Why YouTube Shouldn’t Be Scared of Its Hottest Genre: Horror
The bomb that was “Joker: Folie à Deux” loomed large over this past weekend, but further down the box office tally lies a success story: the limited-release documentary “Sam and Colby: The Legends of the Paranormal” finished sixth despite playing to just 350 screens nationwide.
This feat is just the latest example of YouTubers finding mainstream traction through horror — a genre that has been one of the most eclectic and innovative corners of YouTube — though the platform has made it increasingly difficult for some of these creators to reach audiences.
Originally launching a general vlogging channel in 2014, Sam and Colby gained most of their 13 million subscribers after going all in on paranormal investigation videos. The pair’s most popular videos are one-to-two-hour explorations of such iconic haunts as the Stanley Hotel (43 million views), the Queen Mary (22 million views) and the house that inspired “The Conjuring” (39 million views).
A staple of Sam and Colby’s channel is Hell Week, an annual tradition where the pair release their biggest and scariest project of the year each October. Last year’s limited 168-theater run with Cinemark for their “Conjuring” house series sold out at every location, and so the duo upped the distribution to 350 screens for “Legends.”
Box Office Mojo estimates “Legends” grossed around $1.76 million over the weekend, even with the movie playing to the fewest number of theaters in the top 10. The high fan turnout generated an average of nearly $6,000 per theater.
Sam and Colby’s box office win speaks to the unassuming power of niche yet large online communities and the ability of online content to compete with mainstream entertainment — something on which Michael Bay is banking as he preps “Skibidi Toilet” for the big leagues.
But it’s also just the latest instance of horror-focused creators jumping from YouTube to the mainstream. Last year saw the release of A24’s “Talk to Me,” the acclaimed debut film written and directed by Danny and Michael Philippou, better known as RackaRacka to their 6.86 million YouTube subscribers.
Premiering the week after “Barbenheimer” weekend, ”Talk to Me” not only went on to earn over $92 million globally but it’s A24’s third-highest-grossing film behind Best Picture winner “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and summer blockbuster “Civil War.”
The success of “Talk to Me” has seemingly opened the floodgates for scare-inclined creators to reach audiences beyond YouTube. A24 is looking to YouTube again for its next horror hit, this time striking a deal with 18-year-old Ken Parsons for a film based on his “liminal space”-inspired “Backrooms” series.
Curry Barker, who has made online waves with his award-winning short horror films (most recently the unsettling “Milk & Serial,” inspired by YouTube prank channels), is currently working on a full-length feature with “47 Meters Down” producer James Harris. In the meantime, YouTube film critic Chris Stuckmann’s debut supernatural feature “Shelby Oaks,” which raised over $1 million on Kickstarter, will be released by Neon next year.
It should be noted that this new era of online-bred scares hardly came out of nowhere. Horror is one of YouTube’s most prolific genres, and its presence on the platform spans as far back as YouTube itself.
As a film genre, horror is often associated with low budgets, scrappy filmmaking and craftiness in the face of technical limitations — qualities that can also be applied to YouTubers, especially in the early “Broadcast Yourself” days. Some of the site’s first viral scripted series, such as “Lonelygirl15” and "Marble Hornets,” adapted “found footage”-style horror for the vlogging era, sparking fierce online debates over whether these shows were real.
During the 2010s, BuzzFeed’s “Unsolved” series adapted the supernatural reality show format — a well-performing, if famously embellished, staple of cable — for online audiences, becoming one of the content studio’s most beloved titles. The show’s creator, Ryan Bergara, and co-host Shane Madej even leveraged the popularity of “Unsolved” to launch their own production company, Watcher Entertainment, alongside fellow BuzzFeed creator Steven Lim.
Today, unscripted paranormal investigations are a fixture on YouTube. Offerings like Sam and Colby’s or Watcher’s “Ghost/Mystery Files,” the spiritual successor to “BuzzFeed Unsolved,” regularly thrill millions with ghost hunts and paranormal encounters. Even non-horror YouTubers will occasionally embark on a ghost hunt for easy views.
But the biggest innovations for the horror genre are still coming from ambitious filmmakers including RackaRacka and Barker, despite YouTube’s algorithm and monetization policy becoming more restrictive over the years. As part of its bid to keep advertisers happy and shed its amateurish reputation, YouTube is far from the wild West, anything-goes video platform that allowed creators to get gory in the 2000s and early 2010s.
As a result, creators of all genres are subject to the same monetization rules, which generally favor family-friendly content. The guys behind RackaRacka have even said they make little to no money on their videos — breakneck, bloody and stunt-fueled horror comedies — despite the millions of views on each.
On top of potentially being demonetized, more provocative creators also must contend with age-restriction warnings, which require users to sign into their YouTube account to confirm their age before watching the video. The issue is less about forcing users to sign in, and more that the ability for the video to be picked up by YouTube’s algorithm and reach new audiences is drastically reduced. Creators can manually mark their videos as 18+, but that still impacts each one’s standing in the algorithm and access to ad placement.
YouTube’s automation is also known to automatically age-restrict generally inoffensive videos — ones containing too many swear words, for instance — putting creators’ livelihoods at risk. YouTube did loosen some of its monetization rules following creator backlash last year, but the constantly changing policies are still something creators need to tiptoe around.
Despite these drawbacks, YouTube offers horror creators a platform to experiment, build a following and potentially break through. YouTube has also introduced additional income streams for creators outside of ads, including revenue from YouTube Premium and paid channel memberships in the vein of Patreon.
“We welcome a variety of content and expression on YouTube, but not all videos are a fit for all advertisers, such as content that is age-restricted,” said a spokesperson for the company. “In recent years, we have taken steps to increase transparency around our advertiser-friendly guidelines and have opened up new monetization opportunities, like channel memberships for creators whose content may not suit all advertisers. We’ll continue to listen to the creator community about how we can support their success.”
As YouTube takes on major streaming platforms, transforms its TV app into a full-on streaming platform and advocates for major awards recognition on behalf of its creators, it would be remiss to leave its horror-leaning creators out of the conversation.
Even the most non-advertiser-friendly corners of the genre still generate passionate fandoms, and films like “Talk to Me” — and even “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” the indie horror game turned major franchise thanks to a fervent YouTube fanbase — prove that wider audiences are interested.
And when it comes to the content itself, the quality is there. Barker’s short films wouldn’t look out of place next to Netflix’s horror offerings. All YouTube has to do now is give these creators greater license to scare the hell out of more people.
This feat is just the latest example of YouTubers finding mainstream traction through horror — a genre that has been one of the most eclectic and innovative corners of YouTube — though the platform has made it increasingly difficult for some of these creators to reach audiences.
Originally launching a general vlogging channel in 2014, Sam and Colby gained most of their 13 million subscribers after going all in on paranormal investigation videos. The pair’s most popular videos are one-to-two-hour explorations of such iconic haunts as the Stanley Hotel (43 million views), the Queen Mary (22 million views) and the house that inspired “The Conjuring” (39 million views).
A staple of Sam and Colby’s channel is Hell Week, an annual tradition where the pair release their biggest and scariest project of the year each October. Last year’s limited 168-theater run with Cinemark for their “Conjuring” house series sold out at every location, and so the duo upped the distribution to 350 screens for “Legends.”
Box Office Mojo estimates “Legends” grossed around $1.76 million over the weekend, even with the movie playing to the fewest number of theaters in the top 10. The high fan turnout generated an average of nearly $6,000 per theater.
Sam and Colby’s box office win speaks to the unassuming power of niche yet large online communities and the ability of online content to compete with mainstream entertainment — something on which Michael Bay is banking as he preps “Skibidi Toilet” for the big leagues.
But it’s also just the latest instance of horror-focused creators jumping from YouTube to the mainstream. Last year saw the release of A24’s “Talk to Me,” the acclaimed debut film written and directed by Danny and Michael Philippou, better known as RackaRacka to their 6.86 million YouTube subscribers.
Premiering the week after “Barbenheimer” weekend, ”Talk to Me” not only went on to earn over $92 million globally but it’s A24’s third-highest-grossing film behind Best Picture winner “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and summer blockbuster “Civil War.”
The success of “Talk to Me” has seemingly opened the floodgates for scare-inclined creators to reach audiences beyond YouTube. A24 is looking to YouTube again for its next horror hit, this time striking a deal with 18-year-old Ken Parsons for a film based on his “liminal space”-inspired “Backrooms” series.
Curry Barker, who has made online waves with his award-winning short horror films (most recently the unsettling “Milk & Serial,” inspired by YouTube prank channels), is currently working on a full-length feature with “47 Meters Down” producer James Harris. In the meantime, YouTube film critic Chris Stuckmann’s debut supernatural feature “Shelby Oaks,” which raised over $1 million on Kickstarter, will be released by Neon next year.
It should be noted that this new era of online-bred scares hardly came out of nowhere. Horror is one of YouTube’s most prolific genres, and its presence on the platform spans as far back as YouTube itself.
As a film genre, horror is often associated with low budgets, scrappy filmmaking and craftiness in the face of technical limitations — qualities that can also be applied to YouTubers, especially in the early “Broadcast Yourself” days. Some of the site’s first viral scripted series, such as “Lonelygirl15” and "Marble Hornets,” adapted “found footage”-style horror for the vlogging era, sparking fierce online debates over whether these shows were real.
During the 2010s, BuzzFeed’s “Unsolved” series adapted the supernatural reality show format — a well-performing, if famously embellished, staple of cable — for online audiences, becoming one of the content studio’s most beloved titles. The show’s creator, Ryan Bergara, and co-host Shane Madej even leveraged the popularity of “Unsolved” to launch their own production company, Watcher Entertainment, alongside fellow BuzzFeed creator Steven Lim.
Today, unscripted paranormal investigations are a fixture on YouTube. Offerings like Sam and Colby’s or Watcher’s “Ghost/Mystery Files,” the spiritual successor to “BuzzFeed Unsolved,” regularly thrill millions with ghost hunts and paranormal encounters. Even non-horror YouTubers will occasionally embark on a ghost hunt for easy views.
But the biggest innovations for the horror genre are still coming from ambitious filmmakers including RackaRacka and Barker, despite YouTube’s algorithm and monetization policy becoming more restrictive over the years. As part of its bid to keep advertisers happy and shed its amateurish reputation, YouTube is far from the wild West, anything-goes video platform that allowed creators to get gory in the 2000s and early 2010s.
As a result, creators of all genres are subject to the same monetization rules, which generally favor family-friendly content. The guys behind RackaRacka have even said they make little to no money on their videos — breakneck, bloody and stunt-fueled horror comedies — despite the millions of views on each.
On top of potentially being demonetized, more provocative creators also must contend with age-restriction warnings, which require users to sign into their YouTube account to confirm their age before watching the video. The issue is less about forcing users to sign in, and more that the ability for the video to be picked up by YouTube’s algorithm and reach new audiences is drastically reduced. Creators can manually mark their videos as 18+, but that still impacts each one’s standing in the algorithm and access to ad placement.
YouTube’s automation is also known to automatically age-restrict generally inoffensive videos — ones containing too many swear words, for instance — putting creators’ livelihoods at risk. YouTube did loosen some of its monetization rules following creator backlash last year, but the constantly changing policies are still something creators need to tiptoe around.
Despite these drawbacks, YouTube offers horror creators a platform to experiment, build a following and potentially break through. YouTube has also introduced additional income streams for creators outside of ads, including revenue from YouTube Premium and paid channel memberships in the vein of Patreon.
“We welcome a variety of content and expression on YouTube, but not all videos are a fit for all advertisers, such as content that is age-restricted,” said a spokesperson for the company. “In recent years, we have taken steps to increase transparency around our advertiser-friendly guidelines and have opened up new monetization opportunities, like channel memberships for creators whose content may not suit all advertisers. We’ll continue to listen to the creator community about how we can support their success.”
As YouTube takes on major streaming platforms, transforms its TV app into a full-on streaming platform and advocates for major awards recognition on behalf of its creators, it would be remiss to leave its horror-leaning creators out of the conversation.
Even the most non-advertiser-friendly corners of the genre still generate passionate fandoms, and films like “Talk to Me” — and even “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” the indie horror game turned major franchise thanks to a fervent YouTube fanbase — prove that wider audiences are interested.
And when it comes to the content itself, the quality is there. Barker’s short films wouldn’t look out of place next to Netflix’s horror offerings. All YouTube has to do now is give these creators greater license to scare the hell out of more people.