Things I Like

Curious pebble (2/?)

Curious pebble (1/?)

but if you're like "this is relevant to your own current behavior" with the implication that the intracommunity thing they're currently big mad about is actually not as important and righteous as they're casting it in their head, it's like "no no. not MY behavior. mine is rational and I am correct. the issue I am fighting with other queer people about like rats in a sack IS actually the most important issue to be addressing right now"

and like

this is stuff I have to constantly watch out for in my own behavior! it is absolutely absolutely a thing, and absolutely something we ALL deal with and are capable of engaging in. it's ramped up in intensity the last year or two and I don't think that is a coincidence. I wish we were more capable of this level of analysis of this stuff without getting defensive.

Turns out there's a childhood disease to the tune of measles that erodes the carapace, and the first symptom shows up about a week before any actual damage is caused.

Grace comments to Rocky that one of his students seems to be turning oxidisation-green. About a week later that student has to be hospitalised for this illness.

Eridian scientists realise pretty quick that Grace can detect the illness long before any of their equipment can, and when caught that early it is much, much easier and safer to treat.

He's not morally against swearing, he said holy fucking shit when he saw the Blip-A for the first time, the only reason he doesn't swear normally is because he trained himself out of it because he teaches middle schoolers. If I'm remembering right, he even calls one of the kids a smartass in his internal narration at one point. He's spent so long not swearing that he's not just going to fall out of the habit immediately.

We know that at some point, he learned Eridian swearing anyway because Rocky swears in the final chapter of the book. And I think he learned most of them when Rocky reamed him out after leaving the taumoeba collector out at room temp.

As an architecture student, I was fascinated by how Backrooms turned architectural psychology into horror.

A lot of people say there wasn't enough horror because there wasn't a monster constantly chasing the characters and because there's no jumpscares, but I don't think they realize the monster was the architecture itself. And also, it's a psychological thriller and borderline horror. There's a difference. Grow up.

The film uses things we rely on to orient ourselves in space like landmarks, hierarchy, rhythm, daylight, scale, and spatial memory, then removes them or distorts them.

1. That's why Casino's don't have windows. It keeps you occupied and lose track of time. They literally distort your perception of time.

2. That's why shopping malls have looping layouts so you're forced to explore around. Like IKEA, you're psychologically “led” through a curated sequence, minimizing shortcuts and maximizing exposure to products.

3. That's why theme parks have carefully hidden service areas, controlled sightlines, immersive “world bubbles" to make you mentally stay inside a narrative environment where outside cues are eliminated.

But with Backrooms, it's manipulation of space and time and everything. All your senses are manipulated. Every room feels slightly familiar but never fully readable, so your brain keeps trying to build a mental map and failing.

What makes it scary isn't what is in the space, but what the space does to the mind. Humans constantly construct cognitive maps to understand where we are, but Backrooms breaks that process.

The circulation goes nowhere, the repetition erases reference points, and the environment sits in that unsettling zone between recognition and alienation. It creates disorientation, isolation, and paranoia without needing anything supernatural.

That is also why the concept went viral. Liminal spaces, dreamcore, whatever you call it. It feels endless, familiar yet unfamiliar, and deeply convincing in its emptiness. The suspense comes from thinking something else must be there with you, even when there is nothing. That uncertainty is the horror.

Adding paranormal elements often weakens it, because the original fear already comes from space itself, not from what might be inside it.

Hell, even the shot of Mary's "neighborhood" fucked me up because it looks exactly like the ones we see online and how it looks unoccupied.

Backrooms is really just architecture and human perception turned into a mechanism of fear.

So I hear we're making fun of Ryan Gosling for being a Brand Ambassador for a fancy watch company.