Human Centipede Director Tom Six Reveals Multiple Sclerosis Diagnosis in Confessional YouTube Documentary
Tom Six, the Dutch film-maker behind the notorious Human Centipede horror trilogy, has revealed that he has lived with multiple sclerosis for roughly 14 years — a diagnosis he kept secret for most of that time, disclosed now in a confessional documentary premiering on YouTube.
Titled The End of Tom Six, the film was released on the platform on 15 August 2026, according to an announcement on Six's Instagram account. It blends documentary and feature-film elements, fusing Six's life, career, and illness into what Variety describes as a parable about his declining health. Shot in black-and-white, it opens with noirish images of an Amsterdam canal.
Six was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis roughly 14 years before the film's release, meaning the condition first surfaced around 2012, during the period between the first Human Centipede film (2009) and its sequels in 2011 and 2015. He managed the symptoms in secret for a long stretch of that time, according to Variety.
For the past six years, Six has lived as a recluse in Amsterdam. He spends most of his time in bed, going out twice a day for decaf coffee — a detail the documentary folds into its portrait of a man wrestling with both his body and his legacy, as Variety reports.
The film drew an early exclusive first look from Entertainment Weekly, and a review from The Guardian published on 13 August 2026. Variety confirmed the project's dual nature as both documentary and narrative feature in late July.
What makes the release unusual is the platform choice. A film-maker whose trilogy grossed across international territories — the first Human Centipede became a midnight-circuit sensation after its 2009 premiere — is skipping theatrical distribution and festival-circuit sales entirely, dropping the film directly on YouTube for free viewing. No streaming deal, no limited engagement, no paywall.
Six built his name on body horror that pushed past the boundaries most directors refused to approach. The Human Centipede trilogy — three films released across 2009, 2011, and 2015 — made him one of the most divisive figures in modern horror. Now he turns the camera on his own body, and the result is something that sits at a distance from the genre that made his name.
Whether the YouTube audience that found Six through shock-value horror will follow him into a black-and-white meditation on chronic illness is an open question. The film, though, does not appear to be chasing that audience. It is, by its own framing, a final statement — the title says as much.
