"MOONLIGHT WHITE / WHITE LIKE EYES / NOT LIGHT BUT BLOOD / I DROWN IN HIM" ― Weather Service hijacking

The Moon, in some cases know as The Child^[1] is an astronomical body that orbits the Earth and is Earth's only natural satellite. It plays a major role in the Local 58 series as a hazardous/deadly entity, particularly in Show For Children and (chronologically) later in Skywatching and Weather Service.

Through unexplained means, the Moon becomes capable of harming, possessing or killing those who view it with the naked eye. It can be inferred that this phenomenon hasn't occurred before the events of Weather Service, considering the Moon and its nature are only being reported on at that point, among evidence from other episodes.

Show For Children

The Moon is alluded to in an early morning children's show broadcast of a Cadavre cartoon called A Grave Mistake. It is represented as its own character, having an expressive face to fit in with the animation's art style. The Moon has a subtle presence throughout most of the cartoon. As the protagonist, Cadavre, treads through the graveyard in search of his deceased wife, the Moon stays up in the sky looking down upon him with a wide grin. After Cadavre continues on after witnessing two open graves containing a hideous corpse and a strange bird-like creature, the Moon takes on a different appearance, simply staring at Cadavre with a wide-eyed, haunting expression. Combined with the darker coloring and absence of music, its presence gradually becomes more ominous. After finding a third grave in a subterranean cavern, Cadavre lies down in it and faces up dejectedly at the cavern sealing. As he closes his eyes, the Moon inexplicably hovers through the cavern and peers into the grave. The Moon now appears more realistically than cartoonish, but it still maintains visible eyeballs. Once it passes over Cadavre, his body turns into a lifeless pile of bones.

Skywatching

A broadcast of the show Skywatching is hijacked by amateur camcorder footage trying to pass itself off as the real show. The cameraman displays a few known constellations before zooming in on the Moon, adjusting the lens to make it more clear, and titling it "HIS THRONE". At first, the Moon appears normal in the sky until a sudden transition then shows an extreme zoomed-in look at the moon's surface, which includes not just the expected craters and mountains, but large swaths of seemingly organic, webbed mass like rotting wood or cancerous flesh. The moon also appears to have an atmosphere of some kind, as there are visible wind currents and dust storms on the moon's surface, as well as what appears to be a massive spiracle-like chasm drawing large amounts of lunar regolith into a deep, dark hole.

The final shot of the moon's surface appears to be an enormous city within a valley, consisting of a large cluster of cylindrical towers and several smaller towers connected by "walls". The most prominent feature, however, is a gigantic triangular offering pit carved into the ground nearby, connected to the structure via a massive "canal", making the structure resemble a vast arrow.

After fading to black and zooming back out, the night sky is overcast with cloud cover, and the moon and stars are no longer visible. The lens changes once again, and the moon re-appears, now so close/massive it takes up most of the sky. The southern half of the moon appears to have been broken or rotten away, and an air raid siren is going off as birds scatter. This rotten/broken hemisphere known as "The Child" appears much different from the previous zoomed-in views of the moon's surface, suggesting the moon has either transformed or that this is a different phenomena altogether.

As the camera adjusts for a clearer view of the moon, a previously unseen man slowly walks into view, raises their hands to the moon in reverence, and all sound is muted as title text appears saying "REJOICE" before cutting to static. The original Local 58 broadcasts then returns, playing the credits of the actual Skywatching show. Under the acknowledgements, a photograph of Earth taken from the Moon is shown.

Weather Service

After an EAS weather warning interrupts the Local 58 station broadcast, we get a glimpse of the Moon itself, albeit barely in frame. The alert states that a warning for a "meteorological event" has been issued by the County Weather Service and that it is effective until tomorrow morning. It then advises against viewing this event—the Moon—with the naked eye.

The weather warning is then upgraded to a civil danger alert, advising to stay indoors and not to look at the night sky. Before more information can be given, the EAS is hijacked by an anonymous third party who claims that the event is "safe for all to view" and that the warning has been lifted. Another message reads, "GO OUTSIDE NOW." Why the EAS hijacker would encourage viewers to endanger themselves, and whether or not they are related to the state of the Moon, is currently unknown.

The picture quality then plummets, along with massively distorted EAS tones and strange tones,a sign of heavy interference from the hijacker. The actual County Weather Service then appears to relay lines of text, insisting viewers to stay indoors, not to look up, and to face away from windows, minimizing the risk of viewing moonlight. The hijacker then resumes control of the station, and proceeds to broadcast a series of cryptic messages describing how the "Moon came in" and "found [them] thru the mirror." This is implying that not all who view the Moon are doomed, and that the hijacker may have survived, possibly with an altered mental state. The episode ends with the hijacker offering the viewer to "look together" with them, and the broadcast cuts to the live camera feed of the Moon from earlier. Crowds of people are audibly screaming in the distance as the Moon descends further into the shot, to the point where over half of it is visible.

It is unknown if viewing the Moon through digital means, such as through a camera feed, would produce the same hazardous effects. It's worth noting that the warnings say not to view it with the naked eye, however.

Other Episodes

Contingency

The only segment of Contingency that includes the Moon is the shot of an astronaut saluting on the Moon, which was taken during the Apollo 15 missions in 1971. Otherwise, the Moon isn't seen or directly mentioned during the emergency broadcast message.

A card is briefly shown during the end of the broadcast that reads, "THE 51ST STATE IS NOT A PLACE." It has been the source of much speculation, with some theorizing that the "51st State" is in reference to (and is possibly a warning about) the Moon. Considering the Moon was sometimes called the 51st State after the first U.S. Moon landings, this is surely a possibility.

LOCATOR 628-M-42R

As the cameraman traverses a field where the cryptid Chiron is lurking, the Moon can briefly be seen in the night sky before Chiron is encountered. After snapping a flash photo of Chiron and fleeing, the Local 58 logo flashes on screen briefly, followed by a dim close-up shot of the Moon.

Trivia

• The Moon, as seen in the later half of Skywatching, bears a striking resemblance to the moon from Majora's Mask and the Brethren Moons from Dead Space 3.
• It's possible that the Moon itself isn't causing the anomalous effects, but rather an entity on its surface. The Moon has never actually been shown to its full extent—it was still partially obscured at the end of Weather Service. This is further supported by Cadavre's death in Show For Children, which only happened once the Moon's eye moved into frame. Its "eye" may represent this entity.
  • This is evidenced by the fact that the Moon is referred to as "HIS THRONE" in Skywatching, implying that it is not the Moon that is the danger, but instead an entity living on or within it.
  • The rotten/broken southern hemisphere of the Moon during this sequence almost looks like a skeletal figure, curled in a fetal position and mostly buried, suggesting this may either be a fossil, or that the "moon" here is an "egg" of some sort.