Delusion: Nocturnes & Nightmares 2023 in Los Angeles

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Delusion, Nocturns and Nightmares has been
extended through November nineteenth. We'll hear all

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about it. That's coming up on
today's show from the Haunted Attraction Network.

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I'm Philip and this is our sixty
one day Hauntedthon, where we're counting down

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to Halloween by celebrating haunted houses daily
via videos, podcasts, and VIP in

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person experiences. This podcast is just
one part of this year's Hauntedon and the

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best way to follow everything is by
subscribing to our newsletter or by checking our

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website at Haunted Attractionnetwork dot com.
And remember, the best way you can

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support us as Halloween season is by
sharing our Hauntathon with someone you think we'll

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enjoy it. Today, we're sitting
down with John Braver, the creator of

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Delusion, to learn more about this
year's show, and Manny from our team

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has the interview without further ado.
Here's Mammy and John. Hi. I'm

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John Brave, the creator of Delusion. Delusion Noctrines and Nightmares is a culmination

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of all the previous stories brought into
this one through line, this one narrative

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where the author of the Delusion series
is missing and all of her stories have

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come to life and you've got to
track her down and uncover their dark agenda.

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It's an interactive play where you play
your part in a story. It's

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very narrative driven, with professional actors
and stunt people and sound design. It's

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like you're inside of a movie.
How do you think about something new every

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single year? What is that process? Like? I'm like a delusion fan

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anyway. I think about myself as
what are some new things I'd like to

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see? What's a new way to
experience the same type of venue? Because

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we've been at this venue for three
years, but it still feels very new,

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and I think people have been here
for the last two years will still

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feel lost in this world. But
in terms of coming up with new ideas,

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I just say there's plenty of them, but they don't always fit in

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a story. To me, it's
everything revolves around the story. It's very

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narrative driven and it has to make
sense, even though a lot of it

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sometimes doesn't make sense to be honestly, even as I'm writing it. But

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the ideas come from especially the last
three years, have come from this esther

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Phillips character, from this mansion.
So this is the one hundred and forty

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year old mansion. Esther and Louis
Phillips lived here, and I wanted to

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take their just their names and build
a whole new story around them. So

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it starts off with the logistics of
how you're going to move a group through

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a story, and then I have
a book of stories that I'd like to

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pull from, and sometimes they fit
in certain years and sometimes they don't.

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I have a bunch of ideas,
but they just they have to work,

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they have to fit, and the
ideas come from wherever. They come from,

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dreams, they come from video games. It was one of my favorite

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games. It's called Little Nightmares,
which is incredible, and that was a

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big inspiration for some of the things, like the tall l in this story.

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So I'll like get ideas from that
and then just things will just come

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to me at random moments. But
it has to be a cohesive story.

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So I think the idea of especially
for this year, the idea of an

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author creating all the delusion stories was
super cool to me. It was very

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meta, and it was the idea
that, like I have, it's painful

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to write these things, and so
for her, the idea was that it's

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painful. It's not only painful for
her to write these stories, but it's

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such a curse that it just drives
her completely mad. And then I try

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to think of what's a way to
give more an emotional tug to the story.

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So the idea of her writing these
entire series just to get her daughter

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back to life was a really gripping, gripping tale. So is a dark

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story, which is the world that
I live in anyway, But it's super

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fun. It's just but there are
stories come from the ideas, come from

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anywhere. But there is a foundational
through line for all the Delusion stories,

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and it culminated with this one.
And in that same vein talking about all

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these different stories, when you're making
the decisions on what to pick and choose

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from the various years that went into
this, when sane culmination, what is

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the mindset? Is it more what
it's the most practical? What do you

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think is just the most badass?
Or what got the most fan reaction?

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Yeah, those three the fan reactions. I don't I'm I'd make sure that,

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Like when it comes to something like
stunts, we don't do anything for

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shock value. It's more does it
fit, is it practical, does it

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serve the story properly? So I'll
have a list of things from all the

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past and gags from all the past, and storylines and characters, and then

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I just pull them into this thread. It's a tapestry of story that is

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just I can pull them into a
single thread that carries through and what fits.

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But it has to also be engaging
and exciting. So for example,

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I don't I cannot spoil it,
but we did something this year we've never

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done before with a group and it
turned out to be a pretty badass experience.

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To your point, it's what's a
badass moment? Action sequences? Right?

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Every year we do action sequences,
and this year opens up with a

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big action sequence. So can you
say anything along the lines of the VIP

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experience. As a VIP guest,
you get to actually take this step further

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with play your parts and you get
to play a zombie and an actual sequence

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of the show where you get to
scare other guests. And so I know

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we talked about it briefly, but
can you talk about one what's next for

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you? And then two what's next
for Delusion? I think Delusion will always

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be with me. They are slightly
different paths, but delusion is always a

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part of me. So for me
personally, I need to start taking all

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these characters, these over fifty characters
and nine stories, and start pulling them

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into the film the world because I
have a daughter's fourteen now for me,

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is about legacy stuff, and these
shows are great and she can come and

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see them, but they don't once
they're done, and so I need to

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start making the films and making the
TV series based on these She and all

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the rest of the Braver family can
go back in and see their dad's work.

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So that's a big part of it
for me. But delusion has a

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special place in a lot of people's
hearts, and I don't want to end

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that. The idea of bringing back
some of the old shows would be a

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wonderful option as well too. I
don't want it to end, but I

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feel like we've if it did.
This is a nice sort of wrap up

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to that and allows me to focus
on the film properties. Yeah, you

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mentioned legacy, and I thought that's
interesting. How much would you say that

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you act with the mentality that you
would love to leave a lasting legacy,

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Like how important is that in every
decision you've been making, especially with the

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show, it's becoming more and more
important. Mortality sets in for me,

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like after my mom died in twenty
fifteen, everything after that was about mortality.

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It was like everything's finite and it
can end at any moment. And

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I'm proud of what we've done with
Delusion and the fact that we actually have

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really exceptional fans of the show,
people who care very much about it.

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I think that in itself is a
wonderful legacy. But it still needs to

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be recorded on film. I still
feel we need to go back. You

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can go back and look at this
trailer for this stuff's actually go back and

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see a story, a complete story, whether it be again, maybe it's

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film, maybe it's a novel.
There's a lot of options to go,

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but something physical and sustainable and revisitable. Is that a word? Yeah,

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Sure, we're making worries, John, you made delusion. It don't matter.

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We're delusional here, right exactly,
that's right, that's right. So

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you've been doing this for so long
and you do want to pivot if you

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were to take a step back from
Delusion, like a much bigger step than

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your thinking to say, the films
do super well and you don't even have

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time to think about this. What
would you like to see happen to delusion?

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I think if you can, you
can make this a financially viable thing.

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Even though it's okay, it's still
with the low numbers, it's still

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hard to sustain it. I would
like to see it. I would like

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to see it. I like to
see people have the opportunity to live in

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these stories every year. I would
like that to continue. And maybe it

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continues with again maybe it's maybe it's
me, but probably not. Maybe it's

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my assistant director Victor, who's the
GM of Haunted a Ride now like he's

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and he does all the sound design
for this, but he's the one that

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knows he shows best. So if
there was somebody to pass us on to

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would be him. It's time to
pass that on. And either it's the

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old shows or it's something new within
under the delusion banner, then I would

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be totally down for that kind of
stuff. Just as long as I think

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it's really important that these experiences remain
and that people can actually connect and put

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their phones away and have a tangible
experience. It's super important. I think

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these are more these live experiences,
especially post pandemic is like more important than

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ever. Yeah, so it's a
bit of a mission statement to keep it

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going. But both in the live
and the filmed realm is we can do

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both. Yeah, I think that's
just gonna happen. Yeah, going back

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to the fact that you have someone
currently running hay Ride, You've been working

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with Thirteenth Floor for a while,
but you've during your tenure, you've had

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I still can't believe Patrick Neil Patrick
Harris is a part of this at one

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point, right, But how has
overall that journey treated you? What has

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been I guess those check mark moments
where you felt like, Okay, this

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is the next step. Now,
this is the next step. Now this

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is the next step. Yeah,
that's a good question. I think it's

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the I've always I've wanted to make
next steps into, as I said,

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the more film properties. But it's
delusion is such a beast of a show

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that it occupies so much time that
it takes a lot of my focus away.

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So I see the next step,
but then they get wrapped into the

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world of creating the live shows that
I lose time to do the other things.

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So I think, and to be
totally honest, like that. The

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next steps have been delayed because of
the live show. Wo they need to

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That's why I need to step back. But that's why I joined thirteenth Floor.

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I'm my title is director of Immersive
Entertainment. It's not creative delusion.

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It's so the idea is to let's
we can continue this and let's do this.

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But just like I have a guy
on a friend of mine at Netflix

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who does live experiences and he oversees
it. He's not writing them. I

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need to be in that position when
I'm just like overseeing it. All right,

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Victor, you got delusion? Cool, all right, let's do a

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show in Chicago. All right,
somebody else, you go and run it.

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Let's run his Crimson Queen. Let's
find a place over there and let's

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run it over there. Meanwhile,
I'm gonna go shoot the movie of this.

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So there's multiple things need to happen. We haven't been able to do

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that because this is because I'm so
heavily involved this. Yeah, so next

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steps have been delayed. But at
the same time, it's I'm not I'm

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not regrets over it. It's just
there's a time for everything, and the

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time has come to make to just
force myself into that next now. Today's

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episode was produced and edited by me
Philip Hernandez, with post production by David

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Swape and original music composed by Chris
Thomas. We're counting down to Halloween with

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daily podcasts, videos, and events
in our sixty one day Hauntathon. Follow

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Sign up at dantum dot com slash
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Until next time, stay scary.
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