variants
or phantasmagorical
as in hallucinatory
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Recent Examples of phantasmagoric
The action is punctuated by flash-frame collages that bring earlier and later observations together in a tumble of associations and hint at the drama’s mystical, phantasmagorical essence.
—
Richard Brody, New Yorker, 6 Feb. 2026
Today, the public district collection comprises some 35 large-scale murals, sculptures and installations, including the phantasmagoric exterior of its Museum Garage.
—Andres Viglucci, Miami Herald, 30 Nov. 2025
The Land of Spooks is a phantasmagorical blend of twisting gothic spires, impossible land formations, and disconcerting expressionist proportions.
—Kambole Campbell, IndieWire, 4 Nov. 2025
As the two keepers' accelerating madness batters their already uneasy relationship, the film becomes a phantasmagorical endurance test, with the two antagonistic leads hurling themselves against their tight confinement.
—Dennis Perkins, Entertainment Weekly, 31 Oct. 2025
Richard Brody, New Yorker, 6 Feb. 2026
Today, the public district collection comprises some 35 large-scale murals, sculptures and installations, including the phantasmagoric exterior of its Museum Garage.
—Andres Viglucci, Miami Herald, 30 Nov. 2025
The Land of Spooks is a phantasmagorical blend of twisting gothic spires, impossible land formations, and disconcerting expressionist proportions.
—Kambole Campbell, IndieWire, 4 Nov. 2025
As the two keepers' accelerating madness batters their already uneasy relationship, the film becomes a phantasmagorical endurance test, with the two antagonistic leads hurling themselves against their tight confinement.
—Dennis Perkins, Entertainment Weekly, 31 Oct. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for phantasmagoric
Adjective
-
The script leans heavily on exposition — internal monologues, disembodied intercom voices, and hallucinatory flashbacks — to communicate lore that might have resonated more powerfully through action or environment.—
Alison Foreman,
IndieWire,
29 Jan. 2026
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Its first big splash came at the Venice Film Festival in 2023 with AGGRO DR1FT, an 80-minute, Travis Scott–co-starring fever dream shot entirely through thermal lenses and built to feel less like a movie than a game-like, hallucinatory experience.—
Patrick Brzeski,
HollywoodReporter,
15 Jan. 2026
Adjective
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Watching Ilia Malinin skate in person continues to be a surreal experience.—
Rachel Treisman,
NPR,
10 Feb. 2026
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Being here in the city that raised me is a dope feeing and putting a Knicks jersey on is pretty surreal for me.—
Kristian Winfield,
Hartford Courant,
8 Feb. 2026
Adjective
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These images are interwoven with letters to an ambiguous, ageless, and perhaps illusory recipient.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
6 Feb. 2026
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Put another way, the self can be both illusory and real, or real enough.—
Michael Pollan,
The Atlantic,
26 Jan. 2026
Adjective
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Finally, the researchers did another version of the original test but used imaginary grapes instead of juice, with similar results.—
Evan Bush,
NBC news,
5 Feb. 2026
-
Unfortunately, the new love in your life may be imaginary and only after your bank account.—
C. A. Bridges,
Florida Times-Union,
4 Feb. 2026
Adjective
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The best of all sports-movie subgenres, football films have given us great characters – real and fictional – and a bunch of awesome cinematic moments in everything from screwball comedies to real-life narratives.—
Brian Truitt,
USA Today,
6 Feb. 2026
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The overall look has drawn comparisons to a fictional stealth aircraft rather than a conventional Navy jet.—
Sujita Sinha,
Interesting Engineering,
5 Feb. 2026
Adjective
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Beyond that, all apparent structures are merely phantasmal.—
Big Think,
Big Think,
27 Oct. 2025
Adjective
-
Comulate also invented a fictitious insurance agent named Jordan Bates, who purported to work for PBC and who interacted with Applied Systems salespeople through email (with a Phoenix Benefits email domain) to create a customer account on Applied’s Epic.—
John Hyatt,
Forbes.com,
30 Jan. 2026
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In a comparable case in the United States in 2023, a federal judge imposed $5,000 fines on two lawyers and a law firm after ChatGPT was blamed for their submission of fictitious legal research in an aviation injury claim.—
CBS News,
CBS News,
27 Jan. 2026
Adjective
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The Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division has been hollowed out (and has continued to bleed talent even this week) and has been reoriented around chimerical right-wing causes such as claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election.—
David A. Graham,
The Atlantic,
14 Jan. 2026
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There’s also ongoing progress in chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy and other immunotherapies for cancer, as well as in personalized cancer vaccines.—
The Editors,
Scientific American,
16 Dec. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Phantasmagoric.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/phantasmagoric. Accessed 13 Feb. 2026.
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