In Praise of Shadows

In Praise of Shadows (abbreviated to IPOS), also known as Zane, is a YouTuber who makes horror history, reviews, and retrospectives, looking at the best stuff to the worst stuff, and giving some context in the landscape of horror history, from all media, books, movies, tv shows, cartoons, and video games.  
==Notable Works==
===Anatomy of a Franchise===
Anatomy of a Franchise is a series where he goes into great detail of a horror franchise, where it started, where it went, and the impact it had on horror.
===Why You Should Watch===
Why You Should Watch is a simple series where he goes in depth with the reasons why he feels you should watch a specific horror movie.
===Other Video Essays===
Most commonly on his channel, he just does other random essays on horror-related topics.
== Controversy ==
=== Bad Conservative Horror Movies ===
On the 25th of May, 2024, In Praise of Shadows uploaded a video essay titled "Bad Conservative Horror Movies", where he discussed various films. The video saw backlash due to various aspects of the video, most notably, the accusations against YouTuber Isaiah Mark Nichols, better known as Wendigoon. Viewers and friends of Nichols criticized the video for its accusations of Nichols being alt-right, with viewers criticizing the evidence In Praise of Shadows utilized being ultimately trivial to the accusations. An infamous example of this, was a photo with Nichols, and YouTuber Cody Garrett (aka Donut Operator), that was used by In Praise of Shadows as evidence against Nichols' politically-stance. He would also question Nichols' usage of the wendigo, despite Nichols' own love of the myth and his own Cherokee background. He would also make passive aggressive comments about Nichols' family background, using it as a hypocrisy for Nichols' retrospective of Blood Meridian. Viewers also found In Praise of Shadows' jab at Nichols' background of being from the Appalachian region degrading, as he says all Appalachians are automatically "racist" and even makes a snide remark that Nichols should "not be allowed in public".
Additionally, viewers also criticized this segment of the video for being irrelevant to the actual topic of the video, with further criticisms against In Praise of Shadows' poor wording in several segments of the video, the most notable coming from a description of the cannibals in the film, The Hills Have Eyes. He would also label Nichols as being part of the "harassment" he reviewed from the review simply because Nichols followed him on the day the drama occurred. The video also contained accusations and criticisms against many of Nichol's associates, such as Donut Operator, Internet Historian, Shoe0nhead, Oompaville, SomeOrdinaryGamers, Garand Thumb, Turkey Tom, Brandon Herrera, Nick Crowley and Brandon Buckingham. Despite the accusations levelled against Nichols, he left a comment on the video requesting viewers not to harass In Praise of Shadows and apologized if he had done something to upset him.
Following the backlash, In Praise of Shadows would make a post on Twitter announcing that the section regarding Nichols would be removed from the video (an archive of it can be found here), apologizing for some of the allegations and the lack of research, as well as admitting that many of his claims were a result of his own emotions for criticisms in the past. However, in the same post, he would double-down on some of his opinions and accusations. This only resulted in more criticism, prompting In Praise of Shadows to delete the video entirely, making a post on his Patreon, Twitter/X and community tab. In his response, he acknowledged that the video was poorly research, stating that the video did not represent him as a creator and apologized to his audience for the mistakes he had made, announcing that he would be taking a lengthy break from content creation . The community note itself would be deleted soon after, and In Praise of Shadows would eventually private his Twitter/X to followers only. Many of the YouTubers featured in the video, such as Oompaville, SomeOrdinaryGamers and Brandon Buckingham would later make responses to the video, criticizing and debunking the accusations.
Following the controversy, Wendigoon once again requested viewers not to harass In Praise of Shadows, reiterating that harassment did not help him or In Praise of Shadows.
The video has since been deleted, but has been archived by different channels.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F8Rg8rN0Y8 
Despite his hiatus, In Praise of Shadows' Discord https://x.com/Jelx_/status/1796085006315511907and Patreon postshttps://x.com/ChristheNarc/status/1795502242881044584 would be dropped, revealing how he still blamed Nichols for the backlash and even insisting his friends went after him on his accord.
==References==
Category:American YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2018
Category:Film YouTubers
Category:Review YouTubers
Category:Gaming YouTubers