A24 dropped a cryptic teaser for its upcoming film Backrooms in February, showing only endless yellowed corridors and a narrator’s voice. The clip offers no characters or plot, only a camera that slides downward through layers of uncanny interiors, hinting at a vast, self‑building space that feels both familiar and alien.

The idea traces back to a 4chan /x/ post that asked for spaces that looked wrong. An anonymous user shared a photo of a dim, yellow office and wrote that slipping through reality—“noclipping”—could drop a person into a maze of fluorescent‑lit rooms, a concept that blends gaming logic with a simulation‑style dread.

In 2022, 17‑year‑old Kane Parsons—who later directed the A24 film—expanded the myth with a web series that used 3D modeling software to create level after level of office‑like labyrinths. The nine‑minute pilot, shot in a first‑person view, drew over 190 million views and introduced a wire‑and‑organic creature stalking the protagonist.

Scholars now label this trend the Institutional Gothic, a modern take on classic horror that replaces haunted castles with fluorescent‑lit cubicles and corporate ghosts. The genre appears in games like The Stanley Parable and shows on AppleTV’s Severance, echoing the post‑pandemic shift toward empty, echoing workplaces that feel as oppressive as any gothic ruin.