The 'Killer Is Escaping!' TikTok Audio, Explained
TikTok has the innate ability to parody absolutely anything. It edited Travis Scott's questionable apology for the Astroworld tragedy into seemingly mundane situations, and reduced Bojack Horseman's deeply moving existential crisis to a contemporary dance. "The killer is escaping!" audio is another serious moment that's taken on a very different life of its own on the video sharing app. And when you first hear the audio, it's anything but funny.
A bloodcurdling scream echoes: "Help! The killer is escaping! Help me!" Out of context, it's a complete nightmare — but over 400,000 videos interpret the sound as a fun way to show various creatures (or even objects) "escaping." Everything from a terrifying spider to a vibrating toothbrush, from disobedient pets to zoo animals, these are all the "killers" making their escape in the video. Even babies who are literally just trying to be born!
The "killer is escaping!" audio was first posted by TikTok account Horrorcovwn in July, but the sound is still making rounds on the internet. Here are its origins.
Sarah Paulson is the person screaming about the killer on the loose
"The killer is escaping!" TikTok sound comes from a pretty well-known TV series that has won numerous Primetime Emmys — and we know this because the OP, Horrorcovwn, posted the scene along with the audio. It portrays Sarah Paulson's character Lana Winters in the second season of "American Horror Story," screaming that a killer (Evan Peters' character, Kit) is escaping.
In a full circle moment, Sarah Paulson herself used the audio with Lizzo, reenacting the scene in a way only performers know how to. And because they're generous, they even gave us another cut of the scene — a deadpan lip-sync that could possibly do well on an "SNL" skit. Billie Eilish also added her own interpretive movement to the sound — nostril flaring — proving that her talents have no bounds, either.
The rest of non-celebrity TikTok has no shortage either; one user danced like "Michael [Jackson] if he was ever in a horror movie" and another created a TikTok choreography to the sound. Satirical duets and fun POVs take over the rest of the sound, begging the question: if we were to scream "the killer is escaping!" would Gen-Z help — or film?