Well, this is my first Little Nightmares fanart in my entire time in the community (which is a shame, of course; I've been following the fandom for five years). I'd love to do designs for all the important characters, but for now I'll just show my all-time favorite, The Thin Man, aka the Broadcaster of the Pale City. No matter how long the debate about who he is continues, for me, he and Mono will never be the same character. I'm aware of the time loop hypothesis and the plethora of fanarts it's spawned in 2021. And yet, I believe such a charismatic figure deserves to be a separate character. I understand that the time loop is the most common viewpoint in the fandom (and certainly the one favored by the game's creators), but as senior narrative designer Dave Mervik said, "It's all of that." In other words, everyone sees something different in the game, and there's no single right answer; everyone is right (which is why I absolutely adore the games and LN community). For example, I find it easier to see the long-suffering boy with a bag over his head as a successor to the man in the hat. The game's creators gave fans much more freedom of interpretation with Mono and Thin Man than, say, with Six and the Lady (it was stated that the Governess of the Maw we see in the first game and Six are not related in any way). And it's certainly sad that this rockstar of the franchise was severely curtailed, leaving a huge amount of fascinating content in the art book and game files. Aside from the cliched exploitation of Thin Man’s image in Altered Echoes, there's not as much reference to him in Little Nightmares 3 or subsequent DLC (except for the tower, and even that's more of an Easter egg for the second game as a whole).
Also, I'd like to add some trivia.
1. I still have to catch up with all the new details about the universe, but I like to think that Nowhere was once an ordinary world in which everything got mixed up (throughout the game, we see references to different eras; the children also arrive there from different times) and "twisted" as a result of some catastrophe. All these grotesque monsters were once ordinary people who lost their human form and became the embodiment of their worst qualities. So, the Thin Man (I was very inspired by stuff from the art book) was a TV anchor.
2. The Lady is his ex-wife, and The Pretender is their daughter. After the divorce, he started smoking. Yes, despite all the controversy around "thinlady" and The Pretender's rather unclear position in the Little Nightmares universe, I really like this interpretation (the works of @lmaoumagadjieva on Tumblr convinced me of this).
3. The Thin Man we see in the game is the first Broadcaster of the Pale City. He was appointed to this position by the Flesh Walls (a malevolent, super-intelligent eldritch entity). Initially, the anchor, of course, wanted nothing to do with all this abnormal shit change, but The Eyes gave the future Broadcaster a choice: either help guide The Transmission and brainwash the city's inhabitants (They listened to you before, they will listen to you again!), or become a mindless freak like the rest. In essence, he simply became a slave to slaves, an “auxiliary” of this creature. He also gained many remarkable abilities, eventually losing his physical form and turning into the fading shadow, a "living" signal. In fact, he works like a living prism, consolidating the signal, giving it the direction and effectively controlling it. He or she (this position is not strictly gender specific!) has extensive, yet incomplete, control over the signal. The Flesh Walls could (and can) maintain the signal without the Broadcaster, but it would be more diffuse and ineffective. Thin Man can, of course, leave his tower (throughout LN II, Mono and Six encounter his images on the walls; a drawing of a stick figure in the hat can be found in The Pretender's mansion), but only for a limited time (how limited depends on the circumstances). For example, in LN II, after Six is kidnapped, Mono escapes the Viewers, who continue to pursue him despite the TVs around (the monsters are usually willing to drop everything and watch their favorite shows). This happens if The Broadcaster leaves the tower for a long time; the Transmission dissipates (fortunately, Thin Man can always quickly return through any nearby TV and fix everything).
4. The position of Broadcaster condemns its bearer to… celibacy. A servant of the Eyes must be loyal only to their master and love all their audience (the Viewers and other inhabitants of the Pale City) equally, showing no preference to anyone. By the time he assumed the position, the future Thin Man was already divorced, so The Flesh Walls had no issues with him. This restriction doesn't particularly bother the old, disillusioned Broadcaster. For his successor, Mono, it's quite unfortunate, as he was in love with Six, and later with the Broadcaster's daughter, The Pretender.
5. Thanks to his ghost-like nature, Thin Man cannot die from physical damage (although he can feel pain). Also, the Broadcaster has no biological needs. He can't freeze or overheat, get sick or poisoned. He doesn't need to eat, drink, or sleep (by nature, he simply can't, even though sometimes he'd like to!). He can be wounded or even disintegrated, as Mono did at the end of LN II, but not killed. The only way The Broadcaster can "die" is to simply "fade away" (become increasingly depleted by the signal until he disappears completely). Nevertheless, the Eyes can reduce the signal's intensity (here, without the help of the anchor, of course) to maintain the Transmission and prevent the Broadcaster from depleting too quickly, sustaining his existence for a very long time, if not forever. Also, the Thin Man cannot leave his post whenever he wishes; the Broadcaster must leave behind a successor. If the keeper of the Signal Tower refuses to take on an apprentice, then he condemns himself to eternal service to The Eyes, and a rather miserable existence (the reasons for this miserable existence are listed above). This is why the Thin Man kidnapped children and did everything to ensure that Mono (the boy with the same abilities as himself; the chosen one of the Eyes) ended up in the Tower.
6. After the Broadcaster has trained a successor (a lengthy process) and passed on their position, they are relieved of their post and lose all their abilities. If the keeper of the Signal Tower is relatively young and hasn't been a Broadcaster for long (say, 10 years or more), they will regain their physical form and be able to lead an ordinary life. If the Broadcaster is old and has been transmitting the signal for a long time, becoming sufficiently exhausted, they will simply disappear after the transfer, as I mentioned above. The same Broadcaster cannot hold their post twice, so if the young ruler of the Pale City leaves a successor and resigns, they will not be able to return to their position later.
7. At the very end of LN II, we see Mono's gradual transformation into the Thin Man. This scene is also actively discussed in the community, but again, everyone interprets it as they wish. Although everything is shown quite quickly in the game, we cannot judge how long the entire process took. Perhaps we are simply looking at a time lapse. We don't know what happened between these stages: Mono could simply be sitting in a chair, or he could be doing something; here again, we're given freedom of interpretation. So, I like to think that the boy became the Broadcaster's apprentice, learning from him how to operate The Transmission (a dynamic very similar to that in the @virtualgalaxysuit’s comic). All of this just doesn't appear on screen. I'm sure they would have been a great duo.
8. The Thin Man deliberately orchestrated Six's betrayal to appeal to his apprentice's trauma (You did everything for this girl, and she betrayed you. Be a good apprentice, and I won't betray you. Be a good Broadcaster, and the Eyes won't betray you.) and manipulate him. That's a topic for another post, so I won't go into detail here.
9. In my story, the Thin Man isn't a kind old gentleman like the inimitable @redrumrose’s, but he still hasn't killed anyone. He kidnapped children in the Pale City before Six and Mono, but none of them proved suitable candidates for the role of successor. They were all released and sent out of the city after only a relatively short time in the tower (The Broadcaster has enough grotesque monsters both in the tower and among his audience; he certainly doesn't need more!). However, for no kids the stay in the Tower and such close exposure to the Transmission was not without consequences...
10. He's about 2.2 meters tall. At the time of LN ll, I'd guess he was about 45-50+ years old.
11. It doesn't play any role in the plot and isn't mentioned in my story, but his real name is Walter Nachtigall. Everyone prefers to call him just the Broadcaster.
Fun fact: The Thin Man is indirectly the reason why my blog is called thecatinthefedorahat. His image served as a huge inspiration for my OC, Samuel "Sam" O'Hara (a journalist from New York). In the furry interpretation, he appears as an anthropomorphic, tall, skinny, black Oriental cat with blue eyes, wearing a black Stetson fedora. The Thin Man and my OC are quite similar in appearance, but that's where the similarities end. They are two completely different characters.
