Ari Aster’s Hereditary transforms the concept of family demons into something simultaneously literal and deeply unsettling on an existential level, crafting a horror masterpiece that weaponizes grief as both psychological torment and supernatural gateway. Rather than relying solely on jump scares or gore, the film excavates the terrifying possibility that our most profound vulnerabilities—the raw wounds left by loss, mental illness, and family dysfunction—can become conduits for malevolent forces beyond human comprehension. Aster originally envisioned a film rooted in family dynamics, trauma, and grief, then layered supernatural horror onto this foundation, creating a narrative where the horror serves as metaphor both for grief and emerging psychosis.
The cult and demon featured in the movie, Paimon, are based on a controversial grimoire called The Goetia: The Lesser Key of Solomon the King, lending historical weight to what could have been mere fictional horror. The true origin of King Paimon predates much of Christianity, establishing the demon as an ancient force that has manipulated human suffering across millennia. This scholarly grounding amplifies the film’s central conceit: that the Graham family’s tragedy represents not an isolated supernatural incident, but the culmination of a multi-generational conspiracy that exploits the most fundamental human experiences of loss, mental illness, and family loyalty. By anchoring fantastical elements in both historical demonology and recognizable family trauma, Hereditary achieves a rare synthesis of intellectual horror and visceral terror.
Grief and a Sinister Inheritance
After years of battling illness, Ellen Taper Leigh (Pat Barnett Carr) passes away at her daughter’s home. Her death leaves the family—particularly her daughter Annie Graham (Toni Collette), who lives with her husband Steve (Gabriel Byrne) and their two children, Peter (Alex Wolff) and Charlie (Milly Shapiro)—to confront not only grief but also a dark legacy Annie had long tried to escape. Steve rouses Peter from his bedroom and Charlie from her treehouse to get them ready for their grandmother Ellen’s funeral. The service proceeds solemnly, with Annie delivering the eulogy.
After the speeches conclude, Charlie is eating chocolate, which alarms her father Steve. He’s terrified it might contain nuts, since Charlie has a severe nut allergy that can trigger dangerous asthma attacks. They return home and settle in for the evening, but their peace proves short-lived. Annie continues working on her intricate miniature art projects before deciding to head to bed. She accidentally discovers some of her late mother’s belongings, including a spiritual book filled with strange messages addressed to her. These cryptic messages hint at Ellen’s involvement in occult practices, though Annie cannot yet grasp their significance.
Unsure what to make of these messages, Annie feels unsettled and decides to simply go to sleep. As she turns off the lights, grandmother Ellen’s ghostly figure suddenly appears, then vanishes—the first clear sign that Ellen’s death has not severed her influence over the family. Meanwhile, both children begin exhibiting disturbing behavior suggesting supernatural interference. Peter, easily distracted and struggling to stay engaged, spends his time texting friends about an upcoming party rather than listening to the lesson. When the teacher calls on him, Peter fumbles for an answer and is scolded for not paying attention.
Like her brother, Charlie abandons her schoolwork to become absorbed in her toys. During recess, she discovers a dead bird and severs its head with the scissors she always carries. She then notices a strange woman waving at her from the distance, though this mysterious figure’s identity remains unclear. Back home, Annie experiences another supernatural occurrence: her deceased mother’s bedroom door stands open.
Constantly haunted by her mother’s spirit and unable to find peace, Annie joins a support group, convinced that her experiences are psychological. There, Annie opens up about her dysfunctional family history. Her father suffered from psychotic depression and starved himself to death; her brother committed suicide at sixteen, likely due to schizophrenia. Annie hopes similar tragedies won’t befall her own children, unaware they are already marked for a far worse fate.
A Fateful Party Ends Tragically
The supernatural manifestations escalate the next morning when Charlie sees a light while playing in her room and follows it outside to find its source. She discovers her grandmother Ellen seated within a ring of fire, apparently performing some ritual. Annie comes running and pulls Charlie back into the house, but the family’s troubles are far from over. Soon after, Peter asks Annie’s permission to attend a party that night. Worried that her son might get drunk and make poor choices, she insists Peter take Charlie along, hoping this will bring him home earlier.
At the party, Peter approaches a girl who interests him and offers to share marijuana with her. Since Charlie keeps following him around, he tells her to eat cake, hoping this will occupy her. Unfortunately, the cake contains nuts, putting Charlie at risk of an asthma attack and anaphylactic shock due to her severe allergy. When Charlie complains of breathing difficulties, Peter immediately takes his sister home. During the drive back, Charlie struggles as her airways swell, desperately gasping for air with her head stuck out the car window.
Peter suddenly swerves after spotting a dead deer in the road, and Charlie’s head, hanging out the window, is severed when it strikes a telephone pole. The catastrophe devastates Peter, who believes he caused his sister’s death through negligence and poor judgment. Shocked and confused, Peter finally returns home without telling his parents what happened.
The next morning, Peter hears his mother screaming and crying when she discovers Charlie’s headless body still in the car. They quickly bury her without pressing Peter to explain Charlie’s death. From that moment on, the relationship between Peter and his mother becomes strained; they barely speak to each other. Unable to accept Charlie’s death, Peter often dissociates and zones out, while Annie frequently sleeps in the treehouse where Charlie used to play, trying to maintain connection with her lost daughter.
Seeking Comfort Through the Occult
One evening after Annie finishes her support group meeting, a woman named Joan (Ann Dowd) approaches her, expressing sympathy for her situation and noting the pain of losing both mother and daughter so close together. Joan gives Annie her address in case she needs someone to talk to or seeks relief from her grief. When Annie visits Joan’s home hoping to find comfort, she is surprised to see a mat similar to one her mother Ellen used, though she does not yet realize its significance. Once inside, Annie pours out her grief to Joan, who appears sympathetic while secretly manipulating her emotions to make her more receptive to occult practices.
Family tension reaches a breaking point during dinner when Peter and Annie sit in complete silence until Annie can no longer hold back and unleashes her frustration, blaming Peter for Charlie’s death. Peter, refusing to accept all blame, defends himself by saying that if his mother hadn’t forced Charlie to attend the party, perhaps none of this would have happened.
The next day, when Annie finishes shopping at the supermarket, she encounters Joan again. Joan mentions having just met with a psychic who can communicate with the deceased. Annie is invited to Joan’s house and shown how to summon spirits through a seance ritual. Frightened by the spirit-summoning ritual, Annie asks to stop and demands to go home immediately. Joan gives her paper with incantation words and a candle for the ritual, hoping this will heal Annie’s longing for Charlie.
That night, Annie experiences a terrifying nightmare in which she sees a swarm of ants marching toward Peter’s room, finding him covered by countless ants and apparently dead from their attack. This prophetic dream hints at Peter’s role as the intended vessel for demonic possession. The next morning, Annie immediately wakes Steve and Peter, brings them downstairs, and invites them both to perform a spirit-summoning ritual according to Joan’s instructions.
Explore More:
Using only a candle and holding hands, Annie begins reading her incantation, and Charlie’s spirit appears. Annie briefly becomes possessed by Charlie’s spirit, which frightens Peter and makes him beg his mother to end the ritual. Steve, unable to bear it any longer, pours water on his wife to snap her out of the possession. The scene then reveals a miniature recreation of Charlie’s accident that Annie has unconsciously created and writing on the wall reading “Liftoach Pandemonium”—Hebrew for “Open, gate of hell”—though its significance remains unclear to the family.
Uncovering Joan’s Deceptive Manipulation
The next day at school, Peter sees a light similar to what Charlie once saw, then sees his own reflection smiling at him in the classroom window. At home, Annie works on miniatures depicting her family’s life when she suddenly destroys her work due to mounting stress. Of everyone in the family, only Steve remains sane and free from strange disturbances, making him the voice of reason amid increasing chaos.
However, supernatural phenomena intensify when Charlie’s sketchbook suddenly begins drawing by itself, creating images that seem to predict future events. Just as this happens, Peter sees Charlie’s apparition in the corner of his room. Peter then feels as though invisible hands are strangling him. When he wakes up, Peter suspects his mother’s involvement, but she has only just arrived after hearing his screams.
Annie then returns to Charlie’s room and finds a drawing of Peter’s face with crosses scratched over his eyes. Fearing this connects to Peter’s experience, Annie intends to burn the sketchbook, but when the book starts burning, she realizes that burning it somehow burns her own body as well. She doesn’t burn it completely, then realizes all strange occurrences began after they performed the spirit-summoning ritual.
Annie rushes to Joan’s house but finds no one there except a table full of ritual equipment with Peter’s photo as the ritual’s subject—revealing that Joan has been manipulating the family for occult purposes. Annie begins to realize that Joan’s mat was indeed identical to the one her late mother used. Annie hurries home and examines her mother’s belongings more carefully. The mat Joan used proves identical to her mother’s. Annie also finds a book bearing the same symbol as her necklace, and her late mother’s necklace displays the same symbol that marked the telephone pole that killed Charlie.
Discovering the King Paimon Cult
This symbol is the emblem of King Paimon, a powerful demon who is one of the great kings of Hell. King Paimon is one of Lucifer’s most obedient servants and one of seventy-two demons described in classical demonology texts. According to these texts, King Paimon appears as a human-looking entity who wears a great crown and rides a dromedary. A host of ghouls playing trumpets and roaring demons precede him, heralding his arrival. His face appears feminine, while his body and persona remain masculine.
The text explains that demon king Paimon wishes to inhabit a male host’s body, desiring a male human body as his new dwelling place. His worshippers want him to manifest in the mortal world so he can make them wealthy and knowledgeable. Annie also finds her mother’s photo album containing many cult followers, one of whom is Joan. This reveals that Ellen, her late mother, was the leader of a devil-worshipping cult dedicated to summoning King Paimon into the physical world.
At that exact moment, Steve receives an email showing a photo of Ellen’s vandalized grave, her body stolen by cult members for ritual purposes. Annie, in another room, suddenly smells a foul odor coming from the attic and ventures up to investigate. In the attic, Annie finds Ellen’s rotting, headless corpse and occultist runes drawn in blood.
The focus shifts to Peter, who is at school in an increasingly confused state when Joan suddenly confronts him, shouting incantations. While Peter stands outside his school, Joan appears and begins the final phase of the possession ritual. Whatever spell Joan has cast causes Peter to feel something strange happening to his body. This occurs while he’s in class, where his facial muscles suddenly contort uncontrollably—a sign that demonic possession is beginning. His father is then called by his teacher to pick Peter up from school.
Once home, Peter is immediately told to rest in his room while Annie approaches Steve, explaining that she found her mother’s headless corpse in the attic. Steve suspects Annie herself might have done it, since she often goes out at night, supposedly to attend support group meetings. Annie shows her mother’s photo album containing cult followers and explains about Charlie’s sketchbook that she tried to burn but ended up burning herself instead.
The Ritual’s Violent Final Climax
Since Steve doesn’t believe her, Annie immediately proves it by burning the book again, and suddenly Steve’s body catches fire as the supernatural connection between book and physical reality manifests. In the chaos, Annie becomes possessed by King Paimon. Upstairs, Peter wakes up confused about what’s happening downstairs. Without realizing it, Annie clings to the corner of his room’s ceiling, defying gravity. She slips away when Peter turns his attention elsewhere.
Peter then goes downstairs and finds his father’s body already charred. Unaware that Annie now clings to the ceiling above him like a spider, he turns around and notices a naked cultist smiling at him. When he looks back toward the ceiling, Annie charges at him with inhuman movement. Peter hides in the attic and finds several candles surrounding his grandmother’s remains, which have been arranged for the final ritual with his photo at the center.
Before long, Peter looks up and sees his mother sawing through her own neck with a hacksaw. Possessed Annie decapitates herself to release Paimon’s spirit. Horrified and desperate to escape, Peter jumps from the attic window. Paimon’s spirit then possesses Peter as he lies broken from the fall, and he is finally overtaken by light as King Paimon takes residence in his new male host body.
Shortly after King Paimon takes residence in Peter’s body, Annie—now headless like her mother Ellen and daughter Charlie—floats into the treehouse where Charlie used to play. Peter, now fully possessed, follows her. Along the way, he passes naked cult members prostrating themselves as if welcoming their King’s arrival in his new body.
Inside the treehouse, Peter is greeted by his prostrate followers. A wooden doll with Charlie’s severed head attached reveals she was always intended as part of the ritual. Peter is crowned with gold as a sign that their King has been successfully summoned into the world. King Paimon, the demonic source of horror that befalls the family in Hereditary, has basis in reality, drawn from centuries-old demonology texts describing him as a force predating much of Christianity. The film ends with the chilling suggestion that this family’s tragedy marks only the beginning of a far greater supernatural catastrophe.
