Is Art the Clown a demon? Terrifier 3 ‘9th Circle’ theory explained

Art the Clown is perhaps the most vicious slasher villain in the history of horror; a mute monster who inflicts unimaginable pain on all of his victims, especially those poor sods in Terrifier 3. He’s clearly a supernatural being, but is he a demon?

In the first Terrifier, Art the Clown ties a woman up, hangs her upside down, and cuts her in half, starting at the crotch and sawing all the way down to her forehead. In Terrifier 2, he brutalizes a teenage girl in her bedroom, reducing her to a lump of flesh and broken bone that’d make a Cenobite gag.

Terrifier 3 ups the ante: he bludgeons children and blows them up, chainsaws a man in half (starting at his butt), and shoves rats down a woman’s throat.

In other words, he’s a right nasty piece of work, easily eclipsing the brutality of his slasher brethren. But there’s something deeper going on with Art the Clown, and Damien Leone has already peeled back the truth of what he is.

Is Art the Clown a demon in the Terrifier movies?

Yes, Art the Clown is a demon – more specifically, he’s a serial killer resurrected by a demonic entity (perhaps Satan himself) who’s almost immortal.

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At the end of the first film, with Tara and Dawn dead, Vicky barely alive, and police officers holding him at gunpoint, Art shoots himself. Soon after he arrives at the morgue, he reanimates, kills the medical examiner, and escapes, before making his way to a laundromat – where he meets The Little Pale Girl.

In Leone’s words, she is “the embodiment of evil that has resurrected Art the Clown”, taking the form of one his earliest victims, Emily Crane, a 10-year-old girl he murdered at a carnival.

Bloody Disgusting

According to Terrifier 2’s director’s commentary, only three people could see the little girl: Art, Sienna, and her brother Jonathan, as they’ve both been cursed by the clown. The end of the film also saw Vicky possessed by the same entity, forcing her to give birth to Art’s head.

It’s unclear if the true big bad of the Terrifier movies is the Devil, and that’s who’s taken possession of Art – but it is a possibility. The 9th Circle, Leone’s first short repackaged into All Hallows’ Eve, introduced Art to the world. But, crucially, it also featured a cult and Satan himself, who captured and raped a young woman.

Terrifier 3 ‘The 9th Circle’ Easter egg

At the end of Terrifier 3, Art flees after Sienna nearly kills him. He boards a bus, and we see a passenger reading a book with a familiar title: The 9th Circle.

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As noted above, The 9th Circle was Leone’s debut short film and the first appearance of Art the Clown (portrayed by a different actor).

However, it’s not just a minor Easter egg. Its title is an obvious nod to Dante’s Inferno, Dante Alighieri’s legendary poem about an odyssey through the depths of Hell.

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There are nine levels of Hell, described as a “realm of those who have rejected spiritual values by yielding to bestial appetites or violence, or by perverting their human intellect to fraud or malice against their fellowmen.”

That sounds like Art the Clown, alright! Here’s the important bit: as you probably assumed, the ninth circle is the worst of the worst; the icy, eternal nadir of sin and punishment where Satan lurks. Art the Clown is the most diabolical serial killer to walk the Earth, so there’s a space reserved for him down there.

If Art is a demon, Sienna is God’s savior

As confirmed by Damien Leone, Sienna has been anointed by ‘the divine’ to fight Art and send him to Hell. Don’t think of her as Jesus, Noah, Moses, or another key Biblical figure – she’s a new savior, and defeating Art is her purpose.

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As explained by Leone, Terrifier 2’s Clown Cafe scene wasn’t just a dream sequence: it was a “divine test that manifests itself within Sienna’s subconscious… if she’s not courageous at the end and doesn’t decide to fight back against Art, then she will not be the one.”

When she reaches her hand into the cereal box, pulls out the sword, and uses it to deflect Art’s flamethrower, “that is the moment where the sword officially becomes baptized. It breaks into reality, and the sword is literally on fire.”

When Sienna plummets into a tank of water in Terrifier 2, that was by Satan’s design: it was her personal hell, torturing her soul in a state of never-ending drowning while her body remained in the coffin.

Bloody Disgusting

Terrifier 3 is even more overt, forcing Sienna to wear a crown of thorns and have her hands battered (aka, crucified), and she watches her cousin get dragged into a portal to Hell.

If Terrifier 4 commits to this idea, the stage could be set for a final face-off in Hell. “I know where the endzone is,” Leone told DiscussingFilm.

“I know what the end goal is for these characters and where Sienna and Art the Clown’s finale happens. It’s just a matter of finding out how many movies will it take me to get there.”

Can Art the Clown die?

So far, it seems like Art the Clown is effectively immortal. However, if Sienna can vanquish the demon that’s possessed Art, she could kill him.

In Terrifier 3, it’s made abundantly clear that Sienna’s connection to Art is supernatural; he was able to recover from being decapitated, just like Sienna’s hands healed despite Art battering them and her sword slicing her palms open when she tried to save her cousin.

If you didn’t pick up on the clues, Terrifier 3 is secretly the best Christian movie of 2024, and there have been hints that Art is a vessel for Satan himself, while Sienna represents a new, divine power.

The 20th verse of Revelation warns that, after a millennium in chains, Satan “will be released from his prison and go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth.” What if Art’s story in Terrifier is a loose interpretation of this eventuality? The Devil is loose, and Art is his host (just as God is one but also the Trinity) – and Sienna may be the only one who can defeat him.

For more coverage, find out why Terrifier 4 should be the final Art the Clown movie, when Terrifier 3 is leaving cinemas, why this is the most horrifying scene in Terrifier 3, and where you’ll be able to stream Terrifier 3. You can also check out our list of the best horror movies ever made.