Hello believers, non-believers, and everyone in between. You're listening to Stories with Sapphire. I am Sapphire, I wanted to give you a brief update.

So a couple months ago, I submitted a short film to a competition called The Horror Filmmaking Initiative from Decentralized Pictures.

The community would review and vote for the finalists on the platform, and then a panel of judges, including Judge

Shepard, Eduardo Sanchez, and Roman Coppola, who would select which two filmmakers would receive

$25,000 to bring their short film to life. The project I submitted is called Breeder. It's about a

young, independent woman named Mary, who has just broken up with her

boyfriend because he wanted kids one day, and she did not. Soon after, Mary is haunted in her home

by a Tikbalang, a creature from Filipino folklore who wants her to carry its demonic offspring.

We learned that the Tikbalang was sent by Mary's own mother

because she was that desperate for grandchildren. I submitted my script along with an incredible

creature designed by my friend Sig Neutron, and after the peer review period ended, Breeder

placed 14th out of 82 projects, which was honestly really cool on its own.

But I figured I was now out of the running, so I put the competition in the back of my mind and

kind of forgot about it. And then about a month later, I received an email from the decentralized

pictures podcast talent cast asking me to come on and talk about breeder decentralized

pictures talent cast i am your host matt and i am back in studio with the horror filmmaking

initiative creator jed shepherd good to see you again jed good to see you matt um it's been a week

i know it's been a week.

I know.

I've missed you.

I missed you, too.

No, this is awesome.

...