TALES FROM THE VOID 2024 | RECAP | REVIEW | ENDING EXPLAINED
Today I am going to recap and explain a recently released six-part miniseries called Tales from the Void. This is a six-episode anthology series based on the popular subreddit No Sleep. The first episode is called Into the Unknown. The episode starts in a seemingly poor neighbourhood where we see a guy named Haris walking to his college. When he returned at night he saw his friend Anton arguing with some addict. He tells Haris to concentrate on his studies else he will end up like him as a watchman doing odd jobs. Harris nods in agreement. After some time, from his flat Haris saw Anton sitting in front of a square-shaped black which seemed to be floating above ground. He rushes down to see this phenomenon which appeared from nowhere. Anton says it just appeared from nowhere, it was not reflecting any light and making some weird noises. Haris tries to touch it but Anton stops him and returns him to his flat.
The next morning everyone was in awe as they observed it in fear. They came up with their versions of what it could be. Some say it's alien tech, some say it's a military weapon to beta test their tech and others guessed something else. Bill the guy with his daughter, quickly tells her to stay away from it as if it's dangerous. He then starts dispersing people away from it as if he is some kind of a boss around here. The day goes by but the thing still floats in the field. Haris tries to dig up something on the net about it but all he finds is alien science fiction nonsense. Outside Bill is watching that black square where he sees some light sparkle and hears a thundering noise. As soon as he moves towards it he gets knocked off by some force. The next morning he hires two bouncers to guard this thing as he is sure it's dangerous. Haris out of curiosity, tries to take some photos and run some experiments but Ethan stops him. Says he got orders to stop anyone from going near it. He pulls up a gun on him.
Later Bill dials 911 to explain this peculiar situation to the cops who don't take him seriously. He thinks of him as a crackpot which angers Bill. The Cop here didn't know this neighbourhood hence he confirmed its location. Later Haris sneakily took the photos from behind. When he checked it, it was invisible. Meaning only Humans can perceive it which scared the hell out of him. He concluded that it must be from the outer world or from another dimension or something. He explains this to Anton at night who scolds him a little for scaring the good folks. People's emotions run high and wild when they don't control what they perceive. Harris ignores his warning and tries to run experiments the next morning. He throws a ball at it which disappears as if it's a void. This angers Ethan who beats him by pinning him down and a scuffle breaks out. Bill fires a shot in the air to stop it and warns Haris again to stay the hell away from it. This made Haris furious as he was just checking it out. At 3 AM he comes down from his flat to run experiments but sees Anton bleeding on the ground. It appears someone had stabbed him for his dealing. Ethan and the guy confused this as an attack from the square or the Haris experiment gone wrong. They chased him to his flat, beat him up for good and dragged him back to the ground. Bill got hurt in all this which made him angry, in frustration, he and Ethan threw Haris into the square. Sadly Haris disappears into the square to never return. Bill was shocked to see this as he was hoping that he would return. When Haris doesn't return by the next morning he covers the damn thing with a wooden box and writes a warning to keep away. We see Haris in a black swamp where the square is an opening, he screams for help but no one hears his voice. Soon he gets engulfed by a tsunami of black substance. Of course, the cops never show up. With this episode, one ends.
So, the second story starts in a small town where we see three teenage boys Juan, Kurt and Cedric riding their bicycles at night. These guys were pranking new moms by hacking their baby monitors via wireless walkie-talkies. At the first house, Cedric says, this little one looks delicious and the mom freaks out. These guys run from there as soon as the lights switch on as for them it's just a prank to enjoy. At the next house, Kurt does the bidding and another mom starts crying. This time she thought her baby might be possessed so she was willing to do anything to protect it. Seeing all this Juan got scared, he made an excuse to go home but Cedric bullied him to do the next prank. As he hesitantly did it, nothing happened at first and then all of a sudden these three heard the voice of a baby getting strangled. Someone or something was in the house already and he saw these guys doing the pranks. He says you are being watched now. These boys got the scare of their life and as they started to ride back to their house, the voice started following them. Juan reached his house, quickly locked himself in his room yet the voice was still on his Walkie Talkie. He was threatening him.
The next morning, Juan made some excuse and lied to his mom Ada about what had happened. He was on his way to Cedric's house to discuss the incident when he saw a group of people standing in front of the same house with police at the spot. Apparently, someone had killed the whole family including the baby. Juan started to shiver to see this and ran from there like hell. Later he calls Cedic but he doesn't answer, we see in a shot that someone has murdered him. Kurt asks Juan to meet him at a park to discuss this but he never shows up. Juan waited for him the whole day yet Kurt was missing. As he decided to head home in the evening he heard the same voice on Walkie Talkie that he had yesterday. He followed it to the bushed and to a remote cabin, where he saw Kurt's body. Clearly, the guy had killed him and was threatening him too. So, he started riding back to his house. On his way, he saw the body of Cedric as well in pieces which made it clear that the guy was haunting him. Like all babies who ran to their mother in panic, Juan rushed to the house and started calling his mom Ada. But the house was already dark, she was missing and there was a voice coming from a walkie-talkie. As Juan picked it up and started following his voice screaming in fear and crying for his mom, a seven-foot giant man-like entity appeared beside him and killed him. In the end, we hear multiple police officers reporting all these killings. With this, the story ends.
The third story is about a struggling vlogger guy named Whit. Who wants to make it big and famous by hook or crook? He opened up his new channel and worked on it day and night but got only a few followers. Which made him frustrated and obsessed. One night his friend Nick took him for a change but his mind was on the mobile. He got a notification about one big influencer, Charlie Jeffries being present at the party. At the party, Nick's girlfriend Jenny tried to catch up with him. But Nick behaved with her rudely and thought he might have seen her on Only Fans. Here Jenny denied it while trying to help him by telling him the side effects of social media apps. Just then he saw Charlie chatting with some guys and he gate-crashed it in the hope that he may give him a shout-out. Charlie didn't do it in the end while Nick got pissed hearing from Jenny. He threw him out of his car on his way back in the middle of the road.
When he returned home, he noticed that someone had followed him. It's an account called Magnificient Million Dollar Question. It's a live reality TV show that is looking for participants and an audience. Nick thought this was a good opportunity to get some exposure so he decided to enroll as a participant. The TV show sends him a luxury car and Jessica welcomes him. They had placed him in a red room, where Whit observes a peculiar thing. A photo of him at the party with Jenny was in a dustbin which shocks Whit. He didn't understand this and just then producer Robert greeted him. He explains the whole show, where the host will ask five questions if he answers them correctly then he will a million dollars. If not he will be ousted. Whit was super pumped about this as he was blinded by the fame he was about to get. When Robert asked him what he would do with the money, he rather came up with a weird idea. He says, I will start a live stream to hear the saddest story from my followers and will donate the money to the one with most problems. Basically, he intended to donate the money to gain followers.
As he enters the stage, the host welcomes him with the cheering sound of the audience from behind. The light on Whit's face was so bright that he didn't see any one of them. At first, the host asks some basic questions about him and then asks the real show question. Which were too generic for Whit like who is the writer of the play Macbeth. Where are the great pyramids located? Whit answered this with a strange smile. Now the hosts ask how often he sees his parents. Whether he wants to say High to them since he is Live. Whit regrets this as he has become estranged from them. The next question of where the famous influencer Charlie Jeffries was partying last night made Whit a little cautious. He sensed something was not right yet he answered it as he was there last night. Just then he bent over a little and saw that there was no audience. The room was filled with mannequins to imitate. At this point, Whit started to panic, the host cut the live stream while the manager and Jessica rushed in. Here they revealed that this show is just a spoof of a game show, there is no money involved. They are streaming it and 600000 people are watching it, commenting on it, and liking it. The Manager says if he wants to continue then he can do so privetely now in a green room. Whit by this time felt cheated as he thought he would get thousands of followers overnight. He is not going back empty-handed so he decides to play ahead. Jesicca places him in the green room where he sees the stats. There were lots of people watching him over the dark web, they paid money in Bitcoin or other crypto and selected a knife icon. Whit was happy to see this, he begged them to follow his channel and promised them that he would provide them with good content. Just then a masked man, probably the host arrived here and stabbed Whit with a knife. He killed him on live stream as all of this is a set-up to make money. These guys were on the look for lonely fame fame-hungry vloggers, they had tracked Whit for days as is evident from this image. With this, the third story ends.
So these were the first three stories. In the first story, it is evident that people are scared by the unknown. On the first day, they thought it would go away on its own but when it didn't they got scared. Bill called the cops but the cops never showed up. The cops were so busy that they didn't bother to show up for such a clumsy complaint. The author here reflects the reality of today's world where authority is not doing its job and people are getting killed. The second story is straightforward light horror of you reap what you sow. The third story reflects the obnoxiously stupid influencer's career. The internet is filled with such idiots who see views, and followers in everything. They can go to any extent for that one viral video or reel. Whit could have headed Nick and Jenny's advice but he was blinded in his quest for fame. He could have walked away when he knew all of this was a setup but still, he went ahead to the green room. The author is reflecting on the behaviour of people as they lose the ability to think straight in the plethora of influencers. Overall, I liked all three stories. If you want to read more such stories then please visit the No Sleep podcast.
