Stephen King Shares Terrifying Cats Mash-Up Teaser

The Cats trailer debuted on the Internet earlier this summer to a stunned audience worldwide. Director Tom Hooper’s (Les Misérables, The King’s Speech) latest effort keeps ending up as the center of surreal Internet videos that pair Cats‘ visuals with different songs. Many people’s first response to the trailer was loud opposition to how creepy the CGI effects were, and the latest mash-up trailer to surface won’t do anything to challenge that assessment.

This new treatment turns the musical into legitimate nightmare fuel by splicing in footage of people crowded around a tv about to be shown something disturbing. In a classic bait and switch, instead of something from a slasher flick, the video is just the Cats trailer instead. An intrepid editor tosses in scenes from Stephen Kings’ Pet Sematary, A Quiet Place, and Netflix hit Bird Box for good measure.

The entire fever dream even ends with a fake end card that reads: Stephen King’s Cats. At this point, this entire ordeal feels like one huge group hallucination. Maybe the Internet just spawned all those weird CGI cats of its own accord. After all that attention, you know your fan project is excellent when a master of horror gives you the seal of approval. Maybe this editor might want to put this one in their portfolio.

All of this scary stuff doesn’t stop there. Ian Abramson, a comedian, previously edited the Cats trailer to include “I Got 5 On It” by Luniz, which rose to relevance again after being used in Jordan Peele‘s trailer for Us. In that case too, At one point, that song sounded like a good time, but those days are long gone after the release of Us. Peele signed off on the whole exchange with his approval of how unsettling the finished product ended up being.

The entire process seems very similar to how the Sonic the Hedgehog movie trailer was received. Fans were even doing something similar around the trailer for the film by putting “Gangster’s Paradise” by Coolio over other movie clips and memes. Luckily for Coolio, all the criticism of the film led to a sudden spike in streams for the 90s artist.

Considering the long-running impact that Cats has had on our popular culture – in addition to the technological approach to bringing the movie to life – it feels safe to say that the Internet is only beginning to share their thoughts on the movie. Some are still excited to see the likes of Taylor Swift and Jennifer Hudson showcase their talents, while others are continuously scarred for life by the trailer’s CGI.

Cats stars Taylor Swift as Bombalurina, Idris Elba as Macavity, Jennifer Hudson as Grizabella, James Corden as Bustopher Jones, Rebel Wilson as Jennyanydots, Jason Derulo as Rum Tum Tugger, Ian McKellen as Gus the Theatre Cat, and Judi Dench as Old Deuteronomy.