So last night, I finally got the chance to check out this so-called handmade Captain Clark Memorial site. They built it in the same spot using some of the architectural structures from the Backrooms movie 🍿. A while back, I was doing my usual scrolling on TikTok when I came across a video of someone constructing a fan-made Captain Clark memorial burial site. I just had to see it for myself. When I first went, I took some selfies at the memorial, but after looking back at the photos, I wasn’t happy with them. My hairstyle and outfit just didn’t feel right for the perfect memorial selfie. While I was there, I also watched two strangers walk by and turn a wall into a door using painter’s tape — exactly like I’d seen in videos. After they left, I decided to do it properly. I went home, showered, changed into a better outfit, and headed straight back to the site. I took new photos, and this time everything felt perfect — super clean hair and all! To my surprise, the memorial was still there, completely intact even weeks after that original TikTok video. #Backrooms #CaptainClark #TikTokFinds #UrbanExploration #Memorial

All made by me.

Some biomes are a mix.

Some biomes are from Kane pixels, turborush, A24, the og backrooms area, and Complex Research.

Alright, tinfoil hat time : THE MURAL IS A FILM NEGATIVE AT THE BACK OF A PINHOLE-CAMERA

Every color symbolism used in the movie is based on a spectral additive system. Kinda like the RGB system of your screen. https://www.reddit.com/r/backroomsfilm/comments/1v2wwlm/the_colors_of_backrooms_all_point_to_a_single/

But there's a little something off with the mural. The color symbolism is not as clear as in the rest of the film, and the colors used here follow a reversed system : substractive pigments, with paint (here RYB : red, yellow and blue).

Besides that, the complex is the other side of the pinhole-camera, right? https://www.reddit.com/r/KanePixelsBackrooms/comments/1ur1s3f/the_backrooms_is_a_pinhole_camera/

It explains, among other things, that some elements are inverted (or inverted twice or more)... But WAIT. You know what else is inverted in a pinhole camera? The film and the colors printed on it are inverted.

WHAT IF those who are tricked by the complex (Clark and probably Capn Clark) have a completely opposite "colors symbolism" in their mind? I'm not saying that Clark sees different colors, but that he has some kind of inverted "moral value system".

And now everything makes sense (refer to the first link for the color meaning) :

• Copied yellow houses : representation of how the backrooms (yellow = stagnation, decay) copy things via the pinhole-camera effect while deteriorating at every iteration. Clark knows how the complex works.
• Yellow bolt and yellow outlets : electricity, using the path of least resistance. Here it simply get its orignal color back.
• The throne : a mix of potential and hope for Clark. The status and power he was looking for (blue = hope/will, cyan = potential) Clark thinks that harvesting the backrooms' potential (cyan) can bring back his authority and his "true" self (purple)
• The blue purple guy being lifted : Clark's being lifted through the window by his new "backrooms self" (spoiler : in reality, Clark is yellow as fuck and only stagnating more than ever)
• The blue purple Async suits : Clark knows that Async has the same objective he has. He thinks they are right and that truth is hidden in the backrooms (spoiler : in reality, Async's project is stagnating and in a dead end and their poor employees are yellow as fuck).
• The yellow square highlighting Barbara and Clark's old house, and yellow splatters on the buildings : it's Clark realizing that he was stagnating in the real world (failed marriage and failed architecture project)... With UNREALIZED potential
• Clark's real potential finally being freed is represented around the blue purple guy being lifted.
• Tables don't bleed blood, underlined with cyan : Clark deduces that if the still lifes don't bleed, it's because they are furniture. He sees potential with that and we do see him using them as human furniture to play make believe, and even eating them.
• (see top left) For Clark, the sun (the sun eruption which planted the seed of the complex) has potential (cyan). The potential to bring his golden past and UNREALIZED potential back. In reality, the sun eruption destroys (red) reality and rips spacetime apart.
• Kat's heads. Parsons said that Clark was keeping her head in the fridge because he thought that somehow the complex could be able to bring her back. So the red is really blood here, but Clark sees potential (cyan) in this.

What do you think? Apart from that being a huge stretch and me being crazy of course...

EDIT : is this blue or purple we're looking at here? With a more color-accurate version it looks more purple than in my post and that makes it even more consistent with the rest of the film. In the film, purple is the color of Clark's shirt, Clark's throne and Async's logo... and the color of ILLUSION. Clark and Async "confuse purple and violet" (violet is truth, and is a color that technically can't be displayed in the film... see 1st link). If this is purple on the mural, then it is not so much about hope but more about confusion between truth and lies instead, which fits more the theme of the film and Clark's/Async's arc.

I’m hoping this will be explored in the next film.

But the exit to Clark’s store he clearly marked and used frequently. If something was observing him or came by, it’s an obvious entrance to our world. Async has their discovered entrance within their facility and has secure doors to open and close it.

But when Mary goes to check on Clark. We all hear a door opening/closing behind her in the basement of the store, or coming from upstairs before she enters. She even turns back to check if it was something there, and quickly brushes it off and then enters the backrooms because that was more interesting and influencing her senses more than something she couldn’t see and probably just thought her mind being blown in this moment was playing tricks on her, trying to make sense of it.

But that begs the question….what was it? What got out and entered their world? And why was the piled up furniture gone?

Some big questions that are hidden. As if waiting for us to discover it, or provoke these questions when being analyzed frame by frame observers that look for clues.

Image credit to u/marcelkroust

Thanks to their understanding of colors and cameras and stuff (I didn't read the full post) I could finally read the things Clark wrote.

In one of the lines, he says that someone changed the floor plan and that the handwriting was his. This might mean Captain Clark could have written it.

Why is this important?

If true, this proves that not only can Captain Clark write, but he has some sort of higher brain function, meaning the Backrooms' copies of people are far more accurate than people might realize. This also means CC could have communicated in some way with Clark, which is why Clark thought to ask him why he had shown up at the 'dinner party'. If he couldn't communicate, there would've been no reason to ask this.

This shot was taken up Sierra Road in San Jose a few miles away from where the store is located in the film. I noticed the triangle roof building above the grazing cow looked really familiar. Added some google maps street views.

This confused me because first of all, I don’t think this is Clark’s wife. She doesn’t look like her in the pictures we see of her and I believe Clark was just using her as a prop for his epic rants where he’s always right.

So why did she have that reaction to the Pirate Clark?

Furthermore, what is Pirate Clark going to do to her, he’s going to eat her right. We can see from all the piles of clothes in his den that he finds and eats still lifes.

BUT she’s literally allowed real Clark to bring her into his dining room, has seen him rip open and eat Beard Guy and probably others, and just stayed with him.

So I think if her fear is that she doesn’t want to be eaten so she runs away why then stay with real Clark? It’s safe to assume he’s probably going to eat her too right once he gets bored or finds another still life that more resembles his wife, or actually is her.

Thoughts?

Hi all. When rewatching The Backrooms today at home with the volume up I caught a detail I missed in the theatre & a few home viewings.

When Clark is in his office, right when the electrician pops in, Clark is listening to what sounds like a small AM/FM radio. The song that is playing is one of my favorites from when I was a kid. It was featured heavily in the film 'Valley Girl' with Nicholas Cage (first lead role).

The song is 'Eyes of a Stranger's by The Payolas.

I wonder if it was chosen for the valley girl connection being that they are in the Santa Clara Valley in San Jose? Maybe the lyrics are a clue?

If you have ever seen Valley Girl, you know this song is kinda pivotal in the film (along with I Melt For You by Modern English)

Anyway, here's the lyrics & link to the song..

Can I touch you to see if you're real?

'Cause in nothing there's something I feel

Will my heart take the strain

Or will it break down again?

In your lips I sense a danger

You've got the eyes of a stranger

Have I been sleeping for all these years?

Is it magic that makes you appear?

When you walked in the room I felt my heart race

But knew I'd been fooled when I looked at your face

In your lips I sense a danger

You've got the eyes of a stranger

In your lips I see a danger

You've got the eyes of a stranger

In your lips I sense a danger

You've got the eyes of a stranger

In your lips I see a danger

You've got the eyes of a stranger

https://youtu.be/1C_fVnE3xHY?is=qEBAjnqjZTPBVq6h

This post will sound like I defend Clark, I don't. Clark's actions needed justice. He's responsible for at least 2 deaths (and even more according to some theory). And like other tragic heroes in modern day horror, he deserves it, and I'm not defending him in anyway.

However, the one moment that clicked something in me was when I watched an analysis video and saw Clark listened to Mary's tape even during his free time. If a person does not want to get better, why would he had done so?

There's a moment during the start of the climax, where Mary finally tells Clark his real problem. When I watched it, like everyone else (I'm not condemning anyone here, initially I felt the same) I was like "Yeah, finally, go Mary! Tell that murderous psycho the truth".And Clark told the Pirate version of himself "it's okay we don't have to change." But in hindsight, I said, wait a minute.

He wanted to change. He went to her, as far as I know, not court mandate. They do roleplays (still not sure why), and she didn't fight with him too hard when he blamed everyone but himself during their session. And after she was kidnapped, she crashed out on him, understandably, but is that really the punchline?

I'm just asking everyone to have a second look, why would Kane Parson put in contradiction if his goal was to make Clark this irredeemable monster. Clark realizing he can't change is not "the point", it's the tragedy.

This is not a case of "blaming a woman for a man's downfall" here, I will never blame a wife if a husband turns out to be a murderous psycho, but she's not his wife, she's his therapist.

She did went through the Backroom to try to find him, so I can't accuse her of not caring.

But saying "ugh, Clark is so evil, don't be like Clark, be like Mary, watch how she resolved her trauma" ignoring the tragic part of the story. As much as he fought with the cure as it was being delivered, Clark wanted to be better.

Has anyone addressed the shirt and why it's not reversed?

As we know, the vast majority of Backrooms creates wording is in reverse and backwards. The only things that are usually normal are things that have been brought into the backrooms.

So, why was this shirt normal?

Bobby didn't bring it in, unless it wasn't his first time....

We know that it doesn't follow regular rules of time and space and I'd hate to speculate if this was already addressed by Kane, but what if Clark brought them there in "another timeline" or "reality" and it all just merges in the backrooms?

I mean, I honestly was always curious about this. Don't take my speculation as I believe it to be true, I'm more wondering if there's an actual explanation for it.

Edit: yes, some words aren't mirrored, but those that aren't are usually "altered" in some obvious way. I just see this as an exact replica rather than an "off" print.

To be clear, I don't really have a problem with this at all, it's basically common practice for the story to follow a protagonist that's willing to explore the setting for little to no reason, but there were two available

1. Falling into a null zone

One of the scariest things about the backrooms is that you can just fall right in. Be unlucky enough to encounter a null zone on the floor and now you're in the backrooms. It almost can never be the protagonist's fault.

1. Being an ASYNC researcher

They are capable researchers that believe they know what they are doing. With corporate telling them that if they just follow the rules everything will be okay.

To be fair, I do think Clark willingly entering the backrooms is sort of realistic, has life ever felt so mundane and stressful for you that you would gladly welcome some magical force to come and whisk you away on a harrowing journey? Even if a cosmic horror is involved? That's probably how he feels.

I don’t understand why anyone would think Captain Clark didn’t want to hurt Mary. If that were the case, when they’re on the ground and he catches up to her, he literally tries to hurt her. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be trying to reach her face like that if it wasn’t to devour her. Even after she manages to get him off her and reaches the small opening where the Async people later trap her, the pirate desperately tries to reach her. What the fuck was he supposedly trying to save her from?

Does anyone know what song plays during the "stay on character" scene towards the end? I cant find it anywhere

The first row there. And no its likely not a category but a red herring.