Director Kane Parsons’ horror thriller Backrooms opened with an estimated $81 million over the weekend against a $10 million production budget, an amount more than enough to justify the production of at least one sequel.
Based on YouTube filmmaker Parsons’ web series of the same name, Backrooms stars Chiwetel Ejiofor as Curtis, a struggling used furniture store owner who discovers in the basement of his business an interdimensional portal that leads to a maze of liminal spaces that contain bizarrely placed objects and evil entities.
After convincing his skeptical therapist, Mary (Renate Reinsve), that the spaces — known as The Backrooms in internet lore — are real, she enters the furniture store’s basement portal to find Curtis after he sends a message that he is trapped in the surreal environment.
Even before Backrooms dwarfed pre-release projections for its opening weekend at the domestic box office, Parsons was already discussing his plans of making a sequel — if not a series of movies — and more.
“[Sequels are] more than an option — it’s been the intention since 2022,” Parsons told Polygon in a May 28 article. “I went as far as I could with the YouTube series. [Making a feature film] became an option — I thought it’d be a much slower road to get to where things are now.”
Of course, when we’ll get Backrooms 2 and what comes after it — Parsons didn’t say exactly how many Backrooms movies he wants to make — are questions that are yet to be resolved.
“This film is the first part in what I would desire to be several narrative steps, in terms of approaching what I consider to be the true heart of the idea,” Parsons told Polygon. “I just don’t think you could get to it in the time you have for a single movie.”
Kane Parsons Doesn’t Want Future ‘Backrooms’ To Be Exclusive To The Big Screen
As a filmmaker who cut his teeth on creating his Backrooms web series on YouTube, Kane Parsons doesn’t plan on leaving the platform behind after taking a leap to theaters with Backrooms.
As such, the Backrooms experience, if Parsons gets his way, will continue in some capacity on YouTube, too.
“I don’t want to leave YouTube behind,” Parsons told Variety on May 29. “I immensely enjoy the work I’ve done there, and I feel creatively fulfilled by it in a way that’s proportional to what I’ve done with this film.
“I personally think there’s merits, because there’s a lot of projects that I just could never do outside of YouTube, or outside of a more free-form internet multimedia container,” Parsons added. “So, I wouldn’t limit myself just to one spot, but I do think it’s a way of saying that I’ve got a bit of a good thing going right now that I want to utilize with the energy and positivity around this film.”
Besides, Backrooms began as internet lore that originated as a 4chan post, so it’s only appropriate for Parsons to respect the story’s online roots.
“Without a doubt, Backrooms has always been planned to be more of a series that goes outside the confines of this film,” Parsons told Variety. “If anything, I would say this is a bit of a foot in the door that would lead to more of a progression towards the true root of the narrative, which has been set up online for years.”
Also starring Mark Duplass, Finn Bennett and Lukita Maxwell, Backrooms is playing in theaters nationwide.