Maybe root rot, throw soil out too. You could take a leaf or two in a plastic bag to a good independent nursery and pay for a diagnosis. Or take more pictures, close up and send to your local extension service.

Yeah, I can't tell the plant of interest from the background. Put something light behind it.

Dennis

"I've seen some pretty sad looking plants, but never this bad. i've failed in the most depressing way possible."

FIFY

XD

I would try new soil, pot, and cut down plant stems.
You willnot get pods this year but plant might be saved.

Stoney

I've only seen pods like that from when they go from ripe to over ripe and shrivel and eventually get abandoned by the plant as a normal life cycle if it was in the wild to drop and seed new plants.

If it went from green to that mess, I am at a loss for what it could be, if it were soil then all your plants should exibit the same, it could be a disease possibly passed onto it by a sucking insect like aphids and the likes.

Sorry for your loss, if you find out the cause please share.

here's a more isolated picture. it's in a pot, so I can move it around. I never save soil from plants with issues. heck, the whole pot is going in the trash, I have plenty of small plastic pots.

frankly I think I just need to get new seeds. of 10 attempts (2 at a time 5 different times) this is the only one from the batch I could get to last past seedling stage (7 never sprouted, 2 died young). I don't see any point in trying to save the plant for next year, it was probably just weak stock. I can just try again next year.

and miguelovic, I suppose I'll accept that edit. though I have plenty of plants that have gotten the exact same treatment, all doing much better than this. but hey, I'll accept blame. it's my plant, it damn sure wasn't anyone else's fault.

lots of weird stuff going on this year in my garden. I guess that's what keeps things interesting. what gets me is it's all the mild-medium peppers going bad. the supers are all doing just fine.

If it is some kind of mildew, as I think, the there might be other infected plants around.

sey

That looks awful! I guess pitching it is the right thing to do. definitely something wrong systemically.