A creator contest will find “Fresh Meat” for a theatrical horror anthology

After the success of The Backrooms and Obsession, horror fans are wondering how deep the creator rabbit hole goes. How many more masters of terror are chugging along on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, just waiting for their chance to hit us with a big-screen jump scare?

Dead Meat plans to determine the answer to that question. James A. Janisse and Chelsea Rebecca‘s content brand has become a go-to YouTube destination for more than seven million fright-loving subscribers, and the husband-and-wife duo will leverage their creator horror expertise to launch a new contest.

In partnership with Atlas Entertainment‘s Atlas Literary and Hades Film, Dead Meat has announced Fresh Meat. That’s the name of a talent search that will ultimately combine a lineup of creator-led horror shorts to build a feature-length anthology. According to IndieWire, the resulting film will be released theatrically by Hades.

Submissions for Fresh Meat will open on July 25 and close a month later. English-language work will be considered, though entrants may hail from anywhere in the world.

Hades, a new horror studio aimed at Gen Z, will evaluate the submissions alongside Dead Meat and its fans. The resulting film, which is tentatively due out on October 12, will look to draft off the momentum generated by YouTube hitmakers like Kane Parsons and Curry Barker

Though The Backrooms and Obsession became box office triumphs earlier this year, they weren’t the first theatrical horror projects helmed by creators. RackaRacka’s Talk To Me was a sleeper hit, Chris Stuckmann’s Shelby Oaks earned a distribution deal with Neon, and Markiplier struck it rich with his adaptation of the video game Iron Lung.

Those heartpounding thrillers have sparked bidding wars as Hollywood studios look to find more horror hits that are bubbling up on social media. Janisse and Rebecca have found ways to make themselves part of that movement. They recently broke new ground with their Dead Meat Horror Awards by turning it into an IRL event for the first time.

With Fresh Meat, Janisse and Rebecca will build on their shared identity as tastemakers in digital horror space. “This is our way of finding, highlighting, and amplifying people who can do these things — who already have done them — and helping develop their ideas and make them bigger,” Janisse said.

Fresh Meat will give contest winners a helping hand by offering them financial stakes in the anthology. A joint venture between Dead Meat and Hades Films will also give first-look consideration to certain shorts that can be developed into full-length features.

With those systems in place, Fresh Meat will expand the breadth of creator horror without sacrificing the independent spirit that defines the genre. A handful of creators will get a coveted big-screen opportunity, but with so many scares on the horizon, I suspect that the audience will be the Fresh Meat all along.