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Dementors are wraithlike creatures that feed on human happiness and can drain a soul. Learn about their appearance, abilities, dangers and habitat in the wizarding world.
- Overview
- History
- Description
- Abilities
- Protection from Dementors
- Etymology
- Behind the scenes
- Appearances
"Dementors are among the foulest creatures that walk this earth. They infest the darkest, filthiest places, they glory in decay and despair, they drain peace, hope, and happiness out of the air around them... Get too near a Dementor and every good feeling, every happy memory will be sucked out of you. If it can, the Dementor will feed on you long enough to reduce you to something like itself... soulless and evil. You will be left with nothing but the worst experiences of your life, and you will just be an empty shell that lost its soul."
— Remus Lupin's description of Dementors
A Dementor was a gliding, wraithlike Dark creature, widely considered to be one of the foulest of the Dark creatures to inhabit the wizarding world. Dementors literally fed on human happiness and thus generated feelings of depression and despair in any person in close proximity to them. They could also consume a person's soul, leaving their victims in a permanent vegetative state, and thus were often referred to as "soul-sucking fiends", and the people they left soulless were deemed to have been turned into an "empty-shell".
Dementors were closely associated with Azkaban, as they were formerly employed by the British Ministry of Magic as the prison guards, and were not known to permanently inhabit any other location.
The Dementors of Azkaban were under the employment of the Ministry until mid-1996, when Lord Voldemort was sighted in the Ministry, and their defection to the Dark Lord's cause became undeniable. After the end of the Second Wizarding War in 1998, the Ministry was re-formed, and newly-appointed Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt ensured that they were not used by the government again, presumably due to their changing allegiance and support of Voldemort, and due to ethical reforms in the Ministry and Wizarding society at large. It is not known what happened to the Dementors after they were rejected from their former posts as guards of Azkaban.
There were certain defences one could use against Dementors, specifically the Patronus Charm. Dementors held no true loyalty, except to whoever could provide them with the most people to feed on. They seemingly could not be destroyed, though their numbers could be limited if the conditions in which they multiply, i.e. despair and degradation, were prevented from forming.
Appearances
Dementors had a humanoid shape, approximately 4 metres, or 12 feet high, and were covered in long robes and hooded cloaks of ripped black cloth, making them closely resemble wraiths. Their skins were grey, slimy, and decayed-looking, like a decomposing corpse. Their breathing emitted a rattling sound, like it was trying to "suck more than air" out of a room. Their hands were "glistening, greyish, slimy-looking, and scabbed". They seemed to exude an aura of cold. When in a cluster, Dementors appeared as a foul mist. A Dementor's face, which is usually completely hidden by their deep hoods, had empty eye sockets, covered with thin, scabbed skin. There was a gaping large hole where the mouth should've been, which was used for consuming the positive emotions of humans, as well as for sucking the soul out of the victim in a process called the Dementor's Kiss, leaving victims in a state generally considered worse than death. The Dementor pulled back its hood and sucked out its victim's soul, leaving the person an empty shell, alive but completely, irretrievably "gone". They were described as being able to glide over the ground only, and in any case, they couldn't pass through solid obstacles. Dementors were also known to be blind, as they did not have eyes. However, they could sense whether a presence was near them or not, by sensing the victim's emotions. This sense appeared to have been extremely acute, as the Dementors stationed at the entrances to Hogwarts Castle were able to sense the presence of Sirius Black walking beside the Great Lake in his human form. (It is interesting to note that many witches and wizards, including Hermione Granger, appeared to have had a misconception that Dementors were capable of vision, for instance, when Hermione proclaimed her certainty that the Dementors stationed at the entrances to Hogwarts would have seen Sirius fly into the school.)
Nature and behaviour
"He felt the unnatural cold begin to steal over the street. Light was sucked from the environment right up to the stars, which vanished... The cold was biting deeper and deeper into Harry's flesh... Then, around the corner, gliding noiselessly, came Dementors, ten or more of them, visible because they were of a denser darkness than their surroundings, with their black cloaks and their scabbed and rotting hands. Could they sense fear in the vicinity? Harry was sure of it: They seemed to be coming more quickly now, taking those dragging, rattling breaths he detested, tasting despair on the air, closing in —" — Description of Dementors as they close in Dementors seemed to suck all the light, sound, and happiness from the air as they drew long rattling breaths, and caused darkness to close in everywhere and the victim to feel incredibly cold. They could glide towards a victim with no sound other than then sounds of their own rattling sucking. However, this magically enforced darkness could be lit up by the Lumos Charm, as well as by the silver light of Patronuses. Their sapience was heavily debated: they were sentient enough to taste and sense fear, being drawn to it and the promise of positive memories that it could feed off of. They were also intelligent enough to bargain: they obeyed the British Ministry of Magic for years because, in guarding Azkaban, they were provided with the sustenance of any remaining hope or happiness in the prisoners. They could understand and follow at least simple instructions, which allowed Dementors to act as a bodyguard to Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge in 1995, to bury dead prisoners in the prison grounds, and to escort prisoners in and out of the Muggle-Born Registration Commission courtroom in 1997. They could also communicate what they had heard Sirius Black saying in his sleep to the Ministry in 1993, and comment on his "less human, less complex" state of mind (in his Animagus form), implying that they could speak or otherwise communicate with wizards. On the other hand, Albus Dumbledore described Dementors as savage creatures unable to differentiate between who they pursued and who stood in their way. He also informed the students to give Dementors no reason to harm them, saying that forgiveness and mercy were "not in the nature of a Dementor". And despite their having made bargains with humans - first with the Ministry of Magic, then with Voldemort - they seem to have had difficulty keeping these bargains in mind, as shown when, upon the Stunning of Umbridge by Harry, the Dementors in the room immediately abandoned restraint and attempted to kiss Mary Cattermole, apparently heedless of possible retaliations or repercussions from the wizards. Moreover, they had no soul of their own. Outside of Azkaban, Dementors appeared to hunt for prey in groups of variable size, from as small as two to as large as greater than twenty. They appeared to attack by first surrounding their targets, cutting off any escape, then descending upon them all at once to feed.
"They don't need walls and water to keep the prisoners in, not when they're trapped inside their own heads, incapable of a single cheerful thought. Most go mad within weeks."
— Remus Lupin on Azkaban prisoners' long-term exposure to Dementors
Being blind, Dementors sensed and fed on the positive emotions of human beings in order to survive, forcing their victims to relive their worst memories over and over again. The very presence of a Dementor could make the victim's surrounding atmosphere grow cold and dark, and as the number of Dementors increased, so did the effects. Those that were kept in the company of a Dementor for too long tended to become depressed, and were often driven insane, which was the main source of Azkaban's well-deserved horrible reputation when they still guarded its prisoners. After spending only a few months there, Rubeus Hagrid claimed he wished he would die in his sleep. For this reason, they were considered some of the foulest creatures on earth.
Dementors relied fully on their ability to sense emotion and physical and/or mental health to track the movements of the prisoners in their care, and were generally unable to distinguish one person from another if both were in similar physical or mental condition. They were unable to identify Mrs Crouch being sneaked into Azkaban disguised as Bartemius Crouch Jnr using Polyjuice Potion, or Barty Crouch Jnr being sneaked out disguised as his mother, since both were ill nearly to the point of death, as divulged by Bartemius Crouch Jnr under the influence of Veritaserum in 1995 (though it may be that they simply did not care whom they were sucking happiness from so long as they were "fed").
They were genderless and did not mate, and they grew like fungus where there was decay.
Dementors seemingly didn't feel and recognise animal emotions in the same way as human emotions. When Sirius Black, an Animagus, was imprisoned in Azkaban in his dog form before his eventual successful escape also as a dog, his emotions were less human. The Dementors could feel there was a difference in his emotions when he changed his form, but they didn't understand why there was such a difference; they simply thought he was losing his mind.
Patronus Charm
"Well, when it works correctly, it conjures up a Patronus, which is a kind of anti-Dementor — a guardian that acts as a shield between you and the Dementor. The Patronus is a kind of positive force, a projection of the very things that the Dementor feeds upon — hope, happiness, the desire to survive — but it cannot feel despair, as real humans can, so the Dementors can't hurt it." — Remus Lupin telling Harry Potter what a Patronus was No one had ever demonstrated the ability to kill a Dementor, by Avada Kedavra or otherwise, implying that they couldn't be killed through physical means, but could only be driven away or temporarily kept at bay. One of the few ways to shield oneself from Dementors was by the very difficult Patronus Charm. The charm summoned a Patronus, a magical manifestation of good will and happiness, providing varied levels of protection against the Dementors' influence, based on the caster's strength as a wizard. With sufficient ability, a single wizard could hold off dozens, if not hundreds, of Dementors with a single corporeal Patronus. Harry Potter demonstrated during his third year at Hogwarts when he drove off a horde of Dementors seeking to consume Hermione Granger, Sirius Black, and Harry's past selves. As the Patronus was not alive, the Dementor couldn't feed on it. Only when summoned by an experienced caster would the Patronus take the form of an animal significant in some way to the individual. While the lower level Patronus was more amorphous and ephemeral, corporeal Patronuses chased down Dementors and forced them to flee the vicinity. An incorporeal Patronus only slowed a Dementor down, as if the creature was walking through quicksand, and tended not to last long, but could eventually give the caster time to escape.
Other
Since Dementors couldn't properly sense the less complex thoughts and emotions of a person when they took on an Animagus form, doing so allowed some, such as Sirius Black, to temporarily avoid feeling the effects of the Dementors' presence. When they sensed the less-than-human thoughts of his Animagus form, the Dementors simply thought Sirius was losing his mind. The effects of a Dementor's happiness-draining powers could also be resisted if one focused not on happy thoughts, but on obsessions, or other things that gave one strength without exactly making one feel better. For example, Sirius managed to avoid going mad in the Dementors' custody and eventually plan an escape by focusing on the fact that he was innocent and didn't belong in Azkaban, and later that Peter Pettigrew was at Hogwarts and that Harry was in danger. However, this feat was mostly attributed to the fact of him being an Animagus who was able to temporarily avoid feeling the effects of the Dementors' presence in his animal form. Though clearly not a common method of repelling Dementors, the enigmatic form people took after being brought back by the Resurrection Stone appeared to function much like a Patronus, as the "resurrected" forms of Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and James and Lily Potter were able to shield Harry Potter from the Dementors that Voldemort had stationed in the Forbidden Forest on 2 May 1998. And also, after Harry returned from the brink of life and death, he was so overcome with joy at being alive that the Dementors had no effect on him, showing that if a person was truly happy, the Dementors' main weapon was rendered useless. There may have been another, more common way of repelling and defending against a Dementor, aside from the Patronus Charm, as Remus Lupin stated that there were certain defences against Dementors. Also, Harry Potter disagreed with Professor Snape on the best method for confronting one in Defence Against the Dark Arts when it was the subject of a report in his sixth-year. This implies that there were, indeed, other methods. The spell Protego horribilis may have been one such method as it was cast around Hogwarts Castle shortly prior to the Battle of Hogwarts, and no Dementors were reported to be present on the school grounds before the fall of the spell. The mood-enhancing properties of chocolate were well known in both the Muggle and wizarding worlds. Chocolate was the perfect antidote for anyone who had been overcome in the presence of Dementors, which sucked hope and happiness out of their surroundings. Chocolate could only be a short-term remedy, however. Finding ways to fight off Dementors — or depression — were essential if one was to become permanently happier. Excessive chocolate consumption couldn't benefit either Muggle or wizard. Dark wizards couldn't commonly produce Patronuses. However, they did not need to do so in the first place, as they were like-minded in evil. Voldemort even stated that they were natural allies. This did not, however, prevent Dementors from imprisoning and feeding on Dark wizards in Azkaban.
The English word dementor is used generically to refer to any evil or fearsome creature. The word ultimately derives from the Latin dēmens, meaning "insane".
•J. K. Rowling has revealed that the inspiration for Dementors came from her bout with severe depression before her phenomenal success. She described the feeling as an "absence of being able to envisage that you will ever be cheerful again. The absence of hope. That very deadened feeling, which is so very different from feeling sad."
•In an attempt to sabotage Harry during a Quidditch match in 1994, Draco Malfoy, Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, and Marcus Flint dressed up as Dementors to try to scare him. Malfoy was standing on Goyle's shoulders. Considering how tall Dementors are (they are described in Prisoner of Azkaban as reaching from the floor to the ceiling on the Hogwarts Express, and later, in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, a Boggart impersonating a Dementor was described as being twelve feet tall.), the foursome appear to account for two Dementors, when just a few pages earlier, Harry saw three Dementors. (Although Marcus Flint, as an older student — in his seventh year — may have been tall enough to pass as a Dementor without someone on his shoulders.) However, their attempt failed when Harry cast a Patronus Charm at them, causing all four students to topple over and get tangled up in the costume robes.
•Animatronic Dementors appear in Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, chasing the riders' flying bench through the Chamber of Secrets and around the skeleton of the Basilisk. The Dark Mark appears along with them, suggesting that a Death Eater summoned them to Hogwarts.
•While Dementors are original creatures J. K. Rowling specifically developed for the series, they nevertheless often compared with following creatures;
•Nazgûl: The Nazgûl from The Lord of the Rings are hooded, cloaked beings surrounded by an aura of terror, which affected all living creatures; their aura called the Black Breath could be toxic to those hapless and close enough to them, much like the Dementors presence having negative effects on living beings, rendering them unconscious or in a comatose like state that required unique forms of healing to deal with the effects.
•Spectre: Spectres from His Dark Materials are wraith-like, misty, vaguely humanoid entities that feed upon the Dust that makes up a person's soul, rendering said person in vegetative state in the process, similar to Dementors that could subject their victims to the same fate through Dementor's Kiss.
The Harry Potter Wiki has 211 images related to Dementor.
•Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (First mentioned)
•Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game) (Mentioned only)
•Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (First appearance) (First identified as Dementor)
•Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (film)
•Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (video game)
Dementer is a movie about a young woman who works at a facility for adults with disabilities and faces supernatural threats. The film has mixed reviews from critics and is available on Fandango at Home and Prime Video.
- (24)
- Katie Groshong
- Chad Crawford Kinkle
- Horror
Dementer is a horror film about a cult survivor who works with adults with special needs. Read critics' reviews and ratings of this micro-budget supernatural thriller set in Tennessee.
Dementer - Movies on Google Play. 2021 • 80 minutes. 83% Tomatometer. family_home. Eligible. info. play_arrow Trailer. info Watch in a web browser or on supported devices Learn More. About this...
Mar 1, 2021 · Dementer review – almost the definition of psychological horror. By Alix Turner. Published: March 1, 2021 (Last updated: January 3, 2024) 0. 3.5. Summary. Psychological horror that brings a cult survivor into the world of adults with special needs. Is her experience more real than theirs? And who do they need protecting from?
Dementer is a 2021 horror film starring Katie Groshong and Stephanie Kinkle. It follows a woman who escapes a cult and works in a home for special needs adults, where she faces her dark past and a threat to a Down Syndrome girl.
