As promised, the first two episodes of Alan Wake's live-action prequel, titled "Bright Falls," became available to Xbox Live Gold subscribers earlier this morning. However, though Microsoft said we shouldn't expect to see the videos anywhere else for a couple of days, the New York Times managed to get its hands on the series' first two installments. They're on the newspaper's website right now, and they are weird as hell.

If you're short on time, we suggest you at least get to the "Happy Birthday" scene in the first episode. Watching it is like staring into the inky, black eye of madness.