just a normal guy nothing to see here

wonderful news!! curry barker is one of my favorite (if not my favorite, hands down) short horror directors. as someone who has watched hundreds and hundreds of short horror films on youtube.

here are five of his films with the runtime and a quick summary of each. (sorry if i miss any, these are what i remember off the top of my head!) i've avoided spoilers beyond the basic premise, but every single one of these deals with Absolutely Haunting Thematic Shit:

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THE CHAIR - 25 minutes

when horror connoisseurs hear "curry barker," they usually think of the chair first. barker was approached to make this into a full-length film & pitched obsession instead... GREAT choice, as i don't think the chair would Work with extra runtime.

a man finds an old chair on the side of the road and brings it home to his girlfriend. strange events begin to unfold -- his girlfriend's behavior becomes increasingly erratic, he's losing time, he's unraveling at the seams....

if you enjoyed the fucked-up relationship dynamics in obsession then you will probably have a good time.

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MILK & SERIAL - 62 minutes

barker's other best-known horror film. a twisty found footage thriller about youtube pranksters whose pranks Go Wrong (TM).

i can't say much more than that.... if you watched obsession and thought "pretty good, but pretty predictable. i wonder how curry barker would handle a psychological thriller with more plot twists??"

boy, does this film have an answer!!

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ENIGMA - 20 minutes

this is a psychological thriller about a man dealing with the impending end of the world. explores how other people are also dealing with the end of the world.

i fear i'll give a skewed impression if i say this one is sort of a feel-good film..... but OF the films on this list, it's Certainly the most optimistic. my partner rafi (who really hates depressing horror) watched it with me and concluded, "oh, that was kind of sweet, actually!!"

this one's great if you want a palate cleanser after The Unrelenting Gutwrenching Horror of obsession.

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WARNINGS - 20 minutes

my personal favorite!! criminally underrated!! upsetting in a way that stuck to my skin for days!!

a man starts receiving strange written warnings on halloween. things around him begin to unravel.

similar to the chair in its unsettling surreality, but with a bit more supernatural influence imo. you'll recognize a lot of parallel imagery to obsession, especially with Strange Movement and Nightmare Experiences.

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HEAVY EYES - 5 minutes

the shortest one on this list if you just want to dip your toes in real quick... a pretty easy time investment if you've never watched short horror and aren't sure if you'll like it!

a boy's mom comes home unexpectedly at night.

the only problem?? she's still texting him from the hospital where she works.

even when she begs him to kill her, he does not feel even a shred of pity for her; he only worries "is being with me that bad".

the only reason he tries to change anything is because her behavior started to scare him FREAK him out. had she acted in a meeker way, bear would've lived with her HIS WHOLE LIFE knowing she ISN'T the real nikki NOT GIVING A FUCK about what she would've wanted. PERIOD.

(this came out of a conversation in the comments on a previous post about an author threatening to stop updating a fic because of lack of engagement)

So there’s this idea that fic writers should write for themselves and not care too much about stats or engagement,

and i totally get the sentiment behind that. if writing becomes entirely about stats and external validation, something important does get lost - creative freedom and joy, conviction in your own writing

but i also think:

“i write for myself, but i post for others.”

because posting fic is not only self-expression. it’s social. ao3 is called an archive, but emotionally it often functions as a community space.

people post for connection, for participation, for others to bear witness to their pain and trauma and grief,

and i don’t think most people are asking to be admired so much as acknowledged. there’s something deeply human about wanting another person to encounter something that mattered to you and go:

“ok, yeah, I see what you were trying to say. I see you.”

especially because fanfic is often people processing very real feelings through fictional characters at a safe distance, one step removed,

and then uploading that deeply personal thing into a shared archive and hoping somebody else might connect with it.

And i think that’s why it hurts so much when you summon up the courage and post a fic into the void and you get nothing back,

and then it’s like,

1) my stuffed animals were mostly dogs and cats and bears, implying that bears were a future pet option

The backrooms are generative AI trying to capture something real but only achieving a malformed, mindless imitation.

The backrooms are stagnation, an unwillingness to step into the new and uncomfortable effort of changing, instead running through the same old routine even as it starts to fall in on itself.

Dick, who's filling in for Bruce as Batman: I'll call him

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Hal: you've gained some muscles

Jason, dressed as Nightwing: I started working out

Hal: Damn. What's the routine cause I just saw you last week and you look completely different.

Jason: steroids

Dick, as batman: *chokes on coffee*

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Superman: We might need someone who's good with guns, hm... Hey Nightwing you're in contact with redhood, right? Could you have him come?

Jason, as Nightwing: ... I don't see why not

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Wonder woman: this security is an issue we need someone who can hack this system long enough for us to get pass

Superman: hey hood, any chance you can give red robin a call?

Tim, with 5 inches of padding, as redhood: on it

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Hal: isn't robin usually with you all?

Flash: yeah we could use him with this one

Superman: Red Robin, would you call in Robin for us?