Myth Arc: As mentioned, they appear in person in about half of the Hatchetfield stories. That half of the series reveals more information about them and their overall schemes, while the other half deals with miscellaneous paranormal events which only tangentially, if at all, involve the Lords.
Noble Demon: Depicted this way in Nerdy Prudes Must Die in which they agree to get rid of Jägerman for the protagonists in return for what one of them cherishes the most. They're clearly hoping for this to result in Stephanie having to kill Pete or vice versa, but when Grace outsmarts them by giving up what she cherishes most instead - her chastity - they still hold up their end of the bargain and drag Jägerman into the Black and White despite not getting what they wanted, accepting this as nonetheless a worthy trade. Of course, this may have been Pragmatic Villainy on their part- Grace was broken mentally by giving up her virginity, and she's now looking to take Max's place as Hatchetfield's resident supernatural Serial Killer...
Psychopathic Manchild: Most of the Lords come off as this in some way, befitting their cuddly doll forms. Wiggly sounds like a grown man, but uses cutesy language (for instance, asking his "fwendy-wends" to tickle his "belly-well"). Blinky has a high-pitched, childish voice, created a whole amusement park for his own entertainment and jumps up and down in glee when he's about to witness a bloodbath. Tinky treats humanity the same way a child playing rough with their dolls would, explicitly comparing his victims to toys. The exceptions are Nibbly (who rarely speaks and seems to have no real personality beyond "hungry") and Pokey (who comes across in his physical appearances as The Stoic or a Cold Ham— although he does spend some time in "Yellow Jacket" in the form of a child).
Reality Warper: Although they're thematically associated with certain concepts, all of them seem to have powersets that are vague and unbounded, including being able to arbitrarily mess with people's minds and create illusory realities in a Pocket Dimension.
Series Mascot: After the release of Nightmare Time Season 1, Nick Lang publicly displayed the dolls of the Lords in Black on social media as the new mascots for Nightmare Time and the Hatchetfield series as a whole.
The Smurfette Principle: It's unclear what meaning sex or gender even have for cosmic entities from the Black and White, but the Lords in Black are all referred to as "brothers" while Webby, their singular Good Counterpart, is their "sister".
Super-Deformed: They're humanoid, but in their doll form they all have the proportions of stuffed animals, with giant heads and stubby little limbs, and all but Wiggly having Fingerless Hands.
Void Between the Worlds: They come from the reality that exists outside of and impinges upon all Alternate Universes, known as the "Black and White".
You Cannot Grasp the True Form: This is taken as a given, seeing as they're eldritch gods and regularly take on other forms. In Nerdy Prudes Must Die Pokey states this outright. Wiggly chides Pokey for making this claim, which makes sense as Wiggly's true form was witnessed in Black Friday.

Wiggog Y'wrath / Wiggly

Wiggog Y'wrath, the King in Black / "Tickle-Me Wiggly"

Played by: Jon Matteson | Nick Lang^note

Appears in: Black Friday | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/wiggly_web.png

"Will you be my fwendy-wend?"

^{Click here to see Wiggly's true form in the Black and White}

^{Click here to see Wiggly at the Hatchetfield High School black altar}

Linda: I will wiggle, wiggle, wiggle my way to his side
All the wills that he will have to bend
Oh, when he ascends
The best of all fwendy-wends!

An adorable cartoon mascot whose popularity with the nation's children has recently exploded, making the Tickle-Me Wiggly the most in-demand toy of the holiday season. Later revealed to be the Ruler of the Void Between the Worlds known as the Black and White, and apparently the most powerful of the entities known as the Lords in Black.

Adorable Abomination: An Omnicidal Maniac with just the cutest widdle belly-well!
The Antichrist: Wiggly is an incarnation of everything ugly and self-destructive in the human spirit, and he intends to be physically born on Christmas Day just before the world is destroyed. This is lampshaded with the Shout-Out to The Omen with the name of Becky's employer ("St. Damien's Hospital").
Atrocious Alias: Xander Lee lampshades how surreally disappointing it was to find that the malign godlike entity they'd nicknamed things like "The Lord of Despair" turns out to call itself "Wiggly."
Baby Talk: Wiggly's both creepiest and most annoying trait, and one that he unlike his followers never drops, still talking about his "fwendy-wends" and "belly-well" when gloating to the President of the United States about starting a nuclear war.
Berserk Button: The most intriguing thing about Hannah's mysterious Spirit Advisor Webby the spider is she's the one thing that really pisses Wiggly off.
Wiggly: Webby... is a STUPID BITCH.
Big Bad:
- Linda might be the obvious human bad guy, but we in the audience know from the beginning all the evil this Black Friday will be caused by Wiggly himself.
- Nightmare Time reveals that as the Top God of the Lords in Black, he's the Big Bad and Satanic Archetype of the entire Hatchetfield multiverse.
Big Brother Mentor: "The Web I Spin for You" implies he had this relationship with Webby once, and then made the mistake of betraying her and turning her against him for eternity.
Big Man on Campus: His "teen" form at the Black Altar in Nerdy Prudes appears as the stereotypical prom king, dressed in a letterman jacket and wearing a crown.
Big Ol' Eyebrows: The Wiggly dolls have prominent eyebrows that make their blank expression vaguely angry, as if they weren't enough of a Creepy Doll.
Bland-Name Product: The whole Tickle-Me Wiggly concept is based on the Tickle-Me Elmo Sesame Street toy, whose debut on Black Friday of 1996 is the loose inspiration for the events of, well, Black Friday.
Blue-and-Orange Morality: The show doesn't go too far in trying to make sense of Wiggly's motivations, but Xander does mention to the President that Wiggly being The Omnipotent in his home dimension may mean he simply can't tolerate the existence of a world where he isn't God.
Character Catchphrase: The dolls, at least, have "Tickle my belly-well."
The Chessmaster: Wiggly is much more of The Omniscient than PEIP predicted, and what they thought was his Achilles' Heel — the physical portal they built into the Black and White — was in fact All According to Plan.
The Corrupter: Upon exposure to one of the Wiggly commercials, Wiggly's voice immediately starts to get inside you, nagging you with the idea that all your personal problems and insecurities could somehow be solved by a Wiggly doll. The effect intensifies exponentially with proximity to an actual doll, to the point where even a goody-two-shoes like Becky Barnes Would Hurt a Child. Wiggly's ability to do this is in fact so powerful that it's implied his human avatar, Uncle Wiley, was once Wilbur Cross, MacNamara's mentor, before a single unprepared exposure to the Black and White drove him to a Brainwashed and Crazy Face–Heel Turn.
Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: "The Web I Spin for You" accuses Wiggly of having eventually done this to all of the "witches he summons" to do his bidding, and expresses shock and disappointment that he ended up doing this to his own sister Webby as well.
Companion Cube: A parody of this trope. Most people naturally start slowly doing this with a Tickle-Me Wiggly when they have one, thinking they're imagining it talking to them in the same voice as its "Tickle my belly-well!" Catchphrase. They're wrong — all the words Wiggly speaks are telepathic and come from the true Wiggly, the deity of the Black and White.
Creator Cameo: Nick Lang played Wiggly's voice in the original Black Friday teaser video, before casting Jon Matteson to play him in the show.
Creepy Doll: The Tickle-Me Wiggly.
Creepy High-Pitched Voice: The fact that it's not actually Helium Speech like the Tickle-Me Elmo but is a sensual, adult whisper doing Elmo-style Baby Talk only makes it worse.
The Darkness Gazes Back: Wiggly's "true form" in the Black and White, an enormous glowing pair of eyes opening in otherwise total darkness, barely illuminating the vague shape of a face over a mass of writhing tentacles.
Decon-Recon Switch: An interesting example — back in the 2000s, nerd fandom got so overwhelmed with references to the Cthulhu Mythos that it was popular to take the piss out of the whole thing with parodies like Hello Cthulhu and real-life plush Cthulhu toys to make him into an Adorable Abomination. Now Team Starkid takes it full circle, with Wiggly being a version of Cthulhu who's horribly menacing because he's supposed to be cute and is presented as a kitschy consumer product. You slowly realize the cosmic evil wasn't defanged by becoming a mocking parody of itself, but gained the power to hide in plain sight.
Devil in Plain Sight: The fact that Wiggly is, in fact, a creepy disgusting monster isn't subtle at all — Frank openly makes a joke about it — but it seems to just get chalked up to the weird nature of Flash in the Pan Fads.
Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Not an "early installment" per se, but early promotional materials for Black Friday used the Wiggly doll that Nick Lang handcrafted instead of the version that was mass-produced later on; Nick also voiced Wiggly in these early materials. You can see the original Wiggly design on the main page for Black Friday; most notably, his facial tentacles are made of plastic on the original version, while the final design is plush all over.
Eldritch Abomination: No shit. Behind his cutesy appearance is a timeless demon with incredible power and cruelty.
Faux Affably Evil: The cloying sweetness and talk of being "fwendy-wends" just make Wiggly come off as even more vile than he would anyway — much like Dolores Umbridge (Canon Umbridge, not Starkid Umbridge).
God Is Evil:
- As befits a Lovecraft-inspired story. Wiggly isn't God in our world yet, but he has a surprising amount of influence on us from outside it and seemingly omniscient knowledge of what happens in it. And in his world, the Black and White — explicitly stated to be a higher reality than ours — he is the unquestioned ruler. The song "Made In America" hits the Lovecraftian theme that what Wiggly represents really is a fundamental fact about the nature of the world and human beings ("the very thing that runs the blood of your kind").
- Xander directly compares Wiggly to the Christian God when he compares Wiggly the cosmic entity's relationship with the Wiggly dolls to the Trinity, foreshadowing the reveal that Wiggly intends to be physically born on Christmas as The Antichrist.
- Once Linda is converted to Wiggly's cause, she freely refers to him as "God".
Lovecraft Lite: Well, yeah, he's Cthulhu.
Mascot Villain: Thanks partly to Starkid actually selling Wiggly dolls to the fans, Wiggly has firmly become this for the whole Hatchetfield franchise.
The Nicknamer: Likes calling people by the nicknames other people have called them, to show off his omniscience and get under their skin. He appropriates the nickname "Howie" Xander Lee gave President Goodman, and the nickname "Banana" Ethan and Lex use for Hannah.
Ninja Prop: Wiggly's one in-person appearance in Black Friday is achieved by holding two spotlights above the garlands that have been decorating the stage for the whole show. With the spotlights serving as his eyes, it suddenly becomes clear that the garlands have resembled his tentacled face all along.
No Song for the Wicked: Wiggly himself never actually sings at any point, having Uncle Wiley sing for him in "Made In America", which is probably for the best given his wheezy voice. Averted in Nerdy Prudes Must Die in which he sings "The Summoning" alongside the other Lords in Black.
Non-Standard Character Design: Wiggly dolls look a bit different from those of his brothers, as you can see in the image for the Lords in Black as a group; he's a bit smaller, holds his arms tightly at his sides instead of spread like a teddy bear, is the only one with fingers, and he's entirely made of plush while the others have plastic faces. Out-of-universe, this can be attributed to the fact that Wiggly dolls were mass-produced to promote (and appear in) Black Friday, while the others were handmade for the first season of Nightmare Time; the handmade Wiggly made for Black Friday promotional material looked a bit more like the others, as noted under Early Installment Character-Design Difference. The doll's twisty, tentacled fingers are probably a necessary part of the doll to represent a feature of the real Wiggly, which the other dolls don't need.
The Omniscient: Seems to know pretty much everything that's happening everywhere on Earth and to gloat about this fact in order to put oomph into his Breaking Speeches.
Powered by a Forsaken Child: In a hilariously creepy example, Nick Lang revealed he built the prototype Tickle-Me Wiggly doll by using a Cabbage Patch Kid as a base and building the Wiggly design around it, effectively sealing "Lillian" the Cabbage Patch Girl inside Wiggly's body.
Real After All: The Wiggly character really exists as an extradimensional Lovecraftian deity, although it's hinted that it's only taken on the cutesy name and appearance as a way to mess with us as part of its insane plan. That he and most of his brothers keep up the act in future installments would suggest it's just their schtick no matter what kind of plan they're enacting.
Red Baron: His official title is "The King in Black", a step above the Lords in Black who are his brothers. Before he revealed to PEIP that he goes by "Wiggly", they gave him such lofty names as "the Devil", "the Ruler of the Black and White", and most prominently, "the Lord of Despair".
Santabomination: He's a Cthulhu expy with tentacles made from green tinsel and tries to invade Earth by releasing a hit toy during the Christmas shopping season.
Satanic Archetype: President Goodman outright calls him "The Devil" in Black Friday and no one argues. "The Witch in the Web" has him playing the same role Satan himself does in most stories about a Witch Classic.
Sealed Evil in a Teddy Bear: Wiggly is the most literal possible version of this trope.
Self-Duplication: There's hundreds of Wiggly dolls in the world and each of them is an incarnation of the "real" Wiggly who rules the Black and White
Sickly Green Glow: Wiggly is associated with this — said glow appears onstage whenever Wiggly is speaking to someone or they're coming under his influence, and his realm in the Black and White is completely suffused with it.
Signature Laugh: Wiggly's creepiest trait may be this, what's meant to be a childlike giggle of joy but comes out of his mouth as a wheezing, congested gurgle like a death rattle.
Soul Eating: He openly tells Goodman this is his ultimate goal, to eat him and then eat the world. It seems that it's a natural quality of the Black and White that anything or anyone left there without protection dissolves to become part of Wiggly's Hive Mind, though some people like MacNamara are able to resist.
Take That!: Wiggly isn't just an obvious critique of consumerism and Flash-In-The-Pan Fads but can also be seen as an expression of why people find cutsey mascot characters like Elmo and Barney creepy.
Theme Tune: Has an in-universe one, the "Wiggly Jingle", which plays on his TV commercials and is an obvious riff on the line from The Call of Cthulhu, "In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu lies dreaming."
Wiggly Jingle: Deep down in Drowsy Town, Wiggly is asleep
Dreaming the dream, the sleep of the dead
He desperately needs a fwiendy-wend...
Top God:
- As of The Reveal of the other Lords in Black, it seems that Wiggly is one of five entities ("brothers") of which he is the first and most powerful.
- Willabella Muckwab is a servant of the Lords in Black in general, but specifically serves Wiggly above the others. Hence his return to the series by physically appearing in "The Witch in the Web", which took many viewers by pleasant surprise.
The Voice: Wiggly manifests in our world as a telepathic voice that emerges from the Wiggly dolls whenever someone is near them, which they tend to mistake for their own thoughts if they don't know what's going on. We only see him in his "true form" in the Black and White as a pair of enormous glowing eyes over a mass of tentacles formed by the garlands on the balcony of the stage.
Western Zodiac: When describing the zodiac signs of the main cast Nick Lang added that Wiggly could either be said to have no sign, since as an eternal being he was never born, or be said to be a Capricorn. It turns out that yes, this means that Wiggly intends to be born into physical form on Christmas Day as The Antichrist.

Pokotho / Pokey

Pokotho, the Singular Voice / "Sing-Along Pokey"

Played by: Corey Dorris

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | "Yellow Jacket" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals | "Jane's a Car"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pokotho_web.png

"Join us."

^{Click here to see Pokey at the Hatchetfield High School black altar}

It’s my last of many apologies
It’s hard to see how we go around again
I have to trust there’s a galaxy
Where we succeed
Not a matter of how just a matter of when
Next time
Next time
I’ll find you in the next timeline

The fourth brother to be unveiled, blue with a stone mask for a face from which blue goo steadily drips. As it turns out, the first to play a part in a Hatchetfield story, as later revelations imply him to be responsible for the Hive, the extraterrestrial threat of The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals.

The Assimilator: His entire modus operandi, extinguishing the individuality of everyone that he infects and turning them into extensions of himself.
Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance: His mask resembles a pockmarked meteor, like the one that brought the Hive.
The Bad Guy Wins: As the one responsible for the events of TGWDLM, he currently rules one of the realities of the Hatchetfield multiverse, as the Langs have stated that the Hive successfully conquered the world in a period of two and a half weeks after the end of the show. As far as we know, even his brother Wiggly can't claim as much at this time.
Cool Mask: Wears a mask made of stone with a mysterious blank expression, permanently weeping and dribbling blue goo from cracks in its surface.
Drama Club: His "teen form" at the Black Altar in Nerdy Prudes represents this archetype, being dressed for a Shakespeare play and dramatically brandishing his signature mask.
Foreshadowing: His "Singular Voice" epithet was spoken well before his introduction, by Professor Hidgens in the song "Let It Out".
Greater-Scope Villain: Of The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals.
Hive Queen: He is the true Hive Queen of the Hive Mind in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, providing an explanation for why Emma's plan to blow up the meteorite to destroy the Hive Mind didn't work (since the meteorite was only an extension of a being who was both immortal and safely hidden away in Another Dimension).
Knight of Cerebus: He comes across as the only one of the Lords in Black to have no sense of humor whatsoever. In his first direct appearance (via Otho) he's nothing but menacing and grim, seemingly the one most committed to his role as an eldritch god. His other appearances muddy this impression, though. If he intended the Hive to be what it was (as opposed to, as some have suggested, that occurring by accident because it began in a theatre where Mamma Mia! was being performed) that's a pretty clear sign that he's just as darkly whimsical as his brothers. In Nerdy Prudes Must Die, though he cheerfully sings and dances with the rest of Lords in Black and enjoys the discomfort the human characters feel in his presence, his taunts are the most grandiose and he refrains from the joking and giggling of the others. His appearance as a stereotypical "theater kid" might be meant to convey that Pokey prefers to be dramatic and theatrical.
Meaningful Name: "The Singular Voice", which Webby explains in "Yellow Jacket" refers to his omnicidal narcissism, might also be a Stealth Pun about "singing". His nickname, however, seems to avert it; unlike his brothers, the name "Pokey" doesn't seem to carry any significance.
Omnicidal Maniac: Webby elaborates in "Yellow Jacket" on Pokey's motivation and why he's called the Singular Voice — he hates everything but himself and wants to be the only thing left in existence, a level of evil that seemingly goes beyond that of any of his brothers.
"He might not be the hungriest, or the cleverest. The trickiest, or the most sadistic. But of all my brothers, Pokey is the most... uncompromising. He hates every voice that's not his own. He wants everything dead but him."
Red Baron: His official epithet, furthering the implications about his role in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, is "the Singular Voice".

Bliklotep / Blinky

Bliklotep, the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes / "Blinky"

Played by: James Tolbert ("Watcher World") | Lauren Lopez (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "Watcher World" | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/blinky_web.png

"Welcome to the show!"

^{Click here to see the "Thousand Eyes"}

^{Click here to see Blinky at the Hatchetfield High School black altar}

One thousand eyes are watching
And they're watching you
And they’re watching me
All of the time
I know that you’re not sleeping
‘Cause they’re watching you
And they’re watching me
All through the night

The second brother revealed to the audience, purple with a single gigantic eye. The mascot of popular amusement park Watcher World.

Actor Allusion: James Tolbert, who plays Blinky himself and his various human avatars in the park like the Blinky mascot, Snigglotts and the Carnival Barker, actually did work at Disneyland as a costumed performer in 2019.
Alien Blood: When shot, he bleeds a purple sludge.
As Long as It Sounds Foreign: "Bliklotep" is similar to the Cthulhu Mythos character Nyarlathotep, whose name ends in -hotep ("peace") like the name of an Egyptian pharaoh.
Bad Boss: As @user-il1db4fr6t says in the comments, "get these poor guys a union."
Sniggle 1: In drowsy town, we shake and move / And don’t upset our boss
Sniggle 2: Cuz if we do, his eye gets red
Sniggles 1&2: And he might just spill our guts!
Sniggle 1: And if you wake him, we die. Don’t blink. Don’t you ever blink. Don’t you fucking blink.
Sniggles 1&2: In Drowsy Town, we do our best / To never ever cry / Cuz if we do, our boss gets mad / And then we don’t eat for a week.!
Sniggle 3: I’m so hungry...
Big Bad: Of "Watcher World". Never ends up being quite as big a bad as Wiggly was, with the stakes in "Watcher World" staying strictly personal for Bill and Alice rather than rising to apocalyptic levels.
Bigger on the Inside: Implied to be the size of a human in a mascot costume but can bleed enough to nearly flood the park, washing Alice and Bill to the car park.
The Caligula: "Watcher World" and in particular "The Blinky Song" depict Blinky as a capricious Mood-Swinger who can go from seemingly jolly and kind to murderously angry in an instant (when "his eye gets red") and all of whose cruel actions both to his Sniggle minions and the humans who fall under his influence are for his own amusement.
Call-Back: Despite the creators saying there's no canonical connection between the Hatchetfield series and other Starkid shows, Blinky's official title of "the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes" is obviously a carry-over from The Trail to Oregon!, where it was a deliberately Breaking the Fourth Wall reference to the audience, for whose amusement all the characters' suffering was engineered. Definitely fuel for theories — enough for Nick Lang to eventually submit and say that perhaps TTO is a Show Within a Show that's been seen at the Starlight Theatre.
Creepy Doll: The Blinky dolls. In a series mostly devoid of actual props, Nick Lang did in fact make a Blinky doll that he holds up onscreen in any scene where a Blinky doll plays a role, and just like the Wiggly doll before it it is a masterful example of Creepy Cute design. invoked
Crocodile Tears: One of the most hilariously grating traits of Blinky's followers is their insincere attempts to get his victims to feel pity for him, saying that by defying his authority they have — going along with the Eye Motifs — "made Blinky cry!"
Crosscast Role: Though the Lords usually present as masculine, his appearance at the Black Altar in Nerdy Prudes is as a long-haired Emo Teen played by Lauren Lopez.
Cyclops: Blinky is one of these rendered as a unnerving mascot, with a fuzzy purple teddy bear body supporting a yellow Giant Eye of Doom.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: When Blinky fully manifests himself in the Funhouse, Alice manages, by some combination of Heroic Willpower and The Power of Love, to put her Improbable Aiming Skills to use despite the panic attack she feels coming on, and put a bullet through the eye of a god.
Alice: (Flipping the Bird) Fuck you, Blinky.
Eye Motifs: Blinky is represented by this throughout Watcher World, and his whole shtick revolves around being "the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes".
Eye Scream: During Bill and Alice's confrontation, she manages to bullseye the Blinky doll he has in his hand, and then shrieks that it'll be his eye next. Foreshadowing for the heroic version of this moment when she puts a bullet through the eye of the real Blinky when he manifests through the Hall of Mirrors.
Genius Loci: Appears to be this for the Eldritch Location on which the Watcher World theme park was built.
Giant Eye of Doom: Blinky is often represented in the artwork around Watcher World as just a giant eye of doom — his full "human" form is a cyclops whose body supports a head that's just one big eye.
Godzilla Threshold: Blinky always only acts through his control of the humans of Watcher World until Alice and Bill defy his planned "ending" with The Power of Love at the last moment, forcing him to manifest personally to finish the job.
Happy Ending Override: Attempted by Blinky, who, as a last resort, personally breaks through the Hall of Mirrors from the Black and White — like an angry audience member Breaking the Fourth Wall and storming onto the stage — because he finds Bill's last-minute Heel Realization to be Glurge and demands the blood-and-guts ending he worked so hard to engineer. Luckily, Alice turns out to be a pretty good shot. invoked
Ironic Nickname: "Blinky", as noted under, well, The Unblinking. Also "The Watcher with a Thousand Eyes" — while the music video for "The Blinky Song" depicts multiple eyes in a black void, in person Blinky pretty clearly only has one; the nickname is more symbolic, probably referring to the watchful eyes of Blinky's many Meat Puppets throughout Watcher World.
It Amused Me: Blinky's whole motivation. By the end of the night it turns out everyone in the park has been brainwashed into supporting characters in Blinky's grand patricide/filicide drama.
Carnival Barker: This is an amusement park, sir. But not for your amusement.
Laughably Evil: Blinky's voice, played by James Tolbert, is suspiciously similar to Jon Matteson's performance as Wiggly in Black Friday, but by comparison is more genuinely childlike and manic, reaching its peak when he's clapping and jumping up and down with excitement as Bill and Alice finally attack each other.
No Mouth: Blinky is an exaggerated version of a Cyclops whose eye is so big it takes up his entire face; presumably his voice somehow comes from inside his eyeball.
Peer Pressure Makes You Evil: The subtly-hinted at message of "Watcher World" and what Blinky represents, as opposed to Wiggly representing the more straightforward vice of Greed. Blinky watches you through the "thousand eyes" of the people around you, forcing you to perform a role based on their expectations of you, and by so doing makes you forget who you really are and what really matters to you.
Personal Horror: Blinky's shtick seems to be engineering this, in contrast to the Cosmic Horror Story that introduced his brother Wiggly.
Rage Against the Author: Blinky parallels the Breaking the Fourth Wall reference to the "Watchers With a Thousand Eyes" from The Trail to Oregon!, where it literally referred to the audience members at the stage show demanding to see one of the family members killed for their amusement. Blinky speaks in the voice of an audience member who finds Bill and Alice's reconciliation through The Power of Love to be "sappy, contrived bullshit" and demands the "blood and guts" everything had been building up to.
Red Baron: His official epithet is "the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes".
Red Eyes, Take Warning: We never actually see his eye change color, but "The Blinky Song" has the Sniggles warn that when Blinky's eye turn red it means someone is about to be punished for defying him.
Resignations Not Accepted: The outcome of Blinky's Watch Party implies Blinky takes very poorly to any of his servitors — even if they're just an employee at his crappy theme park — trying to leave his service before he's ready to let them go.
Rule of Drama: Blinky feeds on this trope, and everything he does in "Watcher World" seems to have the singular goal of getting the violent, tragic ending he's written to Bill and Alice's story.
Shout-Out: Blinky's epithet "the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes" is a phrasing that goes back to The Trail to Oregon! and seems to be at least partly inspired by the epithet of H. P. Lovecraft's "Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat in the Woods with a Thousand Young" (as well as, possibly, an inversion of Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces).
Slasher Smile: James Tolbert gives a pretty devastating one when he's playing Blinky or one of Blinky's human avatars. (Although presumably it wouldn't be diegetically visible on Blinky himself, given the lack of mouth.)
Theme Tune: "The Blinky Song", which in-universe is the Opening Chorus to the Show Within a Show Blinky's Watch Party at Watcher World, and is an obvious Call-Back to "The Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle" from Black Friday.
The Unblinking: "Blinky" is, obviously, an Ironic Nickname, because the whole point is he's "always watching" and he doesn't blink. "The Blinky Song" exhorts the audience (in the unsettling way of scary stories aimed at children) to never ever blink or Blinky will be able to wake up and kill them.
The Watcher: This seems to literally be Blinky's real, non-cutesy mascot name, although he's much more proactive about getting the maximum entertainment from what he watches than most examples of the trope.
Yellow/Purple Contrast: Just one more element of the odd design choices around Watcher World are the choice of these two complimentary colors as a motif for the park and Blinky's character design — purple for Blinky's body, yellow for his sclera, and purple again for his iris. They're both colors that seem awfully alien compared to a Red/Green Contrast or Orange/Blue Contrast, and associated with the Cthulhu Mythos especially (e.g. The King in Yellow).

T'Noy Karaxis / Tinky

T'Noy Karaxis, the Bastard of Time and Space / "Tinky"

Played by: Jeff Blim ("Time Bastard") | Curt Mega (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "Time Bastard" | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | "Killer Track" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tinky_web.png

"Tick-tock, Teddy Bear! Tick-fucking-tock!"

^{Click here to see Tinky illustrated in the Black Book}

^{Click here to see Tinky at the Hatchetfield High School black altar}

Jenny: You run around with no regret or ounce of shame
You run around, you think you’ll fix it all the same
You’re a masterful criminal
But the Bastard has time to fall

The third brother revealed to the audience, yellow with a face like a goat's. A tinkerer of mysterious gadgets and a manipulator of time, he is the most blatantly demonic and sadistic of the Lords.

And I Must Scream: Tinky outright describes the afterlife inside the Bastard's Box as "screaming... and screaming... AND SCREAMING!!!"
As Long as It Sounds Foreign: "Karaxis" is a Greek-sounding word the way "Bliklotep" is fake-Egyptian and "Nibblenephim" is fake-Hebrew.
Ax-Crazy: None of the Lords in Black are sane, but he acts the most blatantly Ax-Crazy of them all. His shtick seems specifically to be driving people into incoherent madness by tangling them up in a Timey-Wimey Ball until their perception of reality no longer makes sense.
Color Motifs: His signature color is yellow, although his physical description in the stage directions of "Time Bastard" says it looks more like a dingy, soiled yellow-brown. Ironically, this color could also be interpreted as gold, and the Surreal Music Video Title Sequence leans heavily on golden statues, gold dust and gold pocketwatches.
Creepy High-Pitched Voice: When voiced by Jeff Blim, his is more along the lines of a demented version of Goofy.
Evil Is Hammy: In his brief screen time as Tinky Jeff Blim embodies this trope as only he can.
Evil Laugh: All of the Lords' laughter has been horrifying in different ways, but Tinky's is the most classic Evil Laugh of them all — it's nothing at all like Wiggly's ironic childish giggle, instead just being a pure exultant guffaw of sadistic cruelty.
Fish Eyes: One of the traits that pervert his cutesy appearance into downright gruesome.
For the Evulz:
- Tinky is at once seemingly the least dangerous of his brothers seen so far and yet comes off as far more sadistic and insane than them, because the way he directs his baleful attention is so random. Rather than having any agenda to destroy the world or even to enslave as many people as Blinky did in "Watcher World", Tinky's whole goal in "Time Bastard" is just to put Ted, his Chosen One and Cosmic Plaything, through a truly bizarre and convoluted Trauma Conga Line lasting 15 years and creating a massively unlikely Stable Time Loop, all for the sake of putting him through as much pain as possible before collecting him in the Bastard's Box.
- It's implied that Tinky is bound by the rules of some kind of sick game where once a person's life becomes an unresolvable Time Paradox one way or another (a Stable Time Loop where it's impossible to tell cause and effect apart thanks to Predestination Paradox counts) then because they've been "aborted from the fabric of time and space" their souls belong to him when they die. Note that this is worse than a typical Deal with the Devil situation, thanks to said Predestination Paradox — Ted was never directly offered a choice to become the Time Bastard, because he already was one thanks to the actions of his future self. Of course, it's not clear what benefit he gets from filling up the Bastard's Box with tortured human souls, other than the general For the Evulz pleasure that the Lords in Black seem to live for — Tinky sneeringly calls Ted "Teddy Bear" and refers to him as "one of my toys".
Frozen Face: Part of what's so horrifying about him is that he has a slack jaw with a constantly flapping tongue that doesn't move at all when he talks. This is because his avatar is the form of a human in a goat suit wearing a motionless mask rather than an actual goat-man — but, given his nature, it's pretty unlikely there'd actually be anything human underneath if you took the mask off.
Go Mad from the Revelation: A single glimpse inside the Bastard's Box — or a moment of hearing the screams of those lost inside — is enough to completely break a human being's mind.
Gruesome Goat: His face being a goat head draws on this trope, making him a fuzzy version of Baphomet.
Hate Sink: He seems to exist to exaggerate the repulsive, horrifying traits of Wiggly and Blinky while lacking any of the ironic cutesy veneer that drives people to be fans of them.
Iconic Item: The Bastard's Box, which he carries around with him and contains his collection of human souls severed from the normal flow of causality.
Inconsistent Spelling: Nightmare Time Season 1 scripts spell his name T'Noy Karaxis, while Season 2 goes with T'noy Kyraxis. His depiction in the Black Book seems to go with T'noy Koraxis.
Knight of Cerebus: Of all the Lords in Black, he's the one we've seen who indulges the least in Wiggly's Adorable Abomination shtick of pretending to be a harmless plush children's character. His "doll form" has never physically appeared in-universe (only showing up as one of Willabella's illusions meant to appeal to Hannah), and he's referred to by his Lovecraftian-sounding "true name" of T'Noy Karaxis about as often as his nickname "Tinky" (and his story is the one where the concept of the true names was introduced). His actual in-universe appearance isn't cute at all, described as that of a full-grown man in a stinking, filthy, matted suit with his goat face a grotesque, immobile mask. His voice similarly barely resembles the attempts to give Wiggly and Blinky a cartoon voice, instead being very close to Jeff Blim just straight-up playing a verbally abusive adult bully.
Mind Screw: His whole goal is to engineer these. The Bastard's Box is a permanent, neverending one ("a twisting, endless maze") for those trapped inside it.
Not-So-Imaginary Friend: He never directly physically manifests in the world in "Time Bastard" at any point; as far as anyone else can tell, he's just an elaborate Hallucination Ted is having. The ending to "Time Bastard" implies he's continued to haunt the Homeless Man through his fifteen years of torturous existence and his repeated manifestations have helped prevent him from ever regaining any modicum of sanity or successfully getting off the streets.
Occidental Otaku: This seems to be the high school archetype he aims for in Nerdy Prudes, sporting Anime Hair not unlike Richie's and a pair of purely aesthetic goggles.
Overly Specific Afterlife: The Bastard's Box is one for mortals whose lives ended up ensnared in one of Tinky's Time Paradoxes. As the narration puts it,
He can hear the screams of all those who had been born, and lived, and died, and yet had also never existed at all. The cries of the infinite and the impossible...
Reality Warper: The plot of "Time Bastard" is kicked off by Tinky giving Ted an extremely detailed, realistic glimpse into an Alternate Timeline where he married Jenny and got everything he wanted in life. It's unclear if this was purely an illusion or if there was any reality to it, although the ending suggests it was always bullshit and Ted's fate was always sealed.
Red Baron: His official epithet is "the Bastard of Time and Space". Executive Kilgore also calls him "the Weaver of Impossibilities". His entry in the Black Book dubs him "the Tinkerer".
Sadist: Oh yes. He comes from a whole family of sadists, but Jeff Blim does not hold back at all when showing us how much raw, visceral pleasure he takes from Ted's suffering.
Satanic Archetype: While it's Wiggly who seems to be the ultimate evil of the Hatchetfield multiverse, Tinky's goatlike appearance and sadistic personality evoke traditional Demon Lords and Archdevils such as Satan or Baphomet, rather distinct from the alien elder god vibe of his brothers. Cemented in "Killer Track", where it is noted that his true appearance, as illustrated in the Black Book, wouldn't look out of place on a heavy metal album cover.
Sir Swears-a-Lot: No one's particularly shy about swearing in a Team Starkid show, but he especially is very free with the Cluster F-Bombs for a cosmic being.
Tinky: It was a one-way ticket, ya dumb fuck!
Slasher Smile: It isn't visible beneath his goat mask in-universe, but Jeff Blim gives his signature Jack Nicholson grin quite a workout as Tinky.
Sphere Eyes: Tinky has Fish Eyes both in the sense that they're pointed in random directions and that they bulge horribly out of his skull.
Time Master: His epithet is the "Bastard of Time and Space", a mantle he somehow bestows on his Chosen One, Ted Spankoffski, leading to Ted being "aborted from the fabric of time and space" and capable of Time Travel. We then find out from Executive Kilgore that the initial experiment that created a time portal in Ted's office was a mixture of modern technology and ancient magic meant to draw on Tinky's power, meaning Tinky was the Greater-Scope Villain who arranged for all of "Time Bastard" to happen. It seems his hat among the Lords in Black is creating Time Paradoxes that violate the normal rules of causality and logic and relishing how this drives the souls caught in them to madness.
Yandere: He is very, very enthusiastic about the inevitability of coming to possess Ted's soul.
Tinky: I'm COMING FOR YOUR ASS, TEDDY-BEAR!

Nibblenephim / Nibbly

Nibblenephim, the Thing That Feeds in the Dark / "Nibbly"

Played by: Nick Lang ("Honey Queen") | Kim Whalen (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Honey Queen" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/nibbly_web.png

"Hello, Linda. Yum yum..."

^{Click here to see Nibbly's true form entering the mortal world}

^{Click here to see Nibbly at the Hatchetfield High School black altar}

Sniggles: Nibbly-Nibbly-Nib loves the thrill of the chase
Though he’s blind in his eye, he won’t forget a face
Just throw him a bone and he’s drooling all over you
Unlike the others, he’ll devour you

The final brother seen, pink with a toothy mouth that takes up his entire face. More involved in the physical world than his brothers, the Church of the Starry Children offer him annual sacrifice.

Biblical Motifs: "Nibblenephim" is a very Biblical-sounding name (the "-im" suffix is a Hebrew plural) and sounds like a mangled version of "Nephilim".
Big Eater: Certainly implied by his appearance, and all but confirmed when his epithet, "the Thing That Feeds in the Dark", was revealed.
Call-Back: It may not be intentional, but fans immediately picked up on how his appearance matches the audience-provided name of the Daughter in the YouTube performance of The Trail to Oregon!, "Mouthface".
Crosscast Role: Though the Lords usually present as masculine, his appearance at the Black Altar in Nerdy Prudes is as an anime-style Genki Girl played by Kim Whalen.
Exact Words: Turns out that the Honey Queen's epithet of "the sweetest woman in Hatchetfield" is quite literal as far as Nibby's tastes are concerned.
Eyeless Face: He doesn't even have room for any — as an inversion of Blinky, whose face is all eye with no nose or mouth.
Girlish Pigtails: His human avatar sports these.
Gluttonous Pig: Is revealed to have a pig motif when he debuts. His physical form is made up of pig corpses, and his piglike traits are emphasized by the credits song.
Horror Hunger: Being an Eldritch Abomination, we can probably expect his "feeding in the dark" to be more this than Big Eater.
More Teeth than the Osmond Family: His most prominent — indeed, his only — facial feature.
Pay Evil unto Evil: Nibbly is an entity of hunger and desire, so the Honey Queens sacrificed to him also embody those traits as the ones who are hungriest to win the pageant and are willing to do absolutely anything to seize victory.
Roman, to Linda: We know about the dead girl in the rafters. That's why you won! You wanted it the most! You were the hungriest!
Phlegmings: Nick Lang incorporates a rare live-action version into his portrayal of Nibbly's mouth.
The Quiet One: Nibbly seems to be the most simple-minded of the Lords, and speaks very little.
Red Baron: His official epithet, essentially the first thing revealed about him as he played no role prior to his unveiling, is "the Thing That Feeds in the Dark".
Slasher Smile: The only facial expression he seems to be capable of.
To Serve Man: The pageant to select Hatchetfield's "Honey Queen" is actually run by Nibbly's cult as a way to select a human sacrifice for him to devour.
Walking Spoiler: The story in which Nibbly makes his in-person debut saves any paranormal or horror elements for its twist ending, hence why we've spoilered out which story it is.

Servitors of the Lords in Black

Creatures of Wiggly

Uncle Wiley

Uncle Wiley / Colonel Wilbur Cross

Played by: Joey Richter

Appears in: Black Friday | "The Witch in the Web"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/uncle_wiley_2.jpg

"It's too late, John. Wiggly's prophet has been chosen! And as soon as she has a doll, she will bring about his birth..."

And now the end is nigh, the apocalypse here
In a package that's not what it appears
You may ask, why the doll? Well that's all it takes
When you're made in America
In a valley of silicon

The eccentric creator of the Tickle-Me Wiggly dolls, who pops up in places you wouldn't expect. Heavily implied to have once been Colonel Wilbur Cross, a PEIP agent who entered the Black and White the year Hannah was born and was driven mad by Wiggly.

Ambiguously Human: While he most certainly Was Once a Man, whether he still qualifies as one now is up in the air — he has undefined Reality Warper powers including Breaking the Fourth Wall and Offscreen Teleportation letting him be effectively omnipresent, he seems perfectly at home in the Black and White without any protective gear, he dismissively refers to the human race as "your kind" when talking to the President, etc.
Arch-Enemy: Is one for the whole human race, but specifically one for PEIP and General MacNamara. "The Witch in the Web" reveals he was also one for Miss Holloway, and their Final Battle was destined to end in the death of one of them.
Back from the Dead: Hannah's Power Incontinence resurrects him, after a fashion, as a Living Memory inside Miss Holloway's own "Nightmare Time".
Badass Boast: He gets a couple of really good ones.
- "I don't think you wanna fuck with me, Miss Monroe."
- "You invited him in, and now you come to his house to make demands?!" Really, all of the "Made in America" sequence is him doing this and Evil Gloating at the same time.
Bait-and-Switch: The previews led fans to believe that the goofy Father Neptune Depraved Kids' Show Host gag was all there was to Uncle Wiley, meaning everyone was blindsided by Uncle Wiley turning out to be a terrifyingly seductive Satanic Archetype.
Bodyguard Babes:
- Wiggly's "Sniggle" minions come off as this, since when they appear in "Made In America" only one of them is male, and after MacNamara scatters them with the "Blade of Truth" all three of the ones who remain are played by women, doing "sexy" dance moves behind Wiley and helping reinforce his image as a Sex God.
- Disgustingly, he uses the Three-Girl Creature as these in his reappearance in "The Witch in the Web".
Breaking the Fourth Wall: Wiley memorably casually hands his half-eaten apple to an audience member, saying "Hold this" before launching into "Made In America". Not even the fourth wall can limit his power.
Character Catchphrase: At least for his Black Friday incarnation, any future appearances by him presumably being substantially less Christmas-themed; he greets both Lex and Linda by ogling them and saying, "Well well well... Hello, naughty list." It would seem dear old Uncle Wiley loves sexual harassment almost as much as he loves rampant consumerism.
Combat Pragmatist: Admits to Miss Holloway that as a Living Memory who only exists psychically, even he can't win a fight with her in a battle in the center of her own mind... so "I'm gonna cheat". Cue Pamela Foster's possessed body suddenly strangling Miss Holloway in the waking world.
Creepy Souvenir: "The Witch in the Web" reveals the origin of his denim jacket in Black Friday — it's Miss Holloway's jacket, which he took from her after he killed her in that timeline.
Dead Alternate Counterpart: The Uncle Wiley we meet in "The Witch in the Web" is this to his counterpart from Black Friday, having been killed by Miss Holloway years ago in a Point of Divergence that explains why the world didn't end on Black Friday 2018 in this timeline.
Deal with the Devil: Wiggly doesn't seem to need his help to corrupt people normally, but he does physically appear in order to lay out the terms of an explicit deal with Linda Monroe to become Wiggly's human mother and found a cult around him.
Decapitation Presentation: Wiley taunts Miss Holloway in "The Witch in the Web" with the knowledge that in the timeline where he killed her he took her head as a trophy and "mopped the floor" with it (luckily, the only Battle Trophy he actually kept was the jacket).
Depraved Kids' Show Host: There's no TV show, just the commercials, but Wiley nevertheless plays this role as the face of the Wiggly franchise. He puts on this voice again to sneeringly mock the President in "Made In America".
Double Entendre: As if to prove he's an equal-opportunity sexual harasser, Wiley gives a comment to Frank Pricely that comes off as both obscene and vaguely racist, while actually being Smug Snake Foreshadowing.
Uncle Wiley, delivering crate of dolls: I have a feeling that these little babies are gonna take you so far into the black that you ain't never coming back.
Frank: (Beat, nervous laughter) Well, I certainly hope so!
Uncle Wiley: Oh, you are gonna make a killing!
The Dragon: Wiggly's human representative who acts and speaks on his behalf on Earth.
- "The Witch in the Web" reveals that he views his death in the Nightmare Time timeline as a minor setback, and that the more exciting Plan B than him ushering in the apocalypse was always Wiggly's true greatest servant finally emerging on Earth — Willabella Muckwab possessing Hannah Foster's mind.
Evil Gloating: He takes real pleasure in spelling out how humanity — specifically, Goodman and his ilk — brought this mess on themselves.
Evil, Inc.: Uncle Wiley Toys is one, although the degree to which it's a real company as opposed to a purely supernatural phenomenon is left deliberately ambiguous.
Face–Heel Turn: If he really is MacNamara's mentor then becoming Wiggly's avatar on Earth definitely qualifies, although the turn may have been forced upon him.
Father Neptune: Embodies this stereotype, in keeping with the idea that Wiggly emerged from the sea. Subverted in that he only dresses up as a sea captain for the commercials and completely drops the act in all his other appearances. (He even tells Linda he used to be a colonel, which is an army rank, not a naval one.)
Go Mad from the Revelation: MacNamara believes his old mentor became a Brainwashed and Crazy enemy of humanity after discovering the Black and White for this reason, although no one knows the truth of the matter but Cross/Wiley himself.
Honorary Uncle: One for all of Wiggly's "fwiends". As we learn more about his true nature, he turns out to also be an Evil Uncle, and more than a bit of a Creepy Uncle.
Hot as Hell: He's the Devil as an insanely charming, seductive and leeringly lustful gentleman. His Mephistophelean sales pitch to Linda Monroe gets pretty... handsy, and she doesn't entirely seem to mind.
Uncle Wiley: (embracing Linda from behind as lights dim and sinister music plays, stage whispering) Do you see him? Do you see him? Do you see him? Do you see him?
Linda: YES, I FUCKING SEE HIM!
Iconic Outfit: His all-denim "Canadian Tuxedo" (a denim jacket over a denim shirt and jeans), which is a reference to the similar outfit of Randall Flagg from The Stand or Killer BOB from Twin Peaks. We get some backstory to this outfit in "The Witch in the Web" — originally it was just a shirt and jeans, until he took Miss Holloway's oversized jean jacket as a trophy after killing her (in the Black Friday timeline, anyway) to complete the ensemble. ("Fits me better, anyway.")
I'm a Humanitarian: According to him, in the timeline branch where he killed Miss Holloway in their duel at the Starlight Theater, he celebrated by cutting out her heart and then eating it.
Inexplicably Identical Individuals: Played with, just like in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, by exploiting our expectation that minor roles in a stage production will be double-cast. The truck driver who delivers the Wiggly dolls to Toy Zone seems at first to be just another bit part played by Joey Richter, until it turns out he is in fact Uncle Wiley from the Wiggly commercials. Whether this indicates that the CEO of the company is here incognito or that all of the employees were always Uncle Wiley because the company is supernatural is ambiguous.
Infernal Background: In contrast to the Sickly Green Glow of Wiggly himself, Uncle Wiley is associated with dim red devilish lighting whenever he appears.
Killed Offscreen: "The Witch in the Web" reveals he can be killed, and was killed, in a different Alternate Timeline — the Nightmare Time timeline(s) exist in the branch of history where Miss Holloway successfully killed Wiley in their Final Battle at the Starlight Theater, stopping the apocalypse from happening.
Knight of Cerebus: It's his dead-serious monologue to Linda Monroe that starts to let us know something a lot deeper is going on than just the Retail Riot plot we were expecting, and his next monologue to President Goodman takes us even further into dark, serious and politically relevant territory.
The Little Shop That Wasn't There Yesterday: Played with. The store that sells Wigglies, Toy Zone, is perfectly mundane, but the supplier fits this trope perfectly — Uncle Wiley Toys appeared out of nowhere in the recent past and kicked off a massive nationwide toy fad for unclear reasons that no one seems to question.
Laughably Evil: In the tradition of other Satanic Archetypes like Randall Flagg, he seems to take a great deal of pleasure in Evil Gloating, and everything he says has a mocking, sneering tone to it, that he only drops when he gets really pissed off.
Living Memory: In "The Witch in the Web", he's been dead in Real Life for years, but the traumatic memory of his fight with Miss Holloway is still very much alive in her mind — and during Hannah's "Nightmare Time", her leaking psychic powers coming into contact with the tiny fragments of him inside Miss Holloway are enough to fully resurrect him. His body in the physical world is still long gone, but Miss Holloway's memory of him sprouts into a fully-functional replica of the real Wiley's soul, snark, eldritch powers and encyclopedic knowledge of the setting's backstory all intact.
Mad Scientist: If the implications are correct then he became what he is today by conducting a dangerous experiment with interdimensional travel that left him Brainwashed and Crazy.
Meaningful Name:
- Obviously his name references the word "wily", but may also reference another mad scientist by that name.
- Hannah's prophecy ("Bad blood! Cross! Black and White!") refers to him; "Cross" is definitely a meaningful name for someone who double-crossed humanity, and who's working to create a cult around The Antichrist.
- "Wilbur Cross" is also a very similar name to "Randall Flagg", including the part where his surname ironically refers to an object of worship/reverence.
Merchandise-Driven: Wiggly is a toy-driven children's franchise, the kind that implies an ongoing backstory without having an actual TV show depicting it. Which makes sense, because what that backstory would be is Lovecraftian horror.
Mr. Exposition: Conveniently serves this role in Black Friday and "The Witch in the Web", thanks to his penchant for Evil Gloating.
Not Quite Dead:
Miss Holloway: You can't hurt her. You're dead.
Uncle Wiley: Am I? Am I, though?
Not So Invincible After All: "The Witch in the Web" reveals he can be killed, if not by mundane means — Miss Holloway somehow accomplished it by stabbing him with the Black Blade inside an inscribed eldritch symbol preventing his resurrection.
Old Soldier: Wiley casually mentions he's one of these, and is wearing Army dog tags under his shirt.
Only Known by Their Nickname: Apparently the company "Uncle Wiley Toys" is named after an existing nickname of his and not vice versa; in the timeline of "The Witch in the Web" he was killed before the company was founded, yet his ghost still refers to himself as this and never as "Wilbur Cross" (a name that only occurs in the end credits and the script).
People Puppets: "The Witch in the Web" reveals this as yet another entry in his array of powers, allowing him to reach out and psychically control Pamela Foster's body while his reconstituted soul is still trapped in Miss Holloway's Nightmare Time.
Quizzical Tilt: He likes to do this when he first appears in a scene.
Reality Warper: It's not clear exactly what the limits on Wiley's powers on Earth are, but they seem to be very expansive, including a large amount of necessary Offscreen Teleportation (possibly via the Black and White). He shows off his abilities by teleporting Linda's pepper spray right out of her purse into his own pocket, as Foreshadowing for Lex's ability to do the same to MacNamara's gun.
- As a parasitic Living Memory inside Miss Holloway's mind his will and his skill are strong enough to do this to a limited degree, although as he lampshades he can't keep it up for long against Miss Holloway's own determined resistance — hence "cheating" and using this only to distract her while reaching into Pamela's mind to make her attack Miss Holloway in the physical world.
"The Reason You Suck" Speech: As befits a Satanic Archetype, he's very good at identifying people's faults. The sales pitch he gives to Linda Monroe essentially is one, describing her as a morally bankrupt, utterly selfish narcissist, which she's far gone in her own depravity enough to take as a compliment. He then delivers a far more pointed and scathing one to President Goodman that doubles as one for all of American politics and culture.
The Reveal: "The Witch in the Web" finally reveals that, yes, Uncle Wiley is the same person as Col. Wilbur Cross, although you have to watch the Closing Credits or look up the script to see it (he's listed as simply "Wilbur"). Indeed, Nick Lang speaks so openly about them being the same person (he never uses Wiley's name, only Wilbur's) that it was probably never supposed to be ambiguous in the first place.
Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: "The Witch in the Web" reveals that Uncle Wiley is perfectly aware of the existence of other timelines, and is even aware of what happens to his alternate self in different universes — even though he tells us this at the same time that he says Hannah is the only human with the gift to see across timelines. Of course, Wiley clearly isn't really human anymore, has direct access to his master Wiggly's knowledge, and this version of him has died and just come back from the grave.
Satanic Archetype: Once he drops the kids' show host act, Wiley is this through and through, including appearing munching on an apple to signify his role as tempter. May be an Actor Allusion to Joey Richter playing Satan in The Last Days of Judas Iscariot.
Sealed Evil in a Can: In the "The Witch in the Web" timeline, all that's left of him is a rotted skeleton still held to a magical sigil by the Black Blade keeping him imprisoned inside Miss Holloway's memory. It turns out, though, that with Hannah's psychic energy sloshing around even this is enough to regenerate Wilbur Cross' consciousness from nearly nothing, and if Hannah hadn't managed to get her powers under control and re-kill him, he could very well have Body Surfed out into Pamela's body and gone on to wreak havoc in the real world once more.
Slasher Smile: The sadistic, goofy grin only leaves his face when things get serious enough to replace it with a vicious snarl.
The Snack Is More Interesting: Seems to tend to show up holding an apple, befitting the Satanic Archetype, and starts eating it when talking to President Goodman as if to indicate the President is far more beneath his notice than Linda was. In an especially hilarious moment, when he realizes he has to put down the apple to go onstage and start his dance number for "Made In America", he casually hands it to an audience member.
Southern Gentleman: Wiley's soft, genteel accent just adds to his general air of menace. Makes sense as he was once one "Wilbur Cross", which is a very classically Southern name.
Two Aliases, One Character: Wilbur Cross entered the Black and White, was driven mad by the sight of Wiggly, and subsequently became Wiggly's herald, Uncle Wiley. Notably, this has never been formally revealed in any piece of Hatchetfield text or Word of God; the Lang Brothers just speak about it openly, suggesting a bout of Viewers Are Geniuses on their part almost comparable to their infamous one from Firebringer^{Spoilers for Firebringer} — it would seem they intended us to simply understand that Wilbur and Wiley are the same person before the credits rolled on Black Friday, not to WMG about it after the fact.
The Unblinking: One of his more unnerving traits is he doesn't seem to involuntarily blink, ever (or at least Joey Richter is good at hiding it), and his eyes are locked in a constant piercing gaze.
Unwitting Instigator of Doom: We know nothing about the original Wilbur Cross or his motives, but if MacNamara is right that he was a good guy, and the fans are right that the initial experiment that drove him to madness turned him into Uncle Wiley, then that experiment was the unwitting doom of the entire human race.
Villain Has a Point: Wiley is unambiguously evil, but he brings up some genuinely good points.
- His assessment of Linda's real motivations is spot-on.
- Just before "Made in America," he has a brief monologue about how late-stage capitalism and consumerism has rendered the average American beaten down, tired, seeped in debt, looking to acquire more wealth for themselves... and vulnerable to outside threats. It's blisteringly cynical, but not inaccurate.
Walking Spoiler: His appearance in "The Witch in the Web" is a major Wham Shot for that episode.
Wicked Toymaker: Considering that Wiggly is obviously Cthulhu.
Worthy Opponent: Regards Miss Holloway as this, although he's not above slinging nasty insults at her regardless. He clearly thinks both of them are mere sideshows in the battle between Black and White compared to the real Witch in the Web, Willabella Muckwab, and her descendant Hannah.

Lakeside Mall Cult

Lakeside Mall Cult of Wiggly

Played by: James Tolbert (security guard, man in scarf) | Curt Mega (man in baseball cap) | Robert Manion (man in beanie)

Appears in: Black Friday

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/cult_of_wiggly.jpg

Homeless Man: "If we have faith, we will be rewarded with a cuddly toy!"

You never should settle for the lifetime that is handed to you
There's always a line to be cut and someone to barrel through

The shoppers gathered at the Toy Zone at downtown Hatchetfield for their chance at a Tickle-Me Wiggly, soon becoming a murderous cult who barricade themselves in Lakeside Mall, searching for the last doll.

For members of the cult with their own entries, see Main Residents for Charlotte Sweetly, Hatchetfield Families for Sherman Young, and Other Residents for the Man in a Hurry, the Homeless Man, and Gary Goldstein.

Apocalypse Cult: As befits an over-the-top social satire, the shoppers evolve over the course of the day from rude Jerkasses to feral, screaming zombies to a fanatical cult determined to bring about the end of all existence.
The Bad Guys Are Cops: Just as a major reveal in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals was that the Hatchetfield police department had been infected by the alien mind virus, we get a chilling reveal in the opening to "Adore Me" that the Lakeside Mall security officers who were sent to fight the rioters have been absorbed and brainwashed by the cult, and the cult's access to the mall's security footage is what lets them track down the last Wiggly doll in Hannah's possession.
Brainwashed and Crazy: It turns out Wiggly fever was always Mind Manipulation, and it only gets worse and worse as the day drags on.
Crowd Song: "What Do You Say?" and "Feast or Famine" are both straight examples, with no single lead singer. (The latter is also an Angry Mob Song.) The shoppers also provide backup to Frank in "Our Doors Are Open" and to Linda in "Adore Me" and "Wiggle".
Death by Materialism: All of the cultists — except for Charlotte and Gary — succumb to their greed after Linda dies and start a pitched battle with each other over the last Wiggly doll, even as the mall burns down around them.
Evil Power Vacuum: In direct contrast to the Hive Mind of The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, where the idea of a Hive Queen turned out tragically mistaken, the nature of the Wiggly cult is so self-serving that without Linda's charisma as their object of worship, they immediately start fighting to the death over the burning Wiggly doll and claiming the title of "Prophet" for themselves.
Freudian Excuse: The eventual reveal from Lex is that all of the shoppers have one for their behavior — everyone has "holes in their heart" that Wiggly's whispering voice promises to fill, and the more and bigger those holes are the stronger his influence is.
Gossipy Hens: The Greek Chorus of "What Do You Say?" act like this, which is funny since this is such a feminine stereotype and they're all men except for Linda.
Greek Chorus: The interchangeable Hatchetfield residents who happen to remember Becky and Tom as High-School Sweethearts become this for the song "What Do You Say?"
Greed: Whatever their specific motive for getting one and however sympathetic it may be, Wiggly unites them all in this vice.
Hate Plague: The desperation for a Wiggly doll eventually leads to this.
Hidden Depths: All of the shoppers, who seemed like perfectly normal people before they turned into crazed violent cultists, had this. But special mention goes to Charlotte from The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, who finds another way to show us to Beware the Quiet Ones and transform from Extreme Doormat to shrieking murderer.
Human Sacrifice: The cult graduates from simply being willing to kill to get their hands on a Wiggly doll to taking active joy in murder.
Kick the Dog: Charlotte taking Hannah's "magic hat" from her and putting it on her own head just before Hannah's Human Sacrifice.
Large Ham: The ensemble has a lot of fun playing the cultists as exaggeratedly as possible. Special shout-out goes to the heavily memed line from the security guard cultist, "She has the lying tongue of a snaaaaaake!"
Lower-Class Lout: Curt Mega's character in the baseball cap comes off as this — the violent Hair-Trigger Temper man who physically instigates the riot — although his Freudian Excuse of having been unemployed since the plant closed is probably meant to be sympathetic.
The Main Characters Do Everything: Obviously, since this is a stage show, the hundreds of shoppers in the mall end up represented by a few recurring characters, who form the core of Linda's Apocalypse Cult — Gary Goldstein, Sherman Young, the Man in a Baseball Cap (played by Curt Mega), and the Man in a Hurry. Later they're joined by the Security Guard (played by James Tolbert) and, after Sherman has died, Charlotte from The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals. Ironically, the first four of these characters were at the very front of the line and waited the longest for a Wiggly doll, and yet ended up trapped in the mall and joining Linda's cult because they ended up not getting one — something that Wiggly may have engineered to whip up their emotions into a frenzy.
No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: There's some serious Black Comedy in "Feast or Famine" revealing how rapidly the shoppers cast aside all restraint and just beat the shit out of each other. When they do it to Ethan is when they jump to murder and all the comedy goes out of it.
Primal Stance: All of the shoppers end up adopting this stance as their minds burn out on Wiggly-induced rage.
Redemption Earns Life: Just before Lex sets fire to the last Wiggly doll, she challenges the cultists to "Abandon your god, or burn here with him!" Charlotte is the only cultist onstage who passes this challenge, although all of the scattered survivors at the ruins of the mall in the ending are said by the creators to have been under Wiggly's influence to some degree and broken free of it.
Repeat After Me: The cultists end up having their free will so burnt out by Wiggly's influence they end up doing this joke.
Linda: I will destroy everything
And then I will destroy everything
I guarantee I'll destroy everything in my path
Unless I get what I—shit, it's Gerald. (picks up phone)
Ensemble: I will destroy everything—
Linda: (walking away) All right, keep going, just don't say the "shit" part, that wasn't it.
Ensemble: And then I will destroy everything—
Linda: Don't say the "shit" part.
Ensemble: I guarantee I'll destroy everything in my path... unless I get what I shit!
Linda: No, no, guys!
Shipper on Deck: The Greek Chorus of "What Do You Say?" seem unhealthily invested in the idea of Becky and Tom rekindling their romance.
Shout-Out: The ritual movements made by the cultists in worship of Linda are — hilariously, to any audience members familiar with them — a fairly basic yoga routine.
Sleep Deprivation: The shoppers start lining up in the very early morning after Thanksgiving, which explains them already being in a bad mood before things go south. (Very much Truth in Television for Real Life Black Friday "incidents".)
Sole Survivor: Charlotte is the only full-fledged cultist we see breaking free and surviving to the end of the show, although all of the other scattered survivors of the mall (the Man in a Scarf, the The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals characters, Papa Ed and Peanuts) are said by the creators to have been touched by Wiggly-madness in some way.
Took a Level in Jerkass: Hatchetfield may well have never been a very nice place, as Linda tells Becky, but before Black Friday it wasn't full of murderers who Would Hurt a Child in order to gain some kind of spiritual satisfaction by ending the world.
World of Jerkass: As Nick Lang put it, "No one is at their best on Black Friday", and that's under normal circumstances without a supernatural Hate Plague. As the play unfolds we find out it's not just their immediate situation that brings out the worst in them but the state of the world, stressing everyone out with unemployment and debt and looking for something to assuage their fears.

The Witch in the Web

Willabella Muckwab, the Muck-Witch / The Witch in the Web

Played by: Angela Giarratana

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web"

Mentioned in: "The Hatchetfield Ape-Man"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/witch_in_the_web.jpg

"Your bones will be mine! Your blood will be mine! Your pretty hair and your little mouth! And I’ll SHIT OUT YOUR ASS!"

Webby: The Witch in the Web wants power
Power over you
From the heights of her lonely tower
She flies at the early dew
I can hold her just for so long
In the web i spin and loom
But a witch is a witch if you allow her
To have power over you

A follower of the Lords in Black who was active in the 1820s, in the village where the Witchwood Forest now grows. She is the author of the Black Book.

Absurdly Sharp Claws: Willabella's One-Winged Angel form has long, jagged fingernails as sharp and hard as knives.
Arch-Nemesis: For the whole world, obviously, but especially for Hannah Foster — the single greatest threat to Hannah for her whole life has been the fact that Hannah is Willabella's ideal vessel and her ticket back into the waking world.
Ax-Crazy: When she drops the guise of Lex she loses all pretense of restraint or sanity.
Burn the Witch!: Was the victim of an angry Torches and Pitchforks mob when she died in 1824, although, despite her attempt to get Hannah on her side with her Past-Life Memories, she was in fact guilty of murdering children to cast dark magic (and in a more-historically-accurate version of this trope, she wasn't burned but hanged).
Call-Back: Willabella reveals that she's not really Lex — and not really Hannah's friend — when she decides to quote Hannah's abusive mother's words back to her, calling Webby a "lying little turd".
Creepy High-Pitched Voice: Once she reveals her true self, her voice turns into a constant ear-splitting shriek, literally like nails on a chalkboard. Her No Indoor Voice and her tendency to put the Accent Upon The Wrong Syllable just make her more unbearable to listen to and cement how Ax-Crazy she is.
The Dragon: The original holder of this role for Wiggly and the other Lords in Black, compared to which someone like Uncle Wiley is just The Heavy. Even as a long-dead ghost, the prospect of her resurrection is one of the greatest threats to the world, and a huge amount of Webby and the Hatchetmen's efforts appear to be bent on just keeping her contained.
Early-Bird Cameo: She was briefly mentioned by Donna Daggitt in "The Hatchetfield Ape-Man" as just one of the many folk legends associated with the Witchwood; little did we (or Donna) know that she was a Greater-Scope Villain for the whole Hatchetfield series.
Evil Is Hammy: Angela Giarratana finally gets to prove she's right up there with Robert Manion when it comes to burning all the gas she has in the tank to give a truly diabolical, over-the-top villain their due.
Evil Old Folks: Willabella Muckwab was already quite old — and quite evil — when she died the first time, but apparently two hundred years as the evil spirit haunting the Witchwood has turned her into a horrifyingly twisted hag with literally rotting, stinking flesh barely clinging to a warped and twisted skeleton. It probably doesn't help that "Nightmare Time" is a Spirit World where your appearance reflects your personality.
Familial Body Snatcher: She's been influencing Hannah Foster's dreams to prepare her as a vessel for her reincarnation. Once she merges with Hannah and hijacks Hannah's immense psychic powers to her own will, she'll be unstoppable.
For the Evulz: She doesn't really seem to have held her sanity together very well in the two hundred years she's been dead, and her sadistic urge to make people suffer seems to get the better of her — notably she loses her patience with the charade of pretending to be Lex and keeping Hannah in a Lotus-Eater Machine very quickly, and soon decides the much more pleasurable option will be just torturing and terrorizing Hannah into compliance — all while screaming what an Ungrateful Bastard Hannah is for piercing the illusion.
Greater-Scope Villain: The most important human villain of the series so far — the first human to discover Wiggog Y'Wrath and devote herself to his worship, whose actions led to the creation of the Witchwood and the town of Hatchetfield in the first place and paved the way for all the other Hatchetfield stories.
Hulking Out: When the Witch reveals her true form she physically grows in size until her crooked spine brushes up against the ceiling (making her something like 15 feet tall). Presumably this wasn't actually her "true form" in life but is a One-Winged Angel guise meant to terrify Hannah into submission.
Human Disguise: Willabella's last-ditch tactic to try to get into Hannah's head in "The Witch in the Web" is to fool her into thinking she's awake and in the real world and that her sister Lex has come to save her.
Identical Grandson: Sort of. Her appearance as Lex is obviously just a disguise meant to screw with Hannah, but — given that she and Lex are both played by Angela Giarratana — we have no indication of what her "real" appearance would be otherwise (and presumably when she was younger she looked similar to Lex).
Knight of Cerebus: Even compared to her master Wiggly — who at least is funny in the ironic sense of him presenting himself to the world as a cute stuffed animal — there is pretty much nothing funny about the Witch. She's even more of a straight-up horrifying, disgusting villain than Uncle Wiley, who at least has a veneer of charisma.
Leaking Can of Evil: The Witchwood's web has kept her locked away for hundreds of years, keeping her from manifesting or reincarnating directly into the real world — but it hasn't stopped her from exerting her malign influence on the world in other ways. Uncle Wiley tells us that up till now she's only had the energy to pull minor pranks on Halloween (when the walls between the Spirit World and the physical grow thin), but with Hannah's immense psychic power leaking everywhere for her to feed on she's growing more powerful by the day.
Lotus-Eater Machine: Willabella-as-Lex makes a very convincing offer to Hannah — telling her that her primary consciousness can stay "in Drowsy Town", living an illusory dream of an idyllic life with her sister in a perfect version of her childhood home, utterly oblivious to all the suffering going on in the outside world. (Downplaying the fact that with Willabella piloting her body and drawing on her powers, she'll be causing most of that suffering.)
Manipulative Bastard: Uncle Wiley's Evil Gloating spills the big secret: As a ghost who died long ago she has very little power of her own compared to a living person, especially Hannah, The Chosen One. Her power all comes from being a Master of Illusion and Gaslighting Hannah into turning her own power against herself.
My Grandson, Myself: Pretended to be her distant descendant, Lex and wanted to permanently possess Hannah.
One-Winged Angel: The Witch's final transformation from her disguise as Lex into a gigantic, shrieking, rotting hag with razor-sharp claws. (Presumably she never looked like this in life, given that a lynch mob of mundane villagers was able to overpower and execute her.)
The Pig-Pen: Her epithet of "the Muck-Witch" could just be a schoolyard jab at her surname from her enemies — but when she reveals her true self at the climax of "The Witch in the Web" and Hannah's room transforms into her witch's hut The Narrator tells us there's "muck dripping down the walls".
Schmuck Bait: From the moment she appeared it was obvious to the audience that "Lex" was not to be trusted, although you can't blame someone in Hannah's position for wanting to believe.
Sir Swears-a-Lot: As with most Hatchetfield villains, the Witch gets pretty crude when she finally reveals herself, memorably gloating to Hannah that once she possesses her...
Witch: Your bones will be mine! Your blood will be mine! Your pretty hair and your little mouth! And I’ll SHIT OUT YOUR ASS!!!
Take Our Word for It: Willabella's "transformation" from Lex into her true One-Winged Angel form is just communicated to us by Angela Giarratana's acting and putting a purple filter over her face (the same one Angela used to play Snigglette in "Watcher World"). It works well enough, mainly because of Angela's commitment to the role.
Tear Off Your Face: Just to throw a little extra trauma for Hannah on the pile, the Witch reveals her true face by bloodily ripping Lex's off. (Which Angela Giarratana does a very brave job of physically portraying as authentically as she can without hurting herself.)
Tome of Eldritch Lore: She's the writer of the Black Book, whose spells have caused endless mischief through the years in Hatchetfield and elsewhere.
Uncanny Family Resemblance: She is played by the same actress as her descendant Lex.
Vain Sorceress: It obviously isn't her primary motivation, but after revealing her horrible rotting, putrescent, oozing true form, the Witch makes a show of caressing Hannah's unmarked cheek and talking about how she lusts to wear Hannah's "pretty hair and little mouth".
Villainous Legacy: She's the ancient ancestor of both Lex and Hannah Foster; apparently by being matrilineal descendants of hers ("the daughter of my daughter's daughter's daughter...") they've inherited her powers — with Hannah inheriting the most power of any of her descendants and being The Chosen One and Willabella's intended vessel for reincarnation.
Wicked Witch: Embodies this trope, including coming from the time period of the Puritan witch trials (and being a victim who actually was guilty). She lived long enough to become the wizened, filthy old crone who defines a "witch" in the popular imagination, and seems to revel in horrifying Hannah with her true visage once her cover is blown. Uncle Wiley considers her the only real witch in Hatchetfield, sneering at Miss Holloway's attempt to claim the title.
Would Hurt a Child: The Black Book is said to be written in the blood of children. Webby says she shares the memory of all the children the Witch has ever killed, and it's this crime more than any other that motivates the Judge in 1824 to demand her execution and that her soul be bound forever. And she's very, very willing to inflict an And I Must Scream Fate Worse than Death on Hannah to get her way.

Creatures of Pokey

The Hive

Played by: Jeff Blim ("Greg", man in letterman jacket) | Corey Dorris ("Stu", businessman 2, man in newsboy cap, PEIP operative) | Lauren Lopez (the "Hatchetfield Bee", Smoke Club girl) | Jaime Lyn Beatty (woman in sunset sweater, PEIP operative) | Joey Richter (businessman 1) | Robert Manion (businessman 3, cop 2, PEIP operative) | Mariah Rose Faith (PEIP operative, nurse) | Jon Matteson (Paul)

Appears in: The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tgwdlm_assimilated.jpg

"Paul's a-comin'? The star of the show! Let him come."

Show me your hands, show me those jazz hands
Or I might be inclined to plant my seed
The Hive needs to feed
Happiness is guaranteed
If you just give us one last show-stoppin' number

Victims of what they call "apotheosis". Fungal spores from the meteor that struck the Starlight Theatre infect humans, transforming them into members of the alien Hive Mind, easily spotted by the "blue shit" they have in place of bodily fluids and their tendency to burst into saccharine musical numbers.

While not entirely confirmed as creatures of Pokotho, that entity's appearance and epithet strongly hint at it, and a number of direct allusions in "Yellow Jacket" all but confirm it.

For established characters who are confirmed assimilated, check these other character pages (spoiler warning):

Main Residents ^note
Families ^note
Other Residents ^note
Outsiders ^noteGeneral John MacNamara

Alien Blood: Anyone affected will have blue blood.
Ambiguously Bi: All of the assimilated, regardless of their previous gender or sexuality, caress Paul seductively during their confrontation in "Let It Out".
Ambiguous Situation: It's unclear how much of the assimilated's personality remains within, if they're Brainwashed and Crazy, still in there but unable to control themselves, or truly dead and their corpses puppeted around. All information on this comes from the assimilated themselves, who are Unreliable Narrators to the extreme.
Assimilation Plot: Everyone in Hatchetfield is slowly becoming part of a Hive Mind that makes them into characters from a musical.
Back from the Dead: Multiple characters throughout the show, both assimilated and not, end up getting killed, only to show up again in a later scene, assimilated if they weren't already, raising the question of whether those infected by the blue shit are capable of dying at all.
The Bad Guy Wins: At the end they survive the destruction of the meteor and have moved to the mainland, infecting the world.
Bizarre Alien Biology: The assimilated humans' blood and internal organs turn into a bright blue gelatinous substance, giving them a decentralized anatomy that can function even if they lose their hearts or brains.
- Hidgens discovers that the aliens apparently contain an organ many times more sensitive to sound than the human ear, allowing them to hear music from miles away and maintain the Hive Mind through ultrasonic communication.
- Apparently both the meteor itself and the people it transforms emit some kind of "infectious spore" that allows the infection to slowly passively spread. It goes faster if the assimilated get you to take the concentrated "blue shit" into your body, by getting you to drink contaminated coffee, by holding you down so they can bite you or "puke in your mouth", or, toward the end, by exposing you to some kind of concentrated radiation.
Brainwashed and Crazy: Anyone assimilated has an overly-cheerful version of their own personality and murderous intent toward all those who are not yet assimilated.
Crapsaccharine World: The musical plague vaguely fits the pop-culture Flanderization of musicals as taking place in a sunny, optimistic version of reality without true conflict.
Evil Evolves: The assimilated start out just encouraging people to join them in singing and dancing and fleeing from violence even though they're Immune to Bullets. As Hidgens observes, they get more aggressive as their numbers grow, turning into a Zombie Apocalypse that spreads by mauling and biting people ("Join Us and Die"). Once they assimilate the PEIP unit ("America Is Great Again"), they've reached the point where they can use complex military tactics and infect a person instantly with concentrated meteor radiation. They also go from seemingly taking hours to recover from fatal wounds to seconds.
Face Full of Alien Wing-Wong: We don't directly see it onstage, but "Join Us and Die" describes the zombies forcibly assimilating people by "puk[ing] that goo, right in your mouth", in imitation of this trope.
Flat Character: Even though they have all the memories of their hosts, the victims of the musical plague are all on the same side, have no conflicts with each other, and no real interest in anything but singing and dancing. They pretty much become Flanderized versions of their past selves, taking on roles based on their profession or role in the story (Sam becomes just a "cop", McNamara a "soldier", etc.)
For the Evulz: Whether or not you see the Hive Mind eventually putting an end to The Evils of Free Will as a positive thing, it certainly seems to go out of its way to cause pain and suffering to the unassimilated rather than doing things efficiently. It outright admits to Paul that it has a sadistic desire to torture him until he "begs for apotheosis" because it's offended he's thwarted it so often. May relate to the fact that it's a Hive Mind based on musical theatre and therefore operates based on Rule of Drama.
A God Am I: The Hive Mind's Insistent Terminology for assimilation is "apotheosis", indicating it sees itself as God.
- The Hive Mind deliberately impersonates God when Charlotte prays over Sam's body, to convince her to accept his recovery as a "miracle".
Healing Factor: The assimilated repeatedly recover from what should be mortal wounds, whether acquired before or after they were infected. Bill, for instance, seems to have been infected as a corpse and to have risen from the dead after the PEIP raid. This process seems to speed up as time goes on — Sam takes hours to recover from his head injury, while Ted and Gen. McNamara both shrug off fatal gunshot wounds within seconds. (To be fair, though, Sam recovered from losing his entire brain.)
Hive Mind: How they are able to perform choreographed musical numbers. It appears individual members of the Hive Mind can have their thoughts get out of sync with each other, and recalibrate themselves by literally matching pitch.
Hive Queen: Emma theorizes that the Hive Mind must have a central intelligence, and that it must be housed in the meteorite that brought the infection. Paul decides to blow it up and destroy it. Unfortunately, either she was wrong or it didn't take.
I'm a Humanitarian: The infected don't seem to actually eat human flesh (or anything at all), but they bite and tear at people's organs in imitation of zombie movies as a quick way to infect them (and seemingly to vent their frustrations).
Logical Weakness: It seems they put their showmanship over anything else, so they're nearly incapable of blending in with normal humans for more than a few seconds before they start singing, and they always prioritize their song-and-dance numbers over effective tactics. This is why nobody gets seriously hurt during "Show Me Your Hands" or "Join Us and Die", and Paul and Emma are able to very nearly break through an entire regiment of assimilated PEIP soldiers due to the fact that their movements are in time to the music and therefore predictable.
Musical World Hypotheses: The whole idea of The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals is just a logical consequence of considering the implications of the "Musical Alternate Universe Hypothesis" — in order for a large group of people to perform a choreographed musical number without taking any time to rehearse, they must not actually be independent human beings at all but part of a Hive Mind.
No Name Given: Realistically enough, there's no specific name given to the "alien contagion" transforming the humans in Hatchetfield or the "collective consciousness" controlling them, given that all of this is happening in the span of a single day — see Not Using the "Z" Word below. Official word is that the Hive Mind behind the zombies — which is just called "the Hive" in the lyrics of "Inevitable" — does have a specific identity and a "true name", which have not yet been revealed, although since the final episode of Nightmare Time Season 1 fans have speculated the Hive is run by the blue member of the Lords in Black named Pokotho.
Not Using the "Z" Word: It's not clear whether the converted singing-and-dancing humans would be more appropriately called "zombies" or "pod people", but the characters avoid either in favor of simply saying "Them". Ted refers to them as zombies in a line however.
Rule of Drama: The Hive Mind seems to be controlled by this, being as it is a creature of musical theatre. It goes out of its way to find zombies to play "Greg" and "Stu" so Prof. Hidgens can finish performing "Workin' Boys" before assimilating him, and the whole ending is the Hive Mind going to great lengths to give Emma a Hope Spot before assimilating her.
Speak in Unison: The zombies certainly spend a lot of time singing in unison, but they also do this with the classic science fiction Creepy Monotone during "Cup of Roasted Coffee" and after killing Bill, seemingly just to intimidate Emma and Paul. Hilariously, they seem to find staying in sync much more difficult this way.
Stalker with a Crush: The Hive Mind seems to develop this relationship with Paul.
Summon Backup Dancers: Happens regularly in the musical numbers. Hilariously, in this show it's an actual diegetic, supernatural ability. Prof. Hidgens is able to summon the zombies to his compound by singing "Showstopping Number" in a heartfelt enough performance that the Hive Mind "casts" two men as his characters "Greg" and "Stu" just to perform the finale to the song.
The Virus: Classic instance of this trope, with the only difference from something like the Invasion of the Body Snatchers franchise being that the Assimilated advertise their assimilation by singing and dancing. The infection seems to be both mental and physical — simply being physically near the infected and breathing in their "spores" will eventually spread The Virus, but the process speeds up if you ingest the "blue shit" that makes up their bodies or have your blood tainted by it via biting or scratching, and it also seems to depend on whether the victim actively chooses to join in a musical number or resists doing so.
Yandere: While The Hive wants to infect the world, it is very determined to infect Paul.
The Hive: We swear we will teach you what it means to love, what it means to obey, Paul!
Zombie Gait: The assimilated are expert dancers and have no need to walk like this, and only seem to do it as part of The Reveal of their nature in order to taunt their victims.

Otho

Played by: Nick Lang

Appears in: "Yellow Jacket"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/nmt_otho.png

"Do not fear. We will end this chaos and suffering. There will be harmony... peace... one singular voice."

^{Click here to see his thralls, "the boy with the bloody nose" and Spitfire}

Hannah: Whatever don’t kill you makes you strong
I don’t know about you, but I think that’s wrong
I plan on keeping you living (In shame)
And once I roughed you up
Go back to your boys and say you’re tough
I guess the tea will be spilling (Today)
You may be the champ inside your head
Your stupid head
But if you were smart, you’d play dead

The champion of the Roller-Rama gladiator games, a mysterious masked boy with terrifying psychic power.

The Assimilator: His power allows him to snuff out the personality of others, allowing him to use their bodies and powers. Because Otho himself is an avatar of Pokotho.
Evil Sounds Deep: His voice is digitally deepened to a menacing timbre, unrecognizable as Nick Lang's.
Explosive Leash: Charles implanted a bomb in his brain as a way to keep him and his power under control.
The Greys: Otho looks a lot like a stereotypical gray alien, including gray skin, blue veins, and long fingers.
Keystone Army: His "army" is only two people in the end, but still, they're both reduced to empty husks when Otho is killed.
Your Head Asplode: Unsurprisingly, his Explosive Leash does in fact get detonated.

Creatures of Blinky

Watcher World

Played by: James Tolbert (barker, mascot) | Jon Matteson (ticket-taker, usher) | Joey Richter (announcer, director) | Jeff Blim (cowboy) | Lauren Lopez (Madame Iris, Alison) | Curt Mega (Craig) | Angela Giarratana (Beth)

Appears in: "Watcher World"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/watcher_world_5.jpg

^{Click here to see various named denizens of Watcher World}

From L to R: the carnival barker, the ticket-taker, the director of Blinky's Watch Party, Madame Iris, the cowboy, Beth, Craig

A theme park with a storied history on the northern shore of Hatchetfield Island, known for their colorful eyeball-themed mascot "Blinky". It eventually turns out that this amusement park doesn't exist for the amusement of the patrons...

See Other Residents for the Obnoxious Teen, who appears as a roller coaster attendant.

Actor Allusion: James Tolbert, who plays Blinky himself and his various human avatars in the park like the Blinky mascot, Snigglotts and the Carnival Barker, actually did work at Disneyland as a costumed performer in 2019.
Ambiguously Gay: The Carnival Barker, who, when Bill finally wins the game, kisses him and says "I'm proud of you." (Bill, for his part, is too angry at Alice at this point to notice.) May be an Actor Allusion to James Tolbert being gay in Real Life.
Ambiguous Situation: It's never made clear how much the various characters in the park are acting on their own free will and how much they're just Blinky's Meat Puppets. The Blinky mascot and the Carnival Barker seem to have been Avatars of Blinky all along (hence being played by James Tolbert, who also voices Blinky), while the In-Universe Big-Lipped Alligator Moment of Snigglette's "trial" during Blinky's Watch Party seems to be an indication that Snigglette's actor, Angela, is defying him.
Amusement Park of Doom: Hatchetfield, of course, has one. The theme park is called "Watcher World", which boasts the "tallest roller coaster in the Midwest", the Tear-Jerker. It's separated from Hatchetfield proper by a long drive through the Witchwood. It starts off seeming like just an ordinary Crappy Carnival, but things get increasingly eldritch as the night wears on.
Brainwashed and Crazy: Alice slowly starts to notice people acting strange throughout the day in ways deliberately calculated to push her buttons, especially the odd timing of Craig, Alison and Beth's cheating scenario taking place right in front of Alice. By the end of the day, everyone in the park has the glowing purple Mind-Control Eyes and has become one big audience of Meat Puppets through whom Blinky watches his grand drama unfold.
Covert Pervert: Alice's initial encounter with the Blinky mascot at Watcher World, complete with the creep factor of him checking out her ass, mirrors Lex's first encounter with Uncle Wiley in Black Friday.
Crapsaccharine World: Watcher World itself is one, as is the cartoonish world depicted in the Show Within a Show of Blinky's Watch Party and the Sniggles (all of which is a dig at the artificiality of Disney and other theme parks).
Cult: The Show Within a Show Blinky's Watch Party ambiguously pulls off the mask and reveals that the workers at Watcher World seem to be in one of these, including actually briefly falling into a spell where they believe they are their characters. These hints get more and more intense as the day goes on, until by the climax of "Watcher World" everyone at the park seems to be in the cult.
Depraved Kids' Show Host: The whole Blinky's Watch Party show has this energy, especially with their "leader" Jeff (who plays Papa Sniggle) turning out to be an alcoholic who almost kills Angela, the actress who plays Snigglette, due to what seems to be wild onstage recklessness... Or is it?
Eye Motifs: Watcher World is covered in these, which seems like an odd choice for a supposedly goofy fun theme park... as is the name "Watcher World".
Fake Town: It's not clear whether this happens every day in the park, but on Bill and Alice's ill-fated trip to Watcher World, everything that happens in the park is a manipulation intended for Blinky's benefit, to force Bill and Alice into a final confrontation — including as major an event as shutting down the Tear-Jerker, the park's biggest ride, at the same moment a thunderstorm is rolling in.
Foil: Craig, Alison and Beth are a Love Triangle of Lower Class Louts whom Alice notices in the line for the rollercoaster as being no different from her, Deb and Ziggs despite them being boring straight people, with Craig and Beth waiting for the earliest moment they can get rid of Alison to hook up with each other, seemingly confirming Alice's worst fears about Deb and Ziggs. (This turns out to be a situation Blinky arranged via Mind Manipulation, judging by Craig's glowing purple eyes.)
Fortune Teller: A stereotypical old crone named Madame Iris, who's The Corruptor for Alice the way the Carnival Barker is for Bill, by giving her images of a future ruined by Bill's clumsy attempts to protect her.
Goofy Suit: There's a guy in a Blinky suit wandering around Watcher World, who serves both as a cringey and creepy mascot for the park and, disturbingly, as an enforcer of the park's Sinister Surveillance dystopia (and a Covert Pervert being gross at Alice). Later on the Blinky mascot appears again... but this time there's nothing human about what's inside of him.
Hate Plague: Everything that happens at Watcher World is Blinky subtly or not-so-subtly influencing events to raise Bill and Alice's negative emotions to a fever pitch, amplified by Blinky's supernatural influence on their minds, until they hit the Rage Breaking Point and murder each other in a Final Battle. Upon a rewatch it becomes obvious, and it starts at the very beginning of the day, with the Ticket-Taker tossing an Apple of Discord between them by asking whether Alice should pay the full adult price or get the child discount.
I Don't Like the Sound of That Place: "Watcher World" is an awfully ominous name for a theme park — that you already have to drive through "the Witchwood" to get to. And then there's the slogan, "Blinky is always watching", and the endless Eye Motifs...
Incredibly Lame Fun: Watcher World is filled with this, on the surface, as one would expect from a stereotypical Crappy Carnival. Of course, as Bill lampshades, when the park surprisingly turns out to be Darker and Edgier than its Sickeningly Sweet exterior, Alice likes that even less.
Alice: (after Blinky's Watch Party ends) Either something went terribly wrong or that got strangely... dark.
Bill: First, you don’t like the show cuz it’s for babies. Then you don’t like it cuz it’s too dark. It’s almost as if you don’t like anything.
Meaningful Name: Alison, Beth and Craig's names start with A, B and C, as though they were random fake names made up for a math problem in a textbook, and with Alison's name suspiciously similar to Alice's — a hint that everything going on around Alice is being staged.
- Madame Iris' name, of course, is just another Incredibly Lame Pun about the Eye Motifs in Watcher World, although it's somewhat less cutesy and nonthreatening than most of them.
- Watcher World's name has a hidden Double Meaning — it's not just that the park is named after "The Watcher", the Eldritch Abomination otherwise known as "Blinky" — it's that all of the people in the park are "watchers" on his behalf.
Mind-Control Eyes: Everyone at Watcher World who comes under Blinky's psychic influence starts getting glowing violet irises in their eyes.
No Communities Were Harmed: As a huge Midwestern theme park located on an island in the Great Lakes with a "storied history", Watcher World feels like a reference to Cedar Point, Ohio, although Cedar Point is a peninsula, not an island. The actual "tallest roller coaster in the Midwest" is Cedar Point's Top Thrill Dragster, at 420 feet, and Watcher World's fictional Tear-Jerker just beats it at 425 feet.
Obstructive Bureaucrat: The Obnoxious Teen played by Joey Richter in Black Friday returns here, apparently having moved from his crappy job at the multiplex to a crappy job at the amusement park, and still finds himself vainly trying to enforce his bosses' arbitrary rules on customers who don't give a crap. (This becomes a lot less funny when the Obnoxious Teen keeps insisting help is on the way while they're trapped at the top of the rollercoaster but no help ever arrives.)
Post-Modern Magik: A wink at this trope, when Alice tries to use the creative epithet "Suck my crystal balls" to get Madame Iris to leave her alone, Iris laughs that she doesn't need to use crystal balls to tell the future these days and pulls out what she uses instead... Alice's iPhone.
Rule of Drama: Everyone and everything in Watcher World is being subtly manipulated to maximize the dramatic conflict between Alice and Bill to set up the "big show" at the end of the day, which turns out to be their Final Battle.
Seeing Through Another's Eyes: The catchphrase of the Blinky cult, that Blinky is "the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes", turns out not to refer to the surveillance cameras throughout the park or the fake plastic eyeballs they're embedded in. Blinky watches through the thousands of eyes of the human beings he controls.
Significant Double Casting: James Tolbert is cast as the Mascot dressed as Blinky at the beginning of the show, as "Snigglotts", the other Sniggle who threatens Snigglette with punishment if she tries to quit the Sniggles during Blinky's Watch Party, and the Carnival Barker who oversees Bill's final Descent Into Madness at the "Test Your Strength" Game. All of these characters, even though they're theoretically humans, act as Blinky's mouthpiece, and the climax of the show reveals Tolbert playing the maniacal and unfiltered voice of Blinky himself.
- To a lesser degree, Jon Matteson (who played Blinky's counterpart Wiggly in Black Friday) seems to play all the "flunky" roles in the park like being the Ticket-Taker at the admissions booth and the Usher at Blinky's Watch Party. This is helped by Jon's bland white The Everyman looks that served him so well as Paul in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals and his putting in the effort to show up in costume, with a "retail vest" and nametag.
Sinister Surveillance: The whole theme of Watcher World, which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin, and even has a Big Brother Is Watching slogan for the park ("Blinky Is Always Watching"). At first it seems to only be mundane surveillance, with tiny cameras hidden inside the eyes of the various Blinky signs and pictures and statues throughout the park... but of course, it turns out to go a lot deeper.
Souvenir Land: Unlike most non-Disney theme parks, Watcher World seems to lean hard on the "theme" part, with everything at Watcher World revolving around the eye-themed branding of their mascot, Blinky, and everything at the park trying to push you into buying one of their cuddly yet disturbing Blinky dolls.
Take That!: For people who've worked at Disneyland (as many LA-area actors have in order to pay the bills, which James Tolbert has while Robert Manion had similar experiences at Universal Studios), the basic idea of Watcher World seems like a veiled Take That! against Disney's Sinister Surveillance in their theme parks. The In-Universe Big-Lipped Alligator Moment with "Snigglette" feels like it could be commentary on the oppressive Big Brother Is Watching feeling of working as a Disney "cast member".
"Test Your Strength" Game: A Darker and Edgier version of this trope — Bill gets embarrassed and humiliated at one of these not just as a throwaway gag, but as a way to get him to the Rage Breaking Point by needling him about his masculinity and his many failures as a husband and father until he's fully Brainwashed and Crazy.
- What's worse, the breaking point for Bill is when he sees Alice's head on the target just as he's mid-swing. The mallet hits her, and blood splatters as he caves her head in. But as he removes the mallet, he realizes it wasn't real.
The Place: "Watcher World" turns out to be a story about a theme park literally called "Watcher World".
Villain Override: Although the Mind Manipulation Blinky exerts starts with just messing with Alice and Bill's emotions, by the time it reaches its full power at the end of the night, all the people in the park besides Alice and Bill end up being Blinky's literal puppets, giving one long speech from him line-by-line through different characters' mouths and, it's implied, serving as the cameras through which he watches his masterpiece unfold.
What the Hell Is That Accent?: Lauren Lopez lays on the stereotypical vaguely Eastern European accent for Madame Iris on thick, as does Jeff Blim to a lesser extent as the "cowboy" manning the shooting gallery.
Yellow/Purple Contrast: Just one more element of the odd design choices around Watcher World are the choice of these two complimentary colors as a motif for the park and Blinky's character design — purple for Blinky's body, yellow for his sclera, and purple again for his iris. They're both colors that seem awfully alien compared to a Red/Green Contrast or Orange/Blue Contrast, and associated with the Cthulhu Mythos especially (e.g. The King in Yellow).

Shared among the Lords

The Sniggles

Played by: Angela Giarratana (Snigglette) | James Tolbert (Snigglotts) | Lauren Lopez (Sniggly) | Jeff Blim (Papa Sniggle) | Curt Mega | Jaime Lyn Beatty | Kim Whalen | Robert Manion

Appears in: Black Friday | "Watcher World" | "Honey Queen"

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/the_sniggles.jpg

Snigglette: "Hey, everybody! We're the Sniggles! Don't be scared."

^{Click here to see Snigglette singing "Snoozle Town"}

In Drowsy Town, we shake and move
And don't upset our boss
'Cause if we do, his eye gets red
And he might just spill our guts!

The costumed characters who appear in commercials with Uncle Wiley for the Tickle-Me Wiggly dolls, and in another reality, perform at Watcher World.

Adorable Evil Minions: Pretty much exactly this trope, though apparently President Goodman doesn't find them so adorable when he's being swarmed by them.
Ambiguously Human:
- Well, in the commercials it seems like they're just attractive young people wearing Wiggly-themed costumes. Goodman seems far more horrified and disgusted by them when he encounters them in the Black and White, though whether that's because of their "true form" or just the general situation is ambiguous. The Langs have since confirmed that the Sniggles aren't and never were actually human, although how closely they resemble humans in-universe has still been left unanswered. What precisely the Sniggles are supposed to resemble is also questioned in "Watcher World".
- The "Sniggles" in "Watcher World" are pretty clearly just human actors playing Sniggles, which makes the question of how much they actually resemble the "real" Sniggles in Black Friday something of a Mind Screw.
Baby Talk: They all use words like "fwend" and "pway", but the Sniggle played by Jaime Lyn Beatty takes it up a notch in the commercial.
Bad Boss: Unlike Black Friday, where the Sniggles had Undying Loyalty and seemed to almost be mindless extensions of Wiggly's will, "The Blinky Song" in "Watcher World" reveals that the Sniggles see Blinky as a Bad Boss and are being kept in line out of fear of punishment, to the point of being driven to inform on each other to keep each other in line.
Sniggles: In Drowsy Town
We do our best
To never, ever cry
'Cause if we do
Our boss gets mad
And then we don't eat for a week
Bird People: "Watcher World" gives us either a clarification or a Retcon that Sniggles are supposed to be this, with the fuzzy legwarmers the Sniggles from Black Friday had on their arms supposedly being "wings". (Although there's a joke in "Watcher World" about how a frustrated Alice isn't 100% clear on what kind of animal Sniggles are supposed to be even after watching their whole Opening Chorus.)
Blinded by the Light: MacNamara's "Blade of Truth" attack seems to affect them like this.
Bodyguard Babes: They come off as this to Uncle Wiley, especially since they're mostly female, and after MacNamara's "Blade of Truth" the ones who remain as his backup dancers are all female (Kim Whalen, Lauren Lopez and Angela Giarratana) and start doing "sexy" dances while he sings creepy Double Entendres about Wiggly's "love".
Character Development: The Sniggles in "Watcher World" now have much more distinct personalities and motivations than they did in Black Friday, although this may be because these Sniggles are ambiguously being portrayed by human actors.
Christmas Elves: "Made In America" implies they're Wiggly's equivalent of this, and they're the ones who actually built the Wiggly dolls.
Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The Sniggles serving Wiggly in Black Friday wear shirts in his signature sickly pale green, and they switch to purple when they reappear as Blinky's servants in "Watcher World". Those appearing in the end credits of "Honey Queen" wear pink Nibbly shirts.
The Danza: Invoked. When the actors playing the Sniggles in "Watcher World" suffer a mishap and end up breaking character, each actor is addressed by the name of the actual actor playing them. The confirmed names were "Angela" as "Snigglette", "Lauren" as "Sniggly" and "Jeff" as "Papa Sniggle". "Snigglotts" never being addressed as "James" is potentially significant, as every other character in the story played by James Tolbert is implied to be a more direct mouthpiece of Blinky than the other people in the park.
Depraved Kids' Show Host: The whole Blinky's Watch Party show in "Watcher World" has this energy, especially with their "leader" Jeff (who plays Papa Sniggle) turning out to be an alcoholic who almost kills Angela, the actress who plays Snigglette, due to what seems to be wild onstage recklessness... Or is it? This especially applies if the lyrics to "The Blinky Song" are the same in-universe as they are in the music video, as it's all about Blinky's abusive and murderous Bad Boss tendencies and even includes an F-bomb; either the song was different in-universe or everyone in the audience, including Alice, was already influenced by Blinky to take it to be a normal kids' song.
Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Sniggles "clawing" at Goodman's suit are making gestures a lot more like caressing or fondling, not helped by the leering, lustful lyrics Uncle Wiley is singing at the time and the fact that they're mostly female. Of course, Goodman isn't enjoying it either way, and the end result if they get through it will be just as bad for him.
False Reassurance: Every Sniggle performance opens with Snigglette assuring the kids in the audience not to be scared, which comes across as a suspiciously specific thing to say.
Fun T-Shirt: Their costumes all include green T-shirts that say "Wiggly". In "Watcher World", these are described as being switched for purple T-shirts that say "Blinky"; Team Starkid was unable to actually make any such shirts for the show, but in the music video for "The Blinky Song", Curt Mega puts on a purple T-shirt with Wiggly on it from Black Friday as a substitute. The ones singing the "Nibbly Ditty" have proper "Nibbly" shirts.
Girlish Pigtails: Angela Giarratana puts her hair in these to play Snigglette in "Watcher World".
Idiot Hair: Curt Mega's Sniggle's hairstyle in "Watcher World", with a tiny goofy topknot, seems to be deliberately imitating this trope.
Mauve Shirt: The Sniggles are supposed to be interchangeable, but in "The Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle", the one played by Angela Giarratana is the "main" one who introduces the commercial to the kids and takes center stage in the Freeze-Frame Ending (and remains part of Wiley's personal retinue after MacNamara banishes most of them in "Made In America").
- Angela's Sniggle comes back as "Snigglette" in "Watcher World", who's specifically a special odd one out among the Sniggles (and punished for it).
No Name Given: The Sniggle played by Curt Mega is one of the most recurring (tied with James Tolbert's Snigglotts), but hasn't been given an individual name.
Properly Paranoid: The soundtrack version of "The Blinky Song" says that Blinky's Sniggles have this attitude enforced on them by Blinky's capricious attitude:
It's our job to keep our Blinky happy
Even when he's down (he's always down!)
It's hard to tell what doesn't make him crabby
And so our smiles are frowns (our smiles are frowns!)
Puppet King: The "Papa Sniggle" in "Watcher World" (a character played by "Jeff") is this in multiple senses. Not only is he obviously just a puppet for Blinky, as are all the Sniggles, but he also seems to be a figurehead for The Man Behind the Man Snigglotts.
Red Eyes, Take Warning: We never actually see his eye change color, but "The Blinky Song" has the Sniggles warn that when Blinky's eye turn red it means someone is about to be punished for defying him.
Secondary Sexual Characteristics: Whether these actually are Secondary or Tertiary Sexual Characteristics depends on how human the Sniggles actually are, but only the female Sniggles (or at least the ones played by women) have antennae on their heads during "The Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle". (But Robert Manion's Sniggly apparently grows antennae by the time "Made In America" rolls around, so take that for what you will.)
Show Within a Show: The Sniggles in "Watcher World", as opposed to the original ones in Black Friday, are an Ambiguous Situation where they seem to only be fictional characters portrayed by actors working at the Watcher World theme park.
The Smurfette Principle: Directly referenced with the character of "Snigglette" in "Watcher World", although Lauren Lopez does play another Sniggle who's played by a woman in-universe (but whose gender as a Sniggle is not specified). ^note This is a direct contrast with the "real" Sniggles in Black Friday, who if anything were female-dominated and served as Uncle Wiley's Bodyguard Babes.
Smurfing: The Sniggles in "Watcher World" speak English, but it's almost impossible to tell what any of the Sniggles are saying because half their words are replaced with cutesy neologisms that start with "sn-".
Stepford Smiler: "Watcher World" depicts the Sniggles as being constantly pressured to pretend to be nothing but constantly happy and devoted to their patron Blinky even though they're actually miserable and terrified ("Our smiles are frowns!").
Translator Microbes: Something like this seems to be going on with the Sniggles, since they speak (and sing) in English just fine for the commercial in "The Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle", but when the President meets them face-to-face in the Black and White they're unable to communicate except through squeals, wordless vocalizations and "Wiggly-wiggle-wig!". The Sniggles in "Watcher World" split the difference, speaking in English with heavy Smurfing.
Zerg Rush: The way "Made In America" is played gives the impression there's more of them in-universe than what we see onstage, and that when MacNamara appears Goodman is about to be drowned in a literal sea of them.

Church of the Starry Children

The Church of the Starry Children

Appears in: "Honey Queen" | "Daddy"

Mentioned in: Nerdy Prudes Must Die

The religion that worships the Lords in Black. Enemies to the Hatchetmen.

For established characters who are confirmed members of the church, see (spoiler warning):

Families ^noteRoman Murray, Sheila Young

Other Inhabitants

Webby

"Webby", the Queen in White

Played by: Mariah Rose Faith

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Yellow Jacket"

Mentioned in: Black Friday

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/nmt_webby_hq.png

"I didn't send you that vision, Hannah. You can see these things without me."

^{Click here to see Webby in the palm of Hannah's hand}

Have you noticed that my trust has turned?
You may have taught me, but now I've learned
Gotta catch you before I'm burned
In the web I spin for you

Hannah's imaginary friend, described by Ethan as a magical spider from outer space. Sometimes appearing in the form of a spider, other times as a beautiful white-haired woman, Webby is the sister of the Lords in Black, and opposes their evil.

Arch-Enemy: Implied to be one to Wiggly. When Hannah brings her up, Wiggly retorts, "Webby is a stupid bitch!" with much more venom than usual in his cutesy voice. Confirmed as of "The Witch in the Web"; she is the archenemy of the Lords in Black, and also their sister.
Big Good: The major force that fights against the Lords in Black.
Big Sister Instinct: She is pissed when other denizens of the Black and White set their sights on Hannah.
Black Eyes of Evil: We never see her eyes change, but in "The Web I Spin for You" she sings "The iris of your eye is black" when talking about how the subject of the song betrayed her, then calls back to the line by singing "The iris of my eye is black" when singing about her determination to fight back against them. The iris turning black seems to be a symbol of being willing to use one's full power against another person.
The Chessmaster:
- The song "The Witch in the Web" ends by saying Webby could have made the Sealed Evil in a Can holding Willabella's soul truly impregnable and left her soul there forever, but deliberately did not, because she had a plan requiring her to be released at some point. The plot of the episode implies that this was necessary for Hannah to be born and come into her full power as the Chosen One.
- Nightmare Time's Episode Three Ending Theme "The Web I Spin for You" strongly implies that the plot of the entire Hatchetfield series has really been Webby "spinning a web" in order to somehow take down Wiggly once and for all.
Color Motif: Webby is, of course, associated primarily with the color white, but also seems to generally invert the Grayscale of Evil trope — the Lords in Black are, despite their name, associated with bright, saturated pastel colors, while Webby's "The Web I Spin for You" music video is filled with Deliberately Monochrome images of spiderwebs, and Webby herself is dressed in pure, clean white contrasting with very dark-toned makeup (and a single Splash of Color with her violet fingernails).
Curb-Stomp Battle: Once Hannah allows her to fully manifest within her mind, she's able to annihilate the ghost of Willabella Muckwab as easily as saying it.
Defends Against Their Own Kind: Webby seems to be a Category Traitor to her "brothers" in defense of humanity.
Eldritch Abomination: Just like her brothers, though a benevolent one.
A Form You Are Comfortable With: She can appear as a spider or as a beautiful young woman.
Ghost Memory: The song "The Witch in the Web" says that Webby shares the memories of all of the children Willabella Muckwab has ever killed.
Giant Spider: Her true form is implied to resemble one — or perhaps, like the title creature of IT, an incomprehensible alien being best described as resembling a giant spider. Thus far, the only glimpse we've seen of this form is of a regular-sized, earthly-looking crab spider appearing in the palm of Hannah's hand.
God's Hands Are Tied: As is necessary for any setting with a Big Good, especially a horror setting, for the plot to happen at all. She seems to be bound to acting through human agents, like her brothers, but in her case it's almost to the point of Sealed Good in a Can — so far in all of her appearances she can only have any effect on anything through Hannah, and her Curb-Stomp Battle against Willabella Muckwab at the end of "The Witch in the Web" is only because Hannah has finally mastered her power and is willingly channeling her into her own mind. Repeatedly we're told how important it is that Hannah "remember Webby" and that if she forgets her, Webby will "go away" and all the systems Webby has set up to hold evil at bay will start to fail.
Good Is Not Soft:
- She may be the nicest cosmic entity in the Black and White, but if you cross her or those she cares about, she won't hesitate to erase your very soul from existence, as Willabella Muckwab discovered after menacing Hannah. It's also implied she had some connection to the creation of the "web" in the Witchwood, which is very much a case of Black-and-Gray Morality.
- Compared to her brothers, she completely eschews their strategy of trying to seem cutesy and childish. She has no associated plush toy we've yet seen, when she speaks her voice is warm and friendly but also calm and adult, and her music video is very serious and Played Straight (compared to the bouncy ironic tone of "The Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle" or "The Blinky Song").
Goth: "The Web I Spin for You" gives off this vibe, both musically and with Mariah's dramatic eyeliner and lipstick she uses to play Webby.
Knight of Cerebus: All of the cosmic entities are this to some extent, but when Webby finally appears in person we get a window onto a very Played Straight, Darker and Edgier view of the Hatchetfield universe without the twee filter the Lords in Black's childlike personas impose on the cosmology.
Laser-Guided Amnesia: Willabella's assault on Hannah's mind during "Nightmare Time" seems focused on getting Hannah to forget that Webby exists and forget any details about her, like her appearance and name. These memories seem to be necessary for Hannah to maintain the psychic connection to Webby that lets her keep Willabella's spirit at bay.
Light Is Good: As it turns out, in the alternate dimension of the Black and White, "the Black" refers to her brothers, and "the White" to her.
Magical Gesture: She makes one just before touching Willabella on the forehead to wish her out of existence, and indulges in several more of these (including an ambiguous Futile Hand Reach gesture after singing about how much she misses the person the song is directed toward) in "The Web I Spin for You".
Magic Music: Webby teaches Hannah to repel the Witch in the Web by singing songs about the Witch's true nature, and the Solemn Ending Theme of Nightmare Time Episode 3 has her singing a mystical song about her own past.
Meaningful Name: Her name refers to her aspect as a spider, which is also linked to the mystical "web" formed by the souls trapped in the trees of the Witchwood (whose "roots intertwine over the years").
Me's a Crowd: In "Yellow Jacket" she hangs out with Hannah by throwing a sleepover in which all of the guests are Webby duplicates with different personalities, who all address each other as "Webby".
Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Her song, "The Web I Spin for You", implies in Broad Strokes that Wiggly was once her Big Brother Mentor and she turned against him due to neglect or betrayal of some kind on his part, and that the eons that have passed since then have been her seeking to break free of his influence and find her own identity. It's striking that the song tells us Wiggly, of all people/entities, once seemed capable of love, and that the way he is now is a Broken Pedestal from how she saw him before.
Ms. Fanservice: Not blatantly so, but her appearance in "The Web I Spin for You" has her wearing a revealing, diaphonous white dress.
Mystical White Hair: In her human form.
Not So Above It All: Webby seems like the serious counterpart to her brother’s childish natures at first…at least until “Yellow Jacket,” where she makes some duplicates of herself to play at having a slumber party with Hannah. Which she's apparently done before.
Not-So-Imaginary Friend: Webby is a very real Spirit Advisor to Hannah.
Only Friend: Is this for Hannah, alongside Lex and Ethan. "The Web I Spin for You" tells us that she was once this for Wiggly.
Only Known by Their Nickname: Hannah seems to have made up the name "Webby" on her own; Miss Holloway doesn't actually know it when she hears it, although she immediately guesses Webby's identity from context (and confirms by asking, "Is Webby a... spider?"). It's unknown thus far if she has a true name as her brothers do, or another name that Miss Holloway would know her by.
Sealed Good in a Can: Like her brothers, Webby seems somehow sealed away from the real world and only able to act indirectly through humans; she has some vague connection to the tree-spirits of the Witchwood, and she's only able to help Hannah as long as Hannah maintains a mental connection to her by singing the songs. She's only able to manifest fully and finally destroy Willabella Muckwab after Hannah defeats her and reclaims control of her mind.
Shout-Out: As a cosmic spider, she's likely a good version of the true form of Stephen King's IT.
The Smurfette Principle: It's unclear what meaning sex or gender even have for cosmic entities from the Black and White, but the Lords in Black are all referred to as "brothers" while Webby, their singular Good Counterpart, is their "sister".
Virgin in a White Dress: Her clothing fits the "innocence/purity" version of this trope, and her song "The Web I Spin for You" is about how from her own perspective her Innocence Lost wasn't all that long ago (even if from a human perspective it's probably eons in the past).

Characters / Hatchetfield The Black and White

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The Lords in Black

The Lords in Black

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Time Bastard" | "Jane's a Car" | "Honey Queen"

Wiggog Y'wrath, the King in Black / "Tickle-Me Wiggly"

Played by: Jon Matteson | Nick Langnote in promotional material for Black Friday

Appears in: Black Friday | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

Pokotho, the Singular Voice / "Sing-Along Pokey"

Played by: Corey Dorris

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | "Yellow Jacket" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals | "Jane's a Car"

Bliklotep, the Watcher with a Thousand Eyes / "Blinky"

Played by: James Tolbert ("Watcher World") | Lauren Lopez (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "Watcher World" | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

T'Noy Karaxis, the Bastard of Time and Space / "Tinky"

Played by: Jeff Blim ("Time Bastard") | Curt Mega (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "Time Bastard" | "The Witch in the Web" | "Daddy" | "Killer Track" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

Nibblenephim, the Thing That Feeds in the Dark / "Nibbly"

Played by: Nick Lang ("Honey Queen") | Kim Whalen (Nerdy Prudes Must Die)

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Honey Queen" | "Daddy" | Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Mentioned in: "Jane's a Car"

Servitors of the Lords in Black

Creatures of Wiggly

Uncle Wiley / Colonel Wilbur Cross

Played by: Joey Richter

Appears in: Black Friday | "The Witch in the Web"

Lakeside Mall Cult of Wiggly

Played by: James Tolbert (security guard, man in scarf) | Curt Mega (man in baseball cap) | Robert Manion (man in beanie)

Appears in: Black Friday

Willabella Muckwab, the Muck-Witch / The Witch in the Web

Played by: Angela Giarratana

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web"

Mentioned in: "The Hatchetfield Ape-Man"

Creatures of Pokey

The Hive

Appears in: The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals

Otho

Played by: Nick Lang

Appears in: "Yellow Jacket"

Creatures of Blinky

Watcher World

Played by: James Tolbert (barker, mascot) | Jon Matteson (ticket-taker, usher) | Joey Richter (announcer, director) | Jeff Blim (cowboy) | Lauren Lopez (Madame Iris, Alison) | Curt Mega (Craig) | Angela Giarratana (Beth)

Appears in: "Watcher World"

Shared among the Lords

The Sniggles

Played by: Angela Giarratana (Snigglette) | James Tolbert (Snigglotts) | Lauren Lopez (Sniggly) | Jeff Blim (Papa Sniggle) | Curt Mega | Jaime Lyn Beatty | Kim Whalen | Robert Manion

Appears in: Black Friday | "Watcher World" | "Honey Queen"

The Church of the Starry Children

Appears in: "Honey Queen" | "Daddy"

Mentioned in: Nerdy Prudes Must Die

Other Inhabitants

"Webby", the Queen in White

Played by: Mariah Rose Faith

Appears in: "The Witch in the Web" | "Yellow Jacket"

Mentioned in: Black Friday

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Played by: Jon Matteson | Nick Lang^note