Alex Spider

Alex Vasquez, professionally known as Alex Spider, is a Japanese-American GMOD Animator, known for the versatility of his content, as well as for being the earliest known member of the Splatsource Community.

Spider originally debuted as a TF2 YouTuber in 2010. After several small scale uploads, he began posting Splatoon content in 2015, giving him an unexpected rise in views and subscribers. Since then, Spider has been a notable and influential creator within the community, with many dubbing him as "The Father of Splatsource," alongside other creators such as Poool.

In December 2017, Spider became the first member of the Splatsource community to hit 100,000 subscribers, making him the most subscribed Splanimator. He became the first to cross 1 million subscribers in March of 2022.

Career

2010 - 2015: Team Fortress 2

Alex Spider began his career as a Team Fortress 2 animator under the name ASpider25, though he would often go by Spider 25 in his videos. He posted his first video, "Painis Cupcake meets Mutated Burger," on March 13, 2010. On April 4, 2010, his OC was introduced, alongside an array of other TF2 and OC characters, including Hatsune Miku and mutated versions of TF2 characters. During this time, a small number of short series were started by Spider, such as "The Day of Spider 25," and "Green Spider Headquarters."

On December 11, 2012, Spider held his first collab event, known as Spider's Tel-Adventure Collab, as a way to celebrate his upcoming birthday. The collab involved his character being teleported to several places, depending on the viewer's creation. The collab released 1 week later on December 18, 2012.

On January 25, 2014, Spider held auditions for an animated project known as The Day of Spider: Adventures in Japan. The project, which would be the final episode of his Day of Spider series, would release in two parts on November 11, 2014.

Around October of 2014, it was noted that Spider's upload schedule became more infrequent. In update video released around this time Spider explained that this was due to college work taking up most of his time, though he would continue to work on ongoing projects, including a collaboration with Omegamario89 (who would later become Omega The Squid Man.) On February 26, 2015, another video was posted of a similar nature. At this time, Spider had reached 8,000 subscribers.

2015-2017: Transition to Splatoon Content and Breakthrough Success

The circumstances of Spider's transition to Splatoon content are not known. On July 4, 2015, following 5 months of inactivity, Alex Spider posted his first Splatoon video, Daily Squid Sisters, which according to his description, was to test the new Splatoon models in GMOD. The video today is known as the earliest Splatsource video posted, has 2 million views as of April 2021. Following the release of this video, Alex became a full time Splatoon animator. In August 2015, Alex hit 15,000 subscribers, marking a quicker subscriber increase from his previous content. Several days later, he uploaded the video "Splat Territory," which would mark the debut of his character Inkura.

On September 18, 2015, Spider uploaded "Ridiculous Loop of Turf War," featuring the official debut of the characters Blue and Orange, as well as being the first Splatoon video by Spider to feature voice acting, with Blue and Orange being voiced by GaoGaiKingtheGreatVA and ManicWednesdayVA respectively. Spider's next OC, Dark Squid, would be introduced in the following video, "Squid Hangout."

On March 31, 2016, Spider uploaded an update video to address reaching 50,000 as well as to address a content drought, where he mentioned he would try experimenting with more content and franchises to prevent motivational burnout. 2 months later he would upload "Daily Shantae." Further uploads would also feature collaborators such as Violet Inkling and Heavy The Squid.

At the end of 2017, Spider became the first Splatsource animator to reach 100,000 subscribers on his channel.

2018 - 2021: Expanse in Content

On June 1, 2018, Spider would post what would be the first of many collab entries for SMG4's subscriber milestone videos, which featured his character Meggy. From here on, Meggy would make infrequent appearances through the channel. Including episodes such as "Squid Royale", "Squid Store Sneakin'," and "Splatoon vs Ninjala."

On September 24, 2018, Alex Spider began his first and only Splatoon series, titled Inkura's Inkventure, starring the titular as a member of the Squidbeak Splatoon, alongside himself. The series has 4 uploaded episodes as of April 2022.

During this period of time, Spider began reintroducing TF2 content back into his channel, as well as featuring characters from other franchises. A larger scale series known as Infinity Smash Wars began, meant to act as an unofficial Super Smash Bros themed series featuring multiple characters from the game, as well as his own OCs, battling Master Hand. He also began posting more Nintendo content in general, and on September 5, 2020, began introducing Ninjala characters into his core cast.

2021 - present: Transition to Other Franchises and Hitting 1 Million Subscribers

On July 18, 2021, Spider released a Friday Night Funkin' video which as of April 2022, has achieved 24 million views, becoming tied with Alex's current biggest upload, Inkura's Situation. Following this upload, Alex began transitioning to Friday Night Funkin' animations as a whole, also uploading reels. As a result of the game's popularity, Alex began receiving a massive surge of subscribers.

In 2022, he once again made a full content transition, this time to Five Nights at Freddy's, coming off the hype of Security Breach, which released in December 2021. Like his first FNF video, Alex's first FNAF video, titled "Gregory on the Loose," experienced a high surge in viewers. Despite Spider's lack of content featuring characters from Splatoon or other franchises he worked with in the past, Spider has never announced his retirement from any communities.

On March 28, 2022, Alex Spider hit 1 million subscribers on YouTube, making him the first Splatoon-based creator to do so.

On May 10, 2022, Alex Spider began uploading episodes of a series called The Backrooms, But Everyone Else is in it!, featuring every character he has ever used on his channel trying to escape the backrooms, including his Splatoon OC Inkura. On September 12, Spider revealed on Twitter he was preparing a brand new Splatoon animation. On September 23, Alex Spider premiered Squid of the Dead to correlate with the Halloween season. This marked his first new series since creating Inkura's Inkventure in 2018. The series concluded after 4 parts on November 4, 2022.

Personal life

List of animations

Series

• Inkura's Inkventure (2018 - present)
• Infinity Smash Wars (2019 - present)
• The Backrooms But Everyone Else is in it! (2022 - present)
• Squid of the Night (2022)
• Squid of the Dead - Dark Squid Story (2023)

Standalone animations

• Daily Squid Sisters
• The Inklings Fun Time
• Squidplaza Tour
• Splat Territory
• Squid-nanigans
• Ridiculous Loop of Turf War
• Squid Hangout
• Squad Ranked Battle
• Spider's Splatastic Match
• Inkura's Situation
• Dark Squid Returns
• 100,000 sub Milestone
• Hanging Out with Marie
• Squid Royale
• Squid-nanigans 2
• Mutated Burga Unleashed
• Squid Store Sneakin'
• Agents' Mission
• Moments at Turf Wars
• Squid Fishing
• Splatoon vs Ninjala
• Super Inkura Sunshine
• Squid of the Dead
• Octo Patrol
• Splatlands
• Squid Game
• Dark Squid's Revenge

Other videos

• Mariopalooza Collabs
• 15,000 sub milestone
• Inkling vs Slenderman
• Daily Shantae
• SMG4 collab 2018
• Scout is inkling
• SMG4 collab 2019
• Flayn Plays Minecraft
• Inkura has the Jiggy Piece
• Fall Guys Among Us; Aliens in Space
• Inkura and Niyaka in Cyberpunk 2077
• Crazy GMOD Randomness
• Inkura VS GreenYellow
• ANGRYWOOMY
• When Splatoon becomes Hat Fortress 2
• OH NO YOU DON'T
• Marie Shows off Her Cuteness and Callie Gets Jealous
• Sonic Daily Routine Animation
• Chrisomatic Movie: Attack of the Toybots

Trivia

• As stated previously, Spider has been known to dabble in content centered around multiple franchises (and even mashes them up together for certain videos). As of April 2022, much of his content currently centers around FNAF (and will continue to do so possibly as long as Security Breach or FNAF as a whole stays relevant, which will be estimated to last years).