MOVIE REVIEW; Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story

When an adaptation has nothing to do with the source material beyond a couple Easter eggs, is it really an adaptation?

Nope. Not at all.

Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story may share the name with the beloved webseries but it has but the most superficial of connections to the source.

There's a missing poster of Alex Krallie, the Operator symbol is littered everywheres to the point where it loses all sense of importance and there's a reference to the source material at the very end of the movie.

Yes, at the very end. The main characters are completely boring and uninteresting. The main character stalks the female character for cripes sake. If anything, you actually find yourself routing for the strangely tiny Slender Man, as it takes forever and a day to catch up with them. The dog is the most interesting character.

And speaking of the Slender Man, or the Operator as it's known in the webseries, is depicted completely backwards.

Seen only through cameras? Not in the webseries.

Marking people with the Operator symbol? Not in the webseries.

I can't recommend this film as either a horror fan or a Marble Hornets fan. Although the film credits the creators of Marble Hornets and even lists Victor Surge, the original creator of Slender Man, as an executive producer, the film falls flat in all aspects.

Oh and Doug Jones plays the Operator...yes, they paid a talent like Doug Jones to essentially just stand around in a suit and mask.

Considering that the creators of Marble Hornets, THAC TV, have all gone their seperate ways, you have to wonder, did this stinker of a film have something to do with it? There's no evidence to support that, thought I admit, but I have to wonder.

How must it feel to create something that's so influential, and so revered, to hand it over to a major movie company like Anchor Bay Entertainment and to see it turned into nothing more than just a cash grab - it's just plain sad.