Many horror films from the 1970s and 1980s featured sex as a means of summoning demonic forces, but few of them featured physical pleasure as a central subject. Clive Barker introduced the world to demonic asexual creatures who were so horrifically cursed and changed that they were anything but human in his 1986 novella The Hellbound Heart.
He was ambiguous in his portrayal of the Cenobites in this book, leaving them open to interpretation, though he soon expanded on their backstories. Cenobites worship Leviathan, the deity of flesh and pleasure, and they regard flesh as a work of art to be worked on in order to create works of art.
They exist to serve and protect their master’s labyrinth, which is indisputably comparable to hell. These demonic energies would also change deserving residents of hell into Cenobites, with the process occurring on Earth at times.
The lead Cenobite and top priest Pinhead became a cult favourite almost as soon as the first book was made into a film. Doug Bradley was praised for his outstanding performance as the beast, and his makeup and design were both alluring and horrifying.
Barker directed the film, which was released in 1987 under the title Hellraiser and on a budget of only $900,000. The film went on to become a huge smash with both fans and critics, and the rest is history, as they say. We’ll expose you to some of the lesser-known yet horrifyingly terrifying Cenobites that were never featured in the movies in this video.
Sculptress
Sculptress is a stunning bald woman with light white complexion who wears a dark green off-shoulder dress. She’ll carve your corpse into one of her maquettes and retain the pieces for her human-body art collection. She dresses in skin-baring outfits and possesses razor-sharp knives for nails.
Her real name is unknown, but her profession has given her this fictitious moniker. One of her stories is the greatest way to depict this seductively lethal Cenobite. The Sculptress worked on bodies to shape flesh into weird artwork, and the bodies were delivered to her by The Delivery Man, a cenobite who was also her love interest but sadly lacked lips.
A young masochist man solved the Lemarchand’s box puzzle and was taken by The Delivery Man to The Sculptress. He started falling in love with her as she severed his body into two halves, and she cut out a heart-shaped chunk of flesh from his body. She would address him as ‘My Sweet’, and the more she’d torture him, the more he’d love her.
Until one day, he saw the Delivery Man and the Sculptress have sex. To make him feel worse, she cut out his lips and gave him to the lipless Delivery Man so that he could kiss her. While he derived immense pleasure from physical torture, the psychological torture was worse than any pain he had experienced.
The Seductress is a unique cenobite who doesn’t just rely on physical torture; she can inflict acute mental suffering when required. This tempting masseuse of torture has unparalleled devotion for her work, and she understands the intricate bond between pain and pleasure.
We think her sadist tendencies are a result of the fact that she sees her victims as objects or raw material for her creation and nothing more. Even when she addresses them with sweet names, she means only trauma and suffering. A true hedonist!
Clown
The Clown began his career as the host of the Mr. Winky Dink Show, a children’s television show about a cartoon and its pet. He was then transported to hell to amuse children whose souls were too pure to be damned. The stunts he did, on the other hand, were plainly not intended for children’s viewing, and hell doesn’t have a rating or censorship system.
In a manner, the youngsters would be terrified to death! He once did the well-known trick of retrieving a rabbit from his hat, but this display of compassion infuriated Leviathan, the god of desire and flesh, who proceeded to rip open the Clown’s stomach and remove his guts.
The Clown, it’s safe to say, has learnt his lesson. He is of the few cenobites to have two faces, one of which is a pale yellowish colour, with empty eyes and a bald head. He has scars of deep cuts in his stomach and chest, which were probably the result of Leviathan’s anger. His forehead is lined with nails that hold together what can only be described as patches of skin. And of course, his lips have been stretched to give him an eternal smile.
Underneath this face lies his real face, the visage of an old and tired man with green hair. The Clown was a pseudo cenobite, transformed into a pure cenobite much later. Pseudo cenobites are the ones whose transformation was completed on Earth after their deaths. Clown’s savagery and cunning are celebrated in Mike Mignola’s Hellraiser tale Dead Things Rot.
In this narrative, the Clown dupes a person he’s tormenting into making an apparently beneficial agreement that turns unpleasant, and then he executes his own pet, Agathion, for demonstrating sympathy. He reveals what a ruthless beast he is with this move, but then again, we’re talking about cenobites! Their strongest characteristics aren’t their hearts or feelings.
Hunger
Hunger is a thin cenobite who enjoys collecting souls in the most violent and vicious methods possible. His character is spelt out in his name, and he is always looking for new ways to torture others. He has pale blue skin and is dressed in a spiked black leather outfit. His enormous head is out of proportion to his physique, with massive eyes and a swollen mouth full of razor-sharp fangs, a symbol of his predatory nature.
Hunger has remained a callous Cenobite who seeks anguish and pain throughout history. He is almost immortal, having boundless strength and the capacity to absorb massive damage. Furthermore, his knowledge of magic and the dark arts gives him an edge over his victims and enemies.
But wait, that’s not all! Hunger has the power of telekinesis too, and often makes deceitful trades with people who summon him. A group of Cenobites called Hunger’s Gash follow him around like minions and obey his commands to satiate his unyielding desires.
Hunger was introduced as a primary cenobite in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser #2 – The Vault, but has since appeared in more than ten issues. His most evil story remains a tale called Fire Trap, where he feeds a man named Byron to a monster that was created from the body parts of family members whom Byron had murdered.
This is just sick and twisted in ways we can notcomprehend. The irony here is too dark to make sense of with, but that’s how intelligently evil Hunger is. Cenobites are not famous for giving just rewards, only punishment, although there’s a bleak sense of justice in this story.
Abigor
All Cenobites are known to swear allegiance to Leviathan, but only a handful can match Pinhead’s level of devotion and adoration. Abigor is one Cenobite who displays such fielty, nearly to the point of devotion.
She is a dominatrix dressed in a short, revealing black leather attire that is both seductive and horrific. The complexion of this hot Cenobite is pale, and her hair is short and black. Her mouth is flanked on either side by a zipper, and her cranium is secured by thin blades. Her long, pointed nails are capable of penetrating the skin.
As for her history, not much is known; some claim that she was Cleopatra, the empress from ancient Egypt who was known to possess great intellect but also to use her sex appeal as a weapon to gain political advantage. Others claim her to be Helen of Troy, whose beauty was a gift from gods and whose face ‘launched a thousand ships.’
These historical identities don’t explain the zips on her face, which are a fairly recent invention in human history. Nevertheless, her historical background is not as important as her present character. Like other Cenobites, she has immense powers, including strength, resilience and proficiency in magic and the dark arts.
Her preferred weapon as a weapons master is a whip with hooks at the end. This fits her dominatrix personality, as she thrives on bondage, domination, and sadism. A human weapon cannot kill or even damage her; consequently, to harm her, one must use a cenobite weapon or a blessed weapon.
Abigor’s most remarkable gift is her capacity to attract men to the point that they willingly become her slaves. Quite a succubus here, folks! Some view her as the sister of the famous nun-turned-cenobite Female Cenobite.
However, this relationship was imagined by fans on the basis that the two Cenobites share a love of torture and punishment.Abigor is one mean Cenobite, and has appeared in works such asClive Barker’s Hellraiser #7: Devil’s Brigade. We’d definitely like to see her more in live-action projects though.
Grillard
Grillard, who first appeared in 1223 AD, is one of the most ancient Cenobites. But no one knows how long he’s been abducting souls and sending them to the depths of hell. Grillard’s gender remains a mystery, since his disproportionate form resembles that of a man on the one hand, but the monster has four huge uncovered breasts on the front region of its chest on the other.
The curving metal pin it wears on its nose is another feminine trait. Grillard’s bottom lip has been chained and nailed to two of its breasts, resulting in a damaged visage with the lower lip dangling down to its chest. Its head was once split but now has been stitched together. Its pale skin and lumpy body are covered in fragile-looking, torn, leathery clothes.
Making its first appearance in The Canons of Pain, which is the first story of issue #1 of Clive Barker’s Hellraiser, the creature was reintroduced in future issues. In 1223, Grillard took the soul of Count Carillion of France, and the next year he came to take the souls of Lady Carillion and her new husband, Monseigneur Robataille.
Grillard often comes with a Cenobite hound that terrorizes the victims. It can also summon spikes from hell to kill and crucify people. However, the creature also possesses the fascinating and scary power to reincarnate, and therefore was able to bring back the dead Count Carillion as Lady Carillion’s infant child with Monseigneur Robataille.
As a result, the monstrously hideous Cenobite has a few nefarious and terrible tricks under its sleeve. Grillard was rumoured to be the Cenobite who changed a nun into The Female Cenobite.
Face
Lon Chaney was an American actor in the first quarter of the twentieth century. He was regarded as the most varied and powerful actor of his day, specialising in portraying hideous, diseased, and suffering characters through the use of groundbreaking makeup and technique.
The Cenobite Face was inspired by this renowned actor: Lon Chaney was a stage actor who turned serial killer, according to comic book legend. He would kill people around him and peel off their faces so that he could wear them as masks and thu add quality to his performances.
Leviathan becomes interested in this face-peeling man and sends Pinhead to bring him to hell. Once there, Chaney is transformed into a skinless Cenobite who would wear masks made of people’s facial skin. He runs a theatre in hell too, where he shows plays centring around torment, pain, and suffering to his fellow residents.
His eternal wish to be an actor lived on even after his life ended. Face first appeared in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser #1 – The Canons Of Pain and has returned in a total of twenty-two issues. He is said to control the thoughts of both the living and the dead, sometimes through possession, in addition to possessing superhuman strength and resilience.
When he participates in a show, he staples a variety of face masks made of other people’s skin to his face. He even claims to have a mask for every situation and performance. Face, we believe, is a metaphor for someone’s obsession with their work. After all, why not? Many people have committed crimes in order to achieve artistic brilliance.
Spike
Spike was meant to appear in both Hellraiser: Hellworld and Hellraiser: Deader, but he was deleted from the final versions. Cenobite Spike, both as a cenobite and as a living person, is a terrible character.
e worked as a railroad worker during the day and was well-liked by his coworkers. But as the day set and darkness fell, he let his cruel and sexual impulses out through forced intercourse with young or underaged girls.
He would sometimes employ prickly things for penetration, and his victim’s screams and suffering would satisfy him. He came discovered a Lament Configuration one day and solved it, only to call Pinhead as a result. Pinhead then took him to hell, where The Engineers transformed him into a cenobite by impaling his head with a large pointy spike.
After his transformation, he lost his eyes, nose, and mouth. Yet, he can still move around and claim his victims without any external help. We believe that when he became a Cenobite, his human senses were traded for celestial ones.
His cracked skull is covered with a helmet, and he wears a black leather suit, similar to the one worn by the Hell Priest Pinhead himself. The Engineers probably peeled the skin off his face and pulled it back using metal bearings. The large golden spike left him bereft of the human sensations he so obsessively sought when he was alive.
Even the faculty of speech was taken away because he had no mouth or tongue to speak with. This, we believe, was a direct mirror of the suffering he inflicted on the young girls he assaulted. Spike is a fantastic work of fiction, so the terror he would elicit in a live-action film would be enormous.
Merkova
Merkova is one of the few Cenobites who has a lover: Pinhead, the Hell Priest. This angle was most likely incorporated to give the evil Cenobites a sense of relatability, something that viewers or readers could connect with regarding Pinhead’s character.
When the Cenobites aren’t tormenting souls, this also answers the question of what they’re up to. I mean, they can’t be ripping people apart all day, can they? That is tedious and monotonous. Merkova’s appearance is likewise distinctive. She is a stunning woman dressed in a provocative leather outfit, but her face tells a different narrative.
Stuck on where her nose and mouth should be is the skeleton of a horse’s snout, and she also has horse legs instead of human ones. Unlike most Cenobites, she has long hair styled in a mohawk, and her arms are covered in horsehair. Unfortunately, this interesting character didn’t thrive for very long in the Hellraiser universe.
Leviathan, the god of desire and flesh, was holding his sister, the goddess MorteMamme captive in an egg-shaped tomb, and so she summoned humans to fight the evil Cenobites and free her. Gifted with powers, these great warriors were called the Harrowers.
In retaliation, Leviathan ordered CenobiteThe General to create a team of six, to destroy the Harrowers. Merkova led this team, but was stabbed with a divine sword by Marty Sevenbirds, a member of the Harrowers team.
Pinhead saw his love succumb to her wound as Merkova vanished back to hell. He yanked the sword from her stomach, and she died in hell. Merkova is one of the rare Cenobites to die in hell, and her narrative exemplifies the irony of hell’s insistence on making you pay for your sins.
However, it begs the question of what occurs after you die in hell! Is there a separate hell for people who are too far gone to go to hell? Please let us know in the comments section.
Gehenna
The Hebrew Bible is the source of Gehenna’s spine-chilling and jaw-dropping story. Moloch was a bull-headed deity who people worshipped, and their primary religious activity was flinging infants into the flames, according to the book. Gehenna was a mediaeval Moloch worshipper who spent days sacrificing for his delight.
However, this heinous character had a sliver of compassion for his victims, so he would medicate the infants with medicines to keep them from feeling the pain. He couldn’t use the medications on him after witnessing others exposing his own infant to the same flaming sacrifice.
The child burnt with pain and agony and Gehenna tossed himself into the fire, burning to death until only his bones were left. He was taken to hell, where he remained bonded, and many years later, he was made into a Cenobite. After his conversion, he became a skeletal Cenobite with spikes on his head.
Like all Cenobites, he possesses heightened strength and resilience, but he is also able to generate flames from his bony hands. However, he is not immune to fire, which can be used to inflict pain and suffering upon him – hispower was also his weakness.
Gehenna was friends with Pinhead but probably suffered a fate worse than death at Pinhead’s hands because of a rebellion against Leviathan.Gehenna: Where Death Lives is a 2016 horror film directed by Hiroshi Katagiri, although the film is not related to CenobiteGehenna.
Alastor
Alastor’s tale is darker and more unsettling than that of many other Cenobites. He was once a humble man in rural Italy in love with a lovely girl named Chalkis. Despite her feelings for him, she turned him down when he ultimately proposed to her. He was taken aback and spied and pursued her, only to discover that her brother and father were frequently abusing her.
Alastor, angry, planned a nefarious scheme to save his damsel in danger. He would murder Chalkis’ brother, and she would later offer his body to her father as meat. The father choked to death when he realised he was devouring his son. All through his human-life Alastor wished to be one with his love, and he knew he would only achieve this after he and Chalkis committed horrific acts involving murder and cannibalism.
Later, Alastor would end up in hell and attracted Leviathan’s interest. Alastor was made into a Cenobite and he was eternally attached to Chalkis with a golden chain. After the conversion, he became an obese man with the same golden chains wrapped around his body, with his mouth stretched open by the chains.
Furthermore, he has a golden arrow gashed into his skull. Once transformed, Alastor coordinated a rebellion against fellow Cenobites and, by extension, Leviathan himself. Alastor’s Gash was the name given to this group, and Gehenna was a member of it. Pinhead was later commanded by Leviathan to bring Alastor to justice.
It’s debatable if Cenobites who rebel against their master should be considered good guys, but Alastor was undoubtedly the best of the worst.
The Ferryman
Harmon Taylor was a high-ranking member of the Ku Klux Klan he had a ship named the Dixie Shadow aboard which he would keep imprisoned persons of colour he had kidnapped.
These guys were matched against The Ferryman, a ferocious and cruel fighter who could crush skulls with his bare hands. Taylor discovered and solved a Lament Puzzle during one of his adventures. The Ferryman was somehow transported to hell and transformed into a Cenobite of the same name.
The Ferryman appears to be a giant muscled man with hooked chains around his body and two large metal hooks in his hands. Like other Cenobites, he has immense strength and power, however his history as a fighter and his giant physique give him an edge over the others.
The Ferryman serves in Hell’s Army and is a loyal servant to Leviathan. He’s known to have made an appearance in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser #13, “The Ferryman,” but we would love to see more of this horrific and beastly Cenobite.
Flagellum
The Flagellum is a pale blue Cenobite that is enormously obese and dresses in a little leather suit that causes lumps and tyres all over her body. Metal spikes in the shape of a crown are affixed to her head. She, like Pinhead, is a high priestess of hell. She was a virgin in her youth and until her death because she wanted to stay pure till she married.
But she was often rejected, and the long wait just heightened her sexual impulses. She’d have fits of hysterical masturbation and self-indulgence. Objects of the mortal world would not please her insatiable sexual hunger and she went on to use an exotic object called Obsidian Rhombus Phallus, which was made out of lava from a volcano.
This phallus would give her the first and last orgasm of her life, and it was so extreme and indulgent that she slowly succumbed to it and ended up in hell. Naturally, her extreme desires attracted Leviathan’s attention and she was turned into a powerful and important cenobite, who was not only the priestess but could also foresee events that would bring chaos and anarchy in hell.
The Flagellum was a champion of anthropomancy – theart of seeking knowledge of the future by reading other people’s intestines, especially young virgin girls or children. She could also levitate and would go into a deep meditative sleep in which she would dream of everything evil and diabolic.
Years of meditation had improved her psychic talents to the point where she was able to form a mental link with Leviathan itself, and Pinhead would only stir her up in times of great need or peril. We believe she is one of the most important Cenobites ever developed, and she would play a vital part in a live-action film starring her.
You’ve probably figured out that not all Cenobites were made out of a desire for masochistic or sadistic pleasures; a handful were the consequence of passion crimes. The seven deadly sins of pride, greed, anger, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth are also hinted to.
Regardless of their histories or personalities, one thing is certain: all of these terrible monsters will satisfy the desire of horror hounds for all eternity. Tell us how many of these 12 backstories you’ve heard before.