The horror genre is perhaps one of the most dependable genres in the world of fiction, being able to be taken in a myriad of different directions. From big-budget theatrical horror to smaller independent productions, the genre is rife with variety and originality. However, one place that’s been providing horror with a fertile venue for new ideas has been the World Wide Web. YouTube especially has proven to be a great place for up-and-coming creatives to showcase their own original and home-brewed horror content. These are just a few examples of internet horror projects that, for various reasons, have left people with thrills, chills, and a few nightmares.
10. This House Has People In It
We’ll begin with an oddity, even amongst the world of internet horror projects, brought to us in part by the mad scientists at Adult Swim. Since the late ’90s, the late-night programming block has provided the airwaves with surrealist animation and unhinged comedy content.
This has resulted in additional content, including mind-melting bumpers and even fake infomercials, that make you question your own sanity. Case in point, This House Has People In It, is a short film produced by Alan Resnick in 2016 that aired on Adult Swim late one night, much to people’s confusion.
The short, as best we can describe, showcases a very strange family dealing with a very strange problem. Shown to us through various security camera feeds, we see the family dealing with their teenage daughter’s “issues.” These issues are, in actuality, the fact that she’s face down and slowly sinking into the kitchen floor and the house’s basement. This comes as a great disappointment to her little brother whose birthday party must be put on hold. This is then compounded by other strange occurrences in and outside of the house, including a sinister pink figure emerging from the basement. Throughout its brief runtime, the short film delivers a surreal and rather unsettling narrative, enhanced by the actor’s bizarre delivery.
Following its YouTube release, the short quickly became the subject of analysis and study, with many dedicating whole videos to its dissection. Soon enough, people were savvy enough to search up the short’s fictitious security company and were met with a treasure trove of supplemental content. If you’ve yet to jump down the rabbit hole of This House Has People In It, it’s a surreal experience you owe it to yourself to check out.
9. Local58
A recurring motif among many internet horror series is the use of analog formats like VHS or old film stock to enhance the narrative. The format runs a wide gamut of different styles, tones, and visual flavors, from security cameras to dusty videotapes to unearthed video games. When it comes to analog horror, one project that is often regarded as a top-tier entry is Kris Straub’s Local58. Straub, previously known for his creepypasta entry, Candle Cove, truly struck gold with this glorious blend of analog aesthetics and otherworldly cosmic horrors. If you’ve ever tuned into a local broadcast station then you’ll already be familiar with the various trappings such as station IDs and weather updates. The series then intersperses these throwbacks with various visual glitches, cryptic messages, and unsettling sound design. Local58 perfectly encapsulates that feeling of scanning local television late at night and catching something that perhaps you shouldn’t have seen.
The series has to overtly state what exactly its central threat is, however, through the language presented, the viewers can attempt to solve that for themselves. The series takes full advantage of its format and uses it to craft some legitimately unsettling moments, a small glimpse into a world at the mercy of something massively disturbing. If you enjoy stories of signal hijacking and have an affinity for analog-tinted visuals, definitely check out Local58.
8. The Walten Files
In the wake of Five Nights at Freddy’s and its runaway success, the online horror community has fully embraced the trend of mascot horror. From homebrewed games to fan-made art, people have been on a hot streak of transforming typically kid-friendly visuals into impressively disturbing nightmares-made flesh.
However, one creator who has gone above and beyond in terms of quality is Chilean animator Martin Walls, the creator of The Walten Files. Rather than just copy FNAF beat-for-beat, the fully animated series goes in a very unique direction, telling a story of, not only the supernatural, but loss as well. The story focuses on the now-defunct Bunny Smiles company and the missing employees of the Bon’s Burgers restaurant. From the disappearance of the company’s co-founder, Jack Walten, to the supernatural fallout involving the restaurant’s resident animatronics, the series is full of intriguing elements. The series’ biggest assets are its unique and unsettling visuals, as well as its horrific sound design and voice acting. Many analog horror series utilize the format well but The Walten Files truly takes advantage of every trick the format offers.
Every subsequent episode has only shown Walls’ development as an artist, with each one developing further and further in overall quality. The series has already amassed a sizable following, helped in part by various analysis videos on YouTube attempting to solve the mystery ahead of the series’ conclusion. The series has yet to falter in its execution, so if you’ve yet to give it a peek, definitely do so, it’ll send more than a few chills down your spine.
7. Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared
Every so often, a series comes along that escapes from its little corner of the World Wide Web and takes on an audience of gargantuan size. A prime example is Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, created by Becky Sloan and Joe Pelling, which first debuted on YouTube in 2011 and lasted until 2016.
The series is immediately familiar to anyone who grew up with the likes of Sesame Street, a felt puppet show aimed to teach you some simple life lessons. These lessons are usually taught to a trio of puppets – a tall red guy, a green duck, and a yellow puppet with blue hair. However, as is the case with every episode, the intended lesson quickly devolves into a twisted blend of body horror, screaming, and other unhinged visuals. For example, a lesson about time results in the three lead puppets aging and rotting away, with various body parts falling off in explicit detail.
Every available episode has amassed millions of views, indicative of the series’ widespread appeal, even spawning fan art and other bits of homegrown content. Not only that, but the online series proved popular enough to spawn a full television series, also helmed by Becky & Joe, that aired on the United Kingdom’s Channel 4 in late 2022. The series takes what the web series started and goes even further with it, aided largely by the comparatively larger television budget.
6. Hi I’m Mary Mary
Regarding internet projects that can instill fear, but can also make you feel, look no further than Hi I’m Mary Mary. Crafted by a creator known only as K, the series takes the found footage and ARG formats and uses them to tell an emotionally rich narrative. For context, an ARG stands for Alternate Reality Game, a story where the viewer or reader can interact with the fictional characters. This is usually attained via the use of social media apps like Tumblr, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter) with each one providing a different spin on the format.
In the case of HIMM, the eponymous Mary is directly addressing the people watching the YouTube videos she’s posting during her supernatural experiences. These experiences included having awoken in an unfamiliar home she cannot leave without remembering how she got there. She must also contend with various supernatural entities that prowl the house’s dark halls at night in search of her. These horrors all serve a narrative far richer than just jump scares and digital distortions, it’s also a story of mental health and self-image. If you want a horror web series that pushes the envelope in terms of emotional resonance, definitely give HIMM a shot.
5. Petscop
Video games have often gone hand-in-hand with the horror content on the internet, resulting in some stellar projects. From MyHouse.WAD to Shipwrecked 64, many have crafted their own video games with decade-accurate graphics and sound effects to tell some unsettling stories. However, the one series that many will agree is a cut above the rest is Petscop, a faux video game walkthrough developed by Tony Domenico. Upon first glance, the major attraction of the series is its visual style, a perfect send-up to the graphics and interface of old-school PlayStation games. From the sound effects to the dialogue boxes, everything about the presentation is one point, perfectly in line with game titles released in the 1990s.
The series doesn’t coast off of its aesthetics, as it presents a very intriguing narrative that could be attained via its unique format. As the player, Paul traverses the mysterious game and solves its various puzzles, he eventually uncovers something far more unnerving. Hidden amongst the game’s colorful visuals and quirky designs is a story about a man named Marvin and the disappearance of Lina, his childhood friend. As the series progresses, things only increase in their unnerving and fascinating nature, making for an enthralling and entertaining watch.
4. Welcome Home
We shift from the world of old-school video games to vintage television, specifically, shows revolving around felt puppets. From Sesame Street to The Muppets, puppet-based television has always resulted in colorful characters and incredibly unique comedy. This is the media that Welcome Home has seen fit to pay tribute to, especially through its visuals and increasingly impressive catalog of content. The project is the brainchild of a creator known as Clown, an artist with a penchant for artwork based around old-school felt puppets.
Welcome Home is a unique outlier, even amongst the other entries on this list, as it’s not an episodic series. Instead, the narrative is dished out through a website run by a restoration society looking to preserve any content related to Welcome Home, a fictitious puppet television show from the ’70s. The show centers around a neighborhood of quirky and colorful puppets all learning various life lessons through their silly adventures. From cereal boxes to picture books to vinyl records, the project utilizes a wide range of formats to tell its story.
The story blurs the lines between fantasy and reality, with the in-universe show itself possessing a form of malevolent energy. The more sinister and offputting moments are centered around the show’s lead puppet, Wally Darling who seems to be harboring a dark secret. So far the project has had several big content drops, often related to major holidays like Halloween and Christmas, resulting in stellar content and narrative revelations.
3. The Monument Mythos
The Monument Mythos takes analog horror in a very unique direction amidst a sub-genre of web horror that can sadly get a bit repetitive. In the wake of The Mandela Catalogue, many have seen fit to coast off of cheap jumpscares and visual distortions instead of any legitimate narrative hooks. This is where The Monument Mythos truly shines, combining analog horror with a dark look into alternative world history. Created by Alex Casanas AKA Mister Manticore, the series shows a fictitious alternate reality where James Dean was elected president and personal computers were banned in the late 20th century.
Not only that but, as the videos reveal, famous monuments and landmarks hold some truly sinister secrets.
This includes the likes of the episode titled LINCOLNLOOKER which shows that the Lincoln Memorial is housing a monstrous entity. There’s also RUSHMOREREVENGE where video footage reveals strange anomalies occurring at Mount Rushmore with the faces disappearing and shifting. If you have a penchant for bizarre historical conspiracy theories, then this series will surely scratch that itch. Casanas has since moved on to other projects but Monument Mythos still stands as his best-known, gardening ample coverage from online commentators.
2. The Backrooms
It’s often funny just seeing what happens to an idea once the internet gets a hold of it, often taking it far beyond its humble origins. Before there was The Backrooms there was the concept of liminal spaces – images of empty rooms and locations that evoke bizarre emotions in the viewer. Whether the location stirs up nostalgia or just an unsettling feeling of familiarity depends on how you perceive it.
This trend gave way to the Backrooms, a liminal space resembling an office building without any furniture or people. Soon images of these Backrooms began popping up all over the web, resulting in an impressive crop of content. Eventually, this idea led to a young filmmaker named Kane Pixels crafting his own short film based on the concept.
The Backrooms builds off all the established online lore, starting with the key detail of someone clipping through a wall or floor to travel there. Additionally, the short film’s protagonist soon finds himself pursued by a mysterious entity resembling a creature made of metal and wires. The short film is nothing short of a technical marvel, utilizing its CGI perfectly, resulting in something you might confuse for legitimate video footage.
1. Marble Hornets
If there was a Mount Rushmore for online horror content, then Marble Hornets would be one of the first additions to the lineup. Simply put, without Marble Hornets many of the aforementioned horror web projects on this list would not exist!
The series, which lasted from 2009 to 2014, tells the story of Jay Merrick and his investigation into the bizarre events surrounding Marble Hornets, his friend Alex Kralie’s student film. As he examines the raw tapes of the shoot he begins noticing strange occurrences, the biggest being a faceless being known as The Operator AKA Slender Man. With every passing entry, Jay falls deeper and deeper into a twisted web of lost memories and sinister otherworldly entities.
What made the series so addicting, especially the first time through was its incorporation of alternate reality game, AKA ARG, elements. This meant that the series’ fans could interact with Jay, and eventually Tim, on social media and help them solve puzzles as things progressed. Throw in a slew of tremendous jumpscares, simple yet effective digital effects, plus some solid acting and you have the makings of a web horror classic. If ever there was something that captured the intrigue and simplisticity of the original Blair Witch Project, it’s Marble Hornets.