Kane Parsons’ Eerie ‘Backrooms’ Already Has Gen Z in a Chokehold for a Niche Reason: Pinkpantheress
It’s no surprise that Backrooms has gone viral before the film has even come out. Kane Parsons’ A24-backed horror film, which comes out on May 29, 2026, has naturally inspired a lot of Gen Zers and Gen Alphas to gab about it online. Parsons got his start as Kane Pixels on YouTube, a platform where Gen Zers are as active as millennials (25.1 % and 25.5% respectively). Naturally, Gen Zers will crosspost about their passions to other platforms. There are already hundreds of Backrooms-related TikTok videos.
But there’s a subsection of future Backrooms fans who have made a weird little meme around Parsons’ upcoming film. Across TikTok and YouTube, people are creating liminal space content, featuring a surprise cameo by the name of Victoria Beverley Walker, or one PinkPantheress. Maybe you heard her crooning, “Is this illegal? It feels illegal,” in the trending TikTok audio over silly videos of people shaking hands all last summer.
But PinkPantheress’ music was blowing up long before then. Her remix of the prickly, bratty “Boy’s a Liar” featuring Gen Z rap princess Ice Spice did numbers. Before that, Mura Masa-produced “Just for Me” and ’00s garage flip “Pain” were OG anthems for bedrotters, overthinkers, and anxious, autistic freaks.
This #eeriecore mashup signifies something crucial about the future of horror. In 2026, horror is now digital first — even chronically online. It’s quirky, zany, and a little off-putting. And the patron saints of modern-day horror are artists and creatives who fit that bill. See: Markiplier, who helmed this year’s Iron Lung; Curry Barker, who directed the upcoming Obsession and was tapped by A24 to remake Texas Chainsaw Massacre; and Kane Parsons, of course.
Why Backrooms x PinkPantheress Team Up Makes Sense
The award-winning British electronica artist blends drum and bass, UK garage, and bedroom pop into dreamy ambient tracks. Her music straddles the line between fantastical and melancholic. It’s no surprise that people are marrying #voidcore with PinkPantheress. Enter the world of fan edits, where TikTokers are literally putting their queen in the backrooms.
Slowly but surely, the meme is taking off. A rumor that PinkPantheress will make a cameo in Backrooms alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renata Reinsve has seeped into people’s consciousness. TikTokers are now uploading videos of themselves strutting through their own “backrooms” with PinkPantheress in the background…
And the meme has taken off to the point where liminal space lovers have now come up with a shorthand for the Backrooms x PinkPantheress crossover: The Pinkrooms.
Everything about this horror movie fan trend embodies the kind of playful and dark energy you’d expect from Gen Zers who grew up on the Internet.
PinkPantheress Already Sings About the Backrooms of Our Lives
PinkPantheress’ current trending songs are her “Stateside” remix with Zara Larsson and “Tonight.” These specific singles from her recent album, Fancy That!, are bright and bubbly. But her overall discography is overwhelmingly bleak and listless. The lyrics from “Just for Me” sound like the internal monologue of any killer in Scream, Halloween, or something like Black Christmas.
I found the street of the house in which you stay
And my diary’s full of your name on every page
‘Cause I read somewhere you’ll fall in love with me
I’ll try and try again, one day you’ll see
Your hair’s under my pillow, so I sleep
And I’m dreaming of you leaving roses at my feet
It’s totally not creepy at all that the refrain all over TikTok in 2021 was “I’m obsessed with you in a way I can’t believe / When you wipe your tears, do you wipe them just for me?” And likewise, PinkPantheress’ song “Pain” equally has serial killer vibes.
You told me it wasn’t over and that we’d be together soon
But was this before or after you told me to leave your room?
PinkPantheress constantly waxes poetic about My Chemical Romance and how the vampiric poster children for mid-2000s emo inspired her to be a musician. That influence may not be obvious, but looking at PinkPantheress’ lyrics, it’s clear she loves the imagery of lurking in the shadows.
I expected to see ya on your morning run again
I know I shouldn’t be watching ’cause every time I feel the painListening to PinkPantheress is like walking through a horrific mindpalace that’s also, to use Ejiofor’s phrase in the Backrooms trailer, kind of “beautiful.”
PinkPantheress Is a Horror Fan, If You’re Paying Attention
This current PinkPantheress album cycle is all about leaning into Anglomania, with Pink and fans donning scarlet, royal blue, and tartan plaid from head to toe. But PinkPantheress’ early projects featured surrealist horror imagery. The single cover for “Pain” was an Amityville Horror-style house illuminated by the moon on a dark night. Likewise, PinkPantheress’ EP “To Hell with It” features the artist standing by a white-picket fence on a pitch-black night, with lightning striking in the background.
PinkPantheress’ taste for gothic horror reached a fever pitch recently with the music video for the “Noises” remix, featuring JT. The UK garage artist and Florida rapper fight to survive a poltergeist ripping through the property. The video is fun, balancing PinkPantheress’ teenage melancholy (a haunted pink bedroom) and JT’s luxurious edge (a possessed library).
And the final clue that ties this altogether is PinkPantheress’ Coachella 2026 set of course. The leading man in her dark fantasy? Horror heartthrob Tyriq Withers, who started in the I Know What You Did Last Summer requel and the Jordan Peele-produced HIM. In this day and age, I’d expect nothing less than eagle-eyed music and movie fans celebrating the horror creators and fabulous emo girls they’ve grown to love these past few years.
Whether or not PinkPantheress makes it into the final cut of Backrooms or its soundtrack, this TikTok trend among young horror fans signals a key turning point. Technology and the internet have moved out of the periphery of horror — think Videodrome and then found footage films like The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity — to the forefront. People who make viral content online are circumventing traditional means of gaining notoriety for their talent.
By the look of all the YouTubers with major movie deals, a fierce dedication to social media content creation can pay off in a huge way, in this day and age. And who knows? Maybe our next big horror auteur is currently making PinkPantheress edits on TikTok.
Categorized:Editorials Music