Portrayals of Succubi in Horror TV, Movies, and Books

The first segment of the 2012 anthology horror film V/H/S features a group of men out for a bachelor party who bring a couple of girls back to their hotel room for sex, only to have the evening definitely not go as planned when one of the women reveals that she’s actually some kind of monstrous creature with wings and claws. The segment was popular enough to spin off into its own feature-length film in 2016, in which the woman was revealed to be a succubus named Lilith who was summoned and bound as a sex slave, only to escape with the help of the protagonists and bond with one of them in ways that, as these things are wont to do, end poorly for him.

This 1990 horror movie starring Kadeem Hardison and Samuel L. Jackson, among others, revolves around a sinister succubus who appears as the “perfect woman” at a bar, latching onto Joel, a divinity student who is questioning his beliefs. The sole writing and directing credit of former child star James Bond III (who also plays Joel), Def by Temptation became a cult hit thanks to what the Washington Post calls a “depth and emotional detail generally absent from such films.”

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A rock band’s efforts to conjure up a demon using a virgin sacrifice (because that’s what rock bands do, right?) goes awry in this bawdy 2009 horror comedy written by Diablo Cody and directed by Karyn Kusama. Megan Fox plays the would-be sacrifice, Jennifer, who instead gets possessed by the demon and begins to wreak havoc, especially with some of her male classmates, much to the consternation of her bookish best friend, Needy, played by Amanda Seyfried. 

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Originally created by legendary manga artist Junji Ito, Tomie has not only starred in one of his most popular series, but has also gone on to form the central figure in a nine-movie film sequence. The unexplained Tomie is not exactly a succubus in the traditional sense—in fact, the series never makes clear exactly what she is—but she always appears as a beautiful woman who makes those around her fall in love with her. Their desire to possess her eventually becomes a desire to kill her, but no matter what atrocity befalls her, Tomie cannot seem to die.

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In this weird western anthology film from 1990, one of the segments involves a man who helps out a young, seemingly pregnant woman he encounters. In what is essentially a Wild West version of those “beware of picking up hitchhikers” stories, the two are bedding down for the night when the man gets a whole lot more than he bargained for as the woman literally absorbs his body into hers during the act, explaining why she appeared pregnant in the first place. She was actually digesting.

The popular Canadian TV series—which aired on the Syfy Channel in the United States—follows the adventures and misadventures of Bo (Anna Silk), a bisexual succubus who struggles to master her supernatural abilities and the drawbacks that come with them, while using her powers to help those in need. While far from the only iteration of a “white hat” succubus story, it is certainly one of the most enduring, with five seasons and a loyal fanbase.

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In this episode of the classic TV series, Kolchak runs up against a succubus who is attached to a Mesopotamian clay tablet. This succubus works a little differently than many of the others, existing mainly as a disembodied spirit who possesses the bodies of recently dead women and proceeds to come onto men on a college campus, only to end up scaring them to death.