Last week, as I stood in a theater’s lobby, one poster caught my eye. Unlike the ones next to it, this poster didn’t credit any actors or directors, nor did it show any kind of comprehensible image. It appeared to be a section of bland, yellowish wallpaper.

There was seemingly no reason to get excited, but I did when I saw the film’s title: Backrooms.

The story of the Backrooms has less than humble beginnings. It started as an image on the online forum 4chan, accompanied by a caption about an alternate dimension of maddening interior design (the Backrooms). 

The image gained a large fanbase, which expanded on the premise by adding different levels and inhabitants. The Backrooms became a “creepypasta,” or Internet horror story, with multidimensional levels like a monstrous lasagna.

High schooler Kane Parsons began posting YouTube videos of “Backrooms found footage” in 2022. His videos involved long stretches of classic yellow hallway and occasional jumpscares, which quickly lured in audiences.

Somehow, Parsons directing an A24-produced Backrooms feature film surprised me. The trailer released last month shows well-known actors exploring the yellow expanse, with occasional found-footage fuzziness that Parsons’ fans are used to. 

Backrooms’ advertising is promising. The posters use empty space like unpleasant Rothkos. This mysterious marketing has also worked for other horror films like Longlegs and Weapons. Ideally, the Backrooms actors’ red (or beige) carpet looks will resemble boring wallpaper.

Another YouTuber, Mark “Markiplier” Fishbach, directed and starred in the horror movie Iron Lung earlier this year. His popularity probably contributed to the film’s success. Parsons’ fanbase and partnership with A24 is already drawing attention to his film.

Still, the buzz around Backrooms raises questions: famous YouTubers aside, won’t a movie about wandering through infinite hallways be tedious? What is the appeal?

Put simply, the Backrooms are both nostalgic and alien. Their dissonant similarity to real places is a perfect example of the uncanny valley. You’ve likely encountered a hallway or hotel corridor that seems to go on forever, but without monsters. 

In Kane Parsons’ videos, the Backrooms are also analog horror. Parsons replicates VHS tapes to increase the uncanniness. 2026 has been called the “Year of Analog” in that many young people now gravitate towards physical media. This could help Backrooms at the box office.

Still, Backrooms’ jaundiced desolation may bore audiences. The trailer includes scenes in the “real” world, probably to break up the monotony or develop characters. More fleshed out characters could lead to a psychological horror approach, like in the recent film Exit 8.

 Like the Backrooms, Exit 8 was praised for its liminal aesthetic and sense of paranoia. Unlike Kane Parsons, Exit 8’s director has feature film experience. It’s hard to know whether Backrooms will get the same kind of acclaim.

Collaborative fiction, like the Backrooms or the speculative SCP Foundation Wiki, thrives on the Internet. Other creative works could only exist using online resources. This often makes adaptations difficult. 

If Goncharov, an inside joke on the social media platform Tumblr, became an actual mafia movie, that would defeat its entire purpose. Everyone has a different version of the “film.” Similarly, the Backrooms community is divided between purists and expansionists. Parsons’ vision is coherent, but the wider mythology probably couldn’t be a film.

Recent collaborative fiction features strange Internet entities. AI-generated “Italian brainrot” also uses the uncanny valley, but it’s slop compared to the Backrooms. Is there a future of Internet fiction when AI gets involved? Are we doomed to wander an online labyrinth in search of art?

Regardless of Backrooms’ quality, it’s a leap into the mainstream for an obscure online story. Previous attempts at adapting creepypastas into films failed miserably, but I’m still hopeful. Unlike current brainrot, Parsons’ carefully constructed videos show his passion.

One of my favorite fan-made Backrooms levels appears to be the real world, but is only the Backrooms in disguise. It’s fiction, but watching enough Kane Parsons videos makes it oddly plausible. 

Maybe we do live in the Backrooms, in a sense. The hallway behind the movie theater, an endless parking garage, or an empty school building all resemble that eerie space–and vice versa. The new film will expand the Backrooms’ reach into the real world, but maybe they never needed that.