Editorials
Before Slender Man and CreepyPastas There Was ‘Ted the Caver’!
I’ve always been fascinated by early-internet horror. Before the rise of Slender Man, Creepypastas, and spooky YouTube videos, most people got their occasional dose of online scares from quirky flash games or viral e-mails spreading updated versions of familiar urban legends. However, that would all change in 2001, as the internet would be graced with an iconic scary story that would inspire many more to come, a tale that we now know as the infamous Ted the Caver.
In a time preceding the popularization of MySpace (or even the invention of Facebook, for that matter), customizable web pages were all the rage, with blogging having exploded in popularity all around the world. Several web-hosting sites attempted to cash in on the trend, and it was on an unassuming AngelFire page that spelunking enthusiast Ted began to share his growing obsession with the aptly named “mystery cave”.
Keeping its real name and location intentionally vague in an effort to dissuade curious readers from getting hurt, Ted used the website as a kind of journal to record and reflect on his exploration, describing his first innocent forays into the cave, accompanied only by a strategically unnamed friend (referred to as B in the story) and a disposable camera. Within the cave, he and his friend encountered a small opening that led into an apparently unexplored system of tunnels, and decided to expand the passage in order to reach the cavern’s uncharted depths.
Claustrophobia, anyone?
As Ted and his friend go about enlarging the passage through the use of power drills, sledgehammers, and sheer tenacity, the cavers encounter eerie noises, strange feelings and creepy sigils carved into seemingly unreachable rocks. Of course, things eventually take a turn for the worst, as these intrepid explorers unearth something that was best left undisturbed, but I won’t spoil the rest of the story here. Inquisitive readers can (and definitely should) visit Ted’s Caving Page for the full chilling tale, which is remarkably still online after all these years.
Ted’s story would eventually spread to all corners of the internet, becoming especially popular on message boards where users would argue endlessly about its authenticity. Through Ted’s believable insight and handy camera, we’re offered glimpses into the Mystery Cave’s claustrophobic innards, making this one of the most immersive horror experiences available online. A real group of experienced cavers would eventually pinpoint the actual cave’s location in Utah, adding another layer of credibility to the story. Nevertheless, after a few years, the real Ted re-emerged online and ended up revealing (rather anti-climactically) that the blog was a mix of his real-life spelunking adventures combined with some creative embellishment.
At one point, there was some amount of controversy surrounding a short story by Thomas Lera entitled “Fear of the Darkness“, which some internet users shared as if it were a completed version of the original tale. However, Lera’s take on the story was entirely fan-made, having clearly adapted Ted’s blog, instead of the other way around. While not a bad read in its own right, Fear of the Darkness‘ ending went out of its way to explain things that were better left to the reader’s imagination, making it an inferior version of the story.
After several years of internet infamy, an independent film adaptation of the story was produced in 2008, titled The Living Dark: The Story of Ted the Caver. Directed by David Hunt, the film took a whopping nine years to warrant a release outside of the festival circuit. While this is usually a bad sign, the movie is actually a surprisingly creepy retelling of Ted’s adventures, despite taking a few liberties with the source material.
One of the better Creepypasta-based films.
In spite of an obviously insufficient budget, Living Dark manages to retain the original story’s mysterious atmosphere and early-internet charm, even using some of Ted’s original photographs and journal entries within the film. The ending might divide viewers regarding how decidedly unambiguous it is when compared to the original blog posts, but I thought that it served as a satisfying compromise between showing too much and too little.
Even beyond the world of film, Ted’s Caving Page has had a notable influence on internet culture as a whole, having been considered by some as the internet’s very first creepy-pasta. The story also served as an inspiration for countless other infamous online stories like The Dionaea House (a personal spooky favorite) and the SCP Foundation.
To this day, the page remains incredibly popular, with people are still arguing over their interpretation of Ted’s account and what fate might have befallen him and his friends. I think a lot of this success can be attributed to the candid writing style and plausible presentation of an otherwise traditional supernatural horror story. It really feels like Ted is just relating a series of real events instead of authoring an epic tale of Lovecraftian terror (although you can’t deny the story’s Lovecraftian undertones).
Much like what happened to the Blair Witch Project, the scare factor here is significantly reduced now that we no longer have the benefit of uncertainty over whether or not this is a true story. However, again like the holy grail of found-footage films, Ted’s tale stands on its own as an effective work of horror, carrying all the traits of a good old-fashioned supernatural mystery regardless of its format.
As we reach the 17th anniversary of Ted’s first entry, I think it’s worth taking a look back at the grandfather of modern internet horror and appreciating its influence over our favorite digital scares. Luckily for us, Ted’s Caving Page is still open to anyone curious (not to mention brave) enough to enter, and I wholeheartedly recommend that you do so.
Having grown up in a religious family, Christian movie night was something that happened a lot more often than I care to admit. However, back when I was a teenager, my parents showed up one night with an unusually cool-looking DVD of a movie that had been recommended to them by a church leader. Curious to see what new kind of evangelical propaganda my parents had rented this time, I proceeded to watch the film with them expecting a heavy-handed snoozefest.
To my surprise, I was a few minutes in when Denzel Washington proceeded to dismember a band of cannibal raiders when I realized that this was in fact a real movie. My mom was horrified by the flick’s extreme violence and dark subject matter, but I instantly became a fan of the Hughes Brothers’ faith-based 2010 thriller, The Book of Eli. And with the film’s atomic apocalypse having apparently taken place in 2024, I think this is the perfect time to dive into why this grim parable might also be entertaining for horror fans.
Originally penned by gaming journalist and The Walking Dead: The Game co-writer Gary Whitta, the spec script for The Book of Eli was already making waves back in 2007 when it appeared on the coveted Blacklist. It wasn’t long before Columbia and Warner Bros. snatched up the rights to the project, hiring From Hell directors Albert and Allen Hughes while also garnering attention from industry heavyweights like Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman.
After a series of revisions by Anthony Peckham meant to make the story more consumer-friendly, the picture was finally released in January of 2010, with the finished film following Denzel as a mysterious wanderer making his way across a post-apocalyptic America while protecting a sacred book. Along the way, he encounters a run-down settlement controlled by Bill Carnegie (Gary Oldman), a man desperate to get his hands on Eli’s book so he can motivate his underlings to expand his empire. Unwilling to let this power fall into the wrong hands, Eli embarks on a dangerous journey that will test the limits of his faith.
SO WHY IS IT WORTH WATCHING?
Judging by the film’s box-office success, mainstream audiences appear to have enjoyed the Hughes’ bleak vision of a future where everything went wrong, but critics were left divided by the flick’s trope-heavy narrative and unapologetic religious elements. And while I’ll be the first to admit that The Book of Eli isn’t particularly subtle or original, I appreciate the film’s earnest execution of familiar ideas.
For starters, I’d like to address the religious elephant in the room, as I understand the hesitation that some folks (myself included) might have about watching something that sounds like Christian propaganda. Faith does indeed play a huge part in the narrative here, but I’d argue that the film is more about the power of stories than a specific religion. The entire point of Oldman’s character is that he needs a unifying narrative that he can take advantage of in order to manipulate others, while Eli ultimately chooses to deliver his gift to a community of scholars. In fact, the movie even makes a point of placing the Bible in between equally culturally important books like the Torah and Quran, which I think is pretty poignant for a flick inspired by exploitation cinema.
Sure, the film has its fair share of logical inconsistencies (ranging from the extent of Eli’s Daredevil superpowers to his impossibly small Braille Bible), but I think the film more than makes up for these nitpicks with a genuine passion for classic post-apocalyptic cinema. Several critics accused the film of being a knockoff of superior productions, but I’d argue that both Whitta and the Hughes knowingly crafted a loving pastiche of genre influences like Mad Max and A Boy and His Dog.
Lastly, it’s no surprise that the cast here absolutely kicks ass. Denzel plays the title role of a stoic badass perfectly (going so far as to train with Bruce Lee’s protégée in order to perform his own stunts) while Oldman effortlessly assumes a surprisingly subdued yet incredibly intimidating persona. Even Mila Kunis is remarkably charming here, though I wish the script had taken the time to develop these secondary characters a little further. And hey, did I mention that Tom Waits is in this?
AND WHAT MAKES IT HORROR ADJACENT?
Denzel’s very first interaction with another human being in this movie results in a gory fight scene culminating in a face-off against a masked brute wielding a chainsaw (which he presumably uses to butcher travelers before eating them), so I think it’s safe to say that this dog-eat-dog vision of America will likely appeal to horror fans.
From diseased cannibals to hyper-violent motorcycle gangs roaming the wasteland, there’s plenty of disturbing R-rated material here – which is even more impressive when you remember that this story revolves around the bible. And while there are a few too many references to sexual assault for my taste, even if it does make sense in-universe, the flick does a great job of immersing you in this post-nuclear nightmare.
The excessively depressing color palette and obvious green screen effects may take some viewers out of the experience, but the beat-up and lived-in sets and costume design do their best to bring this dead world to life – which might just be the scariest part of the experience.
Ultimately, I believe your enjoyment of The Book of Eli will largely depend on how willing you are to overlook some ham-fisted biblical references in order to enjoy some brutal post-apocalyptic shenanigans. And while I can’t really blame folks who’d rather not deal with that, I think it would be a shame to miss out on a genuinely engaging thrill-ride because of one minor detail.
With that in mind, I’m incredibly curious to see what Whitta and the Hughes Brothers have planned for the upcoming prequel series starring John Boyega…
There’s no understating the importance of a balanced media diet, and since bloody and disgusting entertainment isn’t exclusive to the horror genre, we’ve come up with Horror Adjacent – a recurring column where we recommend non-horror movies that horror fans might enjoy.
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