I’ve always been a big fan of Phelous and his videos, and make sure to watch them as soon as they are posted. I was especially a big fan of his “Old Man” character: an exaggerated caricature of a portrayal of Beauty’s father from a low-budget animated version of ''Beauty and the Beast''. Phelous’ review of that particular version is one of my favourite reviews of his, and I, of course, love the ''Old Man Reads Creepypastas ''series with every fibre of my being. True, the world and life may be miserable, but they would be a lot worse without videos of Old Man reading terrible creepypastas and pointing out their flaws in his wonderfully mellifluous voice.
So my heart skipped a beat and I squealed with joy when “I HATE YOU – Old Man Reads Creepypastas’ popped up in my subscriptions. There it was, with its preview image of a shrugging Old Man in front of a zombified Luigi, beckoning me to click. So I did.
There was the familiar organ music. There was the familiar “HEEEEE” in the background. Yet something in my gut told me something was off.
Old Man introduced the show: ‘Welcome back to Elderly Male Human Reads Internet Ghost Stories! Today, we will look at a story based on that most terrifying of video games, ''Mario''!’ He picked up Wordsworth the book, and out from his pages fluttered out a note. ‘What’s this?’ asked Old Man, picking up the note and staring at it for – and I got out my stopwatch for this part – ten seconds. ‘Oh no!’ cried Old Man, ‘My daughter Beauty has been kidnapped by Warthog-Goomba, ''and he didn’t pay me a penny''! This will not stand!’
So he threw Wordsworth to the ground and ran off-screen, then I saw him run through a hyper-realistic field, trampling over hyper-realistic flowers, and stopping to take a hyper-realistic shit behind a hyper-realistic bush. It felt like I could reach into the screen and touch the shit.
Eventually, Old Man came across a horrific sight. Various small animals, impaled on stakes. Little squirrels, fluffy kittens, small birds, all dead and bloodied, with their entrails hanging out. In the background, I could faintly hear, ‘Child murderer, child murderer!’
Sure enough, a raccoon hopped onto one of the corpses, and said in a voice not unlike Peter Lorre, ‘Those animals were so stupid.’ Then he let loose one of the most menacing laughs I had ever heard.
‘Ooh,’ said Old Man with a big goofy grin on his face, ‘I was getting hungry.’ One by one, he grabbed the little animals off the stakes and shoved them in his mouth, with their blood staining his clothes.
After devouring the carcasses, he continued his quest, and soon reached the castle. The Beast’s castle looked little like it did in Old Man’s movie, looking more like Castle Dracula. Monochrome towers pierced the sky, grotesques snarled at Old Man from atop their battlements (and didn’t sing), and the walls were covered with thorns.
The camera slowly zoomed in to the castle’s entrance – a giant wooden door beneath a hissing grotesque head – which creaked open. Old Man gasped.
‘Old Man, Old Man, Old Man…’
There stood a plump, balding fellow, dressed in crimson clothes, his most distinguishing feature being his…his moustache.
Senor Moustache. The version of Beauty’s father from another low-budget animated ''Beauty and the Beast'', even by the same company that made Old Man’s. He, however, had not become as big a meme as Old Man. No Creepypasta show for him, only about one cameo in Phelous’ other videos.
‘How do you like ''my'' castle?’ Senor Moustache held up the severed head of the Warthog-Goomba Beast, for about ten to fifteen seconds - I forgot to use my stopwatch that time - before Old Man grabbed it and ate it.
‘Thanks for the meal, wannabe!’
Senor Moustache howled with rage. ‘You’ve been in the spotlight too long, Old Man! This ends now! Let us battle!’
‘Ha!’ Old Man sneered at Senor Moustache. ‘You think you can defeat me? ''Me'', who possessed you just you’d be less ''useless''?’
‘Speaking of which…’ From out of nowhere, Senor Moustache pulled out a bucket of water and threw it at Old Man. Old Man didn’t even flinch.
‘Really?’ Old Man raised an eyebrow. ‘The most obvious attack against me and you did it! You ''are'' an idiot. I mean, yeah, I say that a lot to please the fans – something ''you'' don’t have – but I take, you know, showers and stuff. I’m not the Wicked Witch of the West or anything.’
‘Say,’ said Senor Moustache, ‘did you know Golden Films did a ''Wizard of Oz ''adaptation and they made Dorothy pretty much sound almost exactly like Judy Garland did in the MGM version?’
‘Oh yeah,’ replied Old Man, tapping his chin, ‘I think I saw that once. In that one, the Wicked Witch was pretty much Maleficent, complete with the pig minions…’
With Old Man distracted, Senor Moustache raised a knife and…
My web browser reloaded itself and I was taken to a new Youtube video.
“Sonic.EXE – Senor Moustache Reads Creepypastas”
Senor Moustache stood in front of a black background. Beside him was the severed head of Old Man on a stake, being nibbled at by the raccoon from earlier.
‘Viewers, viewers, viewers, welcome to Senor Moustache Reads Creepypastas! My predecessor…’ He gestured towards the head. ‘…was far too negative. Sonic.EXE is one of my favourite stories ever…’
It was then I screamed.