>>55010022The Pacific Northwest is second only to Appalachia for its cryptid culture, which is literally just Shinto for methheads. Take notes, OP, American cryptid legends and Japanese Shinto mythology are the same: it's a celebration of the natural beauty of nature, the liminal spaces that bridge human civilization with the wild, and the idea that there's something more to discover just over the next hill or behind the next tree that forms the core of the human condition. These concepts should immediately jump out as familiar to you if you've ever taken the time to analyze a Pokemon game beyond its most basic concepts. Mothman is out there and Celebi is real.
The region that makes up Oregon & Washington states are incredibly liminal in nature, with hundreds of miles of winding roads, sweeping mountains, and ancient pine forests dotted by nameless towns, isolated motels just off the beaten path, and also some of the largest and most (in)famous cities in American culture. It's an area that is both rural and urban enough where anything can happen and you can never say with certainty just what you'll find.
An area like the coastline of Lake Michigan makes for a good region because it's one of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet and we know what's out there. The Pacific Northwest makes for a good region because we have no earthly way of knowing what is hiding in those hills unless we take the plunge into who-knows-where.
