🟩 Backrooms (2026) Review - The Zoomer Blockbuster

What is this? A movie from the current year on my retro review blog!?

Yes indeed. I'm finally getting to the Backrooms by Mr. Kane Parsons. This review was supposed to be published two months ago according to my log, but life happens. You know how it is.

Admittedly, while I'm a creepypasta fan boi, I stopped watching Kane Parson's original Backrooms web series around the third episode. Not because it was bad. In fact, it was incredible. Especially compared to other productions in the online horror space at the time *cough* Mandela Catalogue *cough*. I was amazed at the product this young indie director created. However, something about it never connected with me.

Maybe it's because I'm a diehard contrarian that lost interest once it became super popular. Or maybe it's because MatPat stopped doing Backrooms analysis videos on GTLive. Dunno.

Crazily enough, that was years ago. I was eager to see how our young creepypasta idol had developed his craft and how he'd done in pushing his vision onto the silver screen. And. Well. The man did a pretty good job.

But no more preamble. Let's get to it, and, hopefully, I'll be able to get through the whole analysis without using the word "liminal."

Quick Summary

The year is 1990. We follow Clark, a wannabe architect, struggling furniture salesman, and part-time alcoholic. After a drunken rant, his wife steals his house and kicks him out. Distraught, Clark begins seeing local California shrink Dr. Mary Kline. As it turns out, Dr. Kline's got issues of her own. Mommy issues, to be precise.

A series of strange and unfortunate events sees Clark and Mary stumble into the extradimensional backrooms: an endless series of desolate yellow rooms and hallways apparently caked over with Charlotte Perkins Gilman's wallpaper.

It's a place that piques the explorers' curiosities as they wander the corridors and breathe in that soggy carpet stink. Soon, however, they hear noises and see shapes out of the corner of their eyes. Perhaps the backrooms are not as empty as they appear to be.

Story & Character Analysis

We begin as all good monster movies begin: a frenzied victim runs away from an unseen threat and a seagull. You love to see it.

Afterwards, the movie plops us right into an uncomfortable therapy session between Clark and Dr. Mary. Reynolds Wrap must have paid product placement for these two very obvious foils with very obvious character wounds.

Clark is suffering a mid-life crisis. The bills are racking up. He is a failure at his passion. He is a failure in his business and family aspirations. Everything weighs on him, and it shows.

Thus, when Clark discovers the backrooms, it's an escape. Caution quickly gives way to curiosity. This dimension is a place all to himself. One to adventure in. One free of all his past worries. He indulges in his architectural passions by drawing detailed maps and diagrams. He is happy. Boyish.

And I'm sure Clark was ecstatic when the movie didn't pull the "portal I came through is solid now for no reason!" trick. God knows I was glad to see that.

Chiwetel Ejiofor as Clark is *chefs kiss*. He delivers an amazing performance that is both realistic and passionate in the right places. Every movement in the film communicates Clark's frustration with life. It's expertly done. Previously, the only thing I'd seen of Mr. Ejiofor was Scar in The Lion King (2019). And. Well. As an OG Lion King stan, I fucking hate that film. 

I will never forgive Disney for gutting Be Prepared.

In no small part due to Ejiofor's performance, I empathize with Clark a lot. His story reminded me of when I used to watch Judge Judy. Every so often you would get these stories of trashy women forcing men out of the house even though the man is the one paying the mortgage and the bills. Boils my blood, dude.

One facet of Clark's character that we never really see is his alcoholism. It was in the background, of course. We are told that the dude has a drinking problem, and that it led to his wife throwing him out. But we never see Clark struggling with this. We never see him acting out when he's drunk. Nothing that suggests he was a danger to himself or others. Which, honestly, makes me feel like the movie is treating him even more unfairly. I know. I know. Show don't tell is basic bitch advice, but still. I think it applies here.

Mirroring Clark, we have Mary. As opposed to Clark's more natural way of communicating his backstory, Mary's history is explicit.

The audience receives regular flashbacks to the early parts of Mary's life. These highlight the relationship Mary had with her mom and the toll that her mother's mental illness had on her early childhood development and how she still clings to that isolation as a grown woman.

I was not a big fan of Mary's backstory. I don't believe the flashback sequences were woven well into the overall story, or, at least, not well enough to justify pausing the film while we got childhood exposition. They ended up feeling kinda boring and unsatisfying both in the moment and after the credits had rolled.

Mary's plethora of unresolved trauma does make me wonder why she thought counseling people on their problems was a good career choice. Damaged goods trying to fix damaged goods. Maybe it's the money? Homegirl does have her own cassette box set on sale. She might be making bank. In which case, maybe the good doctor can give Clark some career advice.

Renate Reinsve performed well as Mary. The calm and collected face. Beneath an awkward loner. It was not as impactful as Ejiofor's performance, but it stood as a worthy foil.

The film plays with a lot of crazy imagery in this new dimension. However, it does so without being pretentious or repetitive. That is high praise. Backrooms could very easily could have fallen into the spooky set piece trap: having Clark, Mary, and friends bumble about from room to room looking at surrealist architecture and not advancing the story in any meaningful way. Shit like that gets boring real fast, but here Backrooms admirably soldiers on. The film never drags or overindulges on its premise.

That's not to say the movie doesn't try to be clever. It does, but the results are mixed. For instance, I like the baddies being compared to furniture. That was a really awesome connection. Less so was Mary repeating Clark's revelation about copying dogs. That was forced. 

The window metaphor that's strung throughout the film didn't land for me either. Yet, it does lead into one of the most terrifying scenes in the film. It's that one were someone is begging for help behind a one-way wall.

Genuinely terrifying scene. I love when horror movies do this. Have a distressed victim banging on an escape and calling for help. Someone hears them, but doesn't know how to save them. It's a crisis that puts both characters into a state of helplessness. Two scares for the price of one, you might say. Reminded me of that viral clip from Don't Turn Out the Lights.

And one final note here. Barely anyone in this damn movie is American, but the American accents are superb. The only hiccup is Dr. Mary. Hers is a tad iffy at times, but it's subtle enough that I didn't mind.

Technical & Structural Analysis

You all know I love me some found footage, and this movie scratched that itch so well. Peeking around corners. The videographer huffin and puffin and being all scared n' shit. So good.

It's a prominent holdover from the wider backrooms universe, and I am so here for it. It drops a chaotic, mysterious, slightly creepy vibe right into the viewer's lap where otherwise there may be a layer of filtering that dampens the scares.

I appreciate how lots of the outdoor shots feel open yet also somewhat constricting. Yes you have a wide parking lot in front of you. Yes there is the open sky. But sudden cuts between strange angles keep the audience off-balance. 

Down low.

Immediately to up high.

And throw in more horrible CGI seagulls for good measure.

The real world feels like an imitation or extension of the backrooms, in a way. Constantly changing. Shifting. Never allowing the viewer to settle into a steady rhythm. A breach from that dimension into ours rather than vice versa.

The discordant ambience in the music also did wonders for delivering the mood. There isn't a ton of formal soundtracks, per se. It keeps with its desolate roots by making the audience sit with a lot of silence. When the sound department does show up, things range from blaring sirens to droning tones to heartbeats. It's an economical approach to sound design that maximizes emotional impact and minimizes my annoyance. That's more than I can say for some films I've recently posted about...

The commitment to oldie cars and fashions from the 90s was fun. I liked that. It made me happy. But it scares me that a 20-year-old made a film set in the decade before they were born. I'm not prepared for Gen Alpha to make films about my adolescent years. I'll never be able to look at Brittany Spears and Evanescence the same way once those begin rolling out like Autobots.

Final Thoughts

Apologies if this was a relatively brief movie review compared to my last one. Everything about Backrooms is solid. Good music. Acting. Vibes. It's hard to pinpoint an area to criticize when the product is as well-rounded as this. On the other hand, there isn't any WOW element that seared this film into my head for years to come.

With all that said, Backrooms is a great film and an even greater debut. It will be remembered as the definitive blockbuster that brought creepypasta to the mainstream plebeians and heralded the Internet Horror Revolution. Like Prometheus coming down from the Heavens and blessing the Greeks with fire. May it carry that torch well after snatching it from Slenderman's rotting corpse.

🟩 Rating: 8/10