Her Viral TikTok Account Feels Like A Scary Fever Dream [Video]
TikTok might regularly be a mess, what with its encouragement of circular transactions (which is fraud!) or precarious milk crate parkour challenges. Just as often, however, there’s remarkable stuff on there. In the past, I’ve spotlighted phobia videos, spooky pieces of media that intend to trigger feelings of, say, automatonophobia or thalassophobia. I know they’re bad for me, but I watch them anyway. Recently, I’ve been watching a ton of reels from TikTok creator Savannah Moss whose hallucinatory, dream-like skits have been wedging their way into my mind. Check out an example below:
One of her most recent bits was a piece of paid promotion for Blumhouse’s Imaginary. Sure, it’s an advertisement, but I wish all ads could be as daring and unique as this.
It would be easy to reduce Moss’ video as simply weird. And, sure, while they’re undoubtedly tethered to a kind of dream logic, an anything-goes approach to staging, they’re regularly more accomplished than that. Moss, culling from a pool of liminal horror, often frames her skits as somewhere between dreamscape and uncanny reality. Most comments amount to something along the lines of “My dreams be like,” though anyone who has seen hypnagogic (dream) horror before knows it’s easier said than done. Stray too close to reality, the illusion is lost. Push too far past, and it becomes cartoonish and silly, not unnerving.
I don’t know how to explain it, but the Pillsbury Dough Boy was a certified jump scare in that last video. Something about him just doesn’t seem right to me.
Moss is one of several creators on TikTok making remarkable use of short-form video to try something new. If you’re on the platform and not following her, I’d encourage you to do so. And, of course, let me know on Twitter @Chadiscollins which videos of hers are your favorite.
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