Growing Up In Silent Hill : The Eerie Comfort of Y2K Era Horror

[@viralbheda6428]

As an early 90’s kid, I never understood why I always found darkness & desolation so comforting. It’s nice to know someone else more articulate than me is grappling with similar questions.

[@mak_attakks]

Same. I mentioned it to one of my friends, and they thought I was weird

[@buntado6]

@@mak_attakks Horror has an element of mystery behind the danger. Real daily life dangers have long become mundane and repetitive, to the point some stop thinking that dying would be so bad. The spike of a danger you don't understand or of a sudden horrendous monster awakes the dormant primitive instinct, of wanting to survive no matter what, and also a sense of spirituality. Because the saddest part of realizing demons didn't exist was understanding that neither did angels.

[@mattmolloy636]

@@mak_attakks I mean they’re not wrong, but I think we were all kind of weird back then. Hell, we’re all probably weird now and will subsequently wind up having weird kids who will take what they inherited from us and make things even weirder (fingers crossed 🤞🏻)

[@mattmolloy636]

@@buntado6 nothing exists beyond what we choose to breathe life into.

[@sneedmando186]

Glad I’m not alone. Idk why I feel most alive in the dead of night, but I do

[@nimazsheik5152]

"Horror has always been a good hiding place for lonely people", that quote hit me hard, it's so damn relatable.

[@TehUltimateSnake]

Guess that explains why I’m drawn towards horror content 😅

[@zetusky]

And it's not about being married or in couple. When I was happily married, I still was drawn to horror. Actually we both were, we found horror movies... absorbing. Maybe that's why we divorced 🤣

[@naqaychaayal302]

Yep. Me.

[@IskanderKhan]

This bloke can WRITE. He's like a triple threat. Good speaking voice, good editing, good writing.

[@SamuelBlack84]

Nightmares are comforting in a world of evil

[@hernandezmedia]

This isn't a video essay, it's a poem. Lovely to watch, deeply intentional. I feel a growing ambition to tell larger stories. I dig it. :)

[@despar1a]

I really love the way you describe this as a poem. I think this is a perfect description :)

[@mahmoudragab1787]

This should be the first pinned comment. If this is not poetry, what is?

[@dean6452]

i keep coming back to this every few months. genuinely the best video essay i have ever watched

[@soraskingdom2388]

Man… as an elder millennial who’s main source of happiness is rooted in nostalgia and living in the past, this video really moved me. The editing and tone and cadence was perfect. I know all the feelings you’ve described here and I related so much to all the things you touched on. Great work.

[@MissteriousOne]

I’m the exact same way with nostalgia dude.

[@SamuelBlack84]

Nostalgia is like a ghost revisiting its family home after everyone is long gone Empty rooms filled with cold silence but echoing with memories of home cooking, warmth, and comfort Nostalgia for me too is my main source of happiness these days

[@Jokkefanten]

The feeling of having the 90's be just a decade away, yet acknowledging that it's 30 years ago combined with this feeling of everything moving so fast and asynchronously to my own perspective are emotions that I haven't really been able to purposefully ponder. Thanks for this little insight, it's comforting to know that I'm not alone in enjoying the comforts of melancholia as an antidote to the frustration that modernity is causing. Thank you.

[@Naruga]

I am almost 42 but it feels like yesterday morning I was 14 and reading Lord of the Rings in bed, hearing my mother in the kitchen cooking up some breakfast.

[@suzylux]

I think it qualifies as some sort of Mandela Effect. I feel like time has moved very quickly since the year 2000.

[@tw2204_]

Back in October 2022 my son suffered a serious accident. My wife would stay at hospital with him but I came home for work, washing and the dog. Some nights were very lonely, dark and isolating. One night I watched a playthrough of Silent Hill 2. First time seen in almost 2 decades. I’d forgotten most of it and was too young to fully appreciate it. It was the most content I’d felt the whole time he was in hospital. I found it bizarre that relaxation had finally come from such dark, twisted and sad story. Now, after watching this video, I feel it might not just be me. My son made a full recovery. I was born in 1989

[@MissteriousOne]

I’m glad to hear he’s made a full recovery!

[@Luipaard005]

So thankful your son has made a full recovery. It is funny how horror becomes cathartic in these times of grief and fear.

[@TheVAULTofHORROR]

Akira Yamaoka's music will do that to you.

[@paranormalmommel1626]

I'm glad to hear that he's okay

[@mak_attakks]

Wow, hope you're all doing well

[@flamshiz]

"many of those homes half-burned and abandoned, but not always both" gaddamn this writing is good

[@Smallgot83]

Yeah there were a lot of lines like this. Instantly subscribed.

[@TheoKitching]

KaptainKristian is goated

[@almasakic1148]

As a 90s baby your video almost made me cry. You put into words things I've been feeling for decades. I always wondered why simple things like a VHS, a tattered curtain on an abandoned house, a dusty vinyl record, could evoke such emotion in me. Thank you for this so much.

[@Vidiocity92]

I've never thought of horror in relation to the uncertainty of the Millennium, that's an amazing perspective. Memory is like art, it's comforting and disturbing

[@RevCo78]

Look at every eras horror films and the fears of their time. It is a commonly accepted thing that horror stories reflect the fears of their time.

[@Dunge0n]

Turns out, we were right to be afraid.

[@lorevelasco48]

@@RevCo78 fun fact, torture porn is a direct response to 9/11

[@SamuelBlack84]

Memory is like wandering a dilapidated building filled with rooms Some memories are comforting with welcoming furnishings Other rooms are dark, dank with foreboding contours

[@ProvedRobot]

What an incredible blend of media and reality. Delving into your own past and bringing us to where it all began for you deepens the message of the isolation, empty, and barren so common in the stories told for that generation. This video feels almost like a narrative of the era more than just a reflection of a genre. Never been more excited for what the Kaptain does next.

[@yangkee9452]

It's weird, this video is about a man who returns to horror whenever he feels lonely, and how its melancholy soothes him. Well in turn, this video has become that for me. I watch it whenever I feel depression settling in, and somehow, the expression of loneliness in sadness in here makes me feel better.

[@cosmicdeerreviews6268]

I've been so depressed lately and this video somehow summed up everything I've been feeling. Thank you

[@collinemcguigan]

Art disturbs the comforted and comforts the disturbed.

[@SamuelBlack84]

I, too, have felt the same way wandering my town as though lost in a fog and wandering around like a ghost Horror for me has always been appealing for being a comfortable nightmare that I can slumber inside

[@-gator4732]

Amazing. I was born in 1987 and I want to add a few things. 1) The boredom of being a child pre internet. There was no internet to sink your time into. Video games were really basic. So you often were bored out of your mind. This peaked in activities like riding your bike around town with friends, pulling dumb pranks, or exploring places that you were not supposed to be. 2) The fear of Gen X in the early 2000s. Our parents generation really become obsessed with the “dark side of the human experience.” I remember watching Americas Most Wanted Criminals of the late 90s and early 200s. Up till the 90s news was hyper local. It is was rare to even leave your town. Suddenly with Cable this hyper local focus became shattered. Our parents become obsessed by it. Things like the OJ trial was everywhere. Then boom 9/11 happen and every one was scared. The world went for a overall goofy place to a dark scary place overnight. I remember surfing AOL back when it was its own product and my father standing over my shoulder. I asked why and was lectured about how their are pedos out there waiting to steal me. This fear of the world translates to movies and video games. 3) Scream was a huge shattering of the horror genre. It was super meta before meta became a word. Give it watch it you can. It constantly talked about horror movie tropes in it. Things like “well the virgin never dies” were openly talked about in the movie. It was more of a critique on the played out horror movie genre of the 90s. Edit: 4) I also want to talk about Y2K. It may sound like a joke now, but it was very serious at at the time. I remember learning about in school. I was in maybe 2nd grade and we did an actual assignment in it. It covered thing a like register not working, but I remember being shocked because it talked about airplanes not working. I thought they were just gonna drop out of the sky. Looking back on it freaks me out because it was clear the government was worried about our grid shutting down and clearly was trying to prep us for it. On new years all the young’s kid held their breath scarred that something was gonna happen, but nothing did. The adults were all drunk. I guess the tech industry really worked insanely hard to fully fix the bug before it happened.

[@calebmarmon1310]

I’m also a child of ‘87. Good vintage. I think the burgeoning existence of the internet helped give me form to the lonely horror that otherwise manifested as boredom in my life. It’s weird to have nostalgia for the quiet terror of loneliness and isolation.

[@penname8441]

+

[@MasterFrag91]

"I guess the tech industry really worked insanely hard to fully fix the bug before it happened." That was precisely it. When Y2K came and went, and all the news reported that it had been a bust, that nothing of particular note happened, and all the jokes began, it was all down to years of preparation, patching, and execution. It was known to be an issue decades prior, but many vendors didn't bother making fixes for it because nobody expected critical systems to be running on 10/20/30 year old hardware by the turn of the millennium. By most accounts, those who worked on Y2K compliance, many deployments went down to the wire, and many were done years ahead of time. Some systems got patched in '98 or earlier, some got patched in '99, and some only got patched in December of '99 or even December 31st. All the credit for nothing of note happening comes down to the IT workers who worked their asses off to get every major system into compliance on a worldwide scale. In the end, Y2K amounted to: A few US Spy satellites stopped working for a few days until a fix was implemented. A few people were born, according to the computers, at 100 years old. The US Naval Observatory dropped out of time synchronization with the rest of the US Navy. This was fixed within an hour of being reported. Other scattered, trivial issues. The next major issue of this type will occur in 2038, when systems using an unpatched UNIX operating system will overflow the 32-bit signed integer for UNIX Time. It will occur at 03:14:07 UTC on 19, January 2038, and all affected systems will revert to 20:45:52 UTC, 13, December 1901. In reality, this particular problem SHOULD just go over without any effort on the user's (or sysadmin's) part, as most operating systems have been developer much more proactively against issues like this to avoid another Y2K-like scramble to fix everything. The only things that will be affected by this, in all likelihood, are ancient software packages which are quite old even today.

[@Kyrrial]

I'm an '87 kid, too. The thing about Y2K was that it never even was an issue, at least not at the 1999-2000 switchover. Computers have never been in base-10 (the number system we use), so that clock ticking over for us meant nothing. Computers at the time were made using a 32-bit numbering space, meaning that the issues described in Y2K wouldn't have happened until January 19, 2038 at 03:14:08 AM. And that's assuming nothing was done (which it has; computers are 64 bit now, increasing that max year exponentially from 2038 to the year 292,277,026,596). Y2K was solely people (including the government) freaking out because they didn't understand how computers worked. Granted, it pushed the introduction to 64 bit, but the kerfuffle was only fearmongering. I even recall hearing about the 32-bit issue mentioned above very briefly on the news when they interviewed an expert. I remember thinking "Oh, yeah. This dude is right." No one listened and immediately started freaking out again. Edit: And if any system is still running in 2038 that has the 32-bit spillover issue mentioned above, it deserves to crash.

[@MasterFrag91]

@@Kyrrial The risk wasn't in consumer equipment, and when dealing with consumer equipment, it was largely relegated to software. The one of the big risks was on systems which truncated the first two digits of the year, e.g. 12/31/99. This was done to save memory on early computer systems, and many of those early mainframes were still essential to a great number of businesses and government entities. When the year 2000 happened, if unpatched, these systems would have flipped over to reading 1/1/00, reading as 1/1/1900. This is one example out of many. What you've failed to account for is the fact that while hardware that the average person was using at the time was largely immune to this issue (outside of software problems), the decades old mainframes, and programs running on those mainframes (databases, for instance) we not. Nobody expected them to still be in place 30 years later, let alone running the same code they were when they were introduced. Much like with your edit, everyone SHOULD HAVE seen it coming, and fixed the issues in the decades prior, it having been a known issue since 1958, but the reality is that people don't like spending money rewriting a program that still works for issues that will exist in the distant future. Mark my words, we will PROBABLY see some news articles about some forgotten mainframe breaking an essential program in 2038. Legacy machines don't go away, many big businesses still rely on them, or forget about them entirely because they still just work. There's a ton of ancient IBM mainframes still running in the banking industry, and there's a HUGE demand for COBOL programmers because these systems need to have software updated still. Don't mistake the lack of figurative fireworks during Y2K as evidence that it wasn't a major issue. It absolutely was, and many of those doomsday scenarios may have played out had everyone NOT taken steps to mitigate it, albeit several decades later than they should have. It wouldn't have been the end of the world, but it would have been BAD. By the time December of 1999 came around, it was absolutely overblown (because most vulnerable organizations had patched in the year or two preceding), but it was absolutely a valid concern. Something like that doesn't turn into a firestorm within the industry if it isn't a big deal.

[@2ndbleak]

Holy hell man, the writing & the editing here - absolutely amazing. I’ve also found myself watching old J-Horror from the 90s and 00s lately, a lot of the themes touched on in those movies feel so very current lately

[@CaKelley]

This might be the closest I've felt someone describe that feeling of melancholy and... sadness perhaps, when visiting a town that, even when it plays a current role in my life, still takes me back to days and years that feel so distant. Like they were a set for the character I was once portraying, now so distant, yet still within an arms reach. I've been absorbed by this platform for more than a decade now, and to this day there are none at this level of expression and execution of sharing and discussing formative media. You a master K!

[@GenericProtagonist7]

This is my favorite piece of media ever, I must have listened to this a hundred times at this point while walking home from work late at night. The quiet, empty streets of the neighborhood I've lived in my entire life passing me by, this video in of itself induces the feeling it describes, just brilliant.

[@mongezibuthelezi1032]

6:32 do you know this ost

[@samcooper4327]

I genuinely think this is the greatest piece of media I’ve ever stumbled across, in 20 minutes I learned and realised more about myself than I have in 24 years. Thank you mate

[@Trepanation21]

Absolutely love that you incorporated some of the Silent Hill OST, omg. Those songs are so haunted and moving, they almost stop me in my tracks when I hear them still. The thing is, I didn't even play the games, I watched my friend play them. And then when I was an adult, during a specific period in my life then, I listened to the soundtracks when I went to bed. for several months. Something about the loneliness of the songs, the melancholy, the passion and absolutely _haunting_ mood of them just fit what I was needing then. When I hear them still, they feel like a kind of womb, or maybe a cocoon, around me. Changing me.

[@flamshiz]

fading into the ball drop countdown is one of the most incredible cinematic transitions of the decade holy shit

[@gegok42]

I added video to favourites instantly!

[@SeanLives]

Of the millennium

[@IskanderKhan]

He's such a talent. I'm honestly in awe.

[@VamshiOhgs]

This is one of main the reasons I love the horror genre, it goes through so many waves every decade and comes out with a totally different appearance each time, with films that are distinct from the prior years and always manages modify itself to never become stale

[@TheMediaMutants]

Well said

[@KK_Draws_Stuff]

Welcome back Frank Ocean

[@denilsonthomas]

Lmfaooo he really be on Frank timing fr

[@zhubinbashiri7167]

😭

[@masonkeys782]

Lmao all love here we miss you

[@NeverSaySandwich1]

Literally who

[@josehasing1495]

I don't get it

[@EasyTargetLP]

This feels so rawly personal at times, yet so well thought out and put together. Some of the transitions here along with the visuals make me feel like I'm being pulled into this hazed world you're conjuring. This is genuinely one of my favorite videos of yours, Kristian. So glad to have you back once again!

[@getjac]

The transitions really did have a hypnotic quality to them

[@TheKnightXavier]

The personal flourish adds tremendously to the narrative of the video. One can really feel how Silent Hill and other late 90s horror so closely reflected your own childhood experience. Uncanny! Really thought provoking, thanks for sharing!

[@kowloonbroadcast]

my man, come back. this video is a masterpiece, the world needs more of this

[@PramitChatterjee1993]

as someone born in the 90s, i got literal chills watching this video. really, well done!

[@katathoombs]

"I always think of the 1990s as being a decade away." You and me both.

[@ManSeekingMeaning]

Incredible topic of choice! Honestly, every time you release a new video, I genuinely stop what I’m doing if at all possible. That’s how coveted your coverage of all things art is for me and so many others. Thanks for the quality content time after time.

[@AnAbsurdExistence]

W aki pfp

[@PoloDavey]

Facts

[@altaidox]

Based

[@WitchingHourInOsaka]

I keep returning to this video. There's just something comforting in the cold melancholy of that period in time. I just wanna live within those feelings. I feel somewhat normal when I do.

[@SeanStrife]

As someone else who grew up in Appalachia in the around the same time period... yeah, this video hit WAAAAAAAAAAAY close to home. Thank you for putting into words what I always struggled to.

[@DoctorSwellman]

Thank you for sharing your melancholy with us. It honestly gave words to how I felt growing up. Poor, in a small town, looking for hidden paths or something else in a maze of old mobile homes. This video might have reminded people of horrors from the past, but for someone like me, I'd love to experience that just one more time. This video is about as close as I'll get and I appreciate that more than you'll ever know.

[@PepeSlivia]

I felt like I was in a trance watching this, like I was peering into your past. Not the history of your past, but the emotions of your past. Keep it up Kristian. I would love to watch a feature of yours someday.

[@SpartanPhobos]

Such comforting story telling. A series of thought provoking truths that people tend to ignore or forget. Some of us don't forget, and we often find comfort in the feeling. For me, this melancholy is where inspiration stems and grows, ironically. I came back to this video a year later to remind myself to find strength and comfort in the uncomfortable.

[@dduuddeechil]

This evokes so many of the emotions that claw at me during the winter months. Thank you for getting far more intimate and unstructured in this video essay, your humanity bleeds through the screen like static on a CRT

[@danielbarrero2815]

This is the most impactful video essay I’ve ever seen man. This was BEAUTIFUL and transcendent. Please keep making these, they’re art

[@Nerdilicious]

The way your essays show a deeper understanding of the mediums you talk about by also inhabiting the same medium is sublime to me. You inspire creativity kap

[@dinospumoni8255]

I love rewatching this video from time to time. The nostalgia trip is therapeutic for me.

[@mongezibuthelezi1032]

Do you know this song 6:30

[@inponderland]

"Growing up in this period and being young and dumb and impressionable and having every single person tell you that your little world that was already crumbling... was nearing its premature end... doing anything about it was as good as trying to flee your fate on a treadmill, so why even bother? It's no wonder we all spent the rest of our lives looking for anything to escape into." Great writing as always Kristian!

[@zvndmvn]

The anxiety of Y2K set the stage for the shattering of innocence experienced on 9/11; Just when it seemed like the worst was behind us, something real was revealed to be more horrific than anything fiction could come up with. The hysteria of adults around me made me realize that there are some things in this world they couldn't protect me from.

[@parkmallbaby]

When I was a kid there's always been a creeping sense of dread starting around 1993 with the Ebola scare all over the news and the 1994 giant asteroid Shoemaker Levy that broke into three parts. I remember rumors claiming the chances of Earth getting hit was highly probable and if not for Jupiter taking the hit it would have been the end of mankind. And of course in school we were taught there was a hole in the Ozone layer that would melt the polar ice caps by 2000 and submerged the Earth underwater. For an 8 year old this felt like a nightmare and probably one of the reasons I developed anxiety at age 23 because I have long memory and was not able to shrug some bad memories off. By late 90s everything seemed to cool off sadly before 9/11 happened many people did feel this was a peak in good times.

[@rage_review]

How is it possible for anyone to be as good as this content creator? Your videos are more passionate and thought provoking than any Oscar winning documentary or Hollywood film. Every single one of your videos I have ever watched has either expanded my love of the topic I thought I already knew everything about. Or changed my mind about something I thought I had no interest in. You are a gift to this world. Thank you for all you do KaptainKristian.

[@danny297]

Idk if we’ll ever get another video but I hope Kristian’s happy.

[@sn33d_]

It's interesting that 20 years later, after going through another period of apocalyptic fear, so to speak, we long to escape back to those memories of melancholy. Things move in cycles.

[@parkmallbaby]

As I have always reiterated with some friends and family the 90s was the last vestige of the Old World. It was a clash in time. It was when society transition to a familiar and hectic one we have today. Not only in a technical sense but the attitudes how we deal with everyday life today jumping from one crisis or event to another. The internet really changed all that and I have always been very sensitive to the changes because I'm still very attached to that old time. The Ring, Silent Hill and Blair Witch played with that aspect as all these literature deal with a past affecting the present.

[@pistachioperson]

i come back to this video again and again, incredible work.

[@elrathJohnson]

Kaptain, you are so different from other youtubers. Most start cheap and slowly grow into quality, but you exploded into posting spectacular material. Most find a rhythm that works for them and coast, but you continue to evolve. Most who do continue to grow expand in quantity, going from video essays to video textbooks. You mature into deeper quality, your video essays turning into the equivalent of poetry. Your work is the best expression of quality over quantity. I watch others to learn and be informed, but when I watch you I know I will be shown a new way of seeing things, and that I will be moved. Thank you. I don't know if you'll see this, but thank you. Keep knocking the lamp.

[@shellpose]

Right when I saw the clips of Silent Hill 1 I knew I was in for a treat. Another gem, and super glad I get to enjoy it for 20 min! All the sound clips of SH have been beautifully edited

[@XSlimSxadyX]

Jacobs ladder

[@manlyleonard9547]

This is exactly how Ringu made me feel. Everything from its atmosphere to the purple colors of the well scene were incredibly melancholic but strangely comforting,

[@gothkub]

This is a beautiful and heart-wrenching video. It's raw and personal and touches on many themes I've grappled with for decades. Thank you for your deep and eloquent words, and for taking the time to produce this and share it with the world.

[@4Kjonas]

Still the goat in editing video-essays

[@jentaro]

Solid editing, narration and overall great video essay, that touch a cord with quite a few of us in our thirties, I'm sure.

[@thesoapboxlord]

As someone who vividly recalls the Y2K scare and also grew up in small, desolate places, this touched a nerve I didn't know I had. Fantastic work. Unnerving in the best way possible.

[@matthewjameson8809]

This is probably the best video essay I've ever seen. Video essays as a whole suck nowadays, 90% of them are unnecessary and have cringe worthy writing, but this video really nailed it with editing, writing, music, and atmosphere.

[@chimedemon]

I grew up in the early 2000's, and for me it felt like I was always experiencing the aftermath of a great apocalypse. Y2K, 9/11, I never experienced any of them and yet I'd hear about them all the time, see their effects. Whenever I was in an airport getting scanned, I was told about how it use to never be like this. I grew up when the climate crisis was beginning to look even more grim, and then I moved to a small town. Not as small or as abandoned as yours, but just as lonely. I would always wander alone, kids would have their phones to distract themselves with while I just had the ever expanding quiet roads, or the random nature trails no one ever went on, or the playgrounds nobody ever took their kids to. I had a childhood friend and we created a whole world where we went on adventures... but whenever he wasn't there, I'd continue playing in that world with a sense of melancholy. stories I'd make up like finding a group of dead soldiers in the fog, where their names would be lost forever. Cosmic ideas of traveling other universes to stop beings that could wipe you from existence. The lonely thoughts of seeing an ancient rundown castle in the distance beyond a river, where the people were long gone... all of it happened in that little town. It's such a weird and specific feeling, and how you describe this type of comforting horror is exactly how it feels. Twilight Princess was my first Zelda game and the music from that has always stayed with me. Why I fell in love with ICO is because it gave me that melancholy while still giving me that wish of protecting someone I loved. When I heard the Silent Hill music for the first time it brought such a sense of... weird nostalgia and comfort as well as just mystical depression.. anyway, fantastic video, I hope you take care, and that we all figure out our own little Silent Hill :)

[@jumpingman6612]

Thanks for shareing

[@kalynaq7720]

A lovely recollection! I'm especially touched by "it never used to be this way." I seem to be slightly older than most of these comments and you might be slightly younger but i kinda think the phenomenon the video is about is how "it never used to be this way" accelerates it's creep into the background of everything. Things lose meaning by losing context (ask a century of post-modernism) and so we find our own wonder or horror...

[@tblue_theyinvade]

The refined, focused aesthetic this video asks you to marinate in as it oozes all over you is so haunting yet beautiful. Been a minute since watching a youtube video has given me frisson. I love this so much

[@allie7239]

Your story-telling of the town you grew up in is amazing and haunting. Absolutely love the video!

[@BelleOrchestre]

Man, I don’t know how you managed to capture and describe such a nebulous feeling, but that is exactly my experience as well growing up in our generation. You’ve always been a favorite creator me me, but this one hit me on a personal level. Thanks Kristian

[@linkage432]

Welcome back!! The soundtracks of that horror media is so warm and haunting

[@DB-sj8km]

Truly one of the most beautiful video essays I’ve ever seen. Maybe the most. I feel like it’s sitting on my mind. I also found myself hoping kaptainkristian is well, because this felt…movingly sad and melancholy, and I see it was his last video, posted over a year ago.

[@fs_000]

Never thought I'd end up crying to a video about horror, but here I am. I have never experienced anything relating to the reflection upon horror so gripping. I'm overwhelmed with emotion: grief, melancholy, fear, hope, happiness, and awe. You've captured a sense of existential sorrow I don't believe I've ever experienced so well portrayed, using visuals, poetry, and storytelling as the mobilizer flawlessly that acts as its own original creation and as a love letter to the source material. Humanity is beginning to sit and reflect. We are all feeling the turmoil of those who have passed and are hearing the messages of our children from the future. Something has changed in us all, almost simultaneously. The fruits of our labor from the distance past are somehow sweeter than the present rations. The stories from the past are calling us back, opening their arms and offering us comfort that leaves us seeking answers. I hope to you, kaptainkristian, and to anyone, some sense of solace, or a discomfort that speaks to you compassionately.

[@myxomatoad2]

The editing alone on this video is absolutely phenomenal. Thank you so, so much for sharing!

[@drinkswateristhirsty]

Came for the 90s horror, stayed for the therapeutic prose of living in ghost towns & horror as escapism. I was born in 2001, so I didn’t experience any of this. Hearing about it from someone’s personal perspective is amazing.

[@swaptrickgaming]

Born in 84, grew up in the 90s. Everything in this video hit very close to home, and the writing and editing in this piece was really top quality stuff. Great work. Made me think, made me feel, made me reflect. Not sure what else I could ask for from a piece of media.

[@Stoney514]

I have watched/listened to this 30+ times easy.

[@Robocalypse0101]

Still my absolute favorite documentary/poetic reflective storyteller and just overall filmmaker on this platform, dude. Absolutely inspiring and shakes me to my core every time you post.

[@rubencarlisle7585]

My upbringing was the same, and thanks to my partner I only recently got out of that place in my adult life. I still get the incredibly strong urge to go back. I love this personal storytelling along with the kind of horror that made who I am today, I didn't expect to feel this nostalgic and homesick today.

[@michaelsilver253]

The examination of OP's hometown hit me real hard. That was the town my mom was from, where I went once or twice a month to visit grandparents and family. A little Pennsylvanian town at the upper edge of Appalachia, called Shamokin, right next to the infamous Centralia

[@adrunkbadger2090]

Perfect way to start a Saturday

[@anactualcat6479]

I never comment on videos, but this really spoke to me. I love horror and always felt strange it didn't scare me, but filled me with comfort. This really sums everything up well. Very excited for more content from you!

[@Craftal]

You gave me goosebumps. By far your best work. Thank you.

[@DefCatofficial]

I spent a LOT of time in towns just like that from Kentucky / NC / Virignia growing up as all my relatives lived out there while I lived in a suburb an hour away into NC. I spent all my summers / winters there with grandparents. It was a second home.

[@wonderwaffle93]

There was something different in this era we grew up in that is simply left us a haunting memory. An old ghost that is so long gone but is still there haunting us. It feels distant yet so close.

[@un_truc_terrible]

"i stared at the abyss, and the abyss stares back" - Friedrich Nietzsche This abyss is a comfort zone for me, i found myself into it. I found myself into your video. Thank you

[@PierceArner]

What an unexpected but welcome surprise in 2023!

[@immersional]

The comfort found in horror is so hard to explain, but damn this does an amazing job. Incredible writing

[@robertbreedlovecraft]

It's interesting how stuff like Blair Witch made you *more* eager to explore creepy areas. I watched the Blair Witch at a way too young age and couldn't even walk down to the creek familiar to me near my grandparents' place for a whole year. Still thank you for articulating a significant part of my childhood i had long buried away.

[@chosencode5881]

WHERE HAS HE GONE???

[@mahmoudfekih1993]

You're one of the most unique KZbinrs I've ever seen

[@Immafuggin182]

This may be my favorite video on this channel

[@Ulysses-hq3rc]

This video was really something special. I thought that I was the only one that saw the world this way but it’s nice seeing that there’s others out there that find comfort in melancholy and horror.

[@ransomsavampire]

Oh my gods this video is beautiful Your writing and narration is beautiful, this is the first video essay to give me genuine chills in such a long time. It really resonates with me even if i was born a few years after the turn of the century.

[@serpentinegallery]

Holy shit, how did the empty hole in my chest learn to make videos? This was an incredible experience. Thank you.

[@OHAli]

What you showed reminded me of Cairo and/or Kenna, WV... Two of the most depressing, dilapidated little towns I've ever visited.

[@at0micwerew0lf]

I didn’t realize how much I missed the 90s until this very moment. 🍺⚡️🍺

[@SamuelBlack84]

I'd sacrifice so much to return to the 90s 😢 This modern era is unspeakable and horrible

[@nathanrodriguez4205]

One of the best videos I've ever seen, I absolutely love your content, so glad you are still videos

[@SwetyBoi]

Only 30 secs in and I can tell this is going to be another masterpiece. Thank you Kap :)

[@brennanscarcello1443]

Thank you for sharing this deep and personal experience. It speaks to the blurred memories and feelings of dispair that exist in everyone when recounting days of the past, whether good or bad. To be transported from the mundanity of everyday life to the helpless and uncaring days of childhood.

[@andrewlkozar]

This is the big nostalgic experience I've been waiting for. You just explained my life to me & why I am the way I am... I'm speechless & emotional now. You are a genius & I will never be able to thank you enough for this. It's the 1st of it's kind & sets the stage perfectly for real discussion & serious content to be created about the decade nobody takes seriously or attempts to analyze beyond "the 80s were way better". Again, you're a genius. BRAVO

[@NineInchNailer]

Damn...this has to be one of THE best video essays that I have ever seen! It hit so deep and made me think about my own feelings towards this decade. I am truly in awe and want to thank you for making it!! I hope you find comfort in the things you said. Melancholia, much like nostalgia, is a tricky thing. It can lead to dark places and bad thoughts...but I sincerly hope that you are doing fine or better after putting so much effort in this video. All the best! Greetings from Vienna, Austria!

[@MaxWronkowski]

This made me surprisingly emotional. I feel a little better than I did before this, I think. I feel understood.

[@jamespearson48]

I was born at the start of the 90s, and this hit home in a way that left me speechless. Thank you.

[@chaoticfirearm]

Always such a pleasure to see a new KK video pop up. You are truly a master of your craft and are the person who made me fall in love with visual essays. Excited to see what you'll do in 2023.

[@GenericProtagonist7]

This video feels like a safety blanket for me.

[@Animationgatecom]

This was an outstanding video. You incorporated essentially my entire teens with the clips from silent Hill, perfect blue, ringu and Blair witch. It was a wonderful time in my life. Well done

[@thatsnodildo1974]

For me time is so fast. I grew up in the 2000s born in the late 90s. I often think about how things feel like it was just a few years ago weren't but they were 5 6 and 7 years ago. Like you I can't remember how things were exactly but I always seem to go back to summer and how things felt warm and how free I felt. How summers were spent at the beach and in the woods. But I can't remember everything but the warmth and the color green. I miss those days and I hate how things change so much but never seem to. Life's funny that way I guess and for that shit of melancholy nostalgia I just try to think back and remember. No matter the pain it brings

[@Lirka_906]

Thank you for this video. I don't know why but I got a little teary eyed at the end, because it felt so true to my own self. I still remember as a kid when I was sitting in the car with my parents. It was cloudy, rainy and moody and when the sun bursted through a spot in the clouds I remember asking my mom why that made me sad. She looked at me like something was wrong with me. I now know that I've just always been very melancholic, and all of my favorite things are in a way. Noir movies, Silent Hill, Blade Runner, Dark Jazzy music, X Files and definitely the sombre horror movies of the 90's. Watching this video was like watching the ring video. I pressed play and then 20 minutes passed without me realizing.

[@aitoralvarez1212]

02:46 that fucking chain of shots were the women are the same size and have the same posture looking at the camera... it just made me remember how much effort this man puts into his videos.

[@Calamus_]

I have thoroughly been enjoying your content for a while, and the recent transition to a more personal, artistic, beautiful video format is simply wonderful. I sincerely hope you and your exceptional content continues to flourish.

[@evan5966]

damn what a beautiful video this was! always a treat hearing from you, it's like catching up with an old friend. been here since the first few uploads from the channel back when i was in high school. your work changed the trajectory of my life forever.

[@mtbms99]

One of the most beautiful, intimate essays I ever had the pleasure to watch. Thank you so much!

[@thesecretsaucechannel]

I resonate so much with this video and at 15 minutes is when it all came full circle. All my life I have been telling everyone the same, how horror helps me relax and they all gave me the look. Nobody seemed to understand why I watched/played/read so much horror and why I love the genre. It wasn't even fight or flight for me, it was this calm and content feeling that it brought for me.