"Um, Hello, They Were Muppets!"

As posted by Mulligan on Twitter, people are still out there hunting for gold, as evidenced by this "Overheard in New York" entry:

Dude #1: I'm telling you that statue has something to do with it.
Dude #2: Why am I even here? I can't believe I'm following you on a quest to find a buried treasure because bunch of puppets told you to.

--Columbus Circle

The gold is still out there (if you're reading this today (and today is October 7, 2010))

Mulligan posted on the pirates' Facekbook page, that the gold is still in the wild:

That picture of Mario in the trailer...

In Episode 3, Mario says "You remember that movie preview teaser thing they did? There's a picture of me with those guys in it. You can see it in that bunch of quick clips where it goes DUMM dumm dum dum DUM duhdum duhdum! Look frame by frame and you will see me!"

The trailer video he refers to is this one: And indeed, if you comb through the trailer video very carefully (it's hard to do on YouTube — try downloading the video first), you will find this picture of Mario and Mulligan:

Mario is looking kind of scruffy. I'll bet Fafa took the photo. The others were too busy taking the gold. Mulligan tweeted: "@diszaster Fafa be the nicest groundhogs ever. He lemme listen ta' Mario's twister sister tape while me crew was robbin' him. #welostourgold"

So the pirates did steal the money from Glove and Boots. Which we already knew...

We Lost Our Gold hoaxes

So far, there have been two notable hoaxes connected with the We Lost Our Gold treasure hunt. (Warning: Spoilers for later episodes. Watch them all first!)

First, someone was leaving bottles in Central Park (near the starting location of the hunt), containing a message (posted to the We Lost Our Gold Unforums thread) purporting to be from the Captain:

This has been denounced publicly by the Captain himself:

And also (according to this Unforums post), in this e-mail from the Captain:

WHAT THE SODDING HELL BE THIS!

Ye ain't no Sherlock Homes, ye codfish! I ain't never said, 'Good Times,
Good times' IN ME RUTTIN' LIFE!!!!!

An' I know how ta spell tha name of me mate Crothers. This bugger don't.
If I find tha wanker what be claimin' ta be me, I give ye two guesses what
I'll do. And here's a hint; it rhymes with 'shoot him in his faske'.
Because the answer is in fact, I would shoot 'em in his faske.

Wanna-be Pirates. What be tha world commin' to. Some arse gots time on
their hands.
-CAPTAIN

Then, shortly after the release of the 8th video, someone claimed that they had found the treasure, and even mocked up a fake message of congratulations from the pirates.

This was quickly debunked:

There sure are a lot of scurvy buggers out there (or one who is really busy). The other lesson from these incidents is that the pirates are highly responsive, so take advantage of their availability while it lasts.

New York Times article about We Lost Our Gold

On August 2nd, the New York Times published an article about We Lost Our Gold, one day after the release of the first video.

This article revealed that the pirate puppet videos and the treasure hunt were created and masterminded by two guys in New York City who wanted to get more attention for their puppetry.

The idea of hiding treasure is a surprisingly well-established technique to inspire a thorough digestion of a work of art; there is nothing like the prospect of monetary reward to make people pay attention to details. One of the inspirations for the project was the three-decade-old children's book, "Masquerade," by Kit Williams, which contained elaborate illustrations that mapped out the route to a jeweled gold figurine buried somewhere in the English countryside.

The historical perspective is interesting:

The trailers for the project and a news release they issued have been generally greeted with skepticism in the blogosphere. The artists said they expected the suggestion that the whole thing was a hoax, given that the only public explanation so far has come from puppets.

Some initially suspected that the treasure hunt was put on by the New York Board of Tourism or as an Alternate Reality Game promoting some Hollywood movie. Episode 3 ("The Larry King") is a hilarious satire of the media as well as the skepticism. It might be my favorite episode for pure entertainment value.



The article is currently the only behind-the-scenes peek on the treasure hunt. Maybe once the treasure has been found, the puppeteers will come forward and describe the making of this fiendishly difficult and fiendishly entertaining puzzle.