History Podcast / WelcomeToNightVale

** Another running gag with Hiram is the fact that he often tries to hide the fact that he is, in fact, a literal five-headed dragon. Cecil will then quote Hiram...and proceed to also quote Hiram's various other heads arguing amongst themselves.

* NuclearHorror: In the year [[ArcWords 1983]], [[spoiler:The Able Archer tests went wrong. Soviet Russia and the U.S.A declared nuclear war on each other. In a fit of desperation, the city's resident benevolent [[EldritchAbomination eldritch horror]] Huntokar reached out and cut off Night Vale from the soon-to-be destroyed reality. However, in doing so, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero she cut off every Night Vale from their realities]] ]].

** ** After four years of incidents in the workplace leading to the deaths of over a dozen interns [[spoiler:that we know of]], Intern Danielle (the most recent intern as of "Civic Changes") tells Cecil that she would very much like to NOT report on the story du jour, thank you very much, and instead opts to run the radio station's social media accounts. [[spoiler:It doesn't help.]]

* CircusOfFear: In ''A Carnival Comes to Town'', in which...[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin a carnival comes to town]]. Cecil clearly distrusts them and finds them... disturbing. [[spoiler:Ultimately ''{{subverted}}''. When the Nightvalians drove them out of town, it becomes apparent that it was just a regular carnival. It comes down to Cecil's natural, locally grown xenophobic tendencies, and his talent for making even mundane thing sound terrifying.]]

* CentralTheme: Community

** It's becoming increasingly common for the show to bring back comedic one-off lines and make them plot-relevant. For example, During "A Memory of Europe", Simone Rigadeau - the transient living in the Earth Sciences Building of Night Vale Community College, released a statement that the world ended "three or four decades ago". It was played for laughs then - but [Best Of?] revealed that she might be right.

* KeepingTheHandicap: In the climax of the StrexCorp arc Kevin tries to turn Steve Carlsburg to his side by saying StrexCorp can "fix" his paraplegic daughter. Steve vehemently shouts that she is not "broken" while suplexing Kevin into a dimensional portal.

* TheHypnotoad: "'''All hail the mighty Glow Cloud.'''"
** Khoshekh also seems to display this, turning anyone who sees him into cat lovers and getting the radio station staff to care for him.

** Episode 195 gives us the origins of [[spoiler:Khoshekh the cat]]

** In Episode 195, “Silas The Thief, Part 1”, “And my name is Silas! Not [[spoiler:Khoshekh]]!

** The local grocery store is a Ralphs, which would suggest south-eastern California (the only desert region where Ralphs operates). Joseph Fink grew up near this area, which has many weird little towns. Mentone is a candidate as is Yucca Valley; Forest Falls and Mountain Home Village would be excellent settings for nearby Pine Cliffs. Cecil mentions "Joshua trees" in "The Registry of Middle School Crushes"; this could refer to Joshua Tree National Park or the nearby weird little town of Joshua Tree.
** The desert immediately surrounding Night Vale is flat enough that mountain sceptics had to be taken on a long field trip to see a real one. This narrows the list of possible locations as much of the northern Great Basin is quite rugged terrain. "[Best Of?]" reveals that there are actually hills in Night Vale, but everyone avoids looking at or thinking about them for fear of the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s living within.

---> "Old Woman Josie has not called, but Intern Dana said that Old Woman Josie updated her Facebook page with an Instagram of some runestones. Dana has been furiously translating these symbols, and her best guess is that they say ‘They come in twos. You come in twos. You and you. Kill your double.’ There’s also a link to this amazing cat that keeps jumping in and out of boxes and oh my god, that is the cutest thing I have ever seen. Dana, you have got to post that on my wall. Oh my God, he loves those boxes ''so much''!"

** Which isn't to say dark is good, but at least it is more permissive and less immediately hazardous than Light.

* RealityEnsues: Or, you know, whatever reality you choose to believe in.

** Cecil thinks Carlos's voice is like caramel and bemoans the fact that while he's at work, "It would be completely inappropriate for me to answer my phone regardless of how much I want to soak my ears in the oaky tones of our community’s most significant outsider."[[note]]Both actors who play Carlos have notably crisp, high tenor voices.[[/note]] He also describes himself as having a "Smooth, sonorous voice."[[note]]He does, and he sounds frighteningly like WGER's ''The Passing Parade'''s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKhfIKmC_B8 John]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bx9WIQsQNEQ Doremus]].[[/note]]

** Cecil thinks Carlos's voice is like caramel and bemoans the fact that while he's at work, "It would be completely inappropriate for me to answer my phone regardless of how much I want to soak my ears in the oaky tones of our community’s most significant outsider."[[note]]Both actors who play Carlos have notably crisp, high tenor voices.[[/note]] He also describes himself as having a "Smooth, sonorous voice."[[note]]He does, and he sounds frighteningly like ''The Passing Parade'''s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKhfIKmC_B8 John Doremus]].[[/note]]

** Cecil thinks Carlos's voice is like caramel and bemoans the fact that while he's at work, "It would be completely inappropriate for me to answer my phone regardless of how much I want to soak my ears in the oaky tones of our community’s most significant outsider."[[note]]Both actors who play Carlos have notably crisp, high tenor voices.[[/note]] He also describes himself as having a "Smooth, sonorous voice."

A ''Literature/WelcomeToNightVale'' novel was released on October 20, 2015. Chronologically, it is set right before Episode 76 of the podcast, which serves both as an epilogue and a sort of advertisement for the book. A second novel, titled ''Literature/ItDevours'', was released on October 17, 2017. The third novel, ''The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home'', was published on March 26, 2020.

** Followed shortly by an epic CompletelyMissingThePoint moment, as [[spoiler:Maureen]] rattles off a list of deceased interns and asks Cecil what they all have in common and even interrupts her to announce another intern has died [[InsistentTerminology and will be missed]] without even realizing he was proving her point.

A recap page can be found [[Recap/WelcomeToNightVale here]] that is in desperate need of some Wiki Love. Welcome to Night Vale now has a [[https://www.youtube.com/user/WelcometoNightVale youtube]] channel.

* BlackEyesOfEvil: Kevin, as perceived by Cecil.
** Several other people have commented on his horrible eyes, most notably the Whispering Forest, which was encouraging him to join them, until they saw his eyes, at which point they begged him to leave.

The show treads a fine line between hilarious absurdity and genuine creepiness. Within a flexible format, each broadcast features not only reports on the town, but also Cecil's personal thoughts and experiences. Night Vale is populated by SecretPolice, mysterious hooded figures in the town dog park, [[ConspiracyKitchenSink and just about every possible conspiracy theory come to life]]. But at the show's core is Night Vale's community, including Cecil's friends and loved ones: such as Intern Dana, who enters the dog park and survives; Old Woman Josie, surrounded by [[BlatantLies beings who are not Angels]] who're all named Erika; Megan, a schoolgirl whose entire body consists of an adult man's severed hand; and Carlos, Cecil's LoveInterest and the town's new ScienceHero. The story is very detailed and intricate, and small seeds planted throughout the episodes tend to unfold into important plot elements months or even years later.

** Episode [=70B=] brings us [[spoiler:a stretch limo that can apparently hold an entire afterparty with dozens of people. And some not-Angels.]]
* BigNo: When the Whispering Forest appears in Night Vale, officials from the town's Parks Department react with a press release consisting of "the word 'no' on a single piece of paper, but with hundreds of Os and maybe two dozen Ns."

** Cecil speaks a bit of Spanish in Episode 6. ("¡Muchas gracias, El Presidente! [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_P%C3%A9rez_Molina#Political_career Mano dura, cabeza, y corazón]]," meaning, "Thanks, President! Firm hand, head, and heart.") There's a lot of Russian later on, when the Apache Tracker mysteriously becomes actually Native American and only capable of speaking in Russian, which Cecil often quotes verbatim.
** The Morse code from Episode 46, "Parade Day", has been translated as [[spoiler:'Tamika needs you', 'Radon Canyon in 2 hours', 'Go to Radon Canyon', 'Now now now' and in the credits, 'Fall 2015'.]]

* EskimosArentReal: The majority of the townsfolk, at the urging of the secret police, do not believe in mountains. (This is often mentioned in the same breath as the similar disbelief by fiat in angels, which if anything is even more absurd, since a given resident will far more often encounter angels than mountains.)

** Old Woman Josie's Angels, who are described as ten-feet-tall, radiant and always smiling.

* OpenSecret: Many of Night Vale's secrets are the "officially denied but everyone knows" variety. Including but not limited to [[OurAngelsAreDifferent Angels]], [[TheMenInBlack a vague yet menacing government agency]], the antics of Sheriff's Secret Police, or the undisclosed location where people (and/or people's loved ones) get taken.

* BatmanGambit: [[spoiler:Janice]], surprisingly, puts together a plan to [[spoiler:steal the Registry of Middle School Crushes from City Council]]. Her plan, according to [[spoiler:her uncle Cecil]], is to use [[spoiler:the various skills of a ragtag group of accomplices, consisting of Old Woman Josie (and her tall friends named Erika), her mother Abby, her father Steve Carlsberg, and her (unofficial) other uncle, Carlos.]]

* BadassBookworm: 12-year-old Tamika Flynn, who defeated the Librarians in "Summer Reading Program" by reading advanced level books such as ''Literature/CryTheBelovedCountry'' (and also beheading at least one). As of Episode 35, Tamika and the other Summer Reading Program survivor kids are [[spoiler:forming an army to fight against [=StrexCorp=].]]

--> ''We do not look around. We do not look inside. We do not sleep.'' '''Our god is not a Smiling God. And we are ready for this war.'''
* BadBoss: Cecil's sinister, otherworldly bosses in the radio station. They're possibly related to (or are) the mysterious hooded figures around town that no one can look at or acknowledge.

** Cecil himself according to [[spoiler:Intern Maureen]]. He's got a bad habit of letting a [[DisposableIntern disproportionate number of interns die on his watch]] and [[ArsonMurderAndJayWalking do ridiculous task for him]] like editing his ''{{Film/Jaws}}'' slash fic.

---> "Old Woman Josie has not called, but intern Dana said that Old Woman Josie updated her Facebook page with an Instagram of some runestones. Dana has been furiously translating these symbols, and her best guess is that they say ‘They come in twos. You come in twos. You and you. Kill your double.’ There’s also a link to this amazing cat that keeps jumping in and out of boxes and oh my god, that is the cutest thing I have ever seen. Dana, you have got to post that on my wall. Oh my God, he loves those boxes ''so much''!"

* DarkHorseVictory: The new mayor ends up being [[spoiler:intern Dana, despite not being a candidate]]. Though Night Vale [[ThePointsMeanNothing does not actually choose due to votes (despite everyone voting anyway), but by the pulses coming from Hidden Gorge]].

* DisposableIntern: It's a RunningGag that the interns are sent out to investigate things that are unnatural even by Night Vale's [[EldritchLocation standards]] and won't live past an episode. The only exceptions are Intern Dana ([[AmbiguousCloneEnding or her double]]) who spends her time reporting back from in Night Vale's worst EldritchAbomination invested locations or flicking in and out of existence with no escape in sight [[spoiler:until being elected mayor]], [[spoiler:Intern Maureen who spent a good deal of time blinking in and out of existence like Dana]] and [[spoiler:main character Cecil himself when he was a teen. Who even then, was implied to have died and been brought back somehow]]. It's worth noting the official Welcome To Night Vale intern shirts [[LampshadeHanging are red]].

** In Episode 45, "A Story About Them", Cecil takes a moment to describe something in the desert intern Dana has been traversing for a few months:

The show treads a fine line between hilarious absurdity and genuine creepiness. Within a flexible format, each broadcast features not only reports on the town, but also Cecil's personal thoughts and experiences. Night Vale is populated by SecretPolice, mysterious hooded figures in the town dog park, [[ConspiracyKitchenSink and just about every possible conspiracy theory come to life]]. But at the show's core is Night Vale's community, including Cecil's friends and loved ones: such as intern Dana, who enters the dog park and survives; Old Woman Josie, surrounded by [[BlatantLies beings who are not Angels]] who're all named Erika; Megan, a schoolgirl whose entire body consists of an adult man's severed hand; and Carlos, Cecil's LoveInterest and the town's new ScienceHero. The story is very detailed and intricate, and small seeds planted throughout the episodes tend to unfold into important plot elements months or even years later.

** "...a dark planet, lit by no sun."

** [[spoiler:"The unraveling of all things"]] has been brought up by The Faceless Old Woman, The Sheriff's Secret Police's Spokesbeing, and Dana.

** Not even Dana knows if she's her double or not.

* AmbiguouslyHuman: When reporting [[spoiler:his producer's death]] Cecil admits to not knowing whether or not Daniel identified as human.

* AndIMustScream: According to Jackie anyone turned into a Stranger becomes incapable of doing anything but breathing due to the intense amount of pain they are in.

* [[AbsurdlyPowerfulStudentCouncil Absurdly Powerful City Council:]] They've been in power since the mid-1800s, voting for them is mandatory in every election, and they command the Sheriff's SecretPolice. People who defy them are regularly detained for "re-education," or are simply taken in the night, never to be seen again.

** Averted with Fay, the "monotone female voice" on the {{Numbers Station|s}}, who [[spoiler:has apparently recently gained sentience]] and only wants to be free. She announces from her own radio station that she is going to try to escape and Cecil goes to help her, only to find that [[spoiler:she has been reset, and has [[DownerEnding gone back to being just a computer program]]. Although "Voicemail" implies that she's either recovering, or faked being reset in the first place.]]

** Not that Night Vale's sky can't have for example: colors not generally associated with the sky, or not on the spectrum for that matter; "mysterious lights" in the words of Cecil, which Steve Carlsberg described as arrows; and the occasional "dark planet"... but seeing that is generally not healthy for the person in question.

* AllMythsAreTrue: Though you should probably pretend that they aren't, just in case the sheriff's secret police suddenly decides that believing in them is a punishable offense.

-->'''Cecil:''' The Sheriff's secret police are searching for a fugitive by the name of Hiram [=McDaniels. Mr. McDaniels=] is described as a five-headed dragon approximately 18-feet-tall, with mostly green eyes, and weighing 3,600 pounds. He is suspected of insurance fraud.

* BaitAndSwitch: The Sheriff's SecretPolice are on the lookout for Hiram [=McDaniels=], a five-headed, 18-foot-tall, fire-breathing dragon with "mostly green" eyes. Why? He committed insurance fraud.

** More generally, when has the "Weather" section ''ever'' actually been a report on the weather?

* HighlyVisibleNinja: The Sheriff's Secret Police make public statements and are well known to the general populace. The Novel reveals that the regular police one day just decided to start calling themselves Secret Police without actually changing anything.

* TheMenInBlack: Agents of a "vague yet menacing" government agency are mentioned in almost every episode. The World Government and the Sherrif's Secret Police also serve as this to a lesser degree.

* OpenSecret: Many of Night Vale's secrets are the "officially denied but everyone knows" variety. Including but not limited to [[OurAngelsAreDifferent Angels]], [[TheMenInBlack a vague yet menacing government agency]], the antics of Sheriff's SecretPolice, or the undisclosed location where people (and/or people's loved ones) get taken.

-->"One death has already been attributed to the Glow Cloud. But listen... it's ''probably'' nothing. If we had to shut down the town for every mysterious event that at least one death could be attributed to, we'd never have time to do anything, right? That's what the Sheriff's SecretPolice are saying, and I agree, although I would not go so far as to endorse their suggestion to 'run directly ''at'' the cloud, shrieking and waving your arms just to see what it does.'"

** Whenever "government agents" are mentioned, Cecil always has to throw in "... from a vague yet menacing agency..."

** There's also Larry Leroy, out on the edge of town.
** "Old Woman Josie, out by the car lot."
** "John Peters, you know, the farmer?"
** "Wheat, [[InsistentTerminology and wheat by-products]]."
** Whenever The Glow Cloud (all hail) is mentioned, you can hear any speaking character give a quick "all hail".
** Whenever Cecil introduces Hiram, who we here at Wiki/TVTropes would like to remind you is literally a five-headed dragon, weighing at least 3600 pounds, he likes to remind the listener that Hiram is literally a five-headed dragon, weighing at least 3600 pounds.

* AbsurdlyIneffectiveBarricade: Cecil's first move in his [[spoiler:war on [=StrexCorp=]]] is to barricade himself inside the studio. A rather magnificent start, so it is unfortunate that Cecil's idea of a barricade is a heap of cardboard signs reading "KEEP OUT!" and "SECRET ROOM!" (in all caps, with an exclamation point).

** Khoshekh the cat, which mysteriously appeared in the men's room of the community radio station, levitating in mid-air and permanently suspended at a fixed point. Initially seemed like an adorable side note, until we start to learn some things about Khoshekh. Like how being in his presence seems to make people into cat-lovers, to the point where it drove one woman to have her dog put down so she could adopt several cats. Or how it's impossible to take a picture of Khoshekh, and attempting to do so results in horrible death. Or how his "adorable meow" is a blood-curdling screech. He also gave birth to a litter of kittens despite being male. Those kittens, and, presumably, Khoshekh, have poisonous spine ridges, venomous fangs, and a "tendril hub."

** [[spoiler:The alternate Night Vale, underneath lane five of the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Fun Complex, has a blank sky with no sun or moon, now that Huntokar has ripped it from the rest of the world in an attempt to save it.]]

** In November of 2014, the show went on a hiatus- but the kind of hiatus where they still released full length episodes, only these were short stories written by guests, narrated by Cecil... and rather odd. "Minutes" were simply the minutes of a Night Vale Community College Faculty Meeting, while "What of the Sea?" were the existential reflections of a Night Vale woman who receives a mysterious letter in the mail.
** Episode 65 "Voicemail" is literally just Cecil's voice-mail, with messages from people like Carlos, Dana, Old Woman Josie and [[spoiler:''Kevin'']].
** [Best Of?] is hosted by [[spoiler:Leonard Burton, Cecil's predecessor]].

* ArmorPiercingQuestion: Occurs in ''Homecoming'', when Cecil's old classmate asks him [[spoiler:what year they graduated in.]] Cecil is stunned into [[NothingIsScarier almost ten seconds worth of dead air]] when he can't remember the answer.

** Cecil thinks Carlos's voice is like "caramel" and bemoans the fact that while he's at work, "it would be completely inappropriate for me to answer my phone regardless of how much I want to soak my ears in the oaky tones of our community’s most significant outsider."[[note]]Both actors who play Carlos have notably crisp, high tenor voices.[[/note]] He also describes himself as having a "smooth, sonorous voice."
** In "Rumbling", Carlos affectionately says Cecil "has the best voice of them all". In "Voice Mail", he calls him "honey-voiced honey".

-->'''Cecil:''' The Sheriff's secret police are searching for a fugitive by the name of Hiram [=McDaniels. Mr. McDaniels=] is described as a five-headed dragon approximately 18 feet tall, with mostly green eyes, and weighing 3600 pounds. He is suspected of insurance fraud.

** Played with in "Old Oak Doors Part B". Cecil starts the audience chanting, and then immediately tells them that they stop, "not because they do not care, but because they are people that are far away and not part of this story." and it's silly for the live audience to chant the same thing as the fictional Night Vale citizens.

* BaitAndSwitch: The Sheriff's SecretPolice are on the lookout for Hiram [=McDaniels=], a five-headed, 18-foot tall, fire-breathing dragon with "mostly green" eyes. Why? He committed insurance fraud.

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Episode 49, "Old Oak Doors" - the citizens of Night Vale are free from [=StrexCorp=] and the Smiling God, and Intern Dana returns home and is elected mayor... but Carlos is still trapped in the other desert.]]

* CrapsaccharineWorld: On the surface, Desert Bluffs appears to be a much more cheery town than Night Vale, but that only makes the occasional references to Desert Bluff's dark side even creepier. [[UpToEleven And then you find out]] everything is [[spoiler:either [[MeatMoss covered in]] or ''[[HumanResources made out of]]'' [[EvilIsVisceral viscera]]]].

** And even that is topped by Episode 110. [[spoiler:The collapse of reality, initiated by [[NiceJobBreakingItHero Huntokar altering time to save Night Vale from nuclear war in 1983]], is completing itself. The sky has been replaced by a giant hole. The five-headed dragons are rampaging and setting the city on fire. Most of the few people left in Night Vale have given up on the town, and are retreating into visions from more pleasant alternate realities. The situation gets so dire that, for the first time in the series, Cecil almost doesn't bother with the Weather report and simply signs off "good''bye'', Night Vale" rather than his usual "good night". Fortunately, he comes up with an idea immediately after.]]

** Overall, the entire city of Night Vale and their mysterious "Masters of Us All" have this as a recurring motif. The town is associated with night-time (duh), the Moon, the void, mysterious lights in the dark sky, hooded figures, hidden secrets, etc. This forms a nice juxtaposition with Desert Bluff's LightIsNotGood tendencies, below.

** To a lesser extent Egemony and Kellogs

** In Episode 35, the city is seized by a mysterious lethargy, to the point that ''gravity itself'' stops working and the sun starts going out. What does Carlos do? Takes the day to get some chores done (the lack of gravity makes it easy to clean the gutters), as he feels quite energetic.

* MindScrew: Much of the show, but ''especially'' Episode 67, ([Best Of]) for invoking MultipleChoicePast on such an extremely bizarre level. According to Leonard Burton, Cecil's been radio host since before the existence of Night Vale, and even radio itself. His predecessor, Leonard Burton, reports on his own death during the Clinton administration. Cecil is apparently older than Old Woman Josie. The world ended in 1983. Confused yet? You should be.

** As of Episode 88, we know there are two Johns: John Peters, you know, the farmer and John Peter, remember, The pharmacist?

* SkewedPriorities: In Episode 61, Night Vale is plagued by the sun in the sky multiplying exponentially, from one to two, then two to four. Cecil spends most of this potential apocalypse complaining about the radio station not getting any water.
* SmallTownRivalry: With the neighboring town Desert Bluffs.

** All angels are named Erika, with a K.

** The sun randomly sets ten minutes later than it's supposed to one day, without reason. [[spoiler:Carlos eventually discovers that it's not that the sun is wrong, it's just that none of the clocks in Night Vale are real.]]

*** Given the Desert Bluff intern/helper doppelgänger helping the original to "Put up shelving" ended up with a death, whereas the Night Vale one was just a pure attack, it seems like Desert Bluffs has a more happy outlook on violence.

** The desert immediately surrounding Night Vale is flat enough that mountain sceptics had to be taken on a long field trip to see a real one. This narrows the list of possible locations as much of the northern Great Basin is quite rugged terrain. "Best Of?" reveals that there are actually hills in Night Vale, but everyone avoids looking at or thinking about them for fear of the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s living within.