The Babadook & The Shadow: A Jungian Reading of Horror and Healing
In Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook (2014), we encounter more than just a horror story about a mother, a child, and a monster lurking in the dark. We are confronted with something far more psychological and archetypal: the Shadow.
From a Jungian perspective, the film becomes a chilling, poetic metaphor for what happens when we repress the parts of ourselves we don't want to face—our pain, our rage, our sorrow. This is where horror meets healing. This is where myth meets the unconscious.
What Is the Shadow?
Carl Jung described the Shadow as the unknown or disowned parts of ourselves—the impulses, emotions, and traits we reject because they’re too painful, too unacceptable, or simply too uncomfortable. But repressing them doesn’t make them disappear. It buries them… and they return in disguised forms: projections, neuroses, destructive habits, or—as in The Babadook—a monster.
The Shadow is both deeply personal and universally human. It includes:
Hidden grief
Anger we weren’t allowed to express
Childhood wounds we never named
Desires we were taught to be ashamed of
Parts of our potential we’re too afraid to step into
The Babadook as Shadow Manifestation
In the film, Amelia, a widowed mother, is raising her son Samuel while silently drowning in the unresolved grief of her husband's death. Her denial and suppression form a perfect breeding ground for the Shadow. Enter the Babadook—a sinister figure from a mysterious pop-up book that begins to haunt their home.
At first, Amelia tries to destroy the book. She tears it up. Burns it. Denies its existence. But the more she tries to get rid of it, the more powerful it becomes.
That’s the first lesson of Shadow work: you cannot heal what you refuse to face.
Psychological Layers of the Film
From a Jungian standpoint, The Babadook offers a masterclass in the dangers of repression and the necessity of integration.
Grief, unacknowledged, becomes horror. Amelia’s grief takes monstrous form because she never gave herself permission to feel or process it.
The child represents consciousness trying to awaken the adult to what’s wrong. Samuel’s “bad behavior” isn’t random—it’s a mirror of Amelia’s inner chaos. The psyche is trying to get her attention.
The monster gets stronger the more it’s denied. In the Shadow’s language: what we resist, persists.
How Do We Work With the Shadow?
The brilliance of the film lies in its ending. The Babadook is not vanquished. It isn’t killed. It’s fed. It’s acknowledged. It’s given a space—in the basement, not in the living room, but not banished either.
This is symbolic of true integration.
Ways we can begin our own shadow work include:
Journaling our emotional triggers and projections
Noticing recurring dreams or intrusive thoughts
Engaging in creative expression (art, writing, movement)
Practicing non-judgmental self-reflection
Working with a therapist or guide trained in shadow integration
And perhaps most importantly: we must learn to see the monster not as the enemy, but as a part of us calling out for compassion.
Living With, Not Against, the Shadow
When Amelia finally confronts the Babadook, she does so not with weapons, but with emotion. She screams. She weeps. She reclaims her power—not by destroying the monster, but by refusing to be ruled by fear. And then she keeps it… in the basement. She visits it. She feeds it. It no longer controls her—but it is still a part of her.
This is the path of individuation. Of becoming whole.
Jung reminds us:
“One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”
Final Reflection
The Babadook teaches us that healing is not about pretending we’re okay. It’s about courageously facing the parts of us that aren’t. It’s about understanding that monsters, real or symbolic, often arise when something in us is crying to be seen.
So if you find yourself haunted by inner tension, recurring fears, or sudden emotional outbursts—pause. There may be a message in the monster. A truth in the tremor.
Not everything that is scary is evil. And not everything in the dark is meant to be destroyed.
Some things just need to be held.
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