One summer afternoon you find yourself cleaning
out the dusty old attic of the new home you've moved into. It's a bit out in the countryside and out
of the way, but it came cheap- the owners seemed very willing to sell it. So willing in fact that they seem to have
left at least half of their possessions up here in the attic, and as you're sorting through
things to trash, things to sell, and things to keep, you come across a strange book. It has a simple red cover with just a title,
no author: Mister Babadook. As you open the book up you're surprised to
discover that it looks like a children's pop-up book, except there's something oddly disturbing
about it. For one it features a creepy figure dressed
in a long black coat and top hat with what looks like long claws for hands, and for the
other it comes with the following piece of disturbing poetry: If it's in a word, or it's
in a look, you can't get rid of the Babadook. You read the simple poem aloud, and suddenly
you think you hear a shuffling of feet in the darkness of the attic. Looking up you're startled to see the figure
from the book- it's real! As it rears up to its full height and displays
its clawed hands you suddenly understand why the owners decided to sell this house so cheap. Hello and welcome to another episode of You
Versus- today we're putting you up against the legendary demon of grief, the Babadook. No one is sure about the origins of the Babadook,
save to say that it's been around at least since the late Victorian era given its predisposition
for the long coats and high top hats so popular at the time. The Babadook could of course be much older
than that, given that it seems to be mystically linked to a pop-up book that bears its full
name. The first pop-up books were made in the late
13thcentury, and it is possible that the Babadook has been around as long as they have. However as a Demon, the Babadook is likely
a far more ancient being, haunting humanity since its inception. Its connection to the pop-up book in question
may just be its chosen avenue of haunting its victims, or perhaps part of some mystical
banishment the demon suffered at some point in its past. Whatever its origins, you're going to have
to know what you're up against if you're in the Babadook's crosshairs. As usual this will be a fight to the death,
or at least a fight to banish the Babadook since it's likely that as a demon, it cannot
die. So, what are you potentially facing? First and foremost the Babadook is in fact
a demon, which places it in a category aside from spirits, monsters, ghouls, or other things
that go bump in the night. As a demon this means that the Babadook is
more intelligent than a spirit or ghoul, and thus far more crafty and manipulative. It understands humanity in a way that other
supernatural creatures can't, as it draws both from its immortal lifespan of experiences
and higher intelligence, and thus knows what makes us tick, and how to exploit all of our
fears. Fear is important, because as a demon the
Babadook is much like a spirit, strengthened by fear, and the more scared its victims become
the more powerful that the Babadook becomes. The Babadook is however specifically a demon
of grief, and prefers to target people who have been made vulnerable by deep sadness,
depression, and loss in their lives. Its hauntings are geared to further deepen
those feelings of hopelessness, pain, and loss, until finally pushing its victims into
either letting it possess them or doing great acts of violence. The Babadook has an arsenal of powers at its
disposals that will prove difficult to counter. First and foremost it has the ability to teleport
at will, though it does show a preference to teleport to darkened, shadowy areas as
opposed to brightly lit spaces. This may mean that the Babadook is tied to
the shadows of the world, and can move through them freely, but has difficulty using its
powers to escape in bright light. This isn't its only trick though, as the Babadook
also displays a formidable talent for telekinesis, able to move objects as large as a couch with
its mind. It can also shapeshift into people the victim
is familiar with, or into mundane objects, though is given away upon close inspection,
so it has an imperfect talent for mimicry. Lastly, it is a keen manipulator, using its
ability to inflict terror on its victims to gradually break down their mental defenses
until they do things that the Babadook wants- which is typically to commit violence. So, you're up against the dreaded Babadook-
how are you going to defeat this demon of grief? First you're going to want to defeat its ability
to randomly teleport at will through the shadows. This will be key in order to keep the Babadook
from getting the drop on you, and so that you can make sure to land a killing blow when
the time comes. In order to counter the Babadook's ability
to randomly teleport away from you you're going to want to get your hands on a piece
of hardware like the Buysight LED searchlight, which can put out as much as 6000 lumens up
to a range of 800 meters. That's half as bright as the sun reflecting
off white snow, and prolonged exposure directly to the eyes can lead to permanent vision problems. With a miniature sun in your hands, you'll
be able to blast away even the deepest darkest shadows, and with the ability to flood, you'll
scatter any shadows directly in front of you leaving no room for the Babadook to hide. Of course that still leaves all the dark areas
behind you that it could try to flee to, so you're going to need something that can light
up really large areas like the rising of a second sun- and nothing can light up large
swathes of ground quite like an Arrimax. The tool of choice by professional filmmakers
who need to work outdoors in the middle of the night, the Arrimax is a whopping 18,000
watt light that can be hoisted up into the air on a crane or secured to a sturdy tree. With this monster light blasting your surroundings,
the Babadook will have absolutely nowhere to hide. So you've taken care of its ability to teleport,
leaving the Babadook with nowhere to hide. You'll have to watch out for its ability to
use telekinesis to move objects around, which it will no doubt try to use as a weapon against
you, but as long as you're keeping a sharp eye on your environment and keeping your head
on a swivel, you should be fine. What you should be most concerned about is
its ability to manipulate your fears- like many evil creatures that go bump in the night,
the Babadook is strengthened by fear, so you're going to have to keep a firm grip on what
scares you. Unlike other demons or similar creatures that
feed on fear though, the Babadook specifically feeds off grief as well, and fear that stems
from that grief- so your next weapon is going to be to arm yourself with some peace of mind. If you're holding on to any particular pain
or loss, let it go. Try to be grateful for the things that you
already have in your life, and try to take joy in the accomplishments you achieve- such
as the imminent Babadook kill you're about to score because you're a zen master, and
this shifty demon can't find any weak spots in your psyche to exploit. You've stripped the Babadook of its ability
to teleport away, you've remembered the five Ds of Dodgeball and Dodged, ducked, dipped,
dove, and... dodged.... everything it's tried to hurl at you with telekinesis, and when
it tried to manipulate your grief and fear, you shut the Babadook down with a Dali Lama-like
level of self-mastery. Now it's time to go for the kill and end this
death match once and for all, sending this demon of grief back to the fiery hell that
spawned it. As you probably know by now from watching
our other episodes, we here at The Infographics Show are fans of problem solving through superior
firepower, and in this case we have one and only one tool to recommend, a surefire way
to blast this hellspawn out of this world and back into its own... the Super Soaker
Scatterblast Blaster. That's right, a squirt gun- only not any regular
type of squirt gun, a 22 ounce beast that can deliver shot-gun like blasts of water
up to 34 feet (10 meters) away! Except you're not going to be blasting the
Babadook with any regular type of water, you're going to be using holy water blessed by a
priest. As a demon, the Babadook is bound to the rules
of our prime material plane if it chooses to manifest physically. That means that if the Babadook took solid
form in order to directly manipulate our world, then its body would be subject to the same
rules as our own bodies or anything else physical- in which case we'd be recommending firepower
on a level much higher than just a squirt gun. However, because the Babadook doesn't manifest
physically, it can't be harmed physically- that's why it needs to haunt victims in order
to eventually wear them down and commit the violence it can't commit itself. So to excommunicate this demon out of our
world and back to its own- at least temporarily- you're going to have to hit it with the only
thing all demons can't stand, corporal or non-corporal: holy water. Water blessed by true faith is the divine
is anathema to evil, and has the power to not just hurt evil, but to dispel it all together. With a tank full of blessed water, your super
soaker scatterblaster is a demon-blasting weapon that Michael the Archangel would be
envious of. That is of course if the water you're using
has been blessed by a priest with true faith- something very, very rare in our world today. Otherwise, well, you're really only going
to be making a very angry demon soaking wet, moments before it rips your soul from your
body and inhabits you forever. How would you defeat the Babadook? Also, if you like this series, check out our
other videos where we pit you against something horrible! Go on, click the thumbnail. I’ll wait!
This isn’t funny. It’s just one big ad.