Tube Trends: ‘Backrooms’ Takes Box Office, TikTok By Storm
While this space is typically limited to YouTube conversations, the flurry of conversation around A24’s new movie, Backrooms — and the tornado of TikTok content around it — is simply too big to ignore.
The film won the U.S. box office during its opening weekend, with an $81.4 million haul and the groundswell of excitement to see it in theaters seems likely to continue into a second weekend.
Part of that buzz comes via TikTok, and the movie’s origins as a web series four years ago.
A24 rarely dedicates much budget to traditional TV (iSpot data shows the studio has spent just $7.9 million on national linear TV ads since the start of 2025). But broadcast and cable also aren’t the only avenues available for promoting a movie via video.
The nature of Backrooms, predicated on a level of chaos and uncertainty, makes for great marketing and an even more compelling viral video campaign. Data from Tubular Labs shows there have been more than 1.1 billion TikTok views generated around Backrooms in the last 30 days, on just 10K uploads.
Though A24 does contribute plenty of those (28.4 million views, per Tubular), this is still virality largely stemming from creator content focusing on reactions, key plot points, frightening moments, and coverage of how well the movie’s performed relative to expectations.
With a budget of just $10 million, Backrooms didn’t need a huge box office performance to turn a profit. Yet did so going away — to the point where Backrooms 2is already happening.
The money is why the next Backrooms movie is happening. Yet that money potentially doesn’t come without the TikTok-fueled hype train leading in.
Of the 50 most-seen videos on TikTok about the film in the last 30 days, just 11 were uploaded since the movie’s release — according to Tubular. One video from May 14 (uploaded by user DarkSun20074) generated 60.7 million views just by noting one of the actors in the film.
@thedarkestsun2.0 It is a perfect casting #thebackrooms #theentity #backroomsmovie #robertbobroczkyi ♬ оригинальный звук - WXRMANE
Compare this level of largely user-generated hype to TikTok content generated around Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu.
In the same 30-day window, Tubular shows 700 million views around the film, with parent company Disney and Star Wars-related accounts making up nearly 14% of those.
Having studio-related accounts posting about its movie is not a negative at all. A24 does it as well for Backrooms. However, the bigger difference comes from how much Backrooms excitement comes from user-generated content (both sponsored and unsponsored).
Today’s box office equation has never been tougher to figure out. Yet, it’s clear that franchises are not the only way for studios to make money.
By harnessing younger movie goers and TikTok excitement, A24 was able to make Backrooms one of the year’s most surprising hits so far. Given the success the movie’s seen already, it’s unlikely this is the last time a perceptively “smaller” film uses social video to create a box office wave this year.
