The Sun Vanished
On April 30th, 2018 a new Twitter account sent its first tweet- “Help.” The following tweets explained the story of someone experiencing the improbable disappearance of the Sun. Throughout the following months, this account uses videos, screenshots of messages, and replies to create an interactive alternate reality multimedia story that other twitter users can follow along to, which makes Twitter the best medium for telling this story.
On the same day, this twitter account by the appropriate name and handle “TheSunVanished” posted a video of his TV screen which contained realistic CNN footage of riots caused by the suns disappearance. Currently, this 42-second-long video is at 1.03 million views with shocked responses down in the comments. This is when people really started to pay attention- people were hooked and conspiracy theorists debated whether or not this account was tweeting from an alternate dimension. Over the next few days, he keeps the audience engaged, sending out pictures and videos of the outside and even putting out a poll on what he should do next. He isn’t just saying what’s going on, but also addressing his audience in the process. His videos are realistic enough to keep people second-guessing but also short enough so that people don’t ask too many questions. I really like the idea that he uses Twitter as his social media medium because many clips on twitter are no more than a minute long, so seeing short and suspenseful clips about his surroundings doesn’t seem out of the ordinary and keeps it grounded to reality.
It isn’t until a few days after the initial tweet that the people following his twitter are introduced to a new character named Danyon. Based on the messages sent back and forth to both of them, you can tell that they are either close friends or family members. You can also come to the conclusion that Danyon lives in a different state, since they say in the text messages that they are a two days drive away. Drawing conclusions and connecting pieces of the puzzle together is part of the fun. The themes of the online twitter narrative take an interesting turn- from a simple yet strange and mysterious phenomenon to a horror/suspense mystery. On May 3rd he tweets about a mysterious figure standing outside of his house. To add more to the suspense and mystery, Danyon warns him to not interact with this figure, and also mentions flashing lights- something that this twitter account mentions a little earlier on. The account now created more of a world with a certain set of rules and storylines that the audience can debate on. Questions can be asked like, who is the guy standing outside? How did Danyon know about the lights? How much DO they know? Adding in another character adds more depth to the story and through the use of screenshots, it also helps create a good example how the use of different multimedia can add further depth and creativity.
Like a typical narrative, as time passes the story, characters, and audience interaction begin to build and grow. The account talks more about the weird flashing lights and the strange behaviors happening outside. Around May 8th, we’re introduced to another character named Tucker. What’s interesting about this account is that unlike Danyon, he also has his own twitter account where he shares his own experiences. While the audience only gets little bits and pieces from “TheSunVanished” account, Tucker DMs a full story of the experience, further fleshing out this narrative and keeping people engaged. Both TheSunVanished account and Tuckers account don’t shy away from audience interaction. Occasionally the account will post polls on what he should do next and the audiences opinion on the characters at play. The account tries to make it as real and immersive as possible by answering direct messages and public tweets from people following along. The themes switch out quite a few times throughout the timeline and by the middle of May the narrative turns into more of a first person survival story.
From the middle of May to the start of June, the account uses more first person videos and updates more about how he’s surviving. From basic knowledge of science fiction stories, the audience can make an assumption that these weird lights and strange encounters could be extra-terrestrial, but at the same time, the speculation of what’s really going on is another example how social media creates a good platform for this story. Social media is meant to be interactive, asking questions and discussing ideas with other people. The more clues that this account throws out, the more that the audience can create theories. He finds a note that’s written all scratched up, stating things like “don’t move, they see motion” the audience is faced with another mystery- who is “they?” some people in the replies speculate aliens whilst others speculate that people are turning into zombie/alien-like creatures. Danyon and Tucker even make a reappearance and give him (and the audience) clues to what the lights mean and how to survive.
Furthering the first person horror experience, during mid-June someone breaks into the house that he’s staying in. He posts pictures and videos of what he sees during the break-in, including first person pictures of him under his bed and bloody handprints across the walls. He later reveals it to be a woman in a trance. Danyon then texts him that he is there to rescue him and we get a first person video of him running to Danyon’s car. Also, if one looks closely enough in the video, they can notice a gun placed on Danyon’s lap for a split second before the video cuts to black.
That video was posted on June 19th with 2.04 Million views, even more than the video of the recording of the riots on TV. The reason why that video gained more attention than the first one was because the audience has got almost daily updates since April 30th, yet after the video was posted he did not post another update until July 7th- which is a little over two weeks. Those two weeks allowed the audience to discuss amongst each other, even expanding to other social media platforms to discuss like Reddit and Discord. On there, they go into even deeper discussions. What happened when he was rescued? Why did Danyon have a gun? The reason the views doubled on that video was probably not only because of the increased popularity of this twitter account, but because the audience was looking for more context clues- something that they’ve been doing throughout the whole narrative. This is what makes twitter such a great platform to tell this story, because if they choose not to update- it means a multitude of things can happen for the audience to share and discuss.
On July 7th, he updates his followers his survival story about him and Danyon. But this time, his tweets aren’t everyday like it was in May and June. He posts more realistic first person videos of what is happening outside, but then he doesn’t post another update until July 12th- almost a week later. He dedicates his time to responding to others theories and answering questions about his situation. Some even decide to join in on the narrative, sharing their own personal stories on what happened when the sun disappeared. He stays active for four more days until he tweets “I’m powering my phone down for now. Wish me good luck.” and that’s the last tweet we get from the account. The greatness of having this story on a twitter account is that the creator of the story could’ve stopped posting updates whenever he wanted and it would still be a suspenseful and fascinating story. If he stopped updating when someone broke into his house, people would be discussing what happened to him then, or similarly when he didn’t update for almost three weeks it allowed people to assume what happened with him and Danyon. Even if it was just his first few tweets of the sun vanishing and then nothing else, people would even make more speculation and analyze the account deeper. If this story was posted in a book, it wouldn’t nearly have any suspense because the book isn’t over with, there is always the next page. Having twitter as a narrative shows that you don’t know WHEN the narrative is going to pick up and start again which keeps people coming back. Twitter allows you and others to respond to each individual tweet and for other people to respond to what you said as well. His last tweet has almost five thousand responses, just filled with threads upon threads of people asking what happened- or what will happen next. It’s even linked to other social media websites like Discord and Reddit, where a group of people following along can create, share and connect their theories. Having a mysterious narrative on a social media account creates the perfect platform because just like all the theories that are made, any part of the story can be created, shared and connected with other people.
