If you think about it, SCPs are basically hyper-evolved urban legends in their own right.
Sure, they’re not as wide-spread and culture defining, but all of the essential parts are
there. Unexplainable happenings, cryptid-style creatures,
secrecy, conspiracy, the possibility that you might stumble across one someday.
A lot of them take mundane things and make them scary, basing them on common fears and
unavoidable tragedies. All generated by the people, for the people
too! And of course, a bunch of SCPs are indeed
based on real urban legends that have been around for ages.
Bigfoot, alien abductions, haunted roads, the works.
Hello horror heads, and welcome back to the scariest channel on YouTube: Top5ScaryVideos.
I’m your horror host, Keegan Hughes, and today we’re going to be counting down the
Top5 Scary SCP Urban Legends! Before we get started, make sure to give this
video a big thumbs up, and subscribe for more recurring ridiculousness.
Golden, let’s begin! NUMBER FIVE: SCP-3934
I feel like the Loch Ness Monster is one of the most ubiquitous cryptids going.
Somehow, some way, references to this long-necked creature find their way into just about every
type of media. It’s particularly prevalent in children’s
media, with characters meeting the aquatic dinosaur, or wondering about the Scottish
legend out loud. Maybe it’s just me, but you’d be hard-pressed
to find someone who has no idea who Nessie is.
Definitely more common than those who know who the Mothman or the Jersey Devil are.
After a few photos of an unidentified creature in Loch Ness showed up starting in the early
20th century, Nessie was catapulted to fame. Ever since then, people have gone out of their
way to prove or disprove its existence. But if we take a look at the SCP universe,
we find out something that nobody could have guessed: the Loch Ness monster belongs to
an entire species of manmade amphibious reptiles. According to 3934’s containment log, this
species was produced via anomalous means by Marshall, Carter, and Dark LLP.
You know, the anomalous company catering to the uber-rich?
Nessie and her relatives were meant to be sold as exotic pets and aquarium denizens
to folks who believed regular animals just weren’t enough.
Using viral marketing tactics, MC&D leaked the famous photos to stir up interest and
drum up business. Demand was high after the media got ahold
of the famous “Surgeon’s Photo.” By carefully curating the creature’s image,
they created a legend. Then they used that legendary status to sell
more specimens to wealthy individuals. It’s been estimated that between 1935 and
now over 1200 instances have been created and sold.
Nobody’s quite sure how they make these half-sized plesiosaurs, but MC&D keep them
coming. Apparently they’re very social animals,
with behaviour purposefully modeled after Labrador Retrievers to make for excellent
companions. And while their temperament was a selling
point for pet owners, the care they required was not.
3934 instances required a specialized diet, a marine habitat with at least one million
litres of water, frequent specialized medical care, and more.
Many owners couldn't keep up with this, and let their pets die.
Some say this is likely planned obsolescence by MC&D to encourage people to keep buying
younger instances. Nowadays, there are some 59 odd Nessies under
Foundation custody, and they’re doing their best to keep them contained at a Parazoology
reserve. NUMBER FOUR: SCP-265
While Nessie is pretty ubiquitous around the world, this next urban legend seems to have
it’s roots firmly set in Slavic Europe. Does the Black Volga ring a bell?
This legend was prevalent in the 60’s and 70’s, and featured a black GAZ 21 allegedly
rolling around and abducting people, especially children.
Seeing a black Volga was a sign of imminent disaster.
Many speculated as to who was driving these dark doom vehicles, and people came up with
many explanations: priests, nuns, communist secret police, mafia, vampires, Satan himself.
It’s very interesting. Now back to the SCP. 265 is a series 1 GAZ
M21 Volga. No license plate, no logos.
It’s painted black, with white-rimmed wheels, and always appears in pristine condition.
Reports claim that there is never any human occupant in the car: it seems to drive itself.
The Volga will appear in scenarios causing dread and paranoia: following lone travellers
home, idling in their driveways, flashing its lights, etc.
It’s largely been sighted in rural Poland, but has been known to drive in other areas
as well. While it’s usually clocked at going around
65kmph, it has been recorded at speeds exceeding 400kmph.
Whatever this mysterious vehicle wants, you can’t outrun it.
NUMBER THREE: SCP-1102 This SCP is based on the Brown Mountain Lights,
also known as the Blue Ridge Phenomenon. Folks have been reporting a series of ghost
lights near Brown Mountain in North Carolina for years.
A geological survey was done, and determined that witnesses had mistaken train or automobile
lights for something else, but according to a marker on the Blue Ridge Parkway, a massive
flood struck the area soon after the completion of the study.
All electrical power was lost, and trains didn’t operate for a period of time.
Despite all this, the Brown Mountain Lights continued to appear.
Huh. The SCP based on this phenomenon operates
a little differently. The lights are still there, and appear on
the Blue Ridge Mountain Range, but there’s a very disturbing side effect.
It targets small, random areas, and sort of raises the dead.
What I mean is: for every reasonable in-tact corpse in the area, human or otherwise, an
animated likeness of the original organism will appear.
As of right now, it’s still unknown if this is the same as the original creature, or a
completely new thing. They look mostly the same, but are often deformed
in some way, or off-colour. The newly-raised dead then return to or rejoin
other members of the original species. They instinctively know where the nearest
group is, and act out their lives as they usually would for a while.
By the end of the night, all instances will vanish, leaving no trace but footprints.
While the lights happen with some degree of regularity, the corpse-parties are quite rare.
As such, the Foundation has limited information on them.
What they do know is that the forms are indeed corporeal and have mass, they don’t react
to extraneous sounds, they can “die,” they have functioning and accurate anatomies
based on the creature they’re representing, and are believed to be neither conscious,
sapient, nor possessing of complex intelligence. I guess they’re just coming back for one
last night among peers. NUMBER TWO: SCP-1010
This legend is a little more ancient, a little less urban.
Plenty of folks have heard of the Green Man and his many forms.
A legendary symbol of rebirth, the manifestation of new growth in the spring.
Sir Gawain’s enemy and mentor, the haint in the Wicker Man.
A leafy lad with skin of bark and a beard of moss.
The SCP counterpart is pretty much all of these things, but a little more sinister.
1010 is a leaf-covered humanoid who can rapidly change the species of the flora on his body.
This is used for camouflage and self-defence. While usually covered in some pretty benign
foliage, 1010 can make the leaves into stinging nettles, or Scottish thistles and the like.
1010’s purpose is to protect and promote plant life.
If it sees anyone causing harm to flora, it will use it’s chimpanzee-level intelligence
to go absolutely buck wild. The forest-harmer will be attacked with murderous
intent, which is bad news because 1010 is stronger than it looks.
If it successfully kills someone, it will proceed to cover their body in sap-like stuff
from its moith, and use the body like fertilizer. How do you like that? Disrespect the forest
and become part of it. 1010’s behaviour changes with the seasons,
too. Summer and Fall are pretty straightforward:
it attends to and encourages the growth of plants.
Winter is hibernation with a twist: get too close to its hiding place and feel your energy
drain away until you die! How fun. Spring is particularly interesting.
The Green Man will seed nearby plants, which seems normal by his standards, but also encourage
anomalous growth in non-plant species nearby. So people and animals will find themselves
becoming larger when near the Green Man in spring.
It also impregnates people who come too close, both men and women.
Nobody can explain how this happens. I’ll leave it at that.
NUMBER ONE: SCP-1337 The modern urban legend to end all modern
urban legends: The Disappearing Hitchhiker. It’s been told by countless campfires, adapted
into all sorts of horror movies, and added to plenty of creepypastas.
You’ve heard it all before: some hapless travellers are driving through a secluded
area when they see a weary traveller on the side of the road.
After picking them up and chatting a little bit, their passenger has suddenly disappeared
without explanation. These tales are found in all sorts of cultures,
too. So how does the SCP Foundation put their twist
on the story? Well, 1337 is the wraith of one Mary Talish.
Mary was abducted, ritually tortured, and executed on May 19th, 1952.
After this, her ghost would appear on the side of a backroad on the 19th of every month.
This figure would flag down passing vehicles, and tell the drivers that she needed to get
home. If they obliged, she would give them directions
that would inevitable pass by the cemetery she’s buried in.
She’d then encourage the driver to stop by the cemetery, and then promptly disappear,
leaving behind her sweater and the urge to return it to her parents.
For whatever reason, a Foundation doctor decided that this harmless spectre had to be dealt
with. He took it upon himself to destroy the home
that Mary wanted to return to, saying that “If she has no one to return to, she’ll
stop coming back.” Following the destruction of her parents’
house, Mary’s behaviour changed. Instead of appearing as her living self, she
shows up covered in the wounds inflicted upon her prior to death.
She sought out and killed the doctor who targeted her house, and now will disappear if someone
tries to pick her up on the roadside. However, if a driver decides to pass her by,
she will manifest in their car and kill them using the same gruesome techniques that ended
her life. Sheesh. I’d say exercise caution when picking
up hitchhikers, but this makes not doing so even more dangerous.
OUTRO What do you think?
Do these SCPs live up to their source material? What’s your favourite urban legend?
Would it work as an SCP? Make sure you let me know down in the comments.
Speaking of comments, let’s take a look at some of your more musical ones from the
Top 5 Scary Cosmic Horror Monsters Too Dangerous To Be Kept Alive:
W.T. says “When he asked: Do you like being alive?, who else’s first thought was no?”
I’m asking the tough questions! But hey, you’re still with us, so there must be something
good going on. HoodSockEntertainment says “No monster can
compare to what I was imagining as a 5 year old in the dark.”
Could you try to translate those toddler thoughts for us? I want to see the incomparable horror.
Alita Road says “Sutter Cane is very Nyarlathotep-like, he fits very well!”
That’s a great way to look at the character of Cane! Five stars!
TheKabukimann says “How about a Top 5 Scary Soulsborne Monsters?”
Ouuuu that could be a lot of fun. Although I’d probably have a little too much Bloodborne
bias to give the Souls games fair representation. Paradox Geist says “Thank you for having
Sutter Cane on the list.” No problem! He fit right in!
And that’s all the time we have for today. Before I give my evil doppelganger a hi-five,
make sure to give this video a big thumbs up, and subscribe for more local legends and
lunatics. Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you next
time.