TikTok edits for Kane Parsons’ upcoming A24 horror movie “Backrooms” is going viral in a way that feels illegal, thanks to… PinkPantheress?
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’ 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.”
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.
