Backrooms Horror: The Creepiest Levels and Darkest Lore
In 2019, an anonymous photo of a yellow hallway turned into one of the biggest creepypastas of a generation. Millions of people have since built out the Backrooms. Hundreds of levels, from an infinite black ocean hiding a planet-sized creature to a children's birthday party run by entities that wear your skin. With a new A24 film bringing the Backrooms to the big screen, we're going no-clipping into the most terrifying levels, the strange mythology of almond water and Greasy Marshmallows, and the chilling stories of people who tried to escape.
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SOURCES
General
https://blog.archive.org/2024/06/01/the-backrooms-of-the-internet-archive/
https://www.wired.com/story/what-are-the-backrooms/
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/object-1
https://backrooms.fandom.com/wiki/Object_2
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/the-m-e-g
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-601
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/th3-sh4dy-gr3y
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-7
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-37
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-109
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-33
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-116
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-250
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/level-943
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/nostalgi-gaius
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/entity-3
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/entity-4
https://backrooms.fandom.com/wiki/Entity_8
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/entity-10
https://backrooms.fandom.com/wiki/Entity_20
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/entity-67
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/entity-140
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/the-beginning-of-the-m-e-g
https://www.creepypasta.com/the-horrors-of-the-backrooms-part-two/
https://backrooms-wiki.wikidot.com/phenomenon-13
TRANSCRIPT
The backrooms is probably the biggest creepypasta of the last few years and today, I want to do a fun little deep dive through some of my favorite parts of the lore
First, I want to take you through a few of the creepiest levels, and then I want to get even deeper and tell you some of the stories that have come from deep inside.
And if you like creepypastas, mysterious disappearances, the true story behind urban legends and more, then hello, you’re just like me, we’ve found each other. Make sure you subscribe to this video and meet me here each week in the RDS Headquarters
The Backrooms began in May 2019 with an anonymous photo posted to 4chan. The photo was of a hallway with ugly yellow wallpaper, beige carpet, and fluorescent lights. The user accompanied it with a caption:
If you're not careful and you noclip out of reality in the wrong areas, you'll end up in the Backrooms, where it's nothing but the stink of old moist carpet, the madness of mono-yellow, the endless background noise of fluorescent lights at maximum hum-buzz, and approximately six hundred million square miles of randomly segmented empty rooms to be trapped in
God save you if you hear something wandering around nearby, because it sure as hell has heard you
This idea captured the imaginations of millions of people online. Within a few short weeks, whole wikis popped up dedicated to telling stories set in The Backrooms. Eventually, forums like Backrooms Wiki and Backrooms Fandom were dedicated to user generated content building on the lore and making this the biggest modern creepypasta we have.
At its core, The Backrooms is a fictional world of endless, monotonous hallways, doors, columns, and objects where unsuspecting people become trapped forever after somehow “no-clipping” through a structure in the real world.
We covered this background and some horrifying, actual places with similarities to the Backrooms in an episode last year. Look in the description for a link to that episode.
There’s a new A24-produced Backrooms film coming out this month from filmmaker Kane Parsons, also known as YouTuber Kane Pixels. Kane is one of many people online who were inspired by the Backrooms and told their own stories set in that world.
With the movie coming out, this is a great opportunity for us to explore some of the other levels created by the fanbase. Over the years, users have generated hundreds of additional levels of the Backrooms for us to get lost in.
And of course, within those levels are all sorts of horrors waiting to attack. So let’s stick close together as we delve once again into the Backrooms.
We began today’s episode on level 0 - this is the most iconic level of the Backrooms, the one inspired by the real-world photograph.
Its main components are the beige, moist carpet, the yellow walls, and the humming fluorescent lights. The ceiling is always low and the majority of the level is long hallways. But there can be some variation. Sometimes, there are doors. When opened, these doors reveal rooms of various sizes full of random, forgotten objects. You might see stacks and stacks of newspapers, or office desks, or moving boxes. People claim the Backrooms are a sort of “afterlife for buildings,” but to me, if feels more like purgatory. Like an endless, empty mid 2000s office space that sprawls for an estimated 600 million square miles.
Level 0 is also known for the random square holes that appear in the ground and walls. It’s possible these might lead to other rooms or levels, but no one is ever seen again after falling through.
The horrible monotony of the yellow walls and humming lights are enough to drive most people mad, but sometimes, level 0 gets worse. The lights will occasionally go out, which you’d think would be a relief. But stuck in the dark you start to hear voices - people whispering in the distance. Or you might instead hear horrible wails from creatures you couldn’t describe even if you could see them.
When and if the lights come back on, you’re actually happy to see the wallpaper again. Though sometimes, you might catch a glimpse of a spray painted arrow that wasn’t there before. Like someone is guiding you where to go.
Those who are lucky enough to find an exit on level zero will next find themselves in level 1, known as “The Habitable Zone.” That name should give you some hope, because it means now you might be able to make contact with other people trapped in the Backrooms.
Level 1 has wide open floors filled with infinite concrete pillars and arches, like a parking garage. As you walk, you see strange messages left on the floor and walls. Cryptic messages about “no-clipping,” the process of falling through a soft spot in reality that landed you here. Or long diatribes from people who went mad. Sometimes, these messages are helpful - they might point you to a stash of items. One of the most useful items you can find on this level is a thermos. It’s filled with a strange, pale liquid - almond water.
Almond water can be found on many floors of the Backrooms. No one knows why. But it can keep you nourished and sane, so drink up.
It’s not to be confused with cashew water, which looks the same but comes in glass bottles. This will sap your strength instead of restoring it.
If you want something other than a drink, or you have a nut allergy and need sustenance, you can also find a food substance known as Greasy Marshmallows throughout the levels. They look just like marshmallows, but if you eat them whole, they will make you feel bloated and lethargic. Eat more than 40 or so and you risk your skin turning the same consistency as the marshmallows themselves. Eat 100 and you’ll end up dissolving into a puddle of grease on the ground.
Eventually, if you keep moving, the smooth concrete walls of level 1 disappear. In their place are long hallways filled with electrical wiring, pipes, and junction boxes. The hallways grow darker and are lit only by the occasional glowing orange light.
This is level 2, the abandoned utility halls. It’s every secret space beneath every city you’ve ever been in. Any time you’ve seen a locked door behind a subway track, or a staircase leading down beneath the bottom floor of a parking garage, it led here.
And unfortunately, this is also the first level where you might hear something that doesn’t sound quite human. You might catch a little bit of movement in the corner of your eye, dashing behind a corner. This is the first floor that something lives on. Known as an entity.
Entities can come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them are microscopic. There is an entity simply called “The Disease” that infects survivors and causes them to bleed from every pore in their body. Some entities are huge, such as La Kameloha, a massive, stone humanoid that rises out of the ocean on certain water-filled levels. Entities can be as intelligent and all-knowing as a god, or as dumb as a rock. Some of them are friendly. But most of them want to kill you.
On these early levels there are a set variety of entities you can encounter. One of the best known are the Smilers. They appear as a bright, white smiley face, like a crooked, neon kid’s drawing. They’re accompanied by a sharp, piercing sound, like an electronic shriek.
Sometimes you might see a human-like figure crawling on all fours. These are called Hounds. They were people from the Frontrooms - the real world - at one point. But they were driven feral by the Backrooms, and now stalk around, looking for victims to tear to shreds with their sharp teeth. Their faces have morphed to look like canine skulls with massive incisors sticking out. Their bodies are covered in long, ratty strands of hair that drag on the ground.
And they’re not even the most dangerous creatures in the early levels. That would be a Deathmoth. These massive insects will try and spray you with a corrosive liquid that incapacitates you. Once you’re paralyzed, they’ll dismember you and drag you to their hive to be used as raw material.
Here, on level 2, as you’re walking down hallway after hallway of pipes and concrete walls, you might pass a door that just says “Jerry’s Room”. Don’t go inside. It’s a long story but Jerry is a parrot and there’s a group of people in the backrooms that worship him like he’s a god. I promise you, it’s best if you mind your own business when it comes to Jerry,
You might finally come across what you think is another survivor. Someone who looks totally human. But as you talk to them, they seem odd, jabbering in a language you’ve never heard before. As you look closer, you see that their skin doesn’t fit quite right - because it’s not their skin at all. This isn’t a survivor, but a Skin-Stealer, a tall, amorphous creature that wears the skin of its victims.
As terrible as all of these things sound, it’s important to remember that encountering them is actually rare. Above all else, your time in the Backrooms will be monotonous. You’ll walk down endless corridors that remind you of a time and place you can’t quite remember.
And this is really the heart of what makes the backrooms so scary. These levels, at least to me, feel like places I kind of remember being as a kid in the late 90’s. An empty corridor somewhere in the mall, a stuffy old office with fluorescent lighting and bare white walls.
Even the floors that are supposed to be relaxing still give off a sense of existential dread that I can’t really explain….
Eventually, you’ll be in the backrooms for so long, you wont remember what the Front Rooms felt like. You wont even remember what they were called other than The Front Rooms. You haven’t seen a window in who knows how long, and you’ve been confined in spaces with low ceilings and tight corridors. Though the backrooms are infinite, your world has felt more and more claustrophobic
At some point, you’ll get to Level 37, also known as "Sublimity," or simply, “The Poolrooms.” It’s a level of endless knee-deep water in hallways and caverns lined entirely with pristine, white, ceramic tile.
The water is lukewarm, so you don’t get chilly. It’s also filled with Epsom salts that, when consumed, relax your muscles and lower your heart rate.
The annoying buzzing and humming of the previous more industrial levels is replaced by the gentle sloshing of the water. According to the lore, someone was able to get a recording of this room and bring it back to the front rooms. This is that recording
https://backrooms.fandom.com/wiki/Level_37 (play like 5 seconds)
Despite having no obvious source, the water never sits completely still. There is always a ripple moving across it. Some theorize that since the level is so big, the water has its own natural, slight current.
There are no entities on this level, but that doesn’t make it completely safe. Occasionally, you’ll notice a tiled staircase going down beneath the water. If curiosity gets the better of you, and you decide to try and follow it deep, deep underwater, you’ll find that these staircases can lead to levels that are significantly less relaxing.
Swim down into the black water, and you’ll re-emerge on an earlier level - level 7, also known as Thalassophobia. This is a water level, filled with an endless, black ocean beneath a dim, cloudy sky. There is no land, so eventually your limbs will wear out and you’ll start to drown. Only, you can’t. Instead, you sink forever, your lungs burning, but death refuses to come.
As you tread water, you might wonder what exactly is beneath your feet. Well, 1km below you is a part of the ocean known as the twilight zone. It’s full of bones. They look like human bones at first, but upon closer inspection they have some stark differences. For one, it appears like these beings had flippers, as well as larger jaws and sharper teeth. Perhaps some long extinct people that used to inhabit this level.
There is no real name for the entity in the water. It is simply known as “The Thing on Level 7.” Most reports indicate that it is some kind of an eel, but no one knows for sure because no one has ever seen all of it. It’s believed that The Thing is the size of a planet, going on forever in the dark water.
If you’re lucky enough, as you sink down into infinity, you’ll come across an underwater cave. This is the exit to a new level. But you never know what horrors might await you.
Aside from The Thalasaphobia level, another level I would never want to get to is Level Fun. It an infinite warehouse of empty ball pits, bouncy castles, and jungle gyms. There are also depressing side rooms with low-effort party decorations for a children’s birthday party.
It looks like the saddest, biggest, most abandoned chuck e cheese you’ve ever seen. It actually reminds me of a time when I got lost in a chuck E cheese indoor playground. I was in one of those tubes that has the submarine windows and couldn’t find my way out. I was just going around in infinite circles, seeing the same view of that animatronic pizza rat over and over and over again. A worker had to come save me. That’s what this entire floor is like,
If you were on this floor, you’d have to get through miles and miles and miles of plastic ball pits and jungle gyms. You might find an electronic device on one of the party tables.
It’s off, but as you pass it, it lights up with a message. It might say something like “I know how to help you, head north". The message will always end with a little, old school millennial smiley face. You know, the colon with the parenthesis. It is important that you do not listen to these messages
They are being sent by the entities that live on this floor. Known as party goers.
Some describe them as looking like Gumbi if he came from hell. Their bodies are yellow instead of green, with giant, red smiley faces carved into their blocky heads. Other versions of partygoers look like humans with yellow sheets over their heads. Their self inflicted wounds leave a blood stained smile on the sheet, giving them a permanent grin.
It’s believed they’re infected with something called Sanguine Festivus Virus. If you contract this illness on this floor, you’ll become obsessed with locating other people trapped in the backrooms and feeding off of them.
Another dangerous level you might find yourself in is Level 33, the Infinite Mall. It first seems like a normal, clean, empty mall, but the further you walk the more it begins to deteriorate. You walk farther and farther, and the walls turn black with mold. Weeds grow up through the floor. The lights start to flicker and die. Soon, the building falls away, and you are left to face a void of indescribable horrors.
And I could talk about the floors for hours.
Level 116 is known as Godspire - it features a small village at the bottom of a hill. Above them sits their goddess, always watching. She is a massive, motionless skeleton, with flesh hanging from her bones.
Level 250 features a field of grass beneath a nighttime sky that has only two stars. If you stare at them, you’ll soon realize these are the eyes of a massive entity staring down at you. It will try to seduce you and make you stay there forever.
Level 943 is a single, lower class tenement that is host to thousands of parasites and diseases. The home is occupied by a family of giant, talking insects that all hate one another. They’re known as “The Rotting Folk.” Trash litters the hallways. The sinks are filled with a dried, brown substance. The mattresses are covered in a mysterious, sticky, yellow liquid. It’s recommended you not enter the home without a hazmat suit.
There are infinite levels with infinite horrors. But there is one final one we can discuss, simply called “The End.”
The End is not truly the final level of the Backrooms. There can be no final level in an infinite place. Technically, it’s level 601. But for many, it does represent the end of their journey.
The End is an infinite library. Not something ancient and grand, but rather defunct and tacky, like a Borders books that has been closed and vacant for years,
The shelves are empty, and above them in the main lobby is a sign that reads “The End is Near.”
A victim of this level walks through the exit doors and finds themselves back home, back where they first no-clipped out of reality. They reconnect with friends. Tell them where they’ve been.
They go back to their life, trying to forget the Backrooms. But the reality is - they’re still there.
This isn’t the real world. It’s not their real life. These aren’t their real friends. They’re a mirage, created by Level 601, ensuring that its victims never leave.
There’s varying lore about how long the backrooms have been around. Some say forever, and that there’s references to them in classic literature, like the greeks talking about the labyrinth. Those were actually the backrooms, some say.
As you can see, the creativity that has gone into the description of the levels and entities within the Backrooms is immense. Users all agree on different number designations for both, giving rise to an official mythology. What they don’t agree on is how you escape the Backrooms - or indeed, if escape is even possible.
Most accounts that I’ve been able to find seem to suggest that there is no escape. One story in particular reinforces the idea that anyone who thinks they’ve found a way out will soon meet a grizzly end.
This is known as Phenomenon 13. It comes to us from a Wikidot user named Iqloose.
Investigators in the Backrooms began to hear stories of a cult called “The Brotherhood of Egress.” The cult was recruiting members on the premise that they had developed a meditation technique that allowed them to escape.
Their base was in Level 63, an infinite blue sky above a series of bridges. The cult would sit on these bridges and look up at the sky, contemplating its infinite blueness as they meditated.
Researchers were able to make contact with the cult, and questioned them about their technique. They called it the 7-Step Plan. And it went like this:
Step 1 was to vow to remain celibate for the rest of your life, and repeat the latin phrase “Non concupiscam” seven times into a lit altar. This means “I will not covet.”
Step 2 was to turn down food and drink seven times, and say the phrase “Non Sum Gulosus” seven days in a row. This means “I am not a glutton.”
Step 3 was to burn what few possessions you’d acquired in the Backrooms with a seven-pronged torch.
Step 4 was to not sleep or rest for seven days.
Step 5 was to give your most despised enemy in the Backrooms 7 items or 7 requests that they desired.
Step 6 was to work under another survivor you were envious of for 7 weeks.
And finally, Step 7 was to live in total isolation for 7 months, saying “Non habeo superbia, purus sum,” every day, and nothing else. This means “I have no pride, I am pure.”
You were then supposed to picture the exact moment you fell into the Backrooms in as much detail as possible, bringing yourself back to the time and place where you no-clipped. If you were successful, you would be returned to where you came from.
The researchers observed six different people in their journey to complete the 7-Step Plan. The first one completed the steps, then disappeared after 2 minutes of meditation. Just…evaporated. The second screwed up on his last day and spoke. However, he still disappeared, but after 14 hours of meditation. It’s said that The third altered the plan, replacing every 7 in the plan with a 6. When he meditated, only the bottom 6/7ths of his body disappeared, seemingly killing him.
Subject 4 failed to complete steps 3 and 4, and as a result only his clothes and eyes disappeared. Subject 5 failed to complete every single step - the researchers said the results were “Too appalling to describe.” Finally, subject 6, one of the researchers themselves, completed the ritual steps without issue, and disappeared after a few minutes of meditation.
The researchers believed that they had truly found a way out, and prepared to share the plan far and wide in the Backrooms.
However, some researchers remained skeptical, and before they started to share the plan they searched the other levels for signs of the subjects. And sure enough, they started to find them - or what was left of them.
One cultist was found on level 48, an infinite sandy beach. They were impaled on a palm tree.
One was found on level 126, an infinite art gallery. He was trapped, frozen in one of the paintings.
One subject’s body was found on level 8, an infinite series of caves. The body was filled with spiders.
And still another subject’s body was found scattered across multiple levels.
The leader of the cult was last seen on an unnumbered, completely greyscale cluster of levels known as the Shady Grey. It’s a complicated part of the backrooms, but it’s believed that if you journey far enough into it, you will arrive at a portal to hell.
So Phenomenon 13, as the researchers later called it, was not a way out after all. Completing this ritual was just sending them to different levels to die gruesome horrible deaths.
But there is another method of escape that I have seen mentioned more than once in Backrooms stories. It’s the idea of a swap, using vague, clandestine, mysterious methods to get someone in the real world to swap places with you in the Backrooms. In some stories they do this willingly - but in most, the person has to be forced to take your place.
There is a well-known story written in 2022 called “The Horror of the Backrooms” by a creepypasta user named MrMills45.
The story goes that in 2006, a 15 year old named Alex moved into a new house with his parents. He was drawn to a wall in the unfinished basement. He swore he could hear strange sounds on the other side. His parents didn’t believe him, but he started conducting experiments at night while they were asleep.
He found that he could not just hear things on the other side of the basement wall, but he could actually pass through it. At first he just experimented with small objects, a broom handle, that kind of thing. But eventually he worked up the courage to step through on his own, dragging a rope tied to the basement stairs behind him.
On the other side of the wall he found the Backrooms. The story describes him finding level 0, with its infinite yellow hallways and moist carpet. However, while most accounts of level 0 describe it as a place without entities, Alex didn’t find this to be the case. He first found a letter written in blood warning him that something lived on this floor.
Eventually, he encountered some type of horrible centipede entity and saw it kill another person in the level.
But then, just as fast as he found himself in the backrooms, he was out. He woke up inside of a library in the real world, unsure of how he ended up there.
He was deeply traumatized by the experience, and so his parents sent him to a therapist.
Alex thought the therapist would never believe his story. But much to his shock, she did. It wasn’t just because she was especially open minded or anything like that. She believed him because she had been there too.
Alex begged her to share her story. She wasn’t sure if she should, being that she was his therapist and she wasn’t supposed to share personal information with clients. But this was a special case.
Her story wasn’t that different from his. She grew up with a shed in her backyard, with a strange wall that she believed had ghosts behind it. One day, she fell through into the Backrooms, to level 0 with the yellow walls and moist carpet.
And like Alex she encountered an entity - one that seemed like it wanted to kill her. But according to the therapist, she was able to strike a deal.
The entity would show her the way out - but if it allowed her to escape the Backrooms, then she had to promise to bring someone to take her place. Apparently some sort of balance was required - if someone went out, someone else had to go in.
It was then that Alex realized the therapist wasn’t just speaking in the abstract. She had learned of his case and made sure to receive him as a patient. She knew he had been in the Backrooms before he ever arrived in her office.
She drew a gun on him, and forced him to get up and walk across the office to a wall with a curtain. She pulled back the curtain to reveal a dark-red door standing ominously in the center of the wall. Alex knew exactly where that door led.
With no other choice, he walked through the door, returning to the one place he had hoped to never go again.
It’s a chilling story, and shows two different ways you can exit. One is if you get lucky and just happen to no clip out, and the other is if you have someone take your place.
Another terrifying piece of lore I found while looking into how you exit the backrooms, was how you know if someone you love has wound up in the backrooms. There are some other stories where people in the real world have friends or loved ones vanish. But then, they start having strange dreams about that person, even feeling like they’re being haunted by them. Sometimes they’d exit their shower to see messages written to them in the steam. In those cases, it’s because that person is able to make weak contact with them from the Backrooms.
The person afflicted by these hauntings might eventually be badgered into agreeing to take the lost person’s place in the Backrooms. Or they might do it out of genuine compassion.
Regardless of the story and method, it does seem that escaping the Backrooms is no easy feat.
Another question you might be asking is - if so many people go missing in the Backrooms, never to be heard from again, how do we know so much about them?
Well, there is an organization that is actively logging information that comes from the backrooms. A story from Wikidot user Stretchsterz can help us get to the bottom of this. His story goes
There once was a young boy known only as Stretch, who grew up near a forest in an unknown area. He had a core group of childhood friends that he would play with in the forest.
One day he and his friends were out playing when they saw something strange in the woods - a glowing, smiling face, grinning at them out of the darkness.
Stretch was afraid for his friends and chased after the face with a stick, but it disappeared. He then heard his friends screaming, and turned around just in time to see one of them disappear into the forest floor. He tried digging through the leaves and dirt but they were nowhere to be found.
The remaining kids tried to make their way back to their campfire, which was just a small, glowing dot in the darkness. But no matter how much they walked in that direction, they didn’t seem to get any closer to the campfire. It was like the forest was infinitely big.
While they got no closer to their campfire, they did arrive at a cliff face at the edge of the forest. There, built into the side of the mountain, was a door. They felt they had no choice but to open it and see what was inside.
Stretch and his friends were then greeted by the nauseating yellow walls and moist carpet that we’re all-too familiar with. They heard a sobbing noise and followed it, eventually discovering their friend who had no-clipped through the forest floor.
The group then traveled together through the Backrooms, making it to the next few levels where they encountered Smilers and Skin Walkers. Miraculously, they were able to work together to fend off the creatures.
It was during one of these fights that they came across a girl named Meg - she was the first new person they had encountered in the Backrooms. Stretch felt obligated to help her. He at least had his friends. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be trapped in the Backrooms all alone. They added Meg to their group, and over the weeks and months and years they continued to grow in number, finding other wanderers that were lost in the backrooms.
Eventually, they numbered in the thousands, and were spread across multiple bases on multiple levels of the Backrooms. Stretch became their leader, and decided to name the organization MEG after the first girl they saved. It’s an acronym that stands for “Major Explorer Group.” Today, Stretch is still the Overseer, trying to save as many people as possible.
The MEG is the primary storytelling device through which many online writers tell their Backrooms stories.
A lot of these stories take the form of MEG archive entries, which can be presented in creative, interactive web pages. Sometimes the viewer is required to confirm they want to see classified information by clicking through redacted text. Some pages have hand-written notes from MEG members and other ephemera from their expeditions.
The lore we have available to us suggests that the MEG has existed since 2012. Beneath Stretch are seven regiments that fulfill different functions.
First up are the Frontline Explorers, who delve into the different levels and report back on their findings. They are theoretically where we get a lot of our information. Personally I think that sounds like a pretty terrifying job.
Although even worse than that is the Entity Removal regiment, who clear different parts of different levels so that survivors can form outposts.
The third regiment are the Lock Breakers, who find and maintain mysterious “level keys” that open different doors in the Backrooms. The keys each have a level of origin, and can open any door on any level and return the holder to that level of origin. So a key to a safe level, such as the Poolrooms, is very valuable, as it can help a survivor escape a dangerous level and return to a safe one regardless of how many floors away they might be.
Beyond these first three regiments, there are Rescues and Raids, Mapping and Pathfinding, Civil Aid and Recovery, and Communications regiments. So clearly The MEG is quite the sophisticated operation.
MEG civilization seems to exist across six large outposts located on a variety of safe levels. My favorite of these is the Level called “The Port of Misgivings.” It’s an endless, run-down port on a large lake. Survivors have a cozy little town there where you can eat at a place called “The Flying Deathmoth Pub.”
The MEG has even made contact with some friendly entities. The most famous of these is an entity called Blanche from level 906. This level is an endless library filled with incomprehensible books. But it’s very beautiful, with elements of Victorian, Gothic, and Baroque architecture. The ceiling is stained glass, with candelabras hanging from it that somehow light up every inch of the library.
The librarian, Blanche, is a short, pale, blue-eyed entity that resembles an old woman. It wears a variety of fancy outfits and tries to share its knowledge with the MEG. If you misbehave in Blanche’s library, it will send you to the last level you were in before arriving.
It’s worth noting that I’m drawing primarily on the most commonly accepted Internet lore around the Backrooms. There are other canons with their own versions, and not all of them feature the MEG. The most famous of these is Kane Parson’s Backrooms. This is a popular YouTube series that depicts a group of researchers called Async methodically exploring the classic level 0.
Async is different than the MEG in that they exist in the outside world, and have created a stable portal for entering and exiting the Backrooms. This is a somewhat more practical approach to the mythology, as it gives us a clear reason why we can now access the various video tapes from their expeditions.
This group is much more grounded in reality. They actually receive a visit from the United States Department of Energy and secure government funding for additional research into the Backrooms.
The researchers of Async are very careful when exploring the Backrooms. They use PPE, motion detector cameras, rovers and other technology to avoid coming into contact with any surprise entities. In fact, they’ve only ever documented one entity - they call it “The Lifeform.” It’s a large, terrifying monster made up of constantly changing and moving black squiggles. It almost defies description.
Now that lore, as well as the other lore developed by Kane Pixels is going to be the bedrock of the new A24 movie
And If I can just wax poetic about creepy pastas for a bit, i am so excited by this. I can’t remember popular culture sharing a creepypasta like this since the days of slenderman. It felt like we were in a creepy pasta DESERT for a while, and I was so excited to see this catch fire.
Not to mention, the movie is being distributed by A24, which is so cool, but also produced by the company I used to work at, Atomic Monster. When I worked there, I would read creepypastas ALL DAY looking for ones to turn into shows and movies. They started developing this one after I left and to say I’m very jealous is putting it lightly.
I’m super excited to see the movie and catch all the little references to some of the things we’ve talked about today. Hopefully I’ve provided you with enough of a crash course on the Backrooms to where you can go see the new movie and catch all the references yourself.
At its core, I think the Backrooms is about nostalgia, monotony, and the horror of isolation. By coming together to tell such creative stories, the Backrooms community fights back against all of those things in their own lives. Maybe you can join them and write some creepy Backrooms stories of your own.
Just be careful not to no-clip!