New Delhi, June 20 -- I was introduced to the concept of "creepypasta", horror stories or threads circulated on the Internet, via Kane Parsons' YouTube series Backrooms (2022). The series followed the fictional Async corporation as it investigated an extra-dimensional, theoretically infinite space made up of inter-connected, mostly vacant indoor complexes. As the original 4chan thread (upon which the 22-year-old Parsons built his world) promised, the aesthetics of Backrooms had "nothing but the stink of old moist carpet, the madness of mono-yellow, the endless background noise of fluorescent lights at maximum hum-buzz".

Parsons' vision has assumed its final form with the release of Backrooms, a gripping 110-minute psychological horror fe...