11calls | Sail app.

PLAYER
Name: Kim
Age:43
Contact: aproclivity@plurk and aproclivity#8377
Permission Post: Permisions
Reserve: If applicable.

CHARACTER
Name: Alex Reagan
True Name: Alexandra Reagan
Canon:The Black Tapes Podcast (303)
Age:33
History: Short and general version
Alex Reagan is a Canadian born journalist who went to the University of Vancouver before heading to Seattle to work at Pacific Northwest Stories (which is kinda like NPR). After working as a segment producer for several years with her friend Nic Silver, Alex broached the idea of doing a podcast on people doing interesting jobs. The first job they were going to focus on was one of paranormal investigator, but while interviewing different paranormal investigators one name kept popping up: Dr. Richard Strand of the Strand Institute, a paranormal investigator who is a rational skeptic(™) and who seeks to disprove all instances of anything paranormal.

After badgering Strand into an interview, Alex stumbles across some black VHS cassette cases, and Strand informs her that those are the cases he can’t scientifically disprove. Yet. From then on, Alex’s podcast takes the form of focusing on the Strand Institute and their “enigmatic founder Dr. Richard Strand” and the videos that he shows her. At first, the videos appear to have no connection, but as we come more entrenched in the shows mythos, the narrative stretches to demons, shadow figures hunting children, ancient religious cults, murders with upside down faces, Dr. Strand’s missing and presumed dead wife Coralee, physics, sacred geometry, murderous music and whether or not Alex’s own show has somehow brought about the end of the word in a demonic apocalypse. Oops. Longer and more in depth history. (in lieu of a decent wiki entry.).

Powers/Abilities: Ordinary human.

Inventory: The clothing that she's wearing: jeans, underwear, blouse, blazer, scarf, red trench coat, ballet flats and her glasses.
Her bag containing: her phone, wallet, multiple notebooks, multiple pens, a phone charger and back up battery pack, a charger for her recorder.

Job History:Journalist/podcast host: Alex has been a host of an extremely popular (in universe) podcast The Black Tapes Podcast for almost three years at this point. Her job skills include research, interviews, investigative journalism, audio production, editing, and writing.

Podcast producer: During hiatuses from her own show, Alex also produced her bosses' podcast Tanis for the first two seasons. In her capacity for doing that, she does fact checking, setting up interviews, research, works with Nic and the executives producers of the studio (think NPR), audio and digital editing, curation of additional information for the show and basically trying to keep the rails from falling off.

Segment producer/story contributor/guest host After interning for Pacific Northwest Stories in Seattle Washington ("one of the most renowned radio programs in the world") while in graduate school, she was offered a permanent position working for the company. For three years, Alex had been someone who worked for their flagship named stories as a segment producer and a journalist as well as occasional guest host for their show. In her capacity for that role, she put her considerable awarded journalistic skills gathering stories on a theme and doing the hard work of investigating even if it wasn't something that she'd placed her own name on.

Suppressions: Recklessness: One of the things that is definitely a major part of Alex’s personality is how reckless Alex is. While amplified by her lack of sleep, Alex is so reckless that she seems to lack any sense of self preservation. Running into danger head on is something that Alex does often even (perhaps even especially) when people are telling her not too. When someone tells Alex not to do something it seems to be the fastest way to make her do something. Even when Nic is present with her, Alex breaks into Maddie Franks’ apartment and admits to it on the podcast despite Nic reiterating it with her about what a dumb idea it is. Recording Strand, going into a parking garage to meet an unknown person, going to Turkey to meet with an admitted mass murderer who’s escaped from a mental hospital are all things that Alex does with abandon despite what it costs. Even continuing on with the story itself is a reckless act.

Single mindedness.: When she is on the trail of a story, especially one Alex is personally involved in (like the Black Tapes) everything other than that is tangential. Things that should be important to her like journalism ethics, Strand’s personal life and even the law go right out of the window especially if she thinks someone is hiding something from her. However, in many ways, Alex’s determination also makes her like a puppy with a bone. Determination and perseverance make her jump into things feet first and recorder out, even when cooler heads prevail. She is determined to understand what is going on around her, and to seek not only her truths but the truths of people around her.

Determination: One of the things at the very core of Alex’s personality is her determination. It’s shown over and over again in the series, right from the theme that has Strand’s “returning one of 11 phone calls from someone named Alex Reagan.” That’s one of the first things that you need to know about her and how that leads into her persistence. Even when Strand quits the show for three months, Alex still reaches out to him very frequently before heading to Chicago to find where he’s holed up in his office. Moving through the show, Alex just throws herself against brick wall and brick wall until they break. In many ways Alex’s unstoppable force of personality is one of the reasons that she feels like she needs to go through with things that other people may or may not be willing to do so. (But most of the time, they probably wouldn't.)

Curiosity: A large part of Alex’s seeking truth comes from an intense curiosity. Her podcast is first meant to be about interesting jobs done by interesting people because these are things that she is curious about. The fact that Alex’s favorite adjective seems to be “enigmatic” definitely points to things that she wants to understand. Indeed, the reason that Alex lies to get back into Strand’s equipment cabinet to see those black tape cases are because she is curious about them, and of course what they mean to him.

Empathy: Part of the reason that people tend to connect with Alex other than through her persistence is through her empathy. The closest thing that Alex has to a superpower is her empathy. This empathy makes people want to trust her (honestly even when they shouldn't) so she can get people who otherwise wouldn't open up about people or experiences that they've had. Her charm goes hand and hand with this and it's one of the ways that she gets people like law enforcement to open up files and cases and give her access to things that she really shouldn't have access to. Even when something is horrifying, Alex can still have empathy for it. When watching an interview between Simon Reese and a court appointed psychologist, during which Simon snaps and starts banging his head on a table, Alex’s empathy lies with Simon rather than the psychologist who is being paid to be there.

Greatest Fear: When it comes to Alex's greatest fear, it's really three fears that are entirely tied up together in a mishmash of emotion. The first thing that she's afraid of are demons. She's always been afraid of them, putting that fear to watching The Exorcist too young. But it's a fear that's entirely seeded deeply to the irony of what she'd ended up mired in. The second greatest fear that Alex has is that by getting involved in The Tapes and with Richard Strand and all of the things his past is tied up in is that she and her work have caused the end of the world. The third greatest fear is that not only has she caused the end of the world, but that she's not going to be able to undo all of the pieces that she'd unwittingly set into motion, dooming everything that she's ever loved or cared about to be replaced by demons.

Greatest Desire:Alex's greatest desire is to be able to stop the things that she'd be able to stop what's happening around her, even if she may or may not be the person who started it. She wants to save the world, stop Thomas Warren and get to a place where she and Richard Strand can figure out whatever the hell that they're doing with one another, something that would be helpful if they weren't in the middle of all of this.

Greatest Regret: When it comes to regrets (she's had a few) one might think that her biggest one is the show and the apocalypse that she may or may not have started, but it's not. Alex believes that it was probably going to happen one way or another considering the plans that she'd managed to blunder her way into the middle of. Instead, the things that she regrets are her own actions within the confines of the story, particularly those that take place during the second season when she was at her messiest and ended up losing all vestments of journalism ethics and managed to kill that stellar reputation of hers stone dead. Recording Strand and Amalia in the sound booth when they were talking without her, getting further involved in Thomas Warren's mechaniations, keeping things from both Strand and Nic (her producer) those are what she regrets. More than that, Alex hates the way that she'd needed to hit Strand's carefully constructed walls with all of the subtlety of a wrecking ball and thus exposing all of the broken pieces of him. She wishes an unhealthy amount that she could have managed to do the story without causing him all of that pain.

Sample: Alex at the TDM