Hollywood is gambling on viral internet scary stories, or “creepypastas”, to find the next big thing in horror.
Entertainment giant Warner Bros Pictures recently won a bidding war for the rights to adapt ‘Siren Head,’ while Amazon MGM Studios and Scott Stuber’s United Artists won the bid for ‘The Mandela Catalogue’.
The rush to adopt internet horror stories and works from independent creators on platforms like YouTube follows the recent blockbuster success of “Backrooms” and “Obsession.”
From obscure monsters to analog horror
The new ‘Siren Head’ movie will feature the creation of monster illustrator Trevor Henderson. The giant, rotting figure with a head composed of two sirens became a popular meme, especially among Gen-Zs, since its original upload in 2018, spawning countless works like YouTube animations, fan stories, video games, merch and others.
‘Weapons’ and ‘Barbarian’ director Zach Cregger is set to write the screenplay for ‘Siren Head’, while Brian Duffield, whose film ‘Whalefall’ is already generating buzz ahead of its October 2026 release, is poised to direct the film.
Meanwhile, ‘The Mandela Catalogue’ is an adaptation of the YouTube series of the same name created by 22-year-old Alex Kirster.
It tells the story of the fictional Mandela County in Wisconsin, plagued by otherworldly shape-shifting entities called Alternates that psychologically torture their victims by becoming their doppelgängers.
The series is part of the “analog horror” subgenre; works often presented via found footage or broadcasts emulating low-resolution footage aesthetics from television, tapes and analog recordings.
Kirster is set to direct the big screen adaptation of ‘The Mandela Catalogue’.
It will be produced by Steven Spielberg and Holly Bari for Amblin Entertainment, Aaron B. Koontz for Paper Street Pictures and Stuber and Nick Nesbitt for United Artists.
An untapped gold mine for blockbusters
The commercial success of independent films ‘Backrooms’ and ‘Obsession’ showed Hollywood that the internet is an untapped gold mine for horror blockbusters.
‘Backrooms’ is the theatrical adaptation of a YouTube series by 21-year-old director Kane Parsons, also known as Kane Pixels.
The film is based on a creepypasta posted on the imageboard website 4chan, stemming from a photograph of a large room with off-putting yellow wallpaper.
Users expanded the myth on the image, turning it into an extradimensional space of empty rooms with interconnected levels and hostile creatures roaming inside.
On its opening weekend, “Backrooms” grossed a total of $118 million globally, with Parson, then aged 20, becoming the youngest director to achieve a No.1 box office film globally.
As of writing, the film has grossed a total of $331 million worldwide.
Meanwhile, ‘Obsession’ is written, directed, and edited by YouTube sketch comedian Curry Barker, known for his other works like ‘Milk and Serial’ and ‘The Chair’.
It follows a music store employee named Bear (Michael Johnston), who used the supernatural “One Wish Willow” toy to make his friend Nikki (Inde Navarrette) fall in love with him, leading to a series of horrifying events.
The film grossed $17.2 million on its opening weekend and earned a total of $376 million worldwide as of writing.
While it is not based on a creepypasta, ‘Obsession’ helped further shine the spotlight on works by YouTube directors.
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Modern-day folklores
Creepypastas have been circulating on the internet since the creation of online forums.
Oftentimes, a user uploads a scary story that becomes reposted on many platforms, slowly becoming a modern-day folklore comparable to scary stories shared around campfires.
Experts say that creepypastas thrive because of the internet’s unfamiliarity, particularly in the early 2000s.
It also explores people’s fear of the digital landscape, with stories often featuring technology like haunted images, websites, video games, music files and others.
One widely known example of a creepypasta is Slender Man, an unnaturally tall, faceless figure with pale skin, tentacles on his back and wearing a black suit.
It was first posted by user Eric Knudsen on the internet forum Something Awful in 2009 for a Photoshop contest.
Since its posting, the Slender Man mythos has appeared in art, literature, video games and memes.
Slender Man is also associated with an infamous accident in 2014, when two girls in Waukesha, Wisconsin, stabbed their friend 19 times in an attempt to murder and sacrifice her to the creature.
Since then, creepypastas have evolved from copy-pasted scary stories to any horror content created and posted on the internet, with the genre thriving mostly because of internet users sharing stories and adding to the mythos of existing ones.
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Gabrielle Wilkinson 
Adam Peaker