6 Spooky Urban Legends That Inspired Horror Movies
Urban legends have been told since long before movies were invented. The morbid and creepy themes in these stories have made them excellent fodder for the horror genre. Many spooky urban legends have inspired horror movies and other works of genre fiction.
The most famous urban legends are remarkably widespread. Everyone “knows” that evil serial candy poisoners kill kids on Halloween and that giant reptiles roam the sewers of New York City (or Paris in some versions of the tale).
Everyone has a friend of a friend who claims to have seen Bloody Mary in a mirror or who narrowly escaped the clutches of a maniac with a hook for a hand.
Urban legends aren’t literally true, but they help reveal the real fears, morals, and social habits of the cultures who spread them. Here are six spooky urban legends that inspired horror movies.
They are listed in alphabetical order. This isn’t intended as an exhaustive list of all the times these legends have been featured, but I’ve listed a number of examples for each.
Alligators in the Sewer
Kids living in a large city, usually New York, keep baby alligators as pets. They eventually grow bored and flush them down the toilet. The gators survive and lurk inside the vast urban sewer system, eventually growing to full size and attacking anyone who has the misfortune of encountering them.
Like many urban legends, this tale is about a hidden danger lurking just beneath the surface. It’s also about the perils of humanity’s attempts to control and domesticate nature. Its themes are similar to the ecohorror and aquatic horror subgenres.
This legend dates back to the early 20th century, when it was common to have baby gators as pets in some parts of the United States. According to the story, New York City has a substantial population of giant gators living under it.
There is no evidence for this. For one thing, the NYC sewers are an extremely unfriendly environment for alligators due to their cold temperatures, lack of sunlight, and minimal food supply. If alligators were stuck in those sewers, they’d be unlikely to last long.
Of course, horror filmmakers never let reality get in the way of a good story. The most famous adaptation of this urban legend is the 1980 thriller Alligator, which depicts a giant gator emerging from the sewer to terrorize New York City. It was followed by Alligator II: The Mutation (1991). Sewer Gators (2022) is another movie inspired by this legend.
Bloody Mary
Bloody Mary is a ghost or demon or witch (the story varies) who will appear if you stand in front of a mirror and repeat her name a certain number of times (usually three). She will then scream at, attack, or curse you for summoning her.
Bloody Mary has many different origin stories, but the common thread is that she was a young woman from long ago who was tragically killed and now seeks revenge.
The first widespread documentation of this legend occurred in the 1970s, although early versions of the story appear to date back much further. The specter may have been based on Queen Mary I of England.
The queen, a devout Catholic, was nicknamed “Bloody Mary” due to her penchant for burning Protestants at the stake. There are also myths about her bathing in the blood of her enemies.
This legend has long been popular among teenagers, especially girls. It has themes related to coming of age and puberty, as well as anxieties related to the supernatural and the unknown.
This is among the world’s most famous urban legends, so it’s no surprise that it has inspired horror filmmakers. The title character in the Candyman series is loosely based on her. There was a spate of low budget movies about her in the 2000s: Urban Legends: Bloody Mary (2005), Bloody Mary (2006), and The Legend of Bloody Mary (2008).
Sadly, we have yet to see a top notch film starring this character. I could see Eli Roth or Damien Leone making a fun gory adaptation.
The Calls Are Coming From Inside the House
A babysitter, typically a teenage girl, receives a series of disturbing calls. Each time, a mysterious man asks, “Have you checked the children?” She locks all the doors and calls the police. They trace the calls and discover that they’re coming from an upstairs bedroom. That’s right – the stalker has been in the house the entire time!
Fear of the unknown and hidden dangers are recurring themes in urban legends, and both obviously show up here. This legend is also about a seemingly safe place being invaded by malevolent forces. Urban violence and rising concerns about crime are likely what spawned this tale.
This was a fun twist back when it was new. The legend dates back to the 1960s. It has been used so often that it’s become a hackneyed cliche. It’s been satirized countless times, including in a Budweiser ad campaign.
The most famous movie adaption of this trope is in When A Stranger Calls (1979), which stars Carol Kane as the babysitter. This legend appears in both versions of When A Stranger Calls (the film was remade in 2006) and in the Black Christmas movies. It was also humorously referenced in the Stephen Graham Jones novel I Was a Teenage Slasher (2024).
The Hook
A young couple is making out in a car in a secluded lover’s lane when they hear an ominous report on the radio: a dangerous escaped mental patient with a hook for a hand has escaped and is on the loose. The couple considers staying, but they ultimately decide to flee.
Later, they discover the man’s hook latched onto their car’s door handle, indicating that they were on the verge of being attacked when they decided to leave. Like all urban legends, this one has several different versions, but that’s the gist of it.
The Hook is a cautionary tale for young lovers. They find a secluded place to fool around together, but almost lose their lives because of it. The implicit warning: don’t give into your desires – doing so could be a fatal mistake! This conservative morality was often featured in early American slasher movies, but is less common today.
This legend’s origin story is shrouded in mystery, but it appears to date back to the 1950s. Killers with hooks for hands appear in Candyman and I Know What You Did Last Summer. The original installment of the latter series specifically mentions this legend. Other movies that have featured it include Final Exam (1981) and Lover’s Lane (1999).
It also appears in the notorious short story collection Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (1981) – a book that was responsible for many childhood nightmares for young millennials, including me.
La Llorona
La Llorona (in English: the weeping woman) is best classified as a folktale, but I couldn’t resist including it in my spooky urban legends list. This ghostly story of a grieving spirit trying to find her lost children has a centuries-long history in Latin America. Today, the story is famous in Mexico and has become well known in parts of the United States.
There are multiple variants of the tale, but the main version is about a mother who drowns her children in a river due to her profound rage and despair after being abandoned by her husband. Overcome with guilt, she takes her own life and is doomed to spend eternity searching for the spirits of her kids.
Like The Hook, La Llorona is a cautionary tale. It has themes related to grief, regret, and despair. The implicit message of the story seems to be a warning to women not to marry the wrong man.
La Llorona has appeared in several movies, including The Curse of the Crying Woman (1961), La Llorona (2009), and The Curse of La Llorona (2019). She is often depicted as a villainous and vengeful specter. Some adaptations, like the 2009 film that I covered in my folk horror article, portray her in a more sympathetic light.
Poisoned Halloween Candy
Malicious psychopaths are planning to give kids poison candy (or apples with razor blades inside them) this Halloween. It happens somewhere every year. Always check your candy before you eat it, and definitely don’t bite into any apples!
This legend’s main theme is obvious – stranger danger! Don’t take candy (or anything else) from folks you don’t know. The man who killed Halloween and the Tylenol murders increased these fears, although legends of trick ‘r treat poisoners predate either of these events.
This simple and seemingly plausible urban legend has been told and believed by countless people for decades. There have been documented cases of kids who were poisoned by Halloween candy, but there is virtually no evidence for random poisonings.
The culprits inevitably turn out to be the kids’ parent(s) or hoaxes created by kids themselves. Despite this, trick or treating has experienced a decline in popularity in recent years. It has partially been replaced by the supposedly safer trunk or treating.
I covered this legend recently in my article about Halloween in the ’90s. The most famous film depiction is in Trick ‘r Treat (2007). The “razor blades in apples” version is depicted in a hospital scene in Halloween II (1981).
My Favorite Urban Legend Isn’t Here!
A guy (sometimes a cab driver) picks up a girl (usually an attractive young woman) from the side of the road. She asks him to please drive her home. On the way there, she vanishes into thin air. The confused man goes to the girl’s house and is told that that she doesn’t live there anymore – she’s been dead for years!
Have you heard this story? I bet you have. It’s the “vanishing hitchhiker” tale, and it’s just as famous as the urban legends above. The most notorious vanishing hitchhiker ghost is Resurrection Mary in Chicago.
This is my favorite urban legend. In fact, I originally included a hitchhiker ghost in my novel Ghost Town. Sadly, she was dropped when I concluded that she was superfluous to the story. This ghost may still appear in a future work.
To me, the vanishing hitchhiker is one of the best urban legends for film adaptation. Many movies have the “ghost who appears in the front of the car” variant, but few have the classic vanishing hitchhiker tale. I hope this legend gets a great movie, show, or novel adaptation someday.
