Unreliable Narrator/Web Original

Examples of Unreliable Narrators in Web Original works include:

Oktober, a collection of journal entries from each of the main characters. Now, obviously, journal entries aren't going to be entirely accurate, so sometimes minor discrepancies appear. Other times though...
The SCP Foundation website is made up largely of documents. Given the nature of the Foundation, much of it is deliberate misinformation. Also, there tends to be a lot of stuff with black marker over it and a large amount of [DATA EXPUNGED].
- There was one instance however in which all of the blacked out sections and [DATA EXPUNGED] were removed, allowing the article to be read in its entirety. Let's just say that there is a very, very good reason for those edits.
- And there there are the SCP objects that can alter either the perception of the viewer or flat out reality, so even if the narrator tries to be reliable of faithful they simply miss on whatever is really happening.
During The Third Night of The Tale of the Exile, Gaven Morren (who tells the story from a first person POV) is dosed with a potent hallucinogen. What follows is a trip into Daydream Surprise, dream logic, and Schrödinger's Butterfly, helped along by a character actively lying to him about events to prevent herself from disappearing.
Rather common in The Slender Man Mythos. Examples on the wiki include J and Damien in no small part thanks to his multiple personalities. A possible example (via Alternative Character Interpretation) would be Zeke Strahm, according to the final entry in the blog.
- A notable example in that the recent video of Tribe Twelve 'The Envelope', there is a piece of paper torn in half that says "unrel/ narra/". Noah may not be telling us everything...
- Paranoia Fuel especially comes into play with Dare 2 Die where Ulryc wasn't even narrating for most of the time.
The Jobe stories of the Whateley Universe. Jobe Wilkins narrates his own stories, explaining how as a handsome, dynamic, brilliant, but misunderstood bio-deviser, he has to put up with all kinds of grief from everyone else. Even within his own stories he seems to be an Unreliable Narrator. Everyone else in all other Whateley stories sees Jobe as an egocentric, inconsiderate, unattractive Heroic Comedic Sociopath who might be a little short on the 'heroic' part. Still, Jobe doesn't seem to lie about events, just put his own personal spin on interpreting them.
- Anything Phase says about the Goodkinds. Canon (particularly "Ayla and the Late Trevor James Goodkind") has proven that there's a lot Ayla doesn't know about his family, but he keeps insisting that the Goodkinds are almost totally morally blameless, ignoring canon events because he doesn't want to apply them to his family.
Surprisingly enough, used in Survival of the Fittest. In the profile for v4 killer Clio Gabriella, it explains several parts of her personality, yet her actions in the game contradict this. Reason? Clio spent nearly all of her teenage life lying to her parents, her therapist, and nearly everyone she knew so that she could put on a demeanor of a normal, well-adjusted teenage girl, when secretly she was a basket case very close to breaking point.
The "Lost Soul" stories from the Global Guardians PBEM Universe are told from the singularly self-serving point of view of an immortal Erzebet Bathory, who is trying to win redemption for herself.
(The Customer is) Not Always Right: I mean, you really gotta wonder...
Strongbad in Homestar Runner is often a pathalogical liar. Sometimes narrating events that just happened as a complete fabrication. Probably most blatantly with how he narrates to us that he successfully popped Pom Pom with a pin. Seen here.
This metafiction story discusses it, in which the Lemony Narrator is snarked at as an Unreliable Narrator because they refuse to describe an entire days' worth of travel, resulting in a literal Plot Hole.

Back to Unreliable Narrator