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Introduced in Season One
Dan
Daniel Powell
Played by: Daniel Powell
The main protagonist of seasons 1 and 2. An archivist who starts a new job reviewing and cataloging recordings made by the Housing Historical Committee of New York State from the eponymous Archive 81.
- Action Survivor
- Adoring the Pests: He is a little skittish around Ratty at first, but grows attached to him later on.
- Body Horror: Whatever Rat and Suit did to him to give him his 'new flesh' - it didn't sound pleasant.
- Break the Cutie: Over the course of the series, Dan is trapped inside a facility alone, forced to listen to increasingly disturbing recordings, only narrowly escapes both the facility and Samuel, and even then, is captured and forced to navigate an Eldritch Location after being turned into a Cyborg.
- Cosmic Plaything
- Determinator: He can't stop himself from listening to the tapes, obsessed with finishing them all.
- Go Mad from the Isolation: Tanya eventually thinks this is what's happening to him.
- Hipster: Called as such by Lou and Clara.
- Nice Guy
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Dan's findings in the Archive inadvertently allow Samuel to enter the Archive.
- Non-Action Guy: To be fair, Season One had him against the ascended form of Samuel and Season Two had him hampered by unwanted cybernetic attachments - so it's not really his fault.
- Power-Upgrading Deformation: In Season Two, he gains some rather interesting abilities over time since being fused with machinery.
- Ship Tease: Implied with his "emotional attachment" he's forced to admit to Rat he has with Clara, in order to connect to her in his dream.
- Was Once a Man: His body is cannibalised and hideously morphed into an audio-recording cyborg in the beginning of Season Two.
Mark
Mark Sollinger
Played by: Marc Sollinger
Dan's journalist friend who has been researching and broadcasting Dan's recordings of Archive 81 to find out what happened to him.
Melody
Melody Pendras
Played by: Amelia Kidd
A representative of the Urban Preservation and Development Department who recorded the original tapes that Dan archives in Season One.
- Determinator: She wants to figure out what's up with the Visser building and the people in it and doesn't let anything stop her.
- Meaningful Name: Songs are a recurring theme in the podcast and also the way to summon the leviathon to enter the other world, which is how her romantic partner enters to find her.
Davenport
Mr. Davenport
Played by: David Powell
Dan's superior from the Housing Historical Committee of New York State who introduces him to Archive 81.
- Affably Evil: Almost never loses his chummy attitude whatever he is doing.
Samuel
Samuel
Played by: Austin Mitchell
The leader of a cult that operates in the Visser building.
- Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: His ultimate goal is to reach 'apotheosis'. He succeeds, in a way.
- Big Bad: Of Season One.
- Dark Messiah
- Evil Is Petty: There probably was no need for him to kill Ratty.
- Faux Affably Evil: He's soft spoken, usually calm to the point and creepy.. and he knows exactly what he's doing!
- Kick the Dog: See Evil Is Petty.
Ratty
Ratty
A rat that Dan 'befriends' while working in the Archive.
Jacob
Jacob
‘’’Played By:’’' John Maher
A resdident of the Visser building and memeber of the Historical Society. Revealed to have become ‘Rat’, the caretaker of the LMG outpost, in the season 2 finale.
- Blue-and-Orange Morality: Rat really does not seem to understand why Suit and Dan are so angry at him. He also tends to label things the other characters find horrific as ‘interersting’.
- Body Horror: We are not given any indication what Rat looks like in season 2, but people around him are always disgusted and horrifed by his apperance.
- Cloudcuckoo Lander: Even as Jacob he is unhinged. Once he becomes Rat it gets so much worse.
- Creepy Housekeeper: Genderflipped. Seems to be the caretaker of the outpost, but spends a lot of his time lurking and asking invasive questions.
- He also doles out a lot of the Body Horror to others.
- The Igor: To Samuel.
- Mad Scientist: As Rat he converted both Dan and Suit into their current nonhuman forms for use by LMG. Though the process for this is not clear it seemed to unclude grafting other peoples body parts onoto suit, and removing a third of Dan’s body.
- Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: As Rat while taking care of the outpost, he seemss far more comfortable and familiar with the world they’re in than any of the others.
- Was Once a Man: Used to be a man named Jacob Lester. Now its not so clear.
Introduced in Season Two
Clara
Clara Real Name: Jennifer Martin
Lou
Lou
- Hidden Depths: Turns out to be a great explorer and captain when he stays in the other world. He also falls in love with Christine and is willing to help her get home despite how crushed he and the crew are to see her go.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Helps Christine get the ambergris she needs and helps her get home after falling in love with her during the two years they've spent together, because that's what she needs.
- Nice Guy: Of all the people in the outpost, he is probably the most easygoing, least jerkish of them all: politely making smalltalk with Dan when they meet, despite obviously being taken aback by his cyborg appearance, in addition to being a very good captain to his crew on the Irons.
Suit
Suit
Played By: Lori Felipe-Barkin
A woman emotionally and spiritually "hollowed" by Rat and used as a human communication device for LMG board members.
- And I Must Scream: She admits to Dan that she prefers being "filled" by them so she doesn't have to think about her existence as an object to be used against her will. It is implied that this is why she hums to herself, to ignore the "unholy" place she's forced to live in.
- Body Horror: She was turned into a living puppet slash walkie talkie in order to be possessed by various LMG members to communicate with the team at the outpost. And the way they control her? She has their fingers on her hand. The only way to permanently prevent them from using her is to cut the finger off.
- Broken Bird: While Suit is generally completely emotionless, there are moments where she admits she hates what she is and where she is but cannot do anything about it.
- Was Once a Man: She is a normal human turned into, essentially, a human phone. She was also once named Caroline Lesta.
Cynthia
Cynthia
Played by: Andrea Romano
One of Davenport's colleagues and a board member of LMG.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Even she finds Rat disturbing.
- Jerkass: Not a single word out of her mouth has a nice thing to say about anyone.
- Lack of Empathy: Has absolutely no concern for the plight of those LMG have 'employed' to traverse the other dimension and cruelly calls Dan a monster due to his unwanted transformation.
- The Nicknamer: Has a condescending moniker for nearly everyone. "Boombox Fuckboi" for Dan, for example.
- Sir Swears-a-Lot
Introduced in Season Three
Nicholas
Christine
Christine Anderson
Played by Kristen Di Mercurio
- Mystical White Hair: As a result of selling her dyed red hair color in the alternate world.
Static Man
Static Man
Played by Jack Calk
- Trademark Favorite Food: Popeye's chicken and biscuits.
- Troll His introduction to the siblings show this.
Entities
Visser
Dromen
The Green Lady
Payphone
Payphone
Played by Jamie Agnello
- Because You Were Nice to Me: Nicholas didn't want to murder her like Static Man did, and in gratitude, Payphone gives him the other half of the tape he and Christine were missing.
- Body Horror: She is made up of all the body parts collected over the years from people who come to her for a deal.
