The Parallel is a good concept with bad execution
Alright, so, if you haven’t seen the Parallel it’s a few YouTube videos by LC, who has also made FNAF analog horror videos.
The main premise is somewhat similar to Vita Carnis season 1, introducing multiple new species and what they can do / are weak to. For the Parallel it’s a collection of videos on multiple newly discovered (kinda?) species that hunt humans.
The issue is the Parallel takes a completely non sensical approach to this.
- Every single new species is near unkillable, runs super fast (One of the weaker one is +100 MPH), and just hate humans for… some reason? Biologically, they would all need a ton of food to keep going, but multiple of them are shown to not eat at all, while others eat a single person and have to move at incredible speeds to do so, which brings up the question of how they get their energy back. You could make the argument that they’re otherworldly and don’t need food to survive, I wouldn’t be surprised if this series reveals they ‘eat human suffering’ or something, but then why do some of them eat humans?
Also, it’s just… boring? Things like the Alternates in the Mandela Catalogue are scary because they can blend in perfectly with humans, for the Parallel it’s: if you see one of these, you’re dead. It’s not very unique or interesting.
There’s a video called History which shows that these creatures have existed seemingly as long as humanity has. Okay… did I mention that the government has successfully hidden the fact that these creatures exist? Despite all of the videos and photos of them being in the middle of the suburbs for the most part, and all of the history showing they exist, people don’t know they exist. I don’t even know what to say about that. Also, if these creatures have existed for so long, why has there been no countermeasure developed against them? If humans can’t kill them, what about trapping them? It doesn’t make sense that they’ve existed for so long and been such a threat on human life, but nobody has even thought of a way to stop them.
A bit more of a nitpick, but the series also says that nobody has returned alive from the land near the Equator. Alright. It’s established that two of these species (Stalkers and Tormentors, you won’t guess what they do) are stronger near the equator. Despite this fact, the land mass is perfectly mapped alongside multiple other islands near the equator. The video Geography also somehow comments on the fact that Caribbean islands are made in a way that makes it hard to escape attacks, despite also saying that nobody has ever returned alive from them, so how the hell do they know that the terrain is like that?
What I mean by it’s a good concept is because it is. A species that solely hunts humans is a pretty scary idea, and imagine what you could do to show that. Look at anteaters, they exist solely to eat ants and nothing else. Instead of being faster or stronger than ants, well I mean they are but, they use their tongue to take ants out of their tunnels and eat them. What I’m trying to say is there are so many cool biological features you could come up with in a species that hunts humans, and this series does none of that. Everything is just “if it sees you, you die”.