Alisha Weir as Abigail.
Universal Studios
Though she appears to be a child, we soon learn Abigail is centuries old, and has developed a habit for ‘playing with [her] food’
Maslow Entertainment
With its occult themes, ’70s nostalgia and some AI controversy thrown into the mix, it’s easy to see why the film was a US box-office success.
Credit Ian Routledge. Copyright Lot Film Pty Ltd
For its many strengths, the film may divide audiences with its chaotic, surreal final act.
Skinamarink/Shudder © 2022
A wave of horror content is popping up across TikTok, carrying on a legacy that began on YouTube.
The film went on to gross nearly $450 million worldwide.
Movie Poster Image Art/Getty Images
When the film premiered, theatergoers fainted and vomited. It went on to inspire a series of copycat films – while fomenting a cultural panic about the demons in our midst.
Dracula in the Netflix series Castlevania.
Netflix
Christopher Lee’s Dracula remains was one of the game’s biggest early influences.
Wirestock Creators/Shutterstock
The answers lie in early human evolution.
Tony (Norbert Leo Butz), Katherine (Olivia O’Neill) and Miranda (Jennifer Nettles) in The Exorcist: Believer.
Universal Studios
There is a liberal splattering of gore, with the obligatory twisting heads and spewing of foul liquids.
Not everyone appears as they seem.
Hodder & Stoughton
The third book to feature the eponymous detective is a whydunnit not a whodunnit.
A24
Our new wave of horror carries the legacy of Australia’s strong horror history – while finally signalling the shedding of some cultural biases.
Russell Crowe as Fr Gabriele Amorth in The Pope’s Exorcist.
Jonathan Hession/Sony Pictures
In reality, most Roman Catholic exorcists recognise the danger of encouraging a person suffering from auditory hallucinations to believe that these are demonic.
Nicolas Cage as Dracula in Renfield (2023).
Courtesy of Universal
Renfield attempts to remodel the vampire movie to 21st century specifications.
Over the course of ‘The Whale,’ Charlie’s body gradually breaks down.
A24
In a thin-obsessed culture, fatness has become its own kind of monster.
Could the pugnacious writer ever have imagined that he would one day become a cult hero?
Nick Lehr/The Conversation via DALL-E 2
Is the writer’s appeal less about the power and complexity of his prose, and more about the view of him as a perennial underdog?
M3gan, the eponymous doll.
© 2022 UNIVERSAL STUDIOS. All Rights Reserved
Far from recoiling in terror, fans have dubbed animatronic murderous doll M3gan a ‘queer icon’ – a horror expert explains why.
Christian Bale as Augustus Landor in Netflix’s The Pale Blue Eye.
Scott Garfield / Netflix
The impressionistic tale of a young Edgar Allan Poe may not be based in fact, but it captures the essence of the young writer.
Ralph Fiennes (centre) plays The Menu’s mad Chef Slowick.
Disney
A despotic chef reveals the theatre, terror and class divides of haute cuisine.
Raggedstone/Shutterstock
Thomas Hardy found horror in the Dorset of his childhood.
idmb
No other living horror writer has enjoyed Stephen King’s literary longevity. His monsters have lingered in the popular imagination, and that of our author.
Alfonso Bresciani/AMC
Black vampires have existed for 200 years in literature.