Reel is a pair (with a third in the making) of Canadian independent Found Footage horror movies, following the exploits of one "SlasherVictim666" (or "Slasher" for short), a serial killer obsessed with becoming the greatest filmmaker ever.
The first movie sees him stalking a vain YouTube movie reviewer named Todd Smith (no, not that Todd Smith, though both series are Canadian), who grew up in the same small town as him, while comparing their personal lives. The second movie is the result of an In-Universe Creator Breakdown, where SlasherVictim666 is upset because his first movie wasn't the hit that he thought it would be. He eventually comes to the conclusion that in order to make his movie a much bigger hit, he has to "cast" a woman in the "lead" role. Around this time, he befriends "Assistant Jane", a Polish immigrant who's at risk of being sent back home.
These are reel tropes, my friends:
- Abusive Parents: Doug McKuttle was a director of what's heavily implied to be snuff films, and mistreated his children by telling them that he'll never live up to him. He kills his older son, James, when he finds out that he's been having an affair with his own mother.
- Affably Evil: Slasher is always incredibly polite to fans when conversing with them online. Of course, it's not actually him speaking, but his seemingly anonymous actor staying in-character.
- The Alcoholic: Gregs is a heavy drinker and it's constantly interfered with his filming schedule and the time he spends with the McKuttle family, enough to make Slasher worry about him.
- All There in the Manual: There's a downloadable PDF called 50 Movies That Inspired Me To Be The Greatest Director Ever on the official site that describes much of Slasher's childhood in detail, in addition to being Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
- Arc Number: 666. The sequel reveals that it's Slasher's address (666 Ontario Street, specifically), and his goal is to kill 666 victims, or in his words, send 666 stars to the Golden House.
- Arch-Enemy: Director Chris (or "Piss") Goodwin to Slasher, who took credit In-Universe for both movies. Slasher vows to kill him someday.
- Asshole Victim:
- Very, very downplayed with Todd. Yes, he spent the majority of the first film being an asshole Smug Snake, invading his family's privacy and treating his viewers like shit for his own incompetence, but he really didn't deserve to have all that done to him.
- Played straight with James McKuttle, who was the most like his father and peeled off his sister's face to give to his mother, who he was having an incestuous affair with.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: The entire McKuttle clan has a history of serial murder, torture, and abuse, though their patriarch seems to draw the line at incest.
- Black Comedy: Pretty much the whole thing. The plot revolves around a Psychopathic Manchild Mad Artist who is utterly convinced of his brilliance despite being a total hack. He engages in the most absurdly violent acts of Disproportionate Retribution, and his family members provide some rather darkly amusing commentary while they torture his "stars".Bransby: (looking directly at the camera) My name is Bransby, and this is how you nail someone's hand to a chair!
- Blue-and-Orange Morality:
- As shown in the Who Wants to be Reely Famous web series. Though he's so obsessed with becoming famous, Slasher forbade one assistant from using social media while they were still in the process of filming, though his assistant's goal was to give him the fame he wanted. He eventually pulls a knife on him for it, and then ties him and tortures him to death when he tries to walk out.
- Generally, Slasher has some warped ideals. While "sending stars to the Golden House" is a Deadly Euphemism, he really seems to think that he's making them famous and believes that he's the greatest director ever instead of a murderous hack in a family of murderous hacks.
- Bullying a Dragon: One of the would-be actors rehearsing in Slasher's attempt at a movie about his childhood learns the hard way not to quote his father on his lack of talent.
- Cain and Abel: Downplayed, in that both the McKuttle brothers turned out to be serial killers like their father, but Slasher/John seemed to be more naïve than his brother, and wasn't into the family business like him, only wanting to be "the greatest director ever". It's implied his early films were a lot more benevolent than the rest of the clan's, but after his brother tried to kick him into gear, he eventually got in line.
- Character Blog: Slasher has an Instagram account
, a Facebook page, and an official website. Todd's YouTube channel is also real. - Even Evil Has Standards:
- While Doug is perfectly okay with brutalizing people for snuff films and abusing his children, the sequel shows that he murdered James because he was appalled that he was having an affair with his wife, who was, of course, James' mother.
- Slasher doesn't seem to be very big on necrophilia and would prefer to find a live woman who reciprocates his love, and considered his brother's prank of putting dead bodies in his bed to be "not funny".
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones:
- Although Slasher is pretty far gone mentally, he still looks up to his big brother, James, who he dedicated the first movie to. He also loves his grandma.
- In the sequel, he seems to genuinely care about Assistant Jane, helping her get the money that she needs to stay in the country, although it's subverted at the end where he cuts off his own penis and then kills her.
- Evil Sounds Deep: Justified, since Slasher has to hide his real voice.
- Foil: Todd, to SlasherVictim666. Both of them grew up in the same town with disapproving parents, have egos despite being failures in their filming endeavors, and resort to criminal actions for the sake of popularity and film it. However, the worst thing Todd ever does is break into his brother's house and make absurd accusations, whereas Slasher has already killed a number of people by the start of the first movie; Slasher's father agrees to help finish both his movies while Todd's parents resent him for pursuing a different job than what they expected of him; and Todd's family was relatively normal.
- Freudian Excuse: With the kind of family that Slasher came from, it's really no wonder he grew up to be a serial killer.
- A God Am I: In an episode of Who Wants to be Reely Famous? he tells his viewers about a dream where he sees something "not human" in his shower ... himself. His book features several occult references, and how he plans to take over Hollywood. Putting all that together, plus his plans to take his own life at the end of his killing spree, this seems to be his end goal.
- Groin Attack:
- Todd gets a few in the ending sequence of the first movie, where one of the McKuttles kicks him in the crotch while torturing him.
- Slasher gives one to himself in the sequel, using a movie slate embedded with razor blades.
- Hollywood Satanism: Averted. Slasher (at least, according to him) used to be a Satanist, but has since moved on after deciding he has no more use for Satanism.
- I Love the Dead: According to 50 Movies That Inspired Me To Be The Greatest Director Ever, Slasher's brother James tried to teach him the proper way to a woman's heart is to her dead body.
- Insane Troll Logic: The driving point of the sequel. Slasher concludes that the first movie wasn't a hit because it didn't have a female lead.
- Jerkass: Todd in the first movie. He starts out seeming like a decent enough fellow, but then he starts complaining about his family — more specifically, his brother's marriage to Melissa — to deliberately start drama and posting it on YouTube for the whole world to see, and blaming his viewers for not giving him enough views on his shitty attempt at a short film.
- Kick the Dog: Whether or not Dave knew what kind of person Slasher was, it was pretty unnecessarily cruel to use his abusive father's words against him.
- Mad Artist: The entire McKuttle clan, due to being snuff filmmakers. Slasher is this even more so, since he considers himself the greatest director ever, despite the Stylistic Suck of both his movies.
- Made of Plasticine: Ethan's head is stomped apart with relative ease underneath Slasher's shoe.
- Meaningful Rename: Slasher gets his name from his plan to murder 665 victims (or, in his words, send them to the Golden House), and finally kill himself as number 666.
- Narcissist: Both Slasher and Todd.
- Slasher, despite the amateur quality of both his movies, thinks of himself as the greatest director ever, when really, his movies amount to little more than trashy homemade snuff and it's perfectly reasonable that nobody would want anything to do with him, except for Assistant Jane. He also has delusions of taking over Hollywood one day.
- Todd's head is so far up his ass and he continually tries to start drama with his family despite their demands for him to stop. He also refuses to admit to his own incompetence and blames his subscribers for the lack of views on Cannibal Kitchen, seeming to think of himself as a filmmaking genius.
- No Name Given: Subverted. Slasher's real name is John McKuttle, as revealed in the second movie and on his Facebook page. Though there's no certainty behind who his actor really is. Nobody seems to really know what he even looks like beneath the mask he wears onscreen.
- Number of the Beast: Guess.
- Plato Is a Moron: Slasher is disdainful of other horror icons such as Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and Ghostface, because he sees them as "fake horror" (never mind that all the movies he listed as inspirations are just as fake) and is proud of his intended body count, where they killed far less victims than he hopes to.
- Psychopathic Manchild: Slasher's mentality is exceedingly immature and he has unrealistic goals, like becoming the greatest director of all time by sending 666 stars to the "Golden House". His drawings aren't much more than stick figures.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Once Assistant Jane discovers what kind of person Slasher really is, she runs away from him, but it doesn't take much for him to win her back.
- Serial Killer: The footage of the two movies shows Slasher stalking and cutting up victims. His family are, too.
- Shout-Out:
- The cover art for the DVD is an obvious one to The Blair Witch Project.
- To Jackass, of all things! Episode 3 of Who Wants To Be Reely Famous? shows a montage of Gregs doing all sorts of dumb stunts, and it's preceded by the trademark skull and cross-crutches and a Don't Try This at Home warning.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Slasher repeatedly insists that he's the greatest director ever, despite his lack of success in the film industry.
- Smug Snake: Todd's biggest flaw is his hubris and self-certainty, and as a result, he does a lot of stupid things that would have gotten him in trouble if he posted it on YouTube like he'd planned. The only thing that stops him is that he didn't find anything when he searched her house.
- Snuff Film: The last 20 or so minutes of both movies are shot like this. It's also the McKuttle family business.
- Stockholm Syndrome: With his grooming of Assistant Jane's drug-addled mind, it really doesn't take a whole lot of effort on Slasher's part to turn her into a willing accomplice.
- The Stoner: Before he joined the family, Bransby was just a fairly average stoner with a YouTube channel. This hobby led him to meeting Slasher's cousin "the Packmaster", who was also a stoner.
- Stylistic Suck: It goes with being a Found Footage movie. Todd's in-universe bomb of a short film, Cannibal Kitchen, is also this.
- That Man Is Dead: Slasher refuses to go by his birth name, claiming it's not who he is anymore.My name is SlasherVictim666. I am the greatest director of all time and keeper of The Golden House. Before I was on my path I was known as John McKuttle but John is no more and SlasherVictim666 is forever. On the street if you yelled "John!" – I would not answer.
- Too Dumb to Live: Okay Todd, go ahead and follow the mysterious man in black who you just saw having sex with your brother's wife in front of her daughter — which very likely implies it wasn't consensual — for several hours, despite the fact that he's clearly onto you. What harm could come of it?
- Torture Porn: Again, the last 20 minutes of both movies.
- Verbal Tic: Slasher frequently ends his narrations with "my friends", directly addressing the audience. He also includes it when he's talking to fans on the Internet in Real Life.
- Villainous Breakdown: Slasher gets a few, like when he's upset that his first movie wasn't the hit he thought it would be. There's also one in his book where he's reviewing The Lost Boys where he gets a moment of lucidity and realizes just how hellish his family life is. The latter moment comes across as out of character for him, given how nonchalantly he talked about it in both movies.
- You No Take Candle: Whenever Slasher writes or types something, it's in disjointed English, which one of the actors he hired to make a movie about his childhood, notices.
