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Aluminum Christmas Trees:
- Contingency looks to have been heavily inspired or influenced by the "CNN Doomsday Tape," an alleged tape from the 1980s that Ted Turner instructed CNN to withhold for broadcast unless there was a literal world-ending event, under the belief that CNN would be the last broadcast outlet of any sort to operate. But unlike Contingency, Ted's "last message" was a simple film of a marching band performing "Nearer My God, To Thee" in front of the network's original headquarters and didn't tell anyone to commit suicide.
- Some viewers may think Digital Transition once again implies that Local 58 exists in an alternate timeline by having the station's switch to digital broadcasting take place on July 13, 2021, instead of June 12, 2009, like in our reality. In actuality, July 13, 2021 was the real-life deadline for low-power stations (which Local 58 is implied in its presentation to be) to shut off their analog signals^note; it was only high-power stations which made the switch in 2009.
- Show for Children airing at 4am seems highly weird. However, Otaku O'Clock is Older Than They Think. It wasn't uncommon back in the late 1980s and early 1990s to start kids' programming that early ^note, usually with something odd, old, or both. Cadavre and Candle Cove would definitely fit the "odd" category.
- As mentioned below under "Narm," some people find the idea of the driver actually following the absurd demands of the GPS system in You Are On The Fastest Available Route like turning off their headlights to be a little absurd. However, when GPS systems first started to really proliferate (but were still incredibly buggy and often working off of old and outdated map data,) it wasn't uncommon for there to be news articles about people who tended to follow the commands of their GPS a little too strictly, often to degrees that seemed to defy common sense, such as making turns that drove them off low bridges or into walls.
Funny Moments:
- Show For Children is mostly creepy and depressing, but after Cadavre looks down into the first grave and sees a realistically-drawn skeleton with eyes, his appropriately frightened reaction is very amusing. The fact that most viewers can relate only adds to it.
- C.L.O.S.E. becomes hilarious if you choose to interpret the ending as whatever abomination living on the asteroid being annoyed by the intrusion, and just throwing the probe away from their home.
- A more meta one happened when the video was first posted: it was posted via YouTube Premiere, which caused a huge flood of fans eagerly awaiting the video start... only to be greeted by an automated countdown introduced by YouTube (Straub later claimed he didn't know this would show up). Once that was over with, the video starts...with an in-universe countdown followed by another countdown. In total, fans were greeted with no less than four countdowns if they watched this during the original premiere.
- Without the context of the other films, "Contingency" can be taken as Black Comedy satire of Cold War propaganda in the same vein as Fallout. A PSA like that, complete with Mission Control Is Off Its Meds and over the top Eagleland stupidity would be entirely in character with that setting.
Heartwarming Moments:
- The third speaker in Weather Service offers to look at the Moon with you if you're scared to do so by yourself. Granted, the third speaker has been infected with the Brown Note, and their offer will only infect you in turn, but it's entirely possible assuming the speaker believes the infector is a genuinely benevolent entity, making it a really kind offer.
- During Digital Transition, the clip shown during the 1993-2003 segment shows a clip from a reboot of Cadavre, showing that the titular skeleton not only survived Show for Children, but is reunited with his girlfriend as well. They're positively adorable together!
Memetic Mutation:
- Scroll down to Contingency's comment section and you'll find no shortage of "KYS - Lyndon Johnson."
- Similar to memes about John Cena, the "There are no faces" mantra has led to people pretending that pictures of the faces from Real Sleep are blank.
- "There are no faces" itself has become memetic, particularly on videos about the flashed face distortion effect, given Real Sleep employs that tactic. In fact, the faces are edited versions of the faces from that very video as shown in the credits - they're just given an X-ray or negative effect (options in Final Cut Pro which Kris Straub uses) with lighting adjustments to make them look extra creepy.
- "REJOICE" (with "HIS THRONE") in general has become a meme thanks to Skywatching.
Narm:
- To some, the third speaker's lines in Weather Service are way too cheesy to take seriously due to them sounding like they came straight out of a horror B-movie.
- The GPS in You Are On The Fastest Available Route telling the driver to follow the "Do Not Enter" sign and turn off the headlights can be this, especially since they're dumb enough to actually do it.
- Some people think the faces in Real Sleep are more goofy than unsettling. Especially once you know how they're done, as applying a negative effect will have them look relatively normal. Also one of them looks like Beavis.
- Some of the "Acceptance" mantras, like "Dreams are just screaming with pictures", are a lot less intimidating than others (like "Cognition is a lie").
- Although meant to be unsettling, the sudden Mood Whiplash in Skywatching from regular names and descriptions of constellations to "HIS THRONE" when the camera points at the Moon can be seen as quite amusing.
Special Effect Failure: The very briefly-seen creature in You Are On The Fastest Available Route appears to be an artistic still put over the footage.
Tear Jerker:
- Close to the end of Show For Children, Cadavre is walking all alone in a deep underground cave. He walks slowly with his arms held close to him, and his face shows visible distress, both of which imply that he's very cold. The short ends with Cadavre laying down in an empty grave, completely alone and afraid. As he closes his eyes, he looks like he's crying...
- The last two slides of the PSA in Contingency: "Regarding Your Children" and "Infants and Pets" are especially heartbreaking. Imagine having to calmly talk your frightened children through suicide, or having to shoot your sleeping baby or beloved pet. The thought of it could make anyone's heart sink.
Ugly Cute: Cadavre from Show For Children (and Broodhollow). For an animated skeleton, he looks downright huggable as a Captain Ersatz of Mickey Mouse and related Ub Iwerks inkblot cartoon characters from the early 1930s. The fact that he's a big woobie probably helps.
Uncanny Valley:
- In comparison with the very Fleischer-esque animation in Show For Children, the corpse in the first grave, the...thing in the second grave, and the Moon near the very end of the short are way too realistically drawn.
- Real Sleep makes extensive use of this with split-second shots of distorted faces, sometimes with the mouth, eyes, or both flipped upside-down.
- As mentioned in Nightmare Fuel, the Moon just looks...off in Skywatching. As if it were almost alive. Some of the patterns on its surface can trigger trypophobia in some viewers.
What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: Show For Children depicts an old black-and-white cartoon whose protagonist is a cartoon skeleton looking for his loved one. Needless to say, knowing the channel, it gets creepy and depressing relatively fast, but for Local 58 this cartoon is perfect for children ^note. That and it aired at 4:00 AM. Alternatively, it could just be morbid humor.

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