Line #68 WebAnimation/NightmaresInTheDark


1	Nightmares in the Dark is an action/horror/drama UrbanFantasy series currently in development by Red Blade Studios (aka Alex "Warlock" Krumwiede, and [[WebVideo/NeedsMoreGay Jamie "Rantasmo" Maurer]].)
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3	Nightmares focuses on an EnsembleCast of characters, chief amongst them being a guy named Donovan. By day he works as on-call roving tech-support for a half-dozen firms, offices, and other businesses around the area. By night, he works in his godfather's bar/nightclub, The Sanctum, as doorman and security.
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5	This is where he has his first encounter with the {{Masquerade}}, and he begins to explore the magical Underworld, meeting (and fighting with) zombies, [[AllTrollsAreDifferent trolls]], ghouls, goblins, [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampires]], [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent werewolves]] and other shapeshifters, and TheFairFolk. He soon learns they have a convenient group term, "'''Wight'''", derived from an old proto-germanic term for any magical creature. (Tolkien appropriated the term for [[OurGhostsAreDifferent a different use]], which led to [[TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons others]] borrowing the incorrect usage.) {{Youkai}} is actually an accurate parallel term.
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7	They have a {{Website/Kickstarter}}! See [[http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/redbladestudios/nightmares-in-the-dark here]]!
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9	Most of the information below is produced from the writer's world bible, excepting major reveals.
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12	[+'''Characters:'''+]
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14	Donovan Albrecht
15	* BewareTheNiceOnes - Inverted. He was always bigger and stronger, but was generally raised to be careful around other people. He actually had to break himself of GentleGiant tendencies when he got on the defensive line in high school sports, and still has to fight it in his second job.
16	* {{Bouncer}} - Donovan works a second job as one of these at the LocalHangout, owned by his godfather. He lives in a loft apartment overtop.
17	* TheBigGuy - He used to be a linebacker in highschool, but he's not DumbMuscle. (Not exactly a GeniusBruiser, but he ''did'' graduate college with a computer-science degree.)
18	* TheHero - Despite being the biggest & strongest among the main cast (instead of the JackOfAllTrades), he's also the lead character.
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20	Samantha Carpenter
21	* [[TheSmartGuy The Smart Girl]] - Her focus in college was literature and mythology, but somehow those didn't get her a job. Her typing skills did.
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23	Mike Brown
24	* EmbarrassingFirstName - Actual first name, "Walter", hates it with a passion. Mike is short for Michael, his middle name.
25	* HandsomeLech - He's pretty much in it for the ladies, and they're pretty much receptive. He is ''so'' glad this is a college town..
26	* TheLancer - Mike plays off of Donovan's seriousness and social awkwardness by being jokey and TheCasanova. If this were a different story, he might've been TheHero.
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28	Fred Warren
29	* ParentalSubstitute - Served in the military with Donovan's father, and did his best to provide the Male Role Model for him growing up. When Donovan needed a job and apartment during college, he provided. Wanders between this and BigBrotherMentor.
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31	Gwen
32	* BeastAndBeauty - She gets involved with Donovan early on. She's a model-esque beauty, he's an ex-linebacker beast.
33	* BrainlessBeauty - Averted. When Mike tries to get Donovan to meet her, he refuses, having dated quite a few airhead cheerleaders who only dated him because he was on the football team in highschool. Fortunately, she's not like that.
34	* FemmeFatale - Much noise is made over the fact that she's stunningly beautiful, almost to HeadTurningBeauty levels. She tends to get her way because of it.
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36	Murdoch
37	* CoolOldGuy - Murdoch looks to be in his fifties or sixties, [[AllTrollsAreDifferent for a Troll, anyway]], but he's closer to [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld three hundred and fifty]]. He's lost track.
38	* OldMaster - Murdoch takes it upon himself to train Donovan and Samantha in combat and the rules of the Underworld.
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41	'''TroperWorks/NightmaresInTheDark includes examples of:'''
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43	* AllMythsAreTrue - More or less, yeah. Every myth has a grain of truth, though a lot of facts have been distorted or mistranslated.
44	* CityOfAdventure - Currently unnamed, but a combination of Pontiac and Grand Rapids, Michigan. Includes diverse geography, a short drive from any one of the Great Lakes, with the downtown split by a major river, with only a 15-minute drive from the downtown urban center to middle-of-nowhere farm country or woods.
45	* DebutQueue - Not one every episode, but the show takes its time in introducing characters.
46	* ElementalPowers - Around half the magic is like this, the other half is indirectly associated, especially in how the elements connect to more idealized concepts like healing (water), defense (earth) or music (wind).
47	* FourTemperamentEnsemble - For the younger portion of the cast:
48	** - Donovan (Phlegmatic) - Rational.
49	** - Mike (Sanguine) - Extroverted.
50	** - Gwen (Choleric) - Ambitious.
51	** - Sam (Melancholic) - Perfectionist.
52	* FunctionalMagic - Several different subtypes are used. Most magic is Theurgy, as rituals call on spirits from the SpiritWorld, but since most spirits are non-sentient, it's almost Rule Magic. Some casters will bind spirits to use their powers on command, but these pacts can have nasty side effects. And some will ''consume'' a spirit to gain those powers for themselves, but you ''will'' get changed by this. (This is also how all the different Wight races were created, the changes stacking up over time.)
53	* GothicPunk - Played with, but ultimately averted. The PunkPunk genres are alluded to with an in-universe fashion trend which tends to wear fake armor, as a modern HotTopic take-off of KISS-style costumes, which is referred to as 'DungeonPunk'. [[spoiler:Also convenient fashion for {{Masquerade}}rs to wear their regular armor in every-day circumstances. Large weapons are still hard to hide, though.]]
54	* {{Gotterdammerung}} - Both straight and averted. There was a previous age when magic was common knowledge and gods walked the earth. Then [[UsefulNotes/TheSpanishInquisition some people]] [[UsefulNotes/TheCrusades didn't like that]]. Averted in that the magic is just as strong today as it was then, they just use it in [[{{Masquerade}} more subtle ways to avoid discovery]].
55	* LifeEnergy - Generally averted. The local variant of healing magic is based around transformative magic, so it's literally shaping the flesh back into a proper form. Don't think about it too hard, not for the believability, but for the {{squick}}.
56	** On the other hand, Mana exists, as a byproduct of sentient thought, and EmotionEater spirits [[spoiler:and others]] feed on it without [[spoiler:usually]] harming the target.
57	* {{Masquerade}} - Several levels of it, in fact. First you have the active Wights who are hiding. Then you have the Changelings, regular people who don't event realize they're actually monsters. See ''Tomato In The Mirror'', below. There are also a number of normal humans who know about and help or hunt the Changelings, but preserve the Masquerade because TheWorldIsNotReady.
58	* MetaOrigin - Somewhere between this and FantasyKitchenSink. Everything has a coherent explanation that all ties back into the same base concepts, but those concepts can be applied broadly enough that just about anything mythological can be justified.
59	* {{Muggles}} - Referred to as "Mundanes", "Mundies" for short, or when in public, "Mondays". (As in, "I hate Mondays.")
60	* OurMonstersAreDifferent - Much research was put into this, including the use of modern fictional sources, such as roleplaying materials and cryptozoology. However, any monster which could be explained by a garbled description of a real animal, has about high chance of being just that. On the other hand, magic does make some of the tougher real-world connections easier to maintain (and who knows what [[AWizardDidIt a wizard might have done..]]).
61	** AllTrollsAreDifferent - Played up with the Jaegers, a broad family of monsters that are beastly near-humanoids without any particular animal's features, such as Goblins, Orcs, Ogres, Gargoyles, etc. The name comes from the term 'hunter', as they're also TheWildHunt. (Specifically, they hunt demons and undead.)
62	** OurDemonsAreDifferent - Several different versions exist, and are related. '''Imps''' are Negative EmotionEater spirits, which can be bound by spellcasters to produce BlackMagic. They can also [[DemonicPossession possess]] or be ''consumed'' to turn someone into a physical demon, referred to as a '''Fallen'''. There are Fallen versions of several of the major races, including [[SuccubiAndIncubi succubi]], [[DealWithTheDevil devils]], {{HellHound}}s, and [[strike:[[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Balrogs]]]]-I mean, [[Myth/NorseMythology Fire Giants]], yeah..
63	** OurElvesAreDifferent - 'Young' elves are slender, naturally graceful folk who tend towards nomadic travel, and are often found amongst Gypsies, UsefulNotes/IrishTravellers, and other off-the-grid subcultures. (The 60's were their heyday.)
64	*** TheFairFolk - Older elves become more these types, as they lose the wanderlust and become more interested in Fey politics. (This usually takes a hundred years or so.) The older they get, the more power they accumulate, and with that power comes a set of oftentimes very odd rules and strictures. The exception to this is that in the Fey Courts, anyone can attain rank, as long as they prove themselves worthy through some means. This means anyone can play their ballgame, you just need to learn the rules of the particular court.
65	** OurVampiresAreDifferent - Well, they [[TakeThat don't sparkle...]] Real vampires are monstrous, undead creatures whose souls have been converted into energy-sucking dark essence (blood just happens to be a handy conduit for energy). 'Half-vampire'/proto-vampire infectees are humans whose souls have been infected by this demonic essence, and risk turning into full vamps, and so must absorb certain energies, including good emotions, from regular people to keep from turning completely. Note that sunlight also contains this energy, which is bad for [[WeakenedByTheLight full-vamps who are only being kept alive by their dark essence]].
66	** WingedHumanoid - Greek Harpies/Sirens, Norse {{Valkyries}}, Indian Garuda, Japanese Tengu, and a few other similar myths are combined into a WingedHumanoid race with Air element connections, including a gift for [[MagicMusic bewitching music]].
67	* PostVictoryCollapse - This happens to Donovan right after his ''second'' encounter with magic, where he was forced to defend himself [[spoiler: from a ghoul, and eventually killed it.]]
68	* PowerTrio - Mixed, depending on the episode. Donovan is in many of the early episodes, but who's along with him depends on the situation, and his role. In the second and third episode, as part of a larger arc:
69	** Donovan ([[TheSpock SuperEgo]]) - He's resistant to the women Mike tries to set him up with, because they're [[BrainlessBeauty brainless bimbos]]. [[spoiler: He ''is'' a virgin, by the way..]]
70	** Mike ([[TheMcCoy Id]]) - He sees that everything gets better if you just [[YouNeedToGetLaid get laid]] regularly.
71	** Gwen ([[TheKirk Ego]]) - She appeals to Donovan's interests aside from dating, displaying a depth which he doesn't expect. [[spoiler: Then she [[NatureAbhorsAVirgin bonks his brains out]].]]
72	* TimmStyle
73	* TomatoInTheMirror - A small but noticeable chunk of the world's population, (something between 5% and 15%) are actually monsters in hiding, ''even from themselves''. Their ancestors were Wights who used magic to hide their magical appearance and abilities in their children, making them entirely human. At least, it would, until they undergo [[DieOrFly a heavy trauma]], or are exposed to certain magics, which wakes those latent magical traits right back up. Referred to as Changelings.
74	* UrbanFantasy - With emphasis on the ''urban''.

Context WebAnimation / NightmaresInTheDark