In the upcoming years, the phrase “the next Backrooms” is going to be thrown around way too much, but in this case, we think it’s warranted. That’s because Warner Bros. just beat five other studios to buy the rights to a viral horror short with over 200 million views and has two horror masters attached to help bring it to life.
The short is called Siren Head, which was created by Trevor Henderson. Based on a drawing from 2018, it got turned into a short film in 2020, has since racked up 240 million views, and follows a terrifyingly tall creature with a siren for a head. Now, according to the Hollywood Reporter, Weapons and Barbarian director Zach Cregger will team up with Spontaneous and Whalefall director Brian Duffield to co-write a Siren Head feature, with Duffield likely to direct.
The trade reports that Sony, Universal, Paramount, and Disney’s 20th Century Studios were also bidding for the film’s rights, which were only being sold to theatrical distributors. No streamers allowed.
Beyond just the short, the idea of this creature has created a vast, fan-driven mythology, which is apparently what drew Cregger and Duffield to the project. “The duo are said to have found a take into the world that jazzed them into collaborating and in turn, excited the studios into bidding,” the trade reports.
And while calling Siren Head “the next Backrooms” makes sense on a few levels (viral short, name recognition, etc.), this is obviously different in many ways. One, it’s more creature-based than concept-based. Two, that film was directed by Kane Parsons, the person primarily responsible for the original itself (though he certainly had help from producers like Oz Perkins). And this is coming together with two proven voices in the horror space. If anything, Siren Head might have a better foundation than Backrooms did.
You can watch the short below if you haven’t seen it. Do you think this could be a mega horror hit?
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