Marble Hornets
mh000.jpg

Something dangerous is going on, and I’m starting to regret ever getting involved with it now.

The Marble Hornets video account concerns a dark presence in the tapes of an abandoned student film and how one man’s investigation of them causes a cycle of paranoia and death to resume. Everyone involved is conspicuously isolated from the outside world, causing the shadows of abandoned structures in the woods to loom ever taller and the online audience to idly watch and decrypt the messages of an enigmatic third party.

External: YouTube | Twitter | totheark | Fan-made Wiki

Internal: Marble Hornets Preamble (Original Mythos) | Season One | Season Two | Season Three | Medical Documents | A Film by Alex Kralie

Season One

  • June 20, 2009 – Jay Merrick, initially called “J”, creates the Marble Hornets channel and begins his investigation of Alex Kralie’s tapes from his canned 2006 Marble Hornets student film, having lost contact with Alex for years
    • Jay’s first notable findings on the tapes include appearances of a tall figure (the Operator), audio and visual distortion, and evidence of Alex’s increasing paranoia in the form of obsessive filming and drawing; his cast and crew included Tim Wright, Brian Thomas, Seth Wilson and Sarah Reid
  • July 22, 2009 – a YouTube account called “totheark” begins its responses to the Marble Hornets channel with “regards”, a vague message about looking closely
  • July 26, 2009 – Jay reports his 104 fever, a culmination of the exhaustion and insomnia he has reported in previous tweets
    • This cycle of declining and recovering health continues in following months as he continues watching the tapes
  • July 31, 2009 – totheark posts “Operator”, a video evidencing their possession of the missing audio from Alex’s tapes
  • September 10, 2009 – Jay watches a tape where he is present, then goes to a doctor (“couldn't find anything wrong with me”)
  • September 15, 2009 – totheark uploads “Exit”, footage of Jay taken from the same day in 2006 as “Entry #13” but filmed without his knowledge from behind the bushes; its final frame asks “WHEREIS/THEARK”
  • September 23, 2009 – Jay uploads “Entry #14”, which has a scene of Alex with blood on his forehead; Jay is now beginning a search for Alex
  • September 26, 2009 – totheark uploads “Program”, a video whose code implies that Alex taped over whatever footage preceded the scene of him bleeding
  • October 2, 2009 – Jay interviews Tim while pretending that he wants to complete the Marble Hornets film; Tim says that he has not heard from Alex or Brian in a while
  • October 12, 2009 – totheark uploads “Advocate”, footage of Brian taken from the same day in 2006 as “Entry #7” but recorded separately
  • October 13, 2009 – Jay follows an “anonymous tip” on Brian’s location to an abandoned house where he experiences a coughing fit, finds blood in the sink, and leaves with two of Alex’s drawings, a bottle of pills, and bullet casing
    • October 21, 2009 – totheark uploads “Addition”, confirming that they filmed him from behind during the coughing fit (and must have sent the anonymous tip)
  • November 1, 2009 – Jay watches another tape where he is present but cannot remember any of its events taking place; he considers returning to the house
  • November 4, 2009 – totheark uploads “Signal”, a video directing Jay to “COME BACK/find me”
  • November 9, 2009 – Jay returns to the house, where he is attacked by a masked man who starts having a seizure but still prevents Jay from removing his mask; Jay flees with a coughing fit and falls unconscious
    • November 10, 2009 – Jay wakes up wakes up in his car off the road with no memory of anything following the attack, his knife missing; he uploads it as “Entry #18” and regrets his involvement
  • November 20, 2009 – surveillance footage from Jay’s room shows the masked man entering Jay’s room as he sleeps and Jay disappearing from his bed
    • Jay sits in a doorway of Brian’s abandoned house, entranced, as the Operator looms above him
    • November 21, 2009 – Jay returns to his room without any memory of leaving; totheark uploads “Messages”, which includes the words “you have been keeping secrets” in reference to Jay’s regular filming of himself for the past month
  • December 9, 2009 – Jay analyzes his previous findings from Brian’s house; the pill bottle label, pills, and bullet casing are missing but one of Alex’s drawings reads “AT THE TOWER”
  • December 10, 2009 – Jay identifies “the tower” as the structure from “Entry #5” and considers returning
  • December 15, 2009 – Jay uploads “Entry #20”, the last of Alex’s tapes that yet again includes events he cannot remember and shows Tim with a pill bottle similar to the one from Brian’s house
  • December 16, 2009 – totheark uploads “Version”, a video directing Jay to the red tower
  • December 21, 2009 – Jay tweets his return to the red tower and one of the tweets (originally “found something”) gets mysteriously corrupted; he finds a tape inside and uploads the trip as “Entry #21”
  • December 22, 2009 – Jay reluctantly uploads “Entry #22”, the tape from the tower which turns out to be 2006 footage of Alex and Seth exploring an abandoned boiler room where they hear a scream and Seth drops the camera; Alex records a final message about how Seth and the others are “gone”
  • January 7, 2010 – Jay considers returning to the house
  • January 27, 2010 – Jay returns to the house, encounters the masked man, experiences the house’s layout shifting around, and eventually ends up in the boiler room where he encounters the Operator
    • January 28, 2010 – Jay wakes up in his apartment with the camera broken and no memory of what happened after the encounter; he gives up on finding answers and posts it all as “Entry #23”
  • February 3, 2010 – totheark uploads “Warning”, instructing Jay to “Stay Home” and “Be Alone”
  • February 15, 2010 – Jay’s surveillance footage shows him leaving his room at night on one camera even though another camera shows the door closed; he has no memory of it
  • March 5, 2010 – totheark posts “Entry ######” to the Marble Hornets channel, warning Jay of their imminent return
  • March 16, 2010 – Jay leaves town for a hotel after watching the video
  • March 24, 2010 – Jay watches a news report on a recent fire that destroyed his apartment and uploads his filming of it as “Entry #25”
  • April 4, 2010 – Alex and his girlfriend Amy Walters encounter the Operator and try to escape out the window; Jay receives a text (“41810”) from an unknown number, really Alex
    • April 18, 2010 – Jay changes his location and films a goodbye to viewers that he intended to post before finding a package outside his door containing a tape
    • Jay uploads the tape’s contents as “Entry #26”, intending to find Alex but expressing uncertainty as to when he will next update viewers on events

Season Two

  • The missing seven months – April 21, 2010 through November 22, 2010:
    • April 21, 2010 – Jay follows the package’s return address to an abandoned building, finding nothing
    • April 2010:
      • Jay returns to the building with Alex and they encounter the masked man; they unmask him, revealing him as Tim, and Alex breaks his leg with a chunk of cement
      • Jay and Alex argue about the violent action in the parking lot; Alex tells Jay to lay low
      • A week after Jay meets Alex at the abandoned building, Alex calls him asking to meet at one Rosswood Park; Jay falls asleep in his car and a hooded man films him out the window
      • The next day, Jay encounters the Operator at Rosswood Park and drops the camera; while Alex returns to argue with him about it, the hooded man returns Jay’s camera to his car and Jay reluctantly agrees to help Alex find Amy
    • Spring 2010:
      • Alex shows Jay a house, claiming that it was where he jumped out the window with Amy and sending a voicemail to her roommate, Jessica Locke; later footage from Alex’s own chest-mounted camera shows him encountering the Operator in Rosswood Park
      • At home, Alex lies to Jessica about finding Amy and disappears from his bed as the Operator appears
    • July 2010 – the hooded man and masked man ambush Alex outside of his apartment; the Operator’s appearance scares them off and Alex threatens to kill them
    • Summer 2010:
      • Jay breaks into Alex’s apartment and attempts to steal a tape until the Operator’s appearance forces him to reveal himself to Alex; Jay successfully steals a key while running from it shortly afterwards
      • That night, Jay and Alex argue in the parking lot and agree to stop helping each other until Jay coerces Alex into giving him Jessica’s phone number; upon calling her, he learns that Alex lied to her and tells her what Alex told him
    • Fall 2010:
      • Jay starts following Alex without his knowledge
      • October 27, 2010 – totheark posts a drawing of a camera (“SMILE FOR THE CAMERA”) to the Marble Hornets Twitter
      • October 31, 2010 – totheark posts an image of the masked man with 23 tally marks to the Marble Hornets Twitter
      • November 16, 2010 – totheark posts an image of Rosswood Park and upside-down letters of “WAKE UP” to the Marble Hornets Twitter
    • November 2010:
      • Jay passes by a stranger while tailing Alex at Rosswood Park
      • Alex kills the stranger in Rosswood Park’s tunnel that same day, thinking he was Jay; the Operator causes the body to disappear and Alex calls Jay, asking him to meet there by lying that he found something relating to Amy
      • The next day, Jay follows Alex into Rosswood Park with a knife and Alex gives away that the key missing from his apartment belongs to his front door; Alex tells Jay a local legend about Rosswood Park in between silence and stays there for the night while Jay leaves and chases the masked man
      • The day after that, Jay breaks into Alex’s apartment, steals the tape, and labels it “56-42”; he later watches its 2006 footage of Alex leaving Brian to be taken by the Operator at an abandoned hospital
      • November 22, 2010 – Jay meets Alex and Jessica at Rosswood Park, Alex attempts to shoot them in an abandoned shed before the masked man attacks him, and Jay steals Alex’s chest camera and locks all footage of the past seven months in a hotel safe; after Jay hears Jessica screaming from her room, he encounters the Operator and it pulls him towards it
  • November 23, 2010 – Jay wakes up in the hotel with no memory of the past seven months, including how he obtained the chest camera; he explores the area, extends his stay beyond one day, and passes Jessica without knowing it
  • December 2, 2010 – Jay examines his possessions and (again) meets Jessica, who says that his name sounds familiar
  • December 16, 2010 – Jay finds a file on his hard drive called “noentry”, a chronologically unplaced video of someone in the tunnel uncovering the bloodstained shirt and chunk of cement from Alex’s murder before encountering the Operator, which he posts as “Entry #29”
  • December 20, 2010 – Jay’s footage distorts as he talks to Jessica, who mentions being kicked out of her apartment and claims not to hear the strange noises in her room; Jay, having forgotten Rosswood Park, plans to re-locate it
  • January 2, 2011 – Jay explores Rosswood Park and Jessica later asks him about his strange behavior and apparent amnesia, which he denies
  • January 12, 2011 – Jessica confronts Jay about his lying and describes her own experience of amnesia, insomnia, and sleepwalking; Jay promises to explain everything if they leave that night and immediately uploads it as “Entry #32”
    • The masked man takes an unconscious Jessica from her room and into Rosswood Park, where the hooded man attempts to protect her from Alex; however, Alex scares him off with the gun and leads Jessica into the tunnel
    • Jay finds the safe combination on a note in Jessica’s empty room and retrieves the tapes from the safe before the masked man chases him out, forcing his permanent leave of the hotel that leads him to constantly change locations for the next few months
    • Alex attempts to shoot Jessica in the tunnel, Jessica steals his gun and flees as the hooded man attacks him, Alex retrieves his gun, and Jessica’s encounter with the Operator leaves her motionless on the side of the road before disappearing
  • February 7, 2011 – Jay starts watching the tapes
    • February 8, 2011 – Jay uploads his initial exploration of the abandoned building as “Entry #34” and continues posting only the tapes’ footage for the following months
  • February 10, 2011 – totheark uploads “Fragments”, a message about their distrust of Alex
  • March 15, 2011 – totheark uploads “Sidetone”, indicating that they have Alex’s voicemail
  • March 21, 2011 – Jay has discovered the scene of Alex telling him the morbid legend about Rosswood Park and intends to upload it as Entry #37, but cannot sign into his YouTube account; his tweets become increasingly incoherent as he describes a headache and insomnia
    • March 23, 2011 – totheark uploads “enttry #37” to the Marble Hornets channel, and it is a scene of Alex’s fifth birthday in 1991 where the Operator appears
    • March 29, 2011 – Jay wakes up in his car near the red tower with no memory of going there and tweets that he needs to “get back. Fast.”
    • March 30, 2011 – Jay starts to leave inexplicably late
  • April 5, 2011 – Jay uploads “Entry #38” and notes that he did not upload “enttry #37”
  • April 6, 2011 – Jay returns to his previous location
  • April 21, 2011 – totheark (apparently, the hooded man) uploads “Forecast”, their footage of Jay sleeping
  • May 16, 2011 – totheark uploads “Intermission”, a hint towards the hooded man’s presence in Rosswood Park the day that Jay encountered the Operator and dropped his camera
  • May 25, 2011 – Jay sees the hooded man for the first time on the 2010 tapes, uploading it as “Entry #41” the next day
  • July 8, 2011 – Jay expresses suspicion that the totheark channel is run by multiple people
  • August 1, 2011 – Jay finds the footage of him tailing Alex
  • September 2, 2011 – Jay watches the footage of Alex murdering the stranger and is reluctant to share it
    • September 5, 2011 – Jay decides to upload it “just in case anything happens to me one day”; by the next day, he has edited “Entry #49” to remove the scene of Alex dropping the chunk of cement on the man’s head four times
    • September 8, 2011 – Jay searches through missing person reports for the stranger and finds nothing
    • September 26, 2011 – Jay gives up on this search and returns to the tapes
  • October 12, 2011 – Jay uploads the “56-42” tape as “Entry #51”, expressing suspicions that Alex tried to dispose of the entire Marble Hornets cast and crew in a similar manner as he had with Brian
  • November 9, 2011 – Jay returns to the downtown area near Rosswood Park, where he sees Tim outside of an antique store
  • November 13, 2011 – Jay uploads the final tape’s contents as “Entry #52”, noting that his new mission is to find out what Tim has been up to and put an end to Alex’s violence

Season Three

  • November 28, 2011 – Jay starts a search for Tim downtown, not finding him for months
    • January 12, 2012 – a year to the day of Jessica’s disappearance, Jay catches himself inexplicably wanting to go back to Rosswood Park and reconsiders it
    • January 24, 2012 – Jay finds the antique store closed; the hooded man films Jay examining it without him ever noticing
    • February 12, 2012 – Jay learns from a delivery driver that the antique store will be closing for good but will remain open as they sell off their inventory
    • February 15, 2012 – Jay sneaks inside and finds many paintings of wooded areas and one with a person whose face lacks details
    • February 29, 2012 – Jay returns to the store while it is open and finds the paintings gone
    • March 1, 2012 – A woman in the antique store tells Jay that Tim went to a doctor’s appointment, and he learns that the only doctor’s office in town is a mental health clinic
    • March 9, 2012 – after a week of waiting outside the clinic, Jay sees Tim and must lie about wanting to finish Marble Hornets for Tim to remember him; Tim calls to say that he has leftover behind-the-scenes tapes Jay could use, and Jay posts “Entry #53” the next day
  • March 15, 2012 – totheark uploads “Reminder”, their footage of Jay outside the antique store
  • March 23, 2012 – Jay receives the tapes from Tim, and the first he uploads two days later as “Entry #54” contains more Operator appearances on the Marble Hornets set
  • April 4, 2012 – totheark uploads “Decay”, a threat directed towards Alex
  • April 9, 2012 – Jay uploads “Entry #55” from a tape evidencing Tim’s earlier symptoms relating to his later behavior as the masked man
  • April 25, 2012 – Jay uploads “Entry #56”, footage of Alex attacking Tim at the abandoned hospital
    • May 6, 2012 – Jay uploads the last tape, containing Tim’s escape, as “Entry #57” and considers calling Tim again and seeing the hospital for himself
  • May 16, 2012 – Jay talks to Tim about returning to the hospital, still lying about Marble Hornets
    • May 18, 2012 – Jay and Tim return to the hospital and Jay chases the hooded man as he finds him stalking them, making Tim suspicious of Jay’s intentions
    • May 20, 2012 – Jay reports feeling sick since his return
  • June 11, 2012 – Jay decides to tell Tim the truth after weeks of considering it
    • June 13, 2012 – Tim has Jay meet him in a parking lot and confronts him about what he has just discovered by finding the Marble Hornets channel, ultimately telling Jay to stay out of his life
    • The hooded man takes a picture of them while hiding
  • June 27, 2012 – Jay returns to the hospital’s maintenance tunnel alone, finding a folder left for him by the hooded man and encountering the Operator
  • July 14, 2012 – Jay uploads “Entry #60.5”, examining Tim’s medical documents from the folder (also containing the hooded man’s photograph of their fight) and expressing regret that he may have made things worse
  • July 30 through August 5, 2012 – totheark hijacks the Twitter account and uploads “observation” on their own channel, having filmed Tim from outside his window
    • August 8, 2012 – the hooded man steals Tim’s pills from his room, causing Tim to have a seizure, and uploads the footage to the Marble Hornets channel as “entry”
    • Jay re-uploads the now-unlisted video as “Entry #61” and sets out to find Tim based on its clues as to his location
    • August 9, 2012 – Jay encounters the masked Tim at Rosswood Park, and Tim drags him away while the hooded man takes the camera; both Jay and Tim wake up by an abandoned shack where the hooded man has left Tim with the tape of Jessica’s disappearance unbeknownst to either, and they leave on better terms
  • September 24, 2012 – Jay meets with Tim, returns his medical records, argues with him about how readily they could find Jessica, and reluctantly agrees to return to Rosswood with him
  • October 7, 2012 – Jay and Tim return to Rosswood, receive a call from Alex telling Jay to leave the tunnel, and encounter the Operator; Jay runs from it at Tim’s urging
    • Tim experiences Rosswood Park’s locations warping around him but arrives to the parking lot before Jay and drives away; he re-lives traumatic memories at the hospital and passes out from an overdose
    • The hooded man drags the unconscious Tim outside, stalks Alex and knocks him unconscious to prevent him from killing Tim, ties him to a chair and has Tim punch him, steals Alex’s gun but flees once the Operator appears, and films Tim waking up beside his mask
  • November 18, 2012 – Tim returns the chest camera to Jay and suggests that they return to the hospital
  • December 29, 2012 – Jay reports having a nightmare that he has forgotten
  • December 30, 2012 – totheark uploads “Surveillance”, which includes scenes of Jessica with only old footage and difficult codes at the end
    • January 5, 2013 – Jay starts puzzling out the code on Twitter for a few days
      • January 7, 2013 – totheark hijacks the Twitter to post another set of numbers
    • January 11, 2013 – Jay solves the video’s code as “she’s out there” and the tweet as “I am watching”
  • January 21, 2013 – Tim takes Jay to the hospital room where the fire started and explains how it was once his and how he fears that he may have spread the Operator’s influence to others; they tail the hooded man without success but manage to retrieve a tape he was hiding
  • February 14, 2013 – Jay gets the dirty tape working and watches its footage of the hooded man’s attack of Alex in the hospital following Jay and Tim’s trip to Rosswood Park
  • February 22, 2013 – Jay reports paranoia that Alex could be anywhere
    • February 22, 2013 – Jay has a nightmare that Alex finds him (“his eyes were missing, and he constantly made these awful, high pitched screams inches from my ear”) and urges Tim to relocate with him
  • March 10, 2013 – Jay re-uploads a hijack video, “68”, as “Entry #68”; it shows Alex ambushing the hooded man and demanding to know Jay and Tim’s whereabouts, apparently recognizing his identity
  • April 4, 2013 – totheark uploads “Decline”, which references Jay’s nightmare
  • April 12, 2013 – Jay and Tim return to their old town and find burnt tapes buried near the red tower; Jay experiences hallucinations
  • April 28, 2013 – Jay uploads “Entry #70”, a tape that he only believes Alex disposed of because it involves Amy
  • May 15, 2013 – Jay uploads “Entry #71”, a tape revealing that Alex hastily attacked him after giving away the original tapes but Jay forgot it entirely
  • June 7, 2013 – Jay and Tim explore Alex’s house from 2006, where Jay hallucinates again and the Operator appears thrice; Jay has a seizure but Tim is able to withstand the Operator until it disappears by taking pills
  • July 1, 2013 – Tim reports on the Twitter account that Jay is “out of it”
  • July 10, 2013 – “entry #73”, another hijack video, shows the hooded man breaking into Tim’s house for more pills and fleeing from Alex inside; at one point, he examines a tape already hidden there
  • July 31, 2013 – Jay recovers from his near-catatonic state and is annoyed to learn that Tim shared pills with him at the time; they plan to return to Tim’s house to take them back, even if it means encountering Alex
  • August 23, 2013 – Jay and Tim find Tim’s house in disarray with a note reading “I HAVE HIM/79 SOUTH CREEK ROAD” and Jay steals a tape that Tim has hidden from him, angrily confronting Tim about it and escaping in spite of his pleas that Jay not watch it yet
  • September 12, 2013 – Jay watches the tape, which shows Jessica’s disappearance
  • October 13, 2013– Jay tweets that he and Tim need to talk
    • October 15, 2013 – Jay returns to Rosswood Park to retrace Tim and Jessica’s steps but finds its layout shifting around him; he sends an apologetic voicemail that Tim never receives and has a seizure upon encountering the Operator
  • October 16, 2013 – Jay goes to Tim’s house with a knife and zip ties, which Tim uses to restrain him before explaining why it was important to hide the tape; Tim leaves to find Alex at the 79 Creek Road college
    • The hooded man leaves Jay a knife with which to cut the zip ties and a message on the mirror; Jay plans to find Tim (“and then I’m going to find Alex and end this”)
  • October 17, 2013 – Jay initially explores the college1
  • November 20, 2013 – Tim learns from the college’s groundskeeper that the film department is in Benedict Hall, and the only entrance to it is through an off-limits maintenance tunnel
  • November 21, 2013 – Jay goes to the college and encounters the hooded man; when Jay follows Tim to a darkened building whose manhole leads to the maintenance tunnel, the hooded man’s photographs of Alex tied up direct Jay to Benedict Hall (and the Ark)
    • Tim waits through the night by the manhole while Jay watches Benedict Hall and uploads “Entry #79”
  • November 22, 2013 – Tim reaches Benedict Hall through the maintenance tunnel and flees from Alex, who has broken free
    • Jay enters Benedict Hall as soon as Tim runs out; Alex shoots him and the Operator takes him away at the same time as Tim blacks out in his car outside for a few hours
    • The hooded man steals Tim’s medication from his car; Tim regains consciousness, retrieves Jay’s camera, and chases the hooded man while blaming him for Alex’s escape
  • December 5, 2013 – Tim assumes control of the Marble Hornets channel with “Entry #80”, footage from Jay’s camera from when he was shot and taken
    • At some point, Tim retrieves Jay’s laptop from his car
  • February 6, 2014 – Tim uploads “Entry #82”, laptop footage of Jay sending the unreceived voicemail in Rosswood Park; Tim notes his risk of relapse without any medicine
  • February 20, 2014 – totheark uploads “Null”, their final video with an allusion to Tim’s “secret”
  • March 6, 2013 – Tim uploads “Entry #83”, where he returns to the college and chases the hooded man through more shifting locations, including Rosswood, the hospital, and his house; Jay’s body turns up and the hooded man plummets to his death from a railing, leaving Tim with only a tape
  • April 1, 2013 – Tim uploads “Entry #84”, the tape’s 2006 footage of Brian that confirms him as the hooded man because of the hoodie he wears in it; in the present, the chest camera has stopped working and Tim will use Jay’s camera instead as he waits for Alex to find him
  • May 13, 2014 – Tim narrowly escapes his house as Alex lights it on fire, brandishing a gun and ranting about how Tim is “the source” without spotting him
  • June 15, 2014 – Tim uploads “Entry #86”, footage of his fight with Alex in shifting locations that start and end with the college; Alex blames Tim for the Operator’s emergence, Tim tries to explain that Alex’s killing has strengthened the Operator while its true weakness lies in mental resistance, Brian’s body turns up, and the Operator takes Alex’s body after Tim stabs him in the throat
  • June 20, 2014 – Tim throws away his mask and says goodbye to Jessica (who is now unable to remember Jay but apparently met Tim at the mental health clinic sometime before); he leaves the downtown area and viewers on the note that “everything is fine”


Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License