IT STARTED, HOLY SHIT

Episodes of the second season of The Record of Stan Frederick are now live! We're four episodes in right now, so you can go check out the YouTube channel to see the full episodes.

I wanted to take this moment to say thank you to everybody who has been constantly posting about the series, be it on Tumblr or Twitter with fanart or text posts or questions. Your support in whatever form (be it critical or otherwise) has been really amazing, and it constantly puts a stupid smile on my face to see all of the content you guys are still throwing at myself and this character.

Please don't stop; while I'm not always present online physically I'm always watching and looking at your stuff. I'm one of those obnoxious losers that constantly scours the tags in search of content related to my stuff, and I see all the awesome things you guys make and say about Stan.

At that, if there's anything you ever want to say to me directly or send me, you can shoot me an email at stanmakesmovies@gmail.com, which is Stan Frederick's in-game email address! Just be sure to title the email "An OOG Message" so I know it's for me and not that fingerless loser.

Thanks again guys, I still appreciate everything you guys have done, and thank you for following Stan to this new place. I don't want to spoil anything for the later parts of the season, but I will say that SF Season 2 is easily my favorite story I've ever told. Ever. In nine years of filmmaking. So do with that what you will.

See you all soon!

SEASON TWO CONFIRMED

Yeah. It's happening.

I have a history of starting things and never finishing them. Look back at most of the bigger projects I've done and you can see a pattern of abandonment; hell, I even started an entire behind the scenes playlist on projects I never finished. For the past two or so years I stopped setting release dates for anything in fear of disappointing the viewers that looked forward to them.

Here's the thing though: The only HUGE project I always managed to follow through on, no matter what - even going as far back as 2012, when it was bad - was Stan Frederick. Release date or not, this was a series I was, and am, passionate about.

So, no release date still. BUT, I'm now going to say, without hesitation or shying away, that season two of The Record of Stan Frederick is happening. For sure.

It'll definitely be a few months (or a lot of months) before the season premiere actually happens; I'm still holding true to my "film and edit absolutely everything before releasing a single episode" plan, so you're just gonna have to give me time.

That being said, I do appreciate your patience, and what the hell, here's a trailer to hold you over.

(And here's a poster.)

Thank you guys, for everything.

- Evan

Social Downsizing; SF Season 2 Talk

Hey everyone.

Been a while, again, since I've updated here - mostly because I knew that a majority of what I had to say about the series would either be seen on my Twitter, tumblr, or on the Stan Frederick thread on unForum. Given recent events though, only one of those sites remain for me, and I'm not allowed to directly post on my own thread in it.

I've deleted 80% of my social media as of November 9th. This includes Facebook, Twitter, tumblr, Vine, and Instagram. All I have left are Snapchat (evansantiago) and ask.fm, which are just off the radar enough for me. I suggest you guys go and subscribe to all my YouTube stuff now that I'm going to be a little less... everywhere. Main / Vlog / BTS / Stan Frederick

It was for a number of reasons - one of which being that this abysmal election (its entirety, leading up to its results, everything) left the internet as an environment of venomous hostility, and I'm not about that. Those of you that know me know that I try my best to remain positive despite my depression, and that kind of attitude just isn't possible in this climate. It's not. I'm not even my best in that situation, and I'm sure a lot of people have seen a shitty side to me because of all that. It's mentally unhealthy for me, so I've cut it down.

The other most prominent reason I deleted my social media is because I've been meaning to. I first had the idea in early 2015 when I realized how distracted I was becoming with Twitter, and how much I wanted to get done with film projects and school. I was reluctant to, however, just because I enjoyed these media so much and didn't want to give up on communicating with the small community I had following me. Fast-forward to mid-2015, post-Night Mind coverage, when my viewer base suddenly grew even more... I just didn't want to give it up. Thankfully, the aforementioned post-election hostility made that decision much easier for me. And so, here we are.

With that out of the way let's talk about Stan Frederick - the thing all three of you are still here for.

I need to clarify CONSTANTLY that, this season is being produced with the exact same mindset that its predecessor was; it is NOT confirmed to be released until every single episode has been shot and edited. Until that first episode of the second season drops on the Stan Frederick channel, as far as you or I are concerned, "20. Just Another Monster" is the series finale. You feel me?

THAT SAID,

Four episodes are completely finished (that's written, filmed, and edited - completely done!) thus far, out of the season's projected twenty. There were more I had finished, though I'm sad to report that a lot of them were lost in yet another hard drive crash of mine recently. Those episodes will have to be re-shot, which is unfortunate because I really liked the originals. Guess I'll just have to do it better!

Nineteen out of the twenty episodes have at LEAST first drafts written (one might take a long time to write for reasons I can't exactly specify), and fifteen out of twenty have been punched up and finalized in writing. Based on the scripts alone (I can't speak for how they'll look after they're completely filmed) this season is easily better than season one. There's more going on thematically, narratively, and in terms of characters. I'll let you guys be the real judges of that though, if this ever comes to fruition.

Feel free to share this on your Twitters and tumblrs as well, since I can't do that anymore - post it to unForum, whatever! I don't usually feel obligated to ask, but with my sudden disconnection it's going to be a lot harder to keep in touch outside what's left.

See you guys soon! Updates will be more frequent here!

Clarification, Part 2? (Alt. Title: Reiterating For Emphasis)

So the new Episode of Stan Frederick, "17. Answers" just dropped, and I can already see that the confusion in unFiction is unparalleled, given the "reveal" at the end of the episode being a tie to the original series.

My original statement from two posts ago still stands.

You do not have to have seen the original series to understand this one.

The original series is NOT NECESSARY.

If you've been paying attention this season, you absolutely will have all the information you need so far. So to everyone that's a Veteran viewer of StanFrederickBTS, do NOT confuse new viewers with excess info from the old series -- even if it does become relevant down the line -- because I'm telling you all right now, without hesitation, NONE of it is needed. Treat the reboot like what it is, a reboot. It has some of the core elements of the original story, but all of that is absolutely unnecessary. If you are watching the original series, it should just be for sheer interest or off-hand enjoyment, NOT for extra information on the plot of the reboot.

That's about as specifically clear as I can be. I hope everyone is enjoying the final act! Stay excited, stay invested, and most importantly, stay sp00k'd.

~ Evan


EDIT (9/12): I have also privated all of the previous StanFrederickBTS videos for these exact same reasons. I'm sure they're out there somewhere, but I don't want to hear about them anymore, honestly. They were fine when they were made, but in order to eliminate confusion, this is honestly the safest move. Enjoy the reboot, all!

TIME TO BE AN ABSOLUTE BUZZKILL, OH GOD.

I'm a huge fan of managing expectations - especially when I see how wildly out-of-whack expectations are getting. That should be a good enough precursor to where this entire blog post is going, so brace yourself.

A week ago, The Record of Stan Frederick was featured on the YouTube channel Night Mind, which is a massive deal for me. Thanks to his video dissecting and commenting on the first eight released episodes of the reboot, I've received over 2,000 subscribers on Stan's channel in under three days. That is phenomenal, and I owe all of that exposure to the kindness of Night Mind's Nick Nocturne, who saw a lot of potential in my little series.

The video mostly covers the self-awareness of the series in relation to some Slenderverse tropes and cliches, which is pretty cool. Some of those things I tried to keep very deep-seeded so that they were not in the forefront, but seeing the depth that went into this was so interesting and exciting for me, especially as a Night Mind fan. The title of the video - "Stan Frederick - Paranormal Investigations & Webseries Parody Done Right" - is the thing that makes me nervous here, and it's something that I felt the need to address based on the simple notion that, these two titled aspects are supposed to be gimmicks.

Let me stress that, I'm not absolutely bothered by the focus on self-awareness as a selling point for the series... It just isn't. Stan Frederick is primarily story first and anything else second. As a matter of fact, there aren't as many meta events as alluded to in the video, but that just becomes a matter of interpretation versus creative vision, and I'm not here to tell anyone where they should find value in something. I'm making this post to help manage expectations on what they can expect going forward.

There's an in-canon reason for Stan Frederick to be so well-versed in the Slenderverse, and it's simple: He's a veteran. He's seen this stuff, he's familiar with a lot of the facets of this world. But it's not meant to be played in a joking light every time; it's meant to inform this world. Because while I know that people believe the Slenderverse is played out or can't produce any new material, the entire point of my creating this series (you know, a new Slenderman series in 2016, which is supposed to be unfathomable, correct?) was to push back on that notion by providing something that is absolutely in line with the tropes and Slenderverse formula and is still at the very least engaging and interesting on a ***story level***. 

I very much hoped that Stan Frederick wouldn't get typecast as "Slenderverse Parody" because this series absolutely is not that primarily (or at all), and is supposed to be doing something else entirely. The more comments I've gotten implying that "Stan Frederick is an amazing comedy series" or that a viewer "couldn't stop laughing" at a part that was absolutely not intended to be comedic, the more I realize I've really missed my mark here. Perhaps I'm not as decent a writer as I thought, or perhaps the flood of creative interpretation is something I am able to manage much less than I previously considered; but regardless of all of this, there are points to be made so that the 2,000+ new viewers expecting parody to be the focus of this series (as was advertised in the Night Vision video) aren't disappointed with the final product. So here's my blanket statement on the issue, and you guys can get back to speculating and enjoying what I've made for what you want it to be, not what I dictate it to be.

The Record of Stan Frederick will always be a story and character series, first and foremost. If you are here solely for "trope-roasting" or believe that Stan Frederick is some kind of subgenre-saving piece of web fiction, then by all means stick around, because there is some more stuff that might satisfy your interest in something like that. We are doing small, new things within the world that this all makes sense in, but within a contained story and manageable means of production. To put things simply, if you are here for a Slenderman series, you're invited to stay. Because while it does new things, it is still a Slenderman series. That is the point I'm making, and I invite anyone and everyone to stick around if you subscribe to that idea. 

I've seen some great new potential series popping up recently, and even some of the bigger boys starting to update again (lookin' at you, Rosner), so I stand on the notion that this stuff is nowhere near played out, and as long as people have ideas, they should be encouraged to make them. There is originality to be found in the familiar (after all, nothing is original anymore, and everything draws inspiration from something), and I'm certain there are endless new places to go in the Slenderverse based on that point of view alone.

This is absolutely not intended as a negative hit on Nick Nocturne or Night Mind in general. As a matter of fact, his coverage of my series was pretty much completely on point, and his words were so kind and sincere about what I was doing with my series that I can't help but feel elated that such a thing even exists. This post is just for those that understand that, as a Creator - and more pretentiously, as an "artist" - this is an incredibly important thing to me, and the last thing I want is for someone to get the wrong idea of where things are going, only to be disappointed. I'm not saying "I am going to outright spoil things because you are not correctly guessing them"; I'm saying that, I owe it to you to be honest with what I am trying to generally do, and you are free to stick around and see/theorize more based on how you feel about that generality.

Thanks again to everyone for watching Stan Frederick. I'm confident it'll achieve something. Not quite sure what that is yet, but we haven't reached that bridge; in the meantime, enjoy the dirt road with me until we get there!

Clarification About the Stan Frederick Reboot

Hey guys, so I'm back on this OOG blog -- and much like Stan Frederick I've deleted all the old posts because they're really not relevant anymore. I'll update here whenever I think it's necessary, though not nearly as frequently as I was with the original series.

I'm making this post primarily to address something brought up on the unFiction forums recently; as you probably know, I check the forums regularly now that The Record of Stan Frederick has started back up again, full-swing, and a string of comments left by user Lithp was both curious and questionable about the reasoning behind my rebooting the series in general. Despite the fact that I've been updating on these things constantly on Twitter, I do realize that not everyone watches my stuff past the actual series, so I'll do my best to echo that stuff here because, I do believe that Lithp is right to be a little off-put by the decisions made now -- and before.

Is this like a complete reboot, or is it a continuation of the old series, or what's going on?

This was of course already answered by other users, but it doesn't hurt to embellish a little; Yes, it is both. The Record of Stan Frederick does accept most, if not all of the original series as canon to its existence, but it does not require you have seen the original series to understand it. Matter of fact, and you're hearing this from me personally, I prefer you skip the original series. There were plenty of things I was okay with in StanFrederickBTS, but the most prevalent things were the ones that I would rather do my best to ignore or at least not highlight too much in the reboot. Season 1's lack of writing (Like, I did none. At all.) led to a twist that left me hectically trying to pick up the pieces after Season 2 started. Even now I'm satisfied with how I concluded Season 2 despite the missteps, but those missteps are huge ones to just forget about.

I must admit, the reason why I'm so far behind is that I really didn't like the big retcon of the 2nd season. I didn't see anything wrong with the story prior to the plot twist, and the things that motivated me to follow the series suddenly weren't there anymore. Then the reboot happened, & now I'm wondering if I shouldn't continue OR drop, but instead just skip straight to the new series.

This is insanely important, and it's the reason why this blog post is being made. I want to be clear and front with any and all people that were even remotely enjoying this thing to start with: I was not. There was no writing. No planning. Just idea after idea, all of which made this entire thing less and less cohesive. It wasn't the story I wanted to tell. The second season, despite being given the daunting task of fixing all the problems I started in Season 1, was closer to what I wanted, but was bogged down by all those missteps.

And now, we have the reboot.

While acknowledging the events of the first two seasons sparingly, those events are used mostly as ways of informing Stan as a character; he's been doing the Slenderverse stuff for a long enough time to be considered a veteran of sorts, and most of the trauma and pain from those events do carry over, but are masked by his sarcasm and wit. That's what I want to do with this reboot: make a character-centric story that happens to have monsters in it, sometimes. If that's what you or others want to see, I invite you to stick around. If not, no harm, no foul. I just want to apologize for never fully explaining all of this, because it's insanely important and without it, everything just becomes a confusing mess.

Thanks to everyone for expressing interest at all. Hopefully I've made something here that's worth watching. Time will tell!