Devil in the arts and popular culture
Film / TV episode Year Animation director/ studio Description
Hell 's Bells 1929 Walt Disney Company In this cartoon a demon named Hades gathers all devils to Hell for a wild party . His three-headed dog named Cerberus ( a character from Greek mythology ) also appears
Red Hot Mamma 1934 Fleischer Studios In this Betty Boop cartoon Betty enters the underworld where she sings Hell 's Bells ' for Satan and his minions and makes Hell literally freeze over
Pluto 's Judgement Day 1935 Walt Disney Company Pluto is send off to a Hell-like place where cats put him on trial and torture him for all the crimes he ever committed against cats . One cat wears a red robe and leads the proceedings , heavily implying that he is the Devil himself . At the end of the cartoon it turns out to have all been a dream
Sunday Go to Meetin ' Time 1936 Warner Bros. cartoons In this Merrie Melodies cartoon a black man , Nicodemus , dreams that he is sent off to Hell for stealing chickens . Once again Hell and the Devil are described as the Hades Court of Justice
Donald 's Better Self 1938 Walt Disney Company Donald Duck is guided by his good and evil conscience on his way to school . Both characters are represented as an angel and a demon who share a physical resemblance to him . At first Donald listens to the demon , but in the end the angel triumphs again
Fantasia 1940 Walt Disney Company In the segment Night on Bald Mountain set to the eponymous orchestral piece by Modest Mussorgsky a character intended to be Satan ( and indeed introduced as Satan in the introduction to the segment by Deems Taylor ) gathers all demons together for a Black Mass . To avoid offending Christian viewers the character was later officially named after Chernobog , from Slavic mythology
Donald 's Decision 1942 Walt Disney Company In this World War Two propaganda cartoon Donald Duck is guided by his good and evil conscience in his choice of buying war bonds . The cartoon re-uses footage in some scenes from the 1938 short Donald 's Better Self
Heavenly Puss 1949 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio In this Tom & Jerry short Tom will be sent to Hell if he does not manage to make Jerry sign a certificate of forgiveness . The Devil in this cartoon is depicted as Spike the Bulldog . In the end everything turns out to have been a dream
Satan 's Waitin ' 1954 Warner Bros. Cartoons In this Tweety and Sylvester cartoon a Satanic bulldog , hoping to acquire the cat 's nine lives , goads Sylvester the Cat into chasing his prey , Tweety , into a number of violent situations
The Hole Idea 1955 Warner Bros. Cartoons In this Looney Tunes cartoon , Calvin Q. Calculus , a scientist with a nagging wife , invents portable holes . At the end of the cartoon he throws her into one of them , causing her to end up in Hell . Satan then throws her back and replies : Is n't it bad enough down here without her ?
Devil 's Feud Cake 1963 Warner Bros. Cartoons A Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam short in which Yosemite is sent off to Hell . There Satan gives Sam several opportunities to bring Bugs to Hell , in exchange for Sam 's own soul
The Adventures of Mark Twain 1985 Will Vinton One segment of the film , based on Mark Twain 's short story The Mysterious Stranger , has the protagonists meet an angel who introduces himself as Satan . He has the children create a little city with people from clay , which he then brings to life and eventually destroys again
Bart Gets Hit by a Car 1991 The Simpsons At the start of the episode Bart falls into a coma and dreams he has died . As he goes up on the Heavenly escalator he spits over the side , despite being told not to do so and as a result is send off to Hell . There he is greeted by the Devil who eventually sends him back to Earth after a quick computer check which learns him that Bart has entered Hell too early in his life . This version of the Devil depicts him in the traditional way , as a goat-like character with a pitchfork . He would return in brief cameos in the episodes Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment ( 1991 ) and Rosebud ( 1993 )
Treehouse of Horror IV 1993 The Simpsons In the first segment , The Devil and Homer Simpson , Homer sells his soul for a donut to the Devil , who is revealed to be his Christian neighbour Ned Flanders , since it 's always the one you least suspect
The Devil 1993 The Nightmare Before Christmas The Devil is one of the residents of Halloween Town , unlike other demons , this version was depicted as a hero
The Red Guy 1997-1999 Cow and Chicken The Red Guy is the recurring antagonist in the series . He is a red demon who often tries to trick the main protagonists
Satan 1998 South Park Satan is a recurring character in the series and made his first appearance in the episode Damien . Several episodes and the 1999 film adaptation , South Park : Bigger , Longer & Uncut ( 1999 ) , depict him as a sensitive and emotionally vulnerable person
The Robot Devil 1999 Futurama In the episode Hell Is Other Robots ( 1999 ) it turns out there is a Robot Hell in New Jersey , where the Robot Devil resides . He would become a recurring character in several other episodes , playing major roles in the episodes The Devil 's Hands Are Idle Playthings ( 2003 ) and Ghost in the Machines ( 2011 )
The Devil 1999 The God & Devil Show The Devil was a recurring character in this Adobe Flash Internet cartoon series and was depicted as a promiscuous woman
The Devil 2000 God , the Devil and Bob An animated sitcom which was prematurely cancelled after offending too many religious viewers . In the series God ( depicted as a hippie ) and the Devil make a bet over whether Earth is worth saving . The Devil is depicted as being jealous of God and often feels that He does not respect him enough . The Devil also has a small sidekick-demon named Smeck
Entertainment -- Film and television
The Devil has been a popular recurring character in many animated films , either theatrical shorts , animated TV series and/or in the anime genre . When a character has to take a moral choice a tiny-sized angel and devil often appear on both sides of his shoulders , representing the two possible choices he can take : the `` good '' path or the `` bad '' one . Demon-like characters have been featured as an occasional character in several animated series , either under the name Satan or as the Devil . When the Hays Code censorship was still in effect between the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s the Devil sometimes went nameless or received a different name referring to diabolical characters from other mythologies to avoid offending religious viewers . Examples of this practice are for instance Chernobog in Fantasia or the description of Hell as Hades in the Looney Tunes short Satan 's Waitin ' ( 1954 ) . Even though these demons and their environment were not specifically identified as Satan and Hell , viewers still would make the connection based on the visual representation . Another way to avoid connotations with Satan was to make the demonic character an anthropomorphic cartoon animal .
The Devil , ( Satan , Lucifer , Beelzebub , Mephistopheles ) appears frequently as a character in literature and various other media. In Abrahamic religions , the figure of the Devil, Satan personifies evil. A devil ( lower case ) is a evil spirit, demon, fiend ( OED ).