Art The Clown’s Origin, Powers & Victims In The Terrifier Movies Explained

Although the Terrifier movies initially revealed little about Art the Clown, Terrifier 3 finally clarified the slasher villain’s mysterious origins, motives, and powers. 2024’s slasher sequel Terrifier 3 saw David Howard Thornton’s Art the Clown land on cinema screens across the globe for the first time. 2022’s Terrifier 2 was an unlikely phenomenon, with the slasher sequel’s limited release earning over $15 million on a budget of only $250,000. The budget for 2016’s Terrifier was even smaller, while Art the Clown’s earlier feature film appearance came in All Hallow’s Eve, a horror anthology movie from 2013.

Although Terrifier 3’s reviews are broadly positive, they understandably warned prospective viewers that the franchise’s latest installment kept two franchise traditions alive. Art the Clown was as terrifyingly violent as ever, coming up with increasingly invented, convoluted, and gruesome ways to dismember his victims, and Terrifier 3 was also still almost as opaque as its predecessors when it came to the franchise’s lore. The Terrifier movies refused to clarify much about his origins and powers and most details could only be gleaned by researching Art the Clown’s on-screen misadventures. Fortunately, Terrifier 3‘s ending changed this slightly.

Terrifier 3 Confirmed Art The Clown Is A Demon

A Reference To The Ninth Circle Clarified Art’s Villainous Status

After the franchise’s first two movies skirted around the topic, Terrifier 3 confirmed that Art the Clown is a demon with a meta-reference to Leone’s original short film. After Terrifier 3’s many brutal kills, Art the Clown is almost destroyed when Sienna pins him to a wall with her magic sword. However, he recovers enough to remove himself from the wall and escape to a nearby bus stop, where he boards a quiet bus. The lone other passenger is reading a book titled The Ninth Circle, an obvious nod to Leone’s aforementioned short film. This awakens an ailing Art.

Art appears to come back to life, much as he did at the end of Terrifier 2, so he can continue his spree of bloodletting and demonic possession. In the original Terrifier, he seemed shocked by his own resurrection after he brutally disfigured Vicky. In Terrifier 2, he was accompanied by a seemingly demonic presence, the Little Pale Girl, who appeared to be an earlier victim of the clown. Terrifier 3’s new villain Vicky handily explained how these events were linked when she told Sienna that she would possess her once she abandoned all hope, just as Vicky had done.

Art The Clown’s Origin In Terrifier Explained

Art The Clown’s Movies Never Fully Explained Where He Comes From

Unlike most slasher villains, Art the Clown has no canonical backstory. He first appeared in 2008’s short film “The 9th Circle,” directed by Terrifier’s eventual helmer, Damian Leone. In this anomaly within the character’s canon, Art the Clown was only an accomplice to a greater villain, namely the Devil himself. Art abducts a woman from a train station and serves her to Satan as a sacrifice, but it is unclear whether he is a human in clown makeup doing the devil’s dirty work or some kind of demon.

Terrifier 3 finally confirms that this remains Art’s role and he is, in fact, a demon. A glimpse of his glowing eyes makes Art the Clown seem like Pennywise in “The 9th Circle”’s ending, and his next short film appearance reinforces this interpretation. In 2011’s short film “Terrifier,” Art stalks and murders another female victim, utilizing impossible teleportation throughout the movie’s story as well as super strength. This backs up the idea that Art is a demon rather than an ordinary human, and All Hallow’s Eve sees him somehow emerge from a television set into reality.

Although the subsequent Terrifier movies sidestepped these explicitly supernatural elements and depicted a more human Art, Terrifier 3‘s ending proves he is a demon.

Art The Clown’s Powers & Abilities In Terrifier

Art The Clown Is Inhumanly Strong And Effectively Immortal

While Terrifier 3’s story confirmed Art’s demonic status, Terrifier and Terrifier 2 already clarified that Art was super strong and effectively immortal, albeit not necessarily capable of shapeshifting, possession, teleportation, or other supernatural feats. This was open to debate, as Art’s presence does seem to drive some people to violence, like his victim Victoria, while his image haunts others until their sanity breaks down, as was the case with Sienna’s father before Terrifer 2 takes place. However, in terms of what viewers actually see depicted on-screen, the Terrifier franchise’s version of Art the Clown remains less openly magical.

Compared to the version of the villain seen in his short films, Terrifier and Terrifier 2’s Art the Clown is at least close to human, although Terrifier 3‘s villain is more magical.. He feels pain when shot or stabbed and injuries temporarily hold him up. However, he is inhumanly powerful, crushing human skulls with his foot and tearing people limb from limb with his bare hands.

Notably, he appears to be surprised when he resurrects after taking his own life in Terrifier’s ending. This means the ending might be Art the Clown’s first resurrection. His second occurs in Terrifier 2’s ending, after his decapitation.

Art The Clown’s Motive In The Terrifier Movies Explained

Art the Clown Seemingly Never Stopped Recruiting Lost Souls For Satan

Despite how indirect his killings are as a method of achieving this goal, Art the Clown appears to be collecting souls for Satan in the Terrifier movies. In “The Ninth Circle,” he provided the Devil with a direct sacrifice whereas, throughout the Terrifier movies, he uses murder to claim souls less directly. Art deprives victims like Vicky, the Little Pale Girl, and Sienna of all hope so that he can then turn them into vectors for demons. This is reaffirmed when Vicky’s corpse melts in Terrifier 3’s ending, opening up a pit into Hell that swallows Gabbie.

It still isn’t clear how exactly Art the Clown’s plans work, since he appears to kill many more victims than he drives to despondency. He might only be able to use one victim as a vessel at a time, as implied by the Little Pale Girl possessing Vicky and Vicky subsequently trying to possess Sienna.

However, this leads to the question of why Art also commits so many extra murders that aren’t necessarily part of this plan. The answer might be that, by spreading misery and wanton cruelty throughout the world, Art deprives survivors of hope and leaves them vulnerable to demonic possession.

Art The Clown’s Main Victims In The Movies

Art The Clown Notably Killed Tara, Dawn, Allie, And Barbara

Art is revived by his asylum-bound former victim Victoria, who gives birth to his disembodied head in Terrifier 2’s wild twist ending. Victoria is one of Art’s many, many victims throughout his movie appearances. In All Hallow’s Eve, Art escapes the cursed videotape the main characters watch, enters their framing device story, and brutally slays two small children. In 2016’s Terrifier, he kills the movie’s apparent Final Girl Tara, her friend Dawn, a lonely vagrant the movie dubs “Cat Lady,” two exterminators, and a pizzeria owner. Art’s kill count is even worse again in Terrifier 2.

This sequel ups the ante, providing viewers with Art’s most shocking outing yet. Art the Clown kills nine people onscreen in Terrifier 2, not counting the Clown Café patrons he mows down indiscriminately in Sienna’s disturbing dream sequence. Almost inevitably, Terrifier 3’s story features even nastier deaths, but Terrifier 2’s most notably extreme shocks include Allie’s death, which is dragged out for far longer than expected and includes Art literally pouring salt on her wounds. The coroner’s brutal demise is similarly violent, while the death of Sienna’s friend Brooke is the sequel’s other notably intense sequence.

The next sequel’s most memorable deaths include the shower-set double murder of Cole and Mia and Terrifier 3’s opening scene, wherein Art murders an entire family in their home on Christmas Eve. Notably, the death of the family’s young daughter is left off-screen, and it is possible Art spared her. It is almost inconceivable that the character would have done this out of the goodness of his heart, but it would fit his demonic modus operandi. Like the Little Pale Girl and Vicky, this lonely, traumatized child could become a perfect vector for demons.

Who Plays Art The Clown In Terrifier

David Howard Thornton Plays The Terrifier Franchise’s Villain

In “The 9th Circle” and All Hallow’s Eve, Art the Clown is played by Leone’s friend Mike Giannelli. In the Terrifier movies, the role went to former mime David Howard Thornton. Ironically, Thornton was primarily a voice actor before he scored the role, and his training as a mime shaped the villain’s unique on-screen persona. Thornton also played a murderous version of the Grinch in 2022’s The Mean One, a Yuletide slasher that parodied the Dr. Seuss classic. While Thornton has appeared in other movies, Terrifier’s Art the Clown remains the actor’s most recognizable role to date.

Thorton also appeared as Art the Clown in comedian Pete Davidson’s Peacock series Bupkis, and he will play a murderous version of Steamboat Willie in 2025’s upcoming slasher movie Screamboat. Thornton’s work as Art the Clown has made him famous among horror viewers, and the actor reprised the role in the 2024 music video “A Work of Art” by the band Ice Nine Kills. Before he found fame in the horror franchise, Thornton played voice roles in video games like Ride to Hell: Retribution and Invizimals: The Lost Kingdom. Now, Terrifier’s Art the Clown is his signature role.

Art’s Powers Aren’t What Makes Him So Scary

Art’s Outlook On Violence Has Made Him A Horror Icon

While Terrifier 3 helped to add more context to Art the Clown’s powers, the fact that the character had already established himself as a modern horror icon proves that these powers were not what made him so scary. Giving Art this immortal aspect certainly makes him formidable and along the same lines as long-standing horror villains like Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger. However, the truly terrifying aspect of Art the Clown is his view of violence.

Art the Clown is one of the most brutal horror movie villains of all time. The gruesome and drawn-out ways he tortures and kills his victims have become legendary already. However, it is not just the brutality of his murders, but the glee Art takes in them that is so unsettling. The images of him silently laughing as his victims scream in pain show that there is little malice in his actions and he is simply evil because he enjoys it. Even without his immortality, such behavior makes it clear the Terrifier 3 villain cannot be reasoned with.

Director

Damien Leone

Release Date

March 15, 2018

Studio(s)

Epic Pictures Group

Writers

Damien Leone

Cast

David Howard Thornton
, Jenna Kanell
, Samantha Scaffidi
, Catherine Corcoran

Runtime

86 Minutes

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