Milk & Serial: the vicious, viral $800-budget horror that’s free to watch

Found-footage horror about YouTube pranksters turns into an online phenomenon, giving its star and creator a Hollywood inroad

2024 is already becoming something of a banner year for horror, with Longlegs making over $100m and Late Night with the Devil earning a whopping 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. And yet the breakout horror of the year might just be an $800 project currently available to watch free on YouTube.

Milk & Serial is a 62-minute, found-footage horror by YouTuber Curry Barker, and it manages to be at once ruthlessly effective and wonderfully authentic. Racking up 348,000 views in the two weeks since its release, its popularity has been supercharged by raves on Reddit that have since crossed over into traditional media. Bloody Disgusting called it “one of the year’s best-kept secrets” and this week Barker found himself being interviewed by no less than Variety.