Web Video / British Cryptids

Thousand of years ago, these isles were teeming with flora and fauna undreamt of by the modern Briton. Invasion from Rome, the Scandinavian Countries, and France have produced a rich cultural heritige that continues to inspire and influence people all over the world.

And yet, within the borders of our own lands there appears to be much that our natural science overlooks. Creatures hidden from modern man's curiosity. Creatures perhaps only known by the simple folk, who live near to the wild forests, desolate moors, and lonely lakes.

These mysterious animals are occasionally glimpsed or encountered by the more educated, who recognise them as unclassified and undescribed specimens hitherto unknown to science."

— from Introduction

British Cryptids is an Analog Horror web series created by Whinny Moor and Colin Leutcher, professing to be a long lost documentary from The '70s, focusing on unknown creatures sighted across Great Britain and its own history.

But forget the Loch Ness Monster, Alien Big Cats, or any other cryptid of the UK you may have heard of. These cryptids are all something far more... different.

There is also a spinoff called Man's Unknowable World which focuses on paranormal phenomona not related to the creatures, so far consisting of the episode "Mising Persons".

On March 8 2024, a teaser for a new series was released, called Europan Cryptids.

See also Whinny Moore's Instagram page.

List of videos

• "Introduction" (April 16 2021)
  • Series One
    • "Yorkshire Yeti" (April 16 2021)
    • "The Hereford Twiggywitch" (May 16, 2021)
    • "The Souter Seawolf" (September 2, 2021)
    • "Stag Men" (October 29 2021)
    • "Cumbrian Dregpike" (March 4, 2022)
    • "The Woodwose of Cannock Chase" (January 1, 2023)
  • Series Two
    • "The Ramflaggie of Argyll" (January 1, 2024)
• Man's Unknowable World: "Missing Persons" (July 2, 2023)

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British Cryptids contains examples of:

• Abandoned Mine: The abandoned Rosedale iron mine was thought to be the lair of the Yorkshire Yeti, but a search discovered only the skeleton of a Nazi spy.
• Anachronism Stew: Keen-eared viewers may recognise that some of the information and dates given don't match up with reality. The most egrigous case is that the very word "cryptid" wasn't coined individually until 1983.
• An Ice Person: Folklore surrounding the Ramflaggie attribute powers over ice, snow, and avalanches to it.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: Although the narration often takes exceedingly weak 'evidence' for the cryptids it is discussing at face value, 'The Woodwose of Cannock Chase' dismisses the existence of Bigfoot out of hand, describing it is as obvious hoax.
• Artefact of Doom: The Arctic audio recordings in 'Missing Persons' apparently cause the death or disappearance of everyone who comes into contact with them.
• Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti:
  • The Yorkshire Yeti is a sheep-killing humanoid from Yorkshire exactly like the Yeti of the Himalayas.
  • The Woodwose is a hairy Wild Man that is actually compared to bigfoot come the 70's (the then-present day). However, the series itself bears skepticism towards Bigfoot itself, calling it a film hoax and a man in an ape costume as opposed to a flesh and blood creature, as opposed to the Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane angle it takes to the rest of the series' subjects.
• Early Instalment Weirdness: The Yorkshire Yeti episode occasionally lapses into other cryptid subjects like black dogs and alien big cats, which are actual myths. The other episode usually stick to one alone.
• Fauns and Satyrs: Satyrs, and the satyr-like god Pan, are discussed as possibly being based on, or connected to, both the Stag Men and the the Ramflaggie of Argyll
• Fictional Document: Almost every episode contains quotations, and images of, numerous fictional books and news reports. Examples include:
  • "Lanou, the Amazon Girl" by the equally fictional writer Florez Blackwell is mentioned in the Woodwose episode. It's also an example of Famous, Famous, Fictional as it comes right after mentioning Mowgli and Tarzan.
• The Freak Show: Emma Watterson, a woman with hypertrichosis, was sold by her family to a travelling freakshow, escaped, and ended up living as a hermit on Cannock Chase. A photograph shown of her is an edited photograph of a real hypertrichosis sufferer, Alice Elizabeth Doherty.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: The very first frame of each episode are pictures of a woman. It is unknown what the signifigence of them are.
• The Ghost: A few cryptids are mentioned but not elabourated on any further.
  • The Lancaster Perch-Man, mentioned in the Dregpike episode.
  • The Cave Children of Coniston, mentioned in the Introduction's description and seen in a newspaper in "Stag Men". Their story is eventually told in brief as an aside in 'The Woodwose of Cannock Chase', suggesting that they were intended for a full episode and then scrapped.
• Gruesome Goat: The Ramflaggie of Argyll is an enormous, supposedly carnivorous goat associated with blizzards and avalanches. The episode focusing on it makes a point of emphasising the relationship between the monstrous Ramflaggie and depictions of the devil, associating it with witchcraft.
• Historical Domain Character: Historical figures are mentioned in many episodes.
  • Early travel writer Celia Fiennes appears in several episodes, expositing local legends of each cryptid.
  • In the Dregpike episode, Charles Dickens appears and is mentioned to have heard a story about the monster and considered writing one book about it himself only to instead write The Bride's Chamber. Beatrix Potter is also mentioned as trying to make a story based off the the Dregpike.
  • Lewis Carroll is mentioned in "Souter Seawolf", where the narrator notes that he was in the region while writing The Walrus and the Carpenter, and even suggests that he may have seen the Sea Wolf and inspiring the creation
  • "The Woodwose of Cannock Chase"
    • There is a sequence discussing Alexander Selkirk and his marooning on Juan Fernández Island and a fictiotous encounteer with a giant wildman he calls a Woodwose. Daniel Defoe is subsequrntly mentioned for adapting Selkirk's life into Robinson Crusoe and replacing the Woodwose with Friday.
    • Arthur Conan Doyle is mentioned for his part in the story of the Great Wyrley Outrages, a series of livestock mutilations in 1903, which he investigated in an attempt to overturn the conviction of a local man who had been wrongly accused. The story diverges from reality in the film's version of Conan Doyle blames a Woodwose for the mutilations.
• Human Sacrifice: The Yugoslavian film 'Zaleðena Princeza', based on a folktale about the Ramflaggie features a king who sacrifices a woman to the Ramflaggie each year.
• Istanbul (Not Constantinople): The North Sea is sometimes called the German Ocean in the setting.
• Lotteryof Doom: The people sacrificed to the Ramflaggie in the film 'Zaleðena Princeza' are chosen by lottery, and ultimately the king's own daughter is selected to die.
• Mars Needs Women: The narrator seems oddly fixated on the idea that semi-humanoid cryptids, like Stag Men and Woodwose, desire sex with human women.
  • The narrator suggests that Classical satyrs are based on Stag Men, and the satyrs penchant for sex with maidens reflects a folk memory of Stag Men mating with human women.
  • John Ralph's account of meeting Emma Watterson and a woodwose on Cannock Chase speculates that the woodwose was her mate.
• Mix-and-Match Critters: The Cumbrian Dregpike is described as being a giant pike with horse's legs.
• Mockumentary: British Cryptids is done up to look like a paranormal documentary from the 1970s that failed to get a wider release.
• Monogender Monsters: Stag Men are assumed to always be male, to the point where the narration speculates that they procreate through mating with female deer rather than their own kind.
• Monster Misogyny: Both Stag Men and Woodwose are associated with luridly-reported attacks on women:
  • Mary Evans and Jane Owen were attacked by a Stag Man near Gladestry, Radnorshire. Jane escaped, but Mary fainted and was apparently killed or abducted.
  • According to a 'Penny Horrible', the Huntston sisters of Brockton Hall were killed on Cannock Chase after being abducted by a Woodwose. One was killed and partly devoured, the other escape but was accidentally shot by a local man.
• Oop North: It's easier to list the cryptids that aren't found in the northern counties^Specifically The Twiggywitch is from the Anglo-Welsh border, the Woodwose is from Cannock Chase in Staffordshire, and the Ramflaggie is from Scotland as opposed to England all together.
  • The Yorkshire Yeti is from well, Yorkshire.
  • The Seawolf is from Souter in South Tyneside, Tyne and Wear.
  • The Dregpike is from the Lakes District in Cumbria.
  • The Stag Men are reported from Yorkshire, though they also range into Scotland and Wales too.
• Our Cryptids Are More Mysterious: The series' premise.
• Plant Person: The Hereford Twiggywitch is a little skeletal being made of twigs and leaves. A scientific study brought up towards the end of its episode hints its made of cells that switch between properties of plant and animal cells.
• The Stinger: 'Missing Persons' contains a stinger after the end credits showing a screaming woman, possibly from the tape itself.
• The Grand Hunt: A lot of the anecdotal sightings of various cryptids are taken from accounts of hunts, particularly fox hunts, and the hunters often end up injured or dead at the hands of the cryptids.
• The '70s: The series was ostensibly created in 1974, and the few segments that take place in the time do reveal the fashions of the era. The music also consists of early synth from the time.
• Wild Child: The Cave Children of Coniston, a pair of feral children who lived in a slate cave and died during a severe winter, are discussed in 'The Woodwose of Cannock Chase' alongside some real or putatively-real examples like Victor of Aveyron and Marie-Angelique Memmie le Blanc.

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