thesiltverses

[thesiltverses]

so i know that the silt verses is approaching its series finale, and i have (allegedly) made peace* with this inevitability. however.

.....is there any chance you guys could be bribed into.... not.... ending the show.... 👀 like i'm not trying to say my mother-in-law makes THE best lemon squares and butter tarts in all of ontario, but i'm also not NOT saying that.

the best confectionary goodness you've ever tasted in exchange for more silt verses, what do u say

*i may still be in the bargaining stage of grief, actually

(also all of this is a joke!! hahaha! unless 👀)

Hahaha, your mother-in-law sounds awesome, and her sweet treats sound delicious!

I know this is a joke (unless 👀), but to answer it sincerely: like most kids, I used to love building Lego. Great towering mangled constructions. And you always got to a point where it was almost finished, probably finished - but the temptation persisted to keep building. Perhaps one detail more? One extra addition, make it taller, make it bigger? And then you'd try and jam another brick on and the whole thing would fall off-balance or collapse into pieces.

And then you had a reckoning with yourself; you'd spoiled your own work because you didn't know how to stop.

When it comes to the world and story of TSV, I of course feel the temptation to keep jamming on more bricks, but I also know what we'd be risking.

Whether it's mainstream TV shows or indie audiodramas, I think there are very few multi-season serials that are universally agreed to stick the landing of their final season; almost every single longform show is popularly considered to have some dropoff in quality or some kind of disappointment in how it handles its ending (even The Wire, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos).

Contrarily, there are a great many shows that are universally accepted to have persevered on long after they should have ended, or to have taken a total dive into a hole they couldn't get back out of.

That's just the nature of longform storytelling - it's ludicrously hard to wrap up in a satisfying way, it's much too easy to keep adding more bricks instead.

We're not done yet, of course, and no matter what I'm sure there are people who will come away feeling that this season was a disappointing ending to the series because it didn't do X or it did Y (and some of that will be totally justified, some of that will be subjective, and some of that is again just the inevitable cost of trying to end a long and complicated story).

But I'm really, really grateful and relieved that we've had some very kind and enthusiastic feedback on S3 so far, and I feel incredibly proud of us and our cast for some of this season's episodes and performances which I think do arguably count amongst our best work.

That feels like a very rare and a very fortunate place to get to end things on, and I wouldn't ever want to risk spoiling that by continuing to over-extend ourselves.

(And equally, I'm just excited to have the chance to make something else next!)

[thesiltverses]

Hi there! I just finished a relisten of the silt verses and oh my GOD the writing is just incredible. I’ve always been blown away by the world building but on this listen I realized just how enamored I am with the way you write complex character relationships. Of course the major relationships develop naturally and beautifully but I have so much appreciation for the less central relationships (Paige and Faulkner’s dads come to mind as characters only on the show for a little while but who absolutely blew me away.)

It’s been said a million times but it’s so refreshing to follow a cast of people who are all terrible (or complicit in terrible things) in different ways. It’s such a natural extension of the worldbuilding—of course it’s near impossible to be a “good person” in a world ravaged by consumerism. I admire how it’s such a fantastical world yet even the worst of the villains feel wholly human.

Anyways I haven’t had the energy to draw for over a month now but I was so inspired by this relisten that I’ve now finished a whole art piece and I have several new ideas to work on! The imagery in tsv is so rich it’s like it wants to be drawn.

Tldr; the silt verses is my fav podcast of all time. I truly hope you feel incredibly proud of your creation. Thank you for putting something so amazing out into the world

Hey! Thank you so, so much - it's comments like these that really just make your day and make all of it feel worthwhile.

On your point about relatively minor roles, I completely agree - of course Steve Shell nails his performance as Faulkner's dad, but I also think Graham Rowat deserves a ton of praise and recognition for what he does with Dennis, and maybe he tends to get forgotten a bit because of the nature of the character.

I see a lot of people raving about the start of his character arc (hating his guts) and the end (feeling moved by him) in completely opposed ways, and I think that really speaks to Graham's brilliant range.

(Also, I think I saw your art piece of Paige and it was absolutely gorgeous! Really thrilled that the show gave you a bit of extra inspiration and thank you in turn for putting something so fantastic out into the world.)

[thesiltverses]

I massively enjoy your podcast! Thank you for creating something so unique!

Every time I hear this song (and Gaelic cover of The Water by Laura Marling) I think of Carpenter and her family singing it together in her childhood

Love this, thank you!

[thesiltverses]

hi. um. my friend is cajoling me into getting a new tattoo and im considering getting the silt verses podcast mark on me. are there any side effects i should be worried about?

As people from the Silt Verses setting like to say, 'what's the worst that could happen?'

(Thrilled and honoured that you'd even think of us - if you do get a TSV tattoo, hope you're happy with the results!)

[thesiltverses]

And as she wept before the grave, the first buds of the Woundtree stretched out around her and formed a bower to shelter her from the falling rain.

It’s tragic, it’s compelling. People understand it, they sympathise with it. It keeps us safe.

I hate her, quite a lot.

Everyone go listen to @thesiltverses NOW. i love Paige so much its not even funny

[ID: fanart of Paige Duplass from the Silt Verses kneeling with tree roots growing from her skin. Paige is a thin white woman with long, straight brown hair and brown eyes. She is nude with her hands twisted in the air above her head. Roots protrude from her flesh, tangling and twisting around her. White crocus flowers bloom from her mouth and one of her eyes, and the flowers frame her silhouette. She looks towards the camera with one anguished eye, a bloody tear gouged into the skin underneath. Where the roots touch her skin, her flesh is marked by deep, bloody wounds. End ID]

[thesiltverses]

huh. there's something on my face

[thesiltverses]

sorry if this is ruining the magic or whatever but how did you do the mirror sound in 39?? it sounds like maybe some reverse-dish-breaking and a tree falling to go along with it?

(sincerely a curious foley artist)

It was a combination of shattering glass (obvs), reversed and sped-up shattering glass, I think some underlaid fleshy sounds, and a prismatic drone SFX. I don't know how audible it is, but in a couple of places there's also a reversed and stretched version of the relevant character's lines being whispered underneath.

[thesiltverses]

The Silt Verses Chapter 40 will arrive on Monday 29 April, folks (we'll be aiming to stick to a three-week release going forward!).

In next week's episode, Carpenter and Hayward make contact with Shrue in Glottage, hoping to persuade the Adjudicator to defect - while across the channel, Val brings the war to a startling and unexpected climax...

#the silt verses #tsv

[thesiltverses]

do we have an official date for the Binding Day of the Saint Electric? it'd be fun to celebrate :3

we do not, so please feel very to nominate a real-world equivalent date that works for you, and I will happily Declare It Canon

[thesiltverses]

what is it like to be a person born or created or whatever in eskew (assuming, of course, that they actually are people and not just human-shaped dolls for the city to play around with), i mean, would they experience the endless nightmares and just kind of accept them as business as usual? not recognize anything out of the ordinary at all? or would they be relatively aware of their unfortunate predicament?

I think we don't get to know that either way, because the whole show is wrapped up in David's paranoia, survivalist incuriosity, and self-centredness, and the nature of Eskew itself reflects his mindset.

As far as David is concerned, everyone in Eskew is assumed to be a human-shaped doll that only acts to go through the motions of modern living or to spitefully torment or thwart him, until every so often someone surprises him by demonstrating their (apparent) awareness of their condition.

In the show, side characters do occasionally react with 'normal' terror instead of apathy towards something awful that's happening in Eskew (usually to them), but does that make them awake, or is this just another part of the ever-changing performance for David's benefit? He doesn't know, so we can't know.

[thesiltverses]

Just a reminder that if you're interested in checking out The Silt Verses RPG and have ~20 hours of free time, I've been getting to grips with the game by running some sessions and trying out custom content with four infinitely more talented players from The Gauntlet community!

Thus far, our intrepid heroes (a theatre kid gone rogue as a follower of The Watcher In The Wings, a compulsively helpful servant of a god of obedience, a mysterious doctor and worshipper of the elemental deities of radiation, and an officious Slag King surveyor) have:

burnt down a hospital

attempted to solve a whodunnit in an isolated ski lodge

negotiated peace through the power of musical theatre

dealt with a demonic bellhop

summoned, fought, or run away from countless horrific angels and saints

#the silt verses

[thesiltverses]

Dude not to pile on but The Silt Verses is already literature in podcast form. If a TSV novel had the same thematic resonance and level of quality as the podcast, I would devour it. If it was a stand-alone book not expecting the audience to be existing podcast listeners, I would also force it on all of my friends who are avid readers.

Unfortunately that's only like 4 people. Two of them are librarians though!

Thank you very much! Honestly, part of the fun and appeal for me of working on a novel would be getting to do something that isn't really achievable to the same extent with serial storytelling like an audiodrama - finishing the thing, seeing the entire shape of it, and then being able to go back for edits.

I love the ramshackle nature of the thing we've built here - and I think there are genuine benefits and advantages to a story that changes and reacts, river-like, as it's told - but there's always stuff you'd change or could improve in hindsight, dead ends and orphaned references.

[thesiltverses]

Speaking of books what about a bestiary type think of all the known gods? Or potentially releasing Paige’s how to birth a god book? I would give you money for these things.

We actually have the former in lorebook form (about 50 pages all in all) on our Patreon already to some extent - not all of the gods we've mentioned, but the ones that I thought have some narrative meat to them! I've definitely tried to restrain myself on that front so that it doesn't become too much a case of tired man exhausts his own setting by trying to amass a worldbuilding encyclopedia: P is for Paper God. Uh, uh, the Licked Envelope, I guess. He gets you with paper cuts. Next.

Likewise, I probably wouldn't release Upon The Birthing Of Gods beyond the excerpts we see in the show, because I think it's better to keep that process a little shadowed.

[thesiltverses]

Happy David Ward day to all who celebrate

Oh, has that come around already?? Happy D-Day, please pour one out for the guy who is living inside your apartment walls, even now

[thesiltverses]

I'll be honest there Jon if ye wrote books set in the silt verses universe id tear into them like a wild animal and rip them apart with my massive teeth (buy at least one copy and read it voraciously)

Sending this to Gollancz as evidence of the vast, hungry and big-toothed following of TSV, thank you very much

[thesiltverses]

Hi! I was initially disappointed because the perspective shifted from Carpenter so quickly, and I was so fucking excited to get some more Carpenter and Hayward scenes because I ADORE them (even if it turns romantic and badass Carpenter is into sad Hayward, I will still love them!), but so incredibly quickly, I was pulled into Shrue’s story and got much more invested in her than I thought I would!! It was such a great episode! Worth the wait! I do hope we get more Carpenter soon because she’s my favorite, but the disappointment in her small role in this episode has already been replaced entirely with excitement for her next appearance instead.

Hi! Really glad you enjoyed Shrue's storyline (they are a they/them, in fact) and the episode on the whole, and thank you for listening!

We are definitely not about to turn Hayward and Carpenter's story romantic, so please don't worry (besides the fact that she's aro, just...no) but they will indeed be a serious focus next episode so hope you enjoy when it comes about.

[thesiltverses]

A series of novels taking place in the same universe definitely worked for the welcome to night vale folks. I bet you have a lot of fan overlap too so you know it would appeal. If you did audiobooks do you think you would you have the cast narrate? Also for me the appeal to a collection of transcripts would be the kind of behind the scenes directors commentary aspect you get with the descriptions in the script of what a character is thinking or the tone that might be implied or sometimes just a clarification on what actually happened that you don’t always get from the audio. That’s why I read them. But having them in a book I could put on my shelf would be nice too.

We do already have those director's commentaries (from S2 onwards) on our Patreon if you're interested! But agree that they could be combined with the scripts themselves for ease.

Audiobooks read by the cast would be wonderful, I'm sure it'd just be a question of whether any prose adaptation sold well enough (if I managed to get it written and published in the first place! Lotta maybes) and how busy our cast are however many years down the line. Our actors are rightly seeing a ton of success in all their endeavours, exactly as they deserve, so I wouldn't want to assume.