Satan



""Here at least we shall be free; the Almighty hath not built here for his envy, will not drive us hence: Here we may reign secure, and in my choice to reign is worth ambition, though in Hell: Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.""

- Satan after losing the War in Heaven, John Milton's Paradise Lost

Known also as the (former) Archangel Lucifer ("light-bearer", Latin translation of the Hebrew word heylel, "brightness"), Shaytan, Iblis, Angra Mainyu, Louis Cypher, Old Scratch, Old Nick, the Quare Fellow, the Father of Lies, the Prince of Darkness, the Lord of This World, The Master of Abortions, Beelzebub (based on the archaic Ba‘al Zebûb, literally Lord of the Flies), The Really Angry One, Asmodeus, Mephistopheles, the Morning Star, Samael, El Diablo, the Evil One, Basement Cat, Melkor, Natas... or simply the Devil (or, if you like, the Red Guy), Satan is the Big Bad of most varieties of Christianity, Judaism and Islam.

No matter what version of Satan is employed, he is usually a shapechanger, capable of taking any form -- physical or not -- that he cares to. In human form, he is often shown with red or blond hair. All things that hide or distort the truth are in his province, making him also the master of deception and illusion. Consequently, his most common incarnations are wheeler-dealers, bargainers, and con-men.

Despite an overwhelming overconfidence (he represents the Deadly Sin of Pride, after all), he almost always possesses a keen sense of enlightened self-interest. In keeping with the belief of the "most beautiful angel" who fell, Satan takes a handsome face whenever possible, but behind it is often rage and hatred; tearing away that mask, either intentionally or not, is possibly one of the most suicidal things a character can do.

In his more modern incarnations, he is often a Man of Wealth and Taste with a taste for the offerings of humanity's cultural achievements, from wine to music to poetry and stories. His interpretations do not always accord with the official ones.

One of his favorite ploys (it's at least Older Than Steam, as seen in Faust and earlier) is to essentially grant one or more wishes in exchange for the wisher's soul. It's a classic lopsided deal in the Devil's favor -- short-term corporeal gain in exchange for long-term infernal torment. This is almost always handled via a physical contract which is usually composed entirely of torturous legalese. Single wishes are almost always handled Literal Genie style, if not perverted outright. In some versions of the story the contracted victim may be able to free himself via a redemptive act or the intervention of God; in modern takes, especially Superhero comics, the hero may take revenge against the Devil via a Faustian Rebellion. In any case, his goal is to lure as many souls to his side as possible, making him an example of The Corrupter.

In recent depictions, Satan is sometimes subverted by giving him an unexpected soft spot that renders him a bit more "human" and less supernatural -- he likes kids, or kittens, or snowcones. It doesn't make him any less dangerous (if he's dangerous at all); it just lets the audience think they understand him.

If a series revolves around polytheistic group of gods and goddesses, usually there will be one God of Evil who is cast as a Satan figure, complete with The Paragon Always Rebels, even if it's completely different from their original portrayal. This is usually Hades/Pluto in the Greco-Roman pantheon, Loki in the Norse pantheon, and Anubis or Set/Sutekh in the ancient Egyptian.

Another common plot revolves around Satan's son, presumed to be The Antichrist foretold in the Book of Revelation. Some common subversions are that he's just a normal person, or that he's a she.

Satan is traditionally associated with a host of archdemonic sidekicks, among the best known of which are Mephistopheles, Azazel, Belial, Moloch, Baal, Asmodeus, Beelzebub, and Lilith. These are sometimes seen as servants of Satan (often with more effective power over humans, presumably because their actions are not so closely watched), but are also (with the obvious exception of Lilith) often conflated into alternate names for the same being. (Most of these names, as with "Lucifer", derive from supernatural figures from pre-Christian beliefs in Europe, who were changed into devils as the new faith took over.)

To learn more about the history of Satan, visit the Analysis page.

A common twist is that Satan Is Good, a victim of propaganda; see God Is Evil. Of course, when God Is Evil, he may overlap with Satan.

See also The Legions of Hell. When hiding under an alias, usually a pretty transparent one, this becomes Louis Cypher. If there's more than one we're talking about Demon Lords and Archdevils. You might be interested in his brothers as well, Archangel Gabriel, Archangel Michael, and Archangel Raphael.

For when Satan rocks out, see Rock Me, Asmodeus.

Anime and Manga

 * In Devilman is revealed to be Satan as well as a Hermaphrodite with angel wings Nagai considering it appropriate due to being an angel, who are often considered sexless.
 * While not a Satan Zenon has a similar look to The Divine Comedy Version being a demon with 3 faces and in The Devil Lady Manga He also has a form that looks like
 * Amuro Ray from Mobile Suit Gundam is called The White Devil
 * In The Demon Ororon, Hell is a dimension ruled by kings who pass down the title of Satan from father to son. Which, if any, is THE Satan is unknown.
 * In Let's Bible, Iesu (pantsless girl Jesus) is menaced by Evil Mexican Mariachi Satan.
 * If we can believe Blackbeard, Satan is apparently the power source of the Yami Yami no Mi/Dark Dark Fruit, "the most evil of all Devil's Fruits". He's a Large Ham for sure, but Oda has said that they are the only supernatural thing in the series, so maybe he might be right.
 * 666 Satan, the name says it all.
 * An important part of the plot of Angel Sanctuary is the attempts by high demons to resurrect Lucifer. His generals are called the Satans and all bear names such as Asmodeus, Belial, Astaroth etc.
 * Dabura in Dragonball Z is heavily based on Satan, being the ruler of a demon world. However, he was enslaved by an evil wizard. Dabura appears in Sand Land as Lucifer.
 * Piccolo was also placed in the role of Satan for a while after his introduction.
 * Broly refers to himself as such; he may be the Saiyan equivalent. Cooler also posses many traits.
 * Ironically, Earth's "strongest" man is called Mr. Satan, but the man's nothing like his namesake. He's as gentle as a flower, tried to befriend Majin Buu, and rescued a puppy from gun-toting thieves.
 * Aizen in Bleach is more or less an Expy of Satan, and fittingly he is the Big Bad. Manages to deceive nearly everyone in Soul Society (read: Heaven) with his good nature until the very last minute; leads an army of Hollows {demons) in a quest to overthrow God (the actual God), his Pride being the reason for his villainy, his  resembling the Great Red Dragon (read: Satan) as painted by William Blake, started off as a shinigami (angel) before leaving to rule Hueco Mundo (Hell), and demonstrated a nigh-omniscient level of planning mixed in with numerous petty acts of cruelty, and  . Optional whether you regard his status as Jack of All Stats / The Ace as another qualification.
 * The Digimon franchise seems to be pretty big on theming species of mons after Satan.
 * Devimon, the very first Big Bad of Digimon Adventure and thus the franchise as a whole, though it's entirely possible that he was merely based on a generic devil given his mere Adult-level status. The Devimon species is also the basis for a sizable range of counterparts and variants, including PicoDevimon, IceDevimon, MarineDevimon, LadyDevimon, and Devidramon. Evil Is Cool so he's got a big family, and the video and card games tend to treat Devimon's line as the evolutionary basis for every other Digimon listed here.
 * Lucemon, the Big Bad of Digimon Frontier, may be the example which plays as the straightest analogue to the most common Western interpretation of Satan, being specifically named for Lucifer. He even starts off as a benevolent ruler before being completely corrupted by his significant power, before being banished to the core of the Digital World, and undergoes several instances of One-Winged Angel in his (successful) quest to destroy the entire Digital World. He reappears in Digimon Xros Wars as a minor villain.
 * Daemon, the Big Bad of Digimon V-Tamer 01 and a minor antagonist in Digimon Adventure 02; perhaps more appropriately, one of his minions is named SkullSatamon, and the other two are from the massive pool of Devimon variants mentioned above. Fittingly, Daemon actively fought against the forces of Lord HolyAngemon in the former work.
 * Beelzebumon is ostensibly this and is considered such in supporting material, but he was an anti-hero rather than a villain in his debut in Digimon Tamers, and was an outright noble hero in Digimon Xros Wars.
 * Amusingly, in his Digimon Tamers incarnation he was the one who made a deal with an (apparently) more evil being to gain power. Originally the plan was for him to be the final Big Bad of the series. Then they went with something worse, and he became The Atoner instead.
 * Vamdemon, a Big Bad in Digimon Adventure, is more based on Dracula, but he was later resurrected as "the beast" VenomVamdemon (after tons of Number of the Beast Imagery). He was again revived in Digimon Adventure 02 as BelialVamdemon (named for the form Satan is said to take during Armageddon), who wields weapons named Sodom and Gomorrah. The line is a mashup of Dracula and Satan. There was another Vamdemon variant in Digimon Xros Wars, NeoVamdemon, but he simply played the vampire thing and didn't have much to do with Satanic thematics.
 * Astamon, the evolved form of Ryouma Mogami's partner in Digimon Xros Wars the Young Hunters Leaping Through Time, is named for and themed after a high-ranking count of Hell. While antagonistic, he's not indicated to be outright evil as of yet.
 * These important ones aside, there are plenty of other Digimon themed after Satan, most prominently a group of Olympus Mons named the Seven Great Demon Lords (of whom Lucemon, Daemon and Beelzebumon are all members). There are also plenty of lower-level Digimon themed on the devil like Boogiemon and Phelesmon, who are depicted as the classic red horned devils. There's actually both a Mephistomon and a Phelesmon (both named after Mephistopheles), but there's no relation; Mephistomon is a goat demon. With all these Satan Digimon around the place, one has to wonder how the franchise escaped as unscathed as it has in America. Even with all the Dub Name Changes that get the series repeatedly labeled Ruined FOREVER by hardcore purists, the only demon Digimon who has lost the demon-ness is the Vamdemon line, becoming Myotismon (Vamde = vampire, demon. Myotis = genus of bats.) Other names just got minor cosmetic tweaks (Beelzebumon becomes Beelzemon because it rolls of the tongue better.) Even the "hour of the beast" thing (Myotismon becomes Venom Myotismon at 6:06 PM and six seconds) remains completely unchanged
 * Ronin Warriors presented a ha'sa'tan/Satan equivalent in the form of Arago (Talpa in the American dub), absolute Emperor of the demonic nether-realms, and, in general, literal Adversary of all mortals.
 * In Umineko no Naku Koro ni, Satan is the third eldest sister of the Stakes of Purgatory and represents the sin of Wrath. She is described as being Tsundere without the dere.
 * Hell, all seven could count, since they're all named after the horned one. There's also Lucifer (Pride), Leviathan (Envy), Belpehegor Sloth, Mammon Greed, Beelzebub Gluttony and Asmodeus Lust (In order of how old they are).
 * In My Balls, Satan is a female nymphomaniac and sex expert who has both the power of light and darkness in her.
 * Ah! My Goddess had Hild, the CEO of Hell. She's the Hot (As Hell) Mom to Belldandy's half-sister Urd. Their father is God.
 * Aion, the Big Bad from Chrono Crusade.
 * In Sengoku Basara Oda Nobunaga claims to be the "Devil King of the Sixth Heaven" which is more or less the Buddhist equivalent of Satan. Turns out he's not exactly joking.
 * Satan himself appears a few times in Ao No Exorcist, always while possessing someone (he's far too powerful to manifest in the human realm). He's a complete Jerkass who swears like no tomorrow and kills random people just for the hell of it, laughing all the while. Near the end of the series, the reason for his hatred against humans is revealed: Love Makes You Crazy, much? Too bad the next person he possessed and had Driven to Suicide was Fujimoto, the very same man who went against orders to raise Satan's sons in secrecy; Rin, one of said sons, promptly decided to kick daddy's ass.
 * Although never making a direct appearance Satan is a big part of Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne. It turns out
 * Homunculus Father of Fullmetal Alchemist is a former trickster turned chessmaster and Diabolical Mastermind. He's a being who fell from another world, and is determined to return to that world as God; he is at war with the real God (The Truth) and is served by the Seven Deadly Sins, all of whom were created from his own desires (making him the father of sin). Needless to say, the Satanic imagery is pretty strong with him.
 * It seems that in Princess Lucia, Satan lost his place in Hell and owns a raman stand.
 * In Berserk, Femto  can be interpreted as this. As a member of the the Big Bad Duumvirate, his job is to essentially strike propositions with those destined to become apostles: he and the rest of the Godhand make the offer of granting a new life to whoever has a behelit in their possession (since in order to summon the Godhand, the person has to be in a pit of utter despair) in exchange for a sacrifice of the person's loved one as well as cosigning both of their souls over to hell. If the deal is struck, that person can become a nigh invulnerable being. That's not even mentioning that   as his Fatal Flaw was his prideful nature, and he's a trickster in nearly ever form... That, and when Femto is in his human form, he's undeniably beautiful, just as Satan is said to be.

Comic Books

 * Marvel Comics has had a number of Satan-based characters over the years. Many of their hell-lords among other demons like Mephisto, Satannish and Marduk Kurios have admitted to either inspiring, playing off the name or claiming to the be REAL Satan. Thanks to inconsistent continuity and their own history as liars nothing they say can be believed. This was further complicated with the introduction of the real Lucifer. A tie-in to the Fear Itself Crossover introduced Satan's empty throne, but was unclear if there was a real Satan and if so who it was(Though when we saw God's throne in Ghost Rider: Heaven's on Fire, it was also empty). Only to have several hell-lords claim to be Satan, but none sit in it for fear of being torn apart by the other hell-lords.
 * Maybe not "Satan", but the Phoenix Force said The Devil does exist in Marvel world, two Devils actually, an Enemy Within everyone and an Enemy Without. The only character who actually dealt with their inner devil so far is Bruce Banner but in their dealings it did indeed confirm to be in everyone.
 * Comic book example/subversion: Lucifer appears in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman series, initially as a one-off villain, but later in the series, he grows tired of ruling Hell and being humanity's scapegoat ("How can anyone own a soul?"), and resigns; Hell is then placed directly under "The Silver City"'s command.
 * This formed the basis, a decade later, for Lucifer, his own series, in which he's sort of but not quite an Anti-Hero. He appears as a blonde, handsome angel, with no hint of the demonic, except for bat wings -- which he loses when he retires -- and two tufts of hair intended to resemble horns. (He is referred to as "Satan" only once across both series, and that by a guy who wanted to make a Deal with the Devil and really didn't get it.)
 * In a related Vertigo Comics series, Hellblazer, Hell is run, after the departure of Lucifer, by the First Of The Fallen, an older and more brutal devil. It is suggested that The First is the original Adversary, that he was created to hold God's own negative qualities and/or as a "best enemy" to God (as in some East European dualist mythologies) and that he knows some horrible secret about God, Jesus and the Church which, if confessed to a mortal would send that mortal howling mad. John Constantine claims that he is God's former conscience. The First looks human, big and tough, with a broken nose and long hair. He is addressed as "Lord Satan" by Gabriel on one occasion, but this may be a title, not his name.
 * The First of the Fallen shares his rule with the Second of the Three and the Third of the Three, who are similarly nasty. The Second appears as a living darkness, and the Third never appears as any one thing for long -- he's a shapeshifter who constantly changes forms according to purpose, mood, or just for the fun of it, and it's implied he doesn't actually have a true form. They don't appear as often, though.
 * Several characters in The DCU are a good match for Mr. S. There's Neron, who ruled Hell for a while and, as the main villain of the Crisis Crossover Underworld Unleashed bought the souls of many supervillains, as well as killing the Rogues and Mongul to show how cool he is; Lord Satanus, who began as a human sorcerer yet grew powerful enough to kick Neron out; and his sister Blaze, who kicked him out in return. The most likely candidate to be the real deal is The Original Darkness, an Eldritch Abomination encountered by Swamp Thing, whose mere presence can kill several powerful sorcerers and whose fingernail couldn't be cracked by The Spectre.
 * Granted, the Original Darkness didn't start out as Satan, but ended up getting the idea of being him.
 * The Devil appears briefly in Preacher (Comic Book), where he is in charge of Hell and follows the stereotypical red-skinned, horned and hooved depiction. He is seen playing cards with the Angel of Death and is called Nick. When the to-be Saint of Killers freezes Hell with his hate, Nick attempts to whip the hatred out but fails. After the to-be Saint accepts his new role, Nick insults the Saint and gets a fatal round through the head for the effort.
 * An excellent version of the "Casting a character in a polytheist story as the Christian Satan" subtrope occurred in the comic Rogan Ghosh, Star of the East, in which the setting and characters were Hindu. Hanuman appeared as The Obi-Wan and the Non-Human Sidekick, with hints of Small Annoying Creature all rolled into one. Kali appeared as The Dragon, and Ganesha turned up in the background for no reason, but the Big Bad was a character called The Soma Swami, False God of a Thousand False Worlds. In the story, he tempts people to sin or leads them into ignorance so that they'll stay in the wheel of reincarnation where he can feed on their energies. People who reach enlightenment/heaven/Nirvana have escaped him (as he himself puts it, "Fuck Christ! Fuck Buddha! They're just the ones that got away!") As a way of adapting the Christian devil to a Hindu setting, it's hard to imagine Soma being bettered.
 * Satan in the form of "El Diablo" pops up to show Johnny around Hell after his death in Johnny the Homicidal Maniac. Though he rules Hell, he doesn't seem to do much other than watch (with glee) the souls of the damned go about their superficial afterlives. He shows up again in Squee as the happy husband of an oblivious Catholic woman with whom he's fathered a son, Pepito. Pepito becomes the closest thing Squee has to a friend.
 * Another version of Satan shows up out of continuity in one of the Meanwhiles, where Jhonen, in an attempt to demonstrate how dissimilar his life is to Nny's after being accused of Author Avatar one to many times, shows us what an average day is for him. In a scene that (deliberately) mirrors an early JTHM issue, he arrives at a convenience store to get a slushy and picks a fight with the clerk. He then goads the clerk into admitting to be Satan, turns out to be correct, and blasts Satan with a laser when Satan threatens to bite his head off.
 * Jack Chick has put Satan into his comics so often you'd think he was a regular. Satan, when shown, ends up being more of a general trickster than a real force of pure Chaotic Evil.
 * A demonic character shows up in Powers claiming to be the devil, but the protagonist is more inclined to thinking it's a minor demon trying to make itself seem bigger and more important than it really is. It's still a powerful, nasty, Hannibal Lecturing creature.
 * In Magnus, Lucifer is a literal Physical God who can be physically confronted and battled.
 * Satan is notably absent from the Hellboy universe, but he is finally mentioned in The Wild Hunt. It turns out he's been
 * A classic Strontium Dog story involved Johnny, Wulf, and the Gronk following a renegade Bounty Hunter named Fly's Eye's into a Hell-dimension, where they had to beat up Satan himself in order to escape.
 * In Necrophim, Lucifer takes the form of a human with a forked tongue and dressed in Edwardian English fashion. He mostly just wants to keep hold of his reign in Hell.
 * In Dilbert, there's Phil, the Prince of Insufficient Light and supreme ruler of Heck.
 * Appears in some stories by Wilhelm Busch, to take the (not so) pious Helene's soul to hell for example.
 * Spawn comics introduced Satan only briefly. He is the brother of God and was the original creator/ruler of hell before being removed by his "Mother." In Spawn God and Satan were two of near infinite number of nigh-omnipotent beings created by the "true" God to help build worlds. They got Earth and unwilling to share fought over it with God creating heaven and Satan creating hell viewing humans as playthings in their wars. Out of disgust their Mother removed them from their thrones until to try and give humanity a chance until Armageddon came. Both are evil, petty creatures. Ironically, Satan granted humans free will to spite God only for that to be what gives humanity the chance to free itself from both heaven and hell.

Fanfiction

 * In the Good Omens fanfiction by JA Moczo, Manchester Lost, he is a menacing figure who mostly considers the archangels to be idiots (Raphael: too nice, Michael: too boneheaded, Uriel: completely out of it most of the time) with the possible exception of Gabriel. There is a great deal of Foe Yay between him and Michael and in the sequel

Film
"Lucifer: [hissing to the main characters while ] "I love you, I love you, I love you more than Jesus!""
 * In the film The Ninth Gate, Johny Depp looks for a book cowritten by Satan, is stalked by a (female) Satan who helps him on his quest, and then later screws her for immortal power.
 * Two of a Kind (the second John Travolta/Olivia Newton-John vehicle) featured a Sodom-and-Gomorrah plot, with God about to destroy the earth and bring all humanity into heaven unless a small band of angels can make two people (Travolta and Newton-John) fall in love with each other. The Devil hassles the angels throughout most of the film, until the nature of God's challenge is explained to him...
 * Oh God You Devil retells the Faust story, except that God (George Burns) is the hero riding to the rescue of the mortal in distress.
 * The Devil's Advocate was a feature film that cast Al Pacino as Satan, undercover as the head of the world's most powerful law firm.
 * "Pitch", a minor devil from the Mexican film Santa Claus, became a recurring guest character on Mystery Science Theater 3000.
 * Seraphim Falls:
 * The "Louis Cypher" joke was done in Angel Heart movie, in which Robert DeNiro played the role. In one scene, he remarks that in many cultures eggs are seen as a metaphor for the soul. He then promptly devours one.
 * In O Brother, Where Art Thou??, the Devil appears as a white Bounty Hunter with a hound dog and sunglasses that are always reflecting firelight. Before the start of the film, he gives Tommy Johnson the ability to play guitar "real good" in exchange for his soul. Throughout the movie, he hunts Ulysses and his group.
 * Bedazzled, the Devil is more in line with the Book of Job version, in which it's his/her job to test humanity with sin. Peter Cook plays the role as a Deadpan Snarker and a Trickster, while Elizabeth Hurley plays a seductress. Both seem to enjoy their job a lot.
 * Lucifer is played with a chilling, vicious malevolence by Viggo Mortensen in The Prophecy. Here he is an uneasy ally to the protagonists, but he makes it clear that he's helping them for entirely self-serving reasons, not for their benefit. Mortenson actually manages to out-creep Christopher Walken. While they share a scene.


 * The Ellen Barkin movie Switch
 * In Constantine, Peter Stormare plays the Devil as a dapper middle-aged gent in a pristine white suit... save for his bare feet and pant cuffs, which are covered in thick black sludge. His behavior is more in line with your average child molester than a suave prince of darkness or a roaring demon. In a rather fine example of outbargaining the devil for a favor,
 * The most important part was forgotten: He got flipped off. That made up for the movie as a whole.
 * The Jesus movie stars Jeremy Sisto as Jesus and un-stars Jeroen Krabbe as (male) Satan and a model in red as (female) Satan. Passion of the Christ Satan looks androgynous (but isn't, being Rosalinda Celentano) and white in the face.
 * In the original book by Nikos Kazantzakis, Satan appeared as a cherubic boy angel. Then again, since it is a classical-style Greek novel, that's, um, not all that surprising...
 * In John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness Satan is revealed to be only The Dragon to someone much, much worse...the Anti-God.
 * In The Devil and Max Devlin, the devil is played by Bill Cosby.
 * In The Witches of Eastwick, the character Darryl Van Horne is implied several times to be the devil. He is definitely the suave sophisticated kind, though -- at least until the end.
 * John Ritter's blink-and-you'll-miss-it mild-mannered Satan cameo is one of the best things in the biblical parody "Wholly Moses".
 * The androgynous Satan (portrayed by a female actress) in The Passion of the Christ. Notable for three scenes: the initial temptation of Jesus in the beginning of the film, a truly disturbing scene during Jesus's torture where Satan is seen cradling a demonic baby, in a mockery of the Virgin Mary, and a shot of Satan screaming in Hell, enraged at Jesus' sacrifice for man's sins and spiritual triumph
 * Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus features Tom Waits as the sinister Mr Nick. He gives an interesting Alternate Character Interpretation of the Devil as an Affably Evil compulsive gambler who is always willing to give another chance for the good Doctor to win their Faustian deal as a sort of double or nothing-clause, since he really loves the game more than winning.
 * Fantasia: The large demon of the "Night on Bald Mountain" sequence, Chernabog, was originally noted by Walt Disney himself, as well as Deems Taylor in the roadshow footage, as being Satan himself. Disney hired Bela Lugosi to come and be filmed as a model for this scene. They photographed him in his cape to capture his movements, flourishes, facial expressions and signature hand gestures to bring their Satan to life.
 * Hell's Highway features a female Satan who poses as a hitchhiker and kills those who give her a ride, such as a memorable scene where she cuts the infamous Ron Jeremy's penis off, which causes him to crash into a gas station after he takes several seconds to even notice it occurred.
 * The Devils Carnival has Lucifer running a carnival for the damned.

Literature

 * Features prominently in the modern Bible. The Hebrew Bible is the Trope Namer, but the character as he is today has largely evolved from a number of different religious entities that served to test the faith of humans, the term used for these entities being something to the effect of (ha-)satan, meaning "adversary".
 * Paradise Lost features perhaps the most famous fictional depiction of Satan in Western literature. John Milton's deep characterization has lead to hundreds of years of critical analysis.
 * Faust is not one work: there are at least two major literary versions of Faust (Marlowe's and Goethe's), as well as several major operas based on one or the other of these, all with varying views as to whether Faust can be saved. Wikipedia has a list.
 * And then there's the earliest stories that gave rise to the legend. Incidentally, Mephistopheles was originally just a demon serving under Lucifer/Satan. He was Satan in Goethe's version.
 * The classic story The Devil and Daniel Webster has been dramatized for television and film countless times. Satan is often Affably Evil in these depictions, and takes the (actually rather hard to argue with) position that he's not doing anything evil by trying to claim the New Hampshire farmer's soul, since he held up his end of the deal and all he's asking is that the other man do the same.
 * Subverted in the Arthur C. Clarke novel Childhood's End, where the devil-like aliens, the twist is that the process is so traumatic that it resonates back through time, causing them to.
 * Subverted in Harlan Ellison's The Deathbird.
 * Robert Heinlein:
 * Subverted in his novel Job: A Comedy of Justice.
 * In Magic Incorporated, the heroes reach Hell and its king, whom custom demands that he let them review The Legions of Hell to find their enemy.
 * Played with in the Russian classic The Master and Margarita. Woland causes mass mayhem in 1930's Moscow including but not limited to driving hack writers insane, beheading someone (he got better) and sending thousands of Muscovites into the streets naked. Yet despite his deviousness, the novel shows a Soviet Russia so screwed up that Woland and his entourage come across as Magnificent Bastards at worst. By the end of the novel, Woland's even in league with Jesus to grant a young couple peace (essentially send them to Dante's first level of heaven).
 * Woland isn't seen perpetrating evil at all. He and his ilk are shown handing punishments right and left to those who deserve them, which just happen to be everyone. While Woland doesn't agree with Yeshua on some key philosophical points, he's actually shown as a force of good (with a twisted sense of humor).
 * The Dark One (whose real name is Shai'tan) in Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time series, who is seen as somewhat less powerful than The Creator, but also vastly, infinitely more powerful than any being in the material world. This series also gets bonuses in that many of The Dark One's top ranked minions have names based synonyms for Devil (Asmodean, Bel'al, Ba'alzamon, et al), and several pseudonyms for The Dark One are obviously based on real world names meaning the same thing.
 * The Devil's Storybook (and sequel) has ten short stories about the Devil trying to do things. He wins roughly half the time; a few stories push him to the background to dwell on the affairs of Hell or such. Examples:
 * The Devil encounters a perfect girl, one who never pouts or has a temper or does anything wrong at all. He throws everything he's got at her, trying to make her imperfect, but it never works. Until finally he hits on a plan that has her losing her temper a dozen times a day:
 * A demon brings a rose to Hell, and plants it; when it blossoms, its aroma fills Hell, disgusting the Devil, who investigates. He finds the rose and orders it destroyed, but the demon at least gets some comfort when he finds a piece of broken crockery with a picture of a rose (no scent!).
 * A man dies and gets cremated, but his housekeeper ends up spilling his ashes and sweeping them up together with the ashes of a roast pig. The pig ends up in Hell, following the man around and nuzzling him. Once the man determines the problem, he gets the Devil to bring him the ashes, and painstakingly separates the ashes flake by flake. Over time, the pig grows distant. When the man has almost completed his task, the housekeeper dies and ends up in Hell...
 * The Lone Power from the Young Wizards series. When the Powers That Be got together to create the universe, the Lone Power's contribution was Entropy and Death, for which It was exiled from the Powers' home dimension. The job of the titular wizards is to slow down the death of the Universe and prevent the Lone Power from further interfering with Life..
 * An incarnation of the devil appears to Ivan in The Brothers Karamazov (in the form of an impoverished country gentleman) and carries on a long conversation with him about the cruelties of the world. Because the narrator warns us that Ivan is suffering from Brain Fever, we're left uncertain as to whether the conversation is real or a demented hallucination. Ivan tries to prove that he's a hallucination several times, only to have the devil trump him by proving that he could very well be real.
 * In the Betsy The Vampire Queen books, Betsy's half-sister is Satan's daughter. In this case, Satan is her mother. "She's" only made one non-flashback appearance, in which she scolds her daughter for "rebelling" (In this case, consciously being the biggest Pollyanna possible).
 * In the Inferno section of the Divine Comedy, Satan is a gigantic, monstrous idiot at the lowest point of hell. He's trapped waist-deep in ice, which is kept forever frozen by the wind of his flapping wings as he tries to escape. This factors into the common Christian theme of sinners placing themselves in hell, rather than God or Satan sending them there. Arch-sinners Cassius, Brutus and Judas are forever getting chewed up in Satan's mouth.
 * Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's Inferno and Escape From Hell books, based on Dante's work have a somewhat more articulate Satan who talks to the protagonists suggesting sardonically that God "could take lessons in morality from Vlad the Impaler" and that "He could have made a better universe by throwing dice".
 * In J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion, Morgoth was the greatest of the Ainur (angels), but rebelled against Eru Ilúvatar (God). He corrupted Feanor, he twisted Eru's creations into the various monstrous Slave Races, and created the Hell-like fortresses of Utumno and Angband. When he was eventually exiled to the Void, his servant Sauron took his place as the Big Bad. Sauron continued Morgoth's Satanic behavior, corrupting the Numenoreans and ruling the Hell-like Mordor. Both Morgoth and Sauron originally had beautiful forms, but lost access to that ability.
 * In For Love of Evil, the sixth book of Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality series, a priest named Parry becomes Satan. However, he's something of a Punch Clock Villain, choosing to manage Evil rather than embody it. This is just fine with the other Incarnations, and we eventually find out why.
 * Hungarian playwright Imre Madách's The Tragedy Of Man features Lucifer as a guide of Adam in his dream through ages from the Ancient Egypt to Distant Future. He appears as a benevolent character, but his ultimate goal was to corrupt mankind and drive him to suicide because of a wager with God (A very unique case of Deal with the Devil indeed). He fails.
 * Satan is (naturally enough) the central character of Jeremy Leven's novel Satan: His Psychotherapy and Cure by the Unfortunate Dr. Kassler, JSPS* (*Just Some Poor Schmuck), in which he undergoes seven sessions of therapy that leave him increasingly better off, but which don't quite work out so well for the poor Dr. K.
 * In a similar vein, in Clark Ashton Smith's short story Schizoid Creator, a psychiatrist tries to cure Satan, under the belief that Satan and God are just two sides of a split personality. This theory turns out to be.
 * In Poul Anderson's Operation Chaos, the hero is not certain whether he's actually met Satan or merely one of his higher-ups (or lower-downs as the case may be). He's certainly met an extremely powerful devil.
 * Good Omens has Satan, but he never actually appears, leaving the work to various underlings, including Beelzebub.
 * Lucifer stars as a major character in Lilith Saintcrow's Dante Valentine series. He is an androgyne, which means he can reproduce.
 * In C. S. Lewis's Perelandra, Satan appears as the main villain, possessing the body of the previous book's villain. Lewis goes out of his way to deconstruct the popular image of the Devil as a Magnificent Bastard -- while he is truly brilliant and can be incredibly charming when he wants to, he seems to derive his deepest pleasures from acting like an annoying five-year-old or torturing small animals to the brink of death without actually showing the mercy of killing them. In short, he's The Dark Knight's Joker, only without the entertaining sense of humor.
 * In C. S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters Satan is called "Our Father Below" by Screwtape.
 * Mark Twain's book Letters From The Earth is told from Satan's point of view. Despite being loyal to God, he gets banished to Earth for a day in angel time for speaking unwisely. However, because of Time Dissonance this means he is stuck there for what seems to us a long time during which he sends back letters on humanity, their nature and Christianity. In the book he comes off as not at all evil though possessing a refined sense of irony and a slight bafflement at humanity.
 * The Sorrows of Satan (1895) by Marie Corelli centers on the premise that Satan actually wants people to resist his temptations, because every human being who rejects him moves him that much closer to being allowed back into Heaven.
 * I Lucifer by Glen Duncan has Lucifer being granted a second chance for redemption by living life as a mortal. The book is told from his perspective with all the dark humour, sex and charm you'd expect from the devil himself. Deals with his side of the story.
 * Anne Rice toys with the concept of Satan a few times in her Vampire Chronicles books. In "The Tale of the Body Thief" one character imagines Satan not as a single entity but instead as a specific duty assigned to various entities throughout history, the job presumably entailing tempting and testing humankind ala Job. In "Memnoch the Devil", vampire anti-hero Lestat actually meets the title character (apparently "Memnoch" is his original name and he dislikes being called "Satan" or anything else) and learns that while he is indeed a rebellious angel thrown from heaven, he's not at all evil (although he's not really exactly good either) and is involved in some sort of cosmic wager with God on whether or not wicked souls can be rehabilitated.
 * In The Guardians, the throne of Hell is currently held by Lucifer Morningstar, but Beliel is waging an Enemy Civil War to take it from him.
 * In Fantendo canon, The Mysterious Mr. ? is portrayed as Satan, as well as the manifestation of Chaos in the universe. Mr. ? often comes to Earth and other universes and does not cause Chaos for the sake of causing it, but rather does it to maintain balance in the universes, as opposed to his counterpart Abaddon, the manifestation of Order. (Though he still does get a Sick Pleasure out of it.)
 * Nyarlathotep from Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos is more or less Satan, if not worse. A shape changer, sometimes humanoid (as the Black Pharaoh in 'Nyaralthotep'), sometimes a hideous Eldritch Abomination (as The Haunter of the Dark in the story of the same name); diabolical pact-maker (to Keziah Mason in The Dreams in the Witch House), trickster (to  in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath). Although he does act as The Dragon for Azathoth, Nyarlathotep can be seen as a physical manifestation of the Outer Gods' will (Yog-Sothoth and Azathoth), and is referred to as their 'soul and messenger' more than once, which means the Outer Gods are colossal bastards. He's also the only one of them with a human mindset, and has active interest in mankind. This isn't a good thing. AT ALL.
 * Satan makes an appearance at the end of The Monk to claim Ambrosio's soul personally.

Live Action TV

 * In the memorable "Halloween" episode of Quantum Leap, the Devil impersonated Al in an attempt to trap and punish Sam for the "fixes" and improvements he'd made in the timeline (unless it was All Just a Dream). Later, it is implied that Satan is (perhaps indirectly) in charge of the organization responsible for the "Evil Leapers" Sam encounters.
 * The First Evil in Buffy the Vampire Slayer is notably not Satan. The First's right hand man Caleb refers to Satan as a "little man." Satan, or at least someone resembling him, later appears on Angel -- "Izzerial the Devil", a tennis partner of Angel and a member of the season's Big Bad group "The Circle of the Black Thorn", although he is killed by a Eldritch Abomination in human form.
 * The Angel episode "The Cautionary Tale of Numero Cinco" mentions an incident where "the devil built a robot".
 * A Year At The Top featured a pair of musicians who made a deal with Satan's son for a single year of rock'n'roll success. They appear to have gotten it, but the series didn't...
 * In the episode "Devil's Due" from Star Trek: The Next Generation, an alien claims to be the Devil-figure from any number of worlds' mythologies (including Klingon) and "proves" it by taking their forms.
 * The original Battlestar Galactica Classic, "War of the Gods": The fleet is tempted by the promises of the mysterious "Count Iblis" (an Islamic name for Satan), who turns out to be a fallen angel from Caprican mythology.
 * Satan is the main character's unseen father in Point Pleasant.
 * Stargate SG-1 eventually met Sokar, allegedly the first Goa'uld to take a humanoid host, master of a hell-like prison planet, who is proposed to be the indirect inspiration for the Christian notion of Satan. Interestingly, actual Egyptian mythology does have a number of gods similar to Satan -- the evil Set is one, as is the monstrous Apep, known better to Stargate fans as Apophis, the Big Bad of the first five seasons.
 * Sokar also owned a moon, Netu, that he terraformed into a Fire and Brimstone Hell to imprison his enemies on.
 * Satan appears in the short-lived series Brimstone as Anti-Hero protagonist Ezekiel Stone's Trickster Mentor.
 * The Daemons (of the planet Daemos) are identified in an episode of Doctor Who as a race of advanced aliens who formed the basis of human demonic mythology. The whole thing is a slightly shameless rip-off of the earlier serial and movie Quatermass and The Pit (Five Million Years to Earth in the US). Decades later, "The Satan Pit" would reveal the "real" Satan, The Beast, a big scary monster bound since before the dawn of time by an ancient race and the origin of every mythology's Devil. Of course, the Doctor's skeptical, since he's met so many "real" versions of mythological beings. The Daemons are mentioned in passing as a Continuity Nod. The Torchwood first season finale goes on to feature Abaddon, the son of the aforementioned Beast.
 * In the miniseries Fallen, Lucifer, the last fallen angel still on Earth, asks our hero to redeem him and send him back to Heaven. Notably, he was played by Bryan Cranston, best known as the goofy dad from Malcolm in the Middle. Weird.
 * Potentially Hilarious in Hindsight since Cranston is now best-known for his role as Walter White on Breaking Bad.
 * Similar to the Quantum Leap example, Seven Days had the Devil show up disguised as a chrononaut from further in the future, tricking the team into assassinating a diplomat and provoking an international crisis that would result in nuclear war. His identity is revealed when Parker stops him, provoking a rant at how Parker and the team keep screwing up the plans he makes for human misery.
 * Ray Wise is the charming, smooth-talking Devil on Reaper. He's also quite funny.
 * He's appeared several times in The Twilight Zone.
 * Satan has never been sexier than when she was played by Julie Newmar in the episode "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville".
 * In "Escape Clause", a hypochondriac makes a Deal with the Devil to avoid death.
 * In "The Howling Man", a man must decide whether to release the title character. Once he does, he finds out who the captive really is...
 * "Printer's Devil". Our favorite demon tries to get a newspaper owner to sell his soul by giving him a linotype machine that can make things come true by printing them. Here he's played with utter relish by Burgess Meredith.
 * In Joan of Arcadia, Satan appears to Joan as sinister versions of previous God incarnations. Or it could've been hallucinations based on Joan's bout with Lyme Disease.
 * It could be that this was simply God testing her, like Job. The second (and final) season finale, however, introduces Ryan Hunter, a person who it's implied previously talked to God and may now be talking to the Devil (or is the Devil). We'll never know though.
 * In American Gothic, Sheriff Lucas Buck apparently is or is possessed by the Devil.
 * In an episode of Northern Exposure, Satan comes to Cicely as a short, wimpy little man played by Charles Martin Smith (Toad from American Graffiti). With the world already in shambles due to war and ethnic cleansing, Satan now amuses himself by tempting good people into making very small concessions of morality. He offers Shelley a more glamorous life if she will only burn her husband's favorite sweater, but she refuses.
 * He's the Big Bad of Supernatural and was ultimately responsible for the events up to Season 5. Surprise.

He had refused to bow down to humans on God's command, believing himself to be superior to the "murderous hairless apes". According to Gabriel, Lucifer was the family favorite and became envious when God "brought home the new baby (humans)". To prove the unworthiness of the human race, he tortured and twisted a human's soul, creating Lilith, the first demon. For this, he was cast into hell and imprisoned until an epic Xanatos gambit was conducted to free him. His endgame in Season 5 is to eradicate humans and demons from the world and return it to the original masterpiece it used to be. He is also affable and acts in a very calm, collected, and calculating manner.
 * The two deitylike figures on the island of Lost, and the "Man in Black," both share numerous traits with the devil as a way of making it unclear who is good and who is evil:
 * has blonde hair, likes wine (and uses it as a metaphor for evil "corked" by the island), interferes with the lives of the characters in subtle ways, and is explicitly called "the devil" by the Man in Black, though he was presumably saying this metaphorically to exploit 's Catholic faith. He's also played by Mark Pellegrino -- Lucifer in Supernatural.
 * The Man in Black is a shapeshifter and manipulator, known for taking the forms of the dead and deceiving mortals. He cannot kill himself and must use someone else to do it. He takes the form of a  that sometimes looks like a slithering snake. He has been called "evil incarnate" and a personification of hell by various characters.
 * In Lexx, the planet Fire is a hot, barren world where people can only survive by living in cities built on top of tall pillars that hold them in the slightly-cooler higher altitudes. The planet is ruled by the Affably Evil Prince, and  Prince himself often claims ignorance of his origins and purpose, but understands that his job is to make sure the people of Fire suffer forever.
 * In the Grand Finale of Ashes to Ashes.
 * Depends on who you believe. Word of God has flip-flopped, and  So, definitely demonic, maybe or maybe not Satan.
 * In Tensou Sentai Goseiger, Our Angels Are Different, but
 * In Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger, Witch Bandra's true master is named Dai (Great) Satan. He looks nothing like the usual depiction of the Judeo-Christian devil, being a floating blue head who yells a lot, and is mostly just an evil spirit that just happens to be named "Satan" (as opposed to being the "actual" Satan). When footage of Dai Satan was used for Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, he was renamed "Lokar" and his role on the story was demoted to a monster who simply served Rita Repulsa.
 * In Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena had killed the previous ruler of hell and is supposed to be the successor. Lucifer comes down from heaven and attempts to force her to accept her new role. However, Xena manipulates him into committing the seven deadly sins, causing him to mutate into a devil-figure, and then kicks him into hell.
 * Al Bundy sold his soul to Lou(cifer) for NFL glory. When it came time to collect, Al found he liked Hell, so Lou brought down the rest of the Bundys, and the Darcys.
 * In Touched By an Angel, Mandy Patinkin plays a surprisingly subtle, low-key devil, trying to make friends with an angel questioning her faith. And he sings.
 * The Collector: The Devil is a central character; He is omniscient, his relationship with God(who is not heard from) is adversarial but otherwise unclear, and he claims that he only seeks to do good. Each episode has him played by a new actor, actress, or in one memorable case puppet, and his main activity as seen through the series is making standardized deals with mortals.
 * In the X-Files episode "Signs and Wonders",.

Music

 * Voltaire has a few that include Lou in one way or another. There's Almost Human which makes the devil into The Woobie, Blue Eyed Matador where a soul in the afterlife mistakes the bull he's fighting for the devil and the girl in the stands for an angel (guess how that works out), and Goodnight Demon Slayer, in which a father is telling his son not to worry about monsters (the devil among them) because he's tougher than any of them.
 * Also in Death Death, where he jabs the narrator in the schlong with a pitchfork.
 * Heather Dale's adaptation of The Black Fox. A group of hunters go out and chase a suspicious black fox, which turns into the devil and chases them home.
 * The third act of Fireaxe's 4 hour Rock Opera Food for the Gods centers around the devil leading an army of demons and damned souls in an attempt to invade heaven. He sings a number of the tracks, most notably Welcome to my Realm, in which the screams of the damned are used as part of the background music.
 * It is not made very clear whether the titular pick of destiny from Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny is the chipped-off tooth of a demon or Satan himself. He claims in his song near the end of the film to be the devil, but different sources in the film say he was just a demon.
 * In one of his songs, singing comedian Stephen Lynch portrays Satan as completely and flamboyantly gay, complete with stereotypical high-pitched, lisping voice, and makes remarks that imply that he himself is Satan's son, who wastes all his time singing songs about "special kids named Fred" instead of spreading evil.
 * Frank Zappa's 'Titties & Beer' features the devil as a little guy with a red suit and widow's peak, quite capable of swallowing a 'big titty girly' whole (and then regurgitating her unharmed afterwards).
 * The Devil Went Down to Georgia from the Charlie Daniels Band shows the typical Deal with the Devil as a contest: I bet a fiddle of gold/ Against your soul/ 'Cause I think I'm better than you!
 * Two versions of the song were heard on radio. The 45 rpm single for AM radio with the line "'Cause I told you once you son of a gun, I'm the best there's ever been," and the album edition for FM radio with the line as "I done told you once you son of a bitch, I'm the best there's ever been."
 * There was a sequel, sung by several different country singers, titled appropriately, The Devil Comes Back to Georgia.
 * "Sympathy for the Devil" from The Rolling Stones works the Wicked Cultured line: 'Please allow me to introduce myself/ I'm a Man of Wealth and Taste... '
 * Gets a few cameos in Don McLean's "American Pie". 'I heard Satan laughing with delight/ The day the music died.'
 * The song also implies that Mick Jagger is Satan, or at least the generation of rock he embodies is Satanic.
 * Jack be nimble, jack be quick,
 * Jack Flash sat on a candle stick,
 * Because fire is the devil's only friend.
 * The "Damien" songs by DMX. Each song is a one-man duet between X and the titular character (X raises his pitch for Damien's parts), where Old Scratch is represented as a friend constantly trying to coax X to the darkside. Marilyn Manson sings the hook in one of the songs.
 * Symphony X created an album based off of John Milton's Paradise Lost and was released in 2007. The vocalist spends a good amount of time as Satan.
 * Running Wild's song "Satan" is more anti-heroic portrayal of him.
 * Esham. AKA, "The Black Devil".
 * Natas: Nation Ahead of Time And Space, or "Satan" backwards?
 * The Insane Clown Posse album Hell's Pit refers to Satan as "the Witch". Interestingly, at no point is he depicted as having any supernatural power other than lies and deception.
 * Esham used "the Witch" to refer to Satan earlier, on his 1992 song "Acid".
 * According to Morrissey, Satan has rejected his soul. As low as he goes, he never quite went that low!
 * Pick a Slayer song.
 * Sum 41's song "Pain For Pleasure" is about the Devil. its displays him in a somewhat negative light
 * Trans-Siberian Orchestra's album Beethoven's Last Night features Mephistopheles as one of the main characters.
 * Don Henley's In the Garden of Allah has the devil. "It's just like home--so damn hot I can't stand it..."
 * Black/Death Metal band Behemoth usually actually references various mythological demons, usually from Sumerian, Egyptian, or Roman mythology, but the song "Christgrinding Avenue" features the line "I'm on my way. Destination, Hell. By the power of will, I shall complete the Devil's work."
 * Their most recent album has a song that is simply titled "Lucifer," the lyrics of which are an old Polish poem sung from his perspective.
 * Celtic Frost, particularly the song "Synagoga Satanae," which, as you may have guessed, is Latin for "The Church of Satan."
 * A OFWGKTA song includes the lyrics, "Somebody tell Satan that I want my fucking swagger back."
 * The Italian heavy metal band Power Symphony has an album titled Lightbringer, featuring the song "Lucifer," in which Satan recalls his beautiful brilliance as Lucifer as well as his fall into darkness.
 * The song Son of the Morning by Oh, Sleeper is written from Satan's point-of-view. In it, he challenges and mocks God to His face. The album's final song implies that God completely destroys him in response (Oh, Sleeper IS a Christian band after all).
 * Kamelot's albums Epica and The Black Halo feature demonic temptation(by "Mephisto"), with Descent of the Archangel being the most prominent example.

Newspaper Comics

 * Dilbert has a toned-down version of Satan, called the Prince of Insufficient Light. He carries a giant pitchspoon. When he curses you, he says "I darn you to heck!"

Radio

 * In the BBC series Old Harry's Game, the Devil is portrayed as a weary, existential figure, tricked into rebelling against God and thereafter condemned to supervise Hell. This is shown to be an extremely arduous task, because almost all human beings have committed a sin of some kind. On one occasion, God accepts that Satan's punishment was out of proportion to his crime, but refuses to pardon him, as the existence of Satan is necessary for reasons that God will not reveal. In the fifth series, the Devil subverts his usual role by trying to convince Humanity to act in a moral manner, in order to ease the congestion in Hell.

Tabletop Games

 * Although for obvious reasons post-Gygax TSR and later Wizards of the Coast were extremely wary of allowing anything that could be even remotely used to put the charges of Satan-worship at their doorstep, there have been a few uses of Satan-like chatracters in the game:
 * Asmodeus, Beelzebub (under the alias "Baalzebul"), Pazuzu and other fixtures in Christian demonolgy are used as villains often in the various D&D worlds, particularly in 1st Edition and 3rd Edition (for most of 2nd, devils and demons were banned or renamed).
 * Satan himself was statted up in a fan-penned article in an early issue of The Dragon, long before the "D&D=Satanism" panic took off. As a injoke, Satan had exactly 333 hit points.
 * At this point, Asmodeus, the ruler of the Nine Hells, has become the single most direct Satan analogue in D&D, to the point of being Old Scratch in all but name.
 * The French game In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas has you playing either demons (INS) or angels (MV). It is a subversion of Christianity in that devils are not all bad, and angels... Well there is an archangel of the Inquisition, and you would not want to meet the Archangel of the Sword, either. Kinda short on the tolerance and all-inclusive love, these guys are. Anyway, Satan is either your Big Bad, or the boss of your boss. A campaign revolves around him getting depressed and wanting to quit his job.
 * The American adaptation by Steve Jackson Games, In Nomine, maintains much the same feel, but its version of Satan is as remote and unknowable as God. In his very few appearances, it's made clear that he's not funny, friendly, charming, suave, honorable, or quirky. His defining traits are that he's very powerful, very smart, and hates you, along with everyone else in Creation.
 * Lucifer was a prominent figure in Old World of Darkness. In Demon: The Fallen, he led one third of the Heavenly Host to rebel against God, believing this to be the only way to prevent a vague impending cataclysm, which his friend Ahrimal has foreseen and which God refused to do anything about. It turned out, said cataclysm WAS Lucifer's rebellion in the first place. Interestingly, Lucifer is not the Big Bad in the game: in fact, he is probably the staunchest believer in humanity the World of Darkness has ever seen. His former lieutenants, however, now sit comfortably on the edge between Eldritch Abomination and Complete Monster... In modern times, however he's by all accounts missing in action... as is God, leaving the newly-escaped Fallen to wonder what to do next.
 * Rather shockingly, the Palladium Fantasy Role Playing Game allows players to create Witch characters who receive their powers from Satan. Take that, moral guardians!
 * Retconned in later editions. Witches now get their powers from alien intelligences.
 * In Kult, his name is Astaroth (but he has 666 avatars walking around using different names).

Theatre

 * Lucifer is the main character of The History of the Devil, where he is sympathetic but still not a nice guy. He is put on trial for causing human suffering; the main theme of the play is whether the devil really is responsible for human suffering or we brought it on ourselves.
 * One of the main characters in Damn Yankees is Mr. Applegate, the Devil, who strikes a bargain with baseball fan Joe Hardy to let him play for his team and win the pennant.

Video Games

 * Vigoor from Ninja Gaiden is the ruling devil and absolute authority of a "holy" empire of evli deities.
 * In the series Shin Megami Tensei, Lucifer is always around the corner, pulling strings in his quest to defeat YHVH. He often appears as a blonde human, named (groan) Louis Cypher. But nobody ever seems to get it anyway, so to Hell with it... His posse in the first game includes Beelzebub, Arioch, the gender-confused Astaroth, and Norse baddie Surt. Satan, on the other hand, is God's servant (of the hasatan flavor in the original Hebrew tradition), as showcased in the second game; needless to say, Lucifer and Satan do not get along.
 * The kicker: God manages to be such a massive jerk in the second game that Satan gets fed up and joins the player should he choose the Law path.
 * In the Persona series, you can summon Satan. And Lucifer. And Lucifer's prettier version (usually called Helel). Put two of the three (it changes depending on the version) into the main character's lineup in 3 and you can use Armageddon, which kills... anything and everything, really.
 * Mundus from Devil May Cry, who was originally intended to be named Satan. He comes in white and looks somewhat like an angel (that is, until Dante messes him up but good, revealing the Eldritch Abomination within). He's not quite omnipotent, though, but it does seem thus far that he cannot be permanently killed, even with the power of Sparda, so Dante eventually has to seal him away like his father did long ago.
 * In the Diablo video game series, the protagonists must fight the three Prime Evils: Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal. All are alternate names for Satan.
 * In Diablo III
 * In God of War, Hades definitely has a certain, er, hell-ish thing going on. The god and the location.
 * In Final Fantasy II, the final boss Beezlebub, however, is a miniboss that can be found.
 * You work for Satan in the first Deception. At least, at first; whether you continue working for him through the story is up to you.
 * Obligatorily the Big Bad of Dantes Inferno. From some of his rants, it seems that he was locked up because he refused to bow down to humans, who were created in God's image, rather than because he tried to overthrow God (though that does seem to be his goal by the time the events of the game roll around).
 * This is actually the reason for the fall of Iblis, Islam's version of the Devil.
 * Red Dead Redemption features a series of Stranger missions with an obviously wealthy and intelligent man who sends John on bizarre missions that only an omnipotent being could know of, always making the options quite clear to John, such as whether to rob or help a nun, or to stop or encourage a man to cheat on his wife. He also makes remarks that he is an "accountant" and that he hopes his son grows up to be "like John." It gets even more bizarre, after John shoots him in the back of the head three times and he continues to walk away, unharmed. Later on, he can be seen both at
 * Though there is a bit of a debate amongst players as to whether he is The Devil, The Grim Reaper, or God. All three view points have compelling evidence, and it was probably Rockstar's intention to make it ambiguous enough that it could be whichever one you think it is.
 * Death Smiles decided that plain old Satan was too boring, so its final boss and head of the demonic invasion triggered by Jitterbug is Demonic Imperator Tyrannosatan
 * And the sequel has as its final boss a bizarre mash-up of demon and Santa Claus called... "Satan Claws".
 * Tekken has the Devil Gene, which allows most of the Mishima family (Besides Heihachi) to turn into a Devil, and the Devil Forms of Kazuya, Jin, and Jinpachi are usually considered the strongest combatants in the game as far as story goes.
 * Note: this was passed over to them through at least one (Kazuya) Faustian deal with an evil winged Manipulative Bastard called…Devil.
 * Mortal Kombat has a backstory character named Lucifer who is in charge of the Netherrealm (an infinite, fiery, wasteland where evil goes to rot, blatantly Hell).
 * And he's apparently overthrown by Shinnok, a fallen Elder God, a high ranking divine being who fell from grace.
 * Mephiles the Dark from Sonic the Hedgehog is essentially the Devil, especially when he fuses with Iblis and becomes Solaris. In fact, both Mephiles (whose name is a play on Mephistopheles) and Iblis (Name's the Same as the Muslim devil) represent two sides of the devil: the supreme manipulator and the destroyer.
 * In Castlevania: Lords of Shadow,
 * While Arceus is the Pokémon equivalent of God, Primal Dialga, the  Big Bad of the second Pokemon Mystery Dungeon game (who looks like an evil Dialga with a black body and red stripes instead of a blue body and green stripes) may actually be the series' equivalent of the Devil. Giratina and Darkrai are popular candidates for the title as well, though they are both not outright evil. Occasionally played straight with the latter however.
 * Giratina definitely fits the role of Satan on a cosmic level: it's a literal god/EldritchAbomination that was banished for its aggressive tendencies(in particular, its obsession with balance) by what is implied to be the aformentioned Arceus. While not evil(it prevents Cyrus from achieving An Arceus Am I), it's a fearesome opponent that has the potential of threatning the world. One could say he's more Hades, keeper of the Underworld, than Satan.
 * Perhaps the closest thing to the Devil the franchise has as far as imagery and pure evil goes? Ghetsis Harmonia, the human Big Bad of the fifth generation. His hair is shaped like horns going out to the side, his eyes are red, and his second outfit is a Black Cloak. He's also fixated on "capturing the minds, hearts, and souls of others", and his battle theme even sounds like a Dark Reprise of Arceus'. The opening theme during the "Episode N" arc in the anime even has a moment where Ghetsis throws his cape back against a red, fiery backdrop in a very Devil-like fashion. This all seems to suggest that he is the Devil made flesh, and that any world ruled by him would be Hell on Earth.
 * For extra Fridge Brilliance, Satan's level of Hell in Dante's Inferno is frigid and layered in ice. What Pokemon does Ghetsis take control of in the sequel games to unleash upon the entire region? Kyurem, an ice type.
 * Bowser, the main villain of the Super Mario Bros. series games may actually be their equivalent of the Devil. Proof? His Japanese name translates into "Great Demon King Koopa", he looks like a demonic-looking turtle-dragon, he lives in what appears to be Hell, and on several occasions, he actually tried to take over outer space! He is also for some reason a necromancer as some of his henchmen are actually ghosts and skeletal turtles.
 * There is a theme among the Ghosts N Goblins villains, as they're all named after some variant of Satan. The actual Satan is The Dragon to Astaroth, the most common recurring villain. Other villains include Beelzebub, Lucifer, Samael, and Hades.
 * In Bayonetta, Queen Sheba is the ruler of Inferno, the realm of demons that Bayonetta often taps into for her most stylish finishers. In fact,.
 * Satan is the bad guy of the first Puyo Puyo game, and a regular character in the series. Tends to be the Final Boss (or at least one of them), as well as a cheater.
 * The ninja from the obscure game The Ninja Kids deal with a bunch of satanists, terrorists and assorted evildoers who want to "resurrect" Satan. They succeed, and you have to fight him as the final boss.
 * The old arcade game Psychic 5 features statues of a demon sit upon a throne (referred to as Satan in the manual) that you have to destroy in order to finish the levels.
 * Manages to be subverted in Fate/hollow ataraxia: The guy who is claimed to be the Devil was actually just some villager who was completely powerless but earned the title of the local devil by being blamed for all the evils in the world and sacrificed to achieve peace.
 * In Graffiti Kingdom, the devil is a horned, purple guy-looking-thing named Medium. When freed from his imprisonment, he takes over Canvas Kingdom and plans to rule the world., so "devil" is probably just a title for "ruler of demons" rather than an actual entity.
 * Hazama/Terumi Yuuki from Blaz Blue may also count as a Satan Expy. One of the revered Six Heroes, he betrayed his team and after being sealed, resurfaced once more to topple Heaven and God and shape the world as he sees fit: Make what he believed to be truth, which is DESPAIR, as the only truth in the world, and the lies of the world (which is everything) to be cut down. And he... succeeded in toppling 'God' (Takamagahara) by Continuum Shift, though only time will tell if the upcoming sequel will have him fall spectacularly. And not only he's an Obviously Evil Complete Monster, he walks around with Eyes Always Shut, speak like a gentleman in order to lull his unaware 'allies' to move like he wills it, and And although his true name 'Terumi' is safe, the nickname 'Hazama' gives the meaning of 'otherworldly'.
 * Hazama/Terumi Yuuki from Blaz Blue may also count as a Satan Expy. One of the revered Six Heroes, he betrayed his team and after being sealed, resurfaced once more to topple Heaven and God and shape the world as he sees fit: Make what he believed to be truth, which is DESPAIR, as the only truth in the world, and the lies of the world (which is everything) to be cut down. And he... succeeded in toppling 'God' (Takamagahara) by Continuum Shift, though only time will tell if the upcoming sequel will have him fall spectacularly. And not only he's an Obviously Evil Complete Monster, he walks around with Eyes Always Shut, speak like a gentleman in order to lull his unaware 'allies' to move like he wills it, and And although his true name 'Terumi' is safe, the nickname 'Hazama' gives the meaning of 'otherworldly'.

Web Animation

 * The Fear Hole has a biological manifestation of the concept of Satan in this episode who functions as an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain.
 * The Old-Timey version of the King of Town from Homestar Runner may actually be the website's equivalent of the Devil.
 * Leo and Satan
 * Retarded Animal Babies has Satan as a recurring character, often with his name screwed with to make other names for himself, such as "Stan" or "Santa".

Webcomics

 * MAG ISA -- While Satan isn't shown at all in this comic, the bad guys are admittedly in the service of Satan. They masquerade as "good" though. Since Satan masquerades as an angel of light. (2 Corinthians 11:14)
 * Parody: In Dinosaur Comics, Satan is seemingly a videogame-obsessed nerd. He's never seen directly, instead being represented by red text coming from below the panel border.
 * Also, T-Rex is the only person who can hear Satan (or God, for that matter), leading the other characters to occasionally speculate that T-Rex is making up those voices he hears.
 * Homestuck has a character named, well, Doc Scratch, who He is omniscient, multi-dimensional, and an excellent host.
 * Good example of a Magnificent Bastard.
 * His name, or at least nickname, is Scratch, which is a nickname for The Devil himself.
 * In College Roomies from Hell, demons first appeared as throwaway characters who were summoned by the inept Satanists Waldo and Steve, but refused to do their bidding. Later, as the strip became more serious, they actually manage to summon Satan (as opposed to the previous nameless minor demons), and, after trying to take Dave's soul, he began showing a clear personal interest in the main characters, quickly proving to have been the Big Bad of the series all along.
 * The Devil appears as a main character in Sinfest. He operates a deal booth styled like Lucy's booth in Peanuts, and is antagonized by The Faceless God, who mocks him with a silly handpuppet. Aside from various taunts against God and attempts to tempt people or buy their souls, he is generally presented as a neutral or even sympathetic character compared to the petty and whimsical God.
 * GoodCopBadCop
 * Has recently shifted squarely into Lawful Evil. Potraying him as lord of a Fire and Brimstone Hell, the Man Behind the Man to the Mega Corp and a Bad Boss has a way of doing that.
 * Satan appears in Casey and Andy not only as a woman, but as the girlfriend of one of the title characters.
 * Satan is a minor character in the Magic: The Gathering webcomic UG Madness, usually working with Magic R&D director Mark Rosewater (portrayed as a comical imp). His first appearance was in this strip.
 * The folkloric devil is often discussed in West Of Bathurst, a slice of life comic, as seen here. The longer the comic goes on, the more likely it seems that one character actually is the devil.
 * Satan has made a handful of appearances in Sluggy Freelance, most notably being summoned onto Riff's computer in the strip's first Story Arc, and for being the father of The Evil.
 * In Manga Punk Sai's The Story From Hell has Satan and Lucifer as two separate characters: loyal angel Satan is in charge of Hell, and his rather thankless duties include hunting down fallen angel Lucifer whenever he manages to run off to Earth. (On closer inspection, Sai seems to have taken down the main storyline, but there's still plenty of character art and Omake arcs there.)
 * It can still be found starting here, thought it's pretty old now and nothing like what she plans it to be in the future -- http://mangapunksai.deviantart.com/art/TSFH-Inside-Cover-3104654
 * Satan's niece, Cassiel (who while not a fallen angel is still distinctly petty and vindictive) is the resident Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain in Misfile. Satan himself is confirmed to exist within the comic's universe, but hasn't put in a personal appearance... yet.
 * Given the primary focus of Jack, it's not surprising that Satan makes occasional appearances, in a form similar to David Hopkins' furry persona (a blue skunk), only with all-black eyes.
 * The Tiger Barb from 95 Gallons is a Satan stand-in, working to corrupt the utopian fish tank by introducing currency, the concept of economics, the idea of people working for themselves rather than for the good of all, etc. He's also crafty, hiding his true evil intentions behind more blatant and short-lived acts of evil -- the above are hidden behind the introduction of drugs, starting a feud between two families of gouramis over who has the nicest home, and tricking fish into worshipping an ultimately worthless game he fabricated, respectively.
 * Blip features variations on both the Jewish and the Christian versions of Satan, as separate characters. Lucifer is the angel who rebelled against God and currently rules Hell -- he's also a Bishonen and a surprisingly nice guy (who still wants to destroy the world). "The Adversary" fills the role of God's prosecuting attorney and Loyal Opposition; he's much less nice. In spite of being on opposite sides of a war, the two of them get along rather well.

Web Original

 * In the "Mr. Deity" series of shorts that can be found on YouTube, Lucifer is "Lucy", an ex-girlfriend of the titular Mr. Deity, who got stuck with the Hell gig after she did Mr. Deity a favour in stirring up things in the Garden of Eden. She's particularly annoyed by the constant "passive-aggressive" references to her being a "snake" in the "script", and would much prefer her avatar on Earth to be a bunny. She's not impressed by Mr. Deity's alternative suggestion of a goat.
 * Appears quite a bit in the first, Hell-centric book of The Salvation War. He's a colossal Jerkass, and a bit of an idiot. Hardly surprising that the human war effort wants to kill him with extreme prejudice.
 * of The SCP Foundation may or may not be Lucifer. A storyline involving both and  strongly implies it. His response when interviewed about it is to first claim he is, then claim he was lying, then point out there's no way to be sure whether he was lying about being Lucifer, or lying about lying about it. Oh, and if this is the case,  may or may not also be the physical incarnation of God or the Second Coming of Christ.
 * The short film "Raking Leaves" by comedy troupe Stella and Bradley Cooper involves a rather unexpected appearance.
 * The Whateley Universe has something that claims to be Satan. Merry has even been spiritually sent to 'Hell' and tortured by him. He claims God exists, and the two of them are trying to keep eldritch abominations from bursting into their universe.
 * Basement Cat
 * Are you really surpised?
 * Satan appears occasionally on Ask That Guy With The Glasses. Ask That Guy works for him, however Satan can be unnerved by what he says. Also, the Nostalgia Critic made a comment that Satan goes to the Devil Devil when he's not being evil enough.
 * In RostoAD's Mind My Gap, we have Virgil S. Horn. As the series narrator and villain, Rosto and he don't exactly say he's the devil, but when Virgil covers the second "a" in his middle name... Besides being a villain, he owns a tv show and is a (con)cept artist.
 * In RostoAD's Mind My Gap, we have Virgil S. Horn. As the series narrator and villain, Rosto and he don't exactly say he's the devil, but when Virgil covers the second "a" in his middle name... Besides being a villain, he owns a tv show and is a (con)cept artist.

Western Animation
"Ned: It's always the last guy you'd expect, isn't it?"
 * Satan as depicted on South Park varies between a genuine lord of all evil and the wussy gay bottom to Saddam Hussein. He's settled on Affably Evil. And he's got a luau!
 * The Devil is the explicit identity of the villain in the pilot episode of Cow and Chicken. This gets Bowdlerised for the series proper, and he's only called "The Red Guy" from there on out, even though it's glaringly obvious he's the Devil; they might have a point, though, because as the series goes on, he was turned from Evil to an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain.
 * "The Red Guy" is also a regular character on I Am Weasel. In the series, he is also referred as "I.B. Red Guy", an allusion to Weasel's and Baboon's names.
 * One of The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episodes had Ned Flanders as Satan, selling Homer a donut in exchange for his soul.

"Bender: You may have to metaphorically make a deal with the devil. And by "devil," I mean Robot Devil. And by "metaphorically," I mean get your coat."
 * The Devil appeared in an early episode where Bart had a near-death experience. He seemed quite affable.
 * Assigning Satan's schtick to another supernatural figure is popular for series in which Old Scratch himself would be inappropriate:
 * Futurama has The Robot Devil, apparently created for the sole purpose of torturing sinner robots who transgress against the tenets of Robotology (which he's refered to as "our religion"). He's a tempter, a deal-maker, and a talented fiddle player (probably a Shout-Out to The Devil Went Down to Georgia above), but not too smart.

"Satan: (transformed as a reviewer): Tim Allen gives that same likeable performance we always love, once again proving Disney Pictures have the magic touch that may not win awards, but keeps America smiling. How was that?
 * The villain known only as "Him" on The Powerpuff Girls is essentially as close as you can get to Satan and get a TV-Y7 rating. He's got a tutu and a high, reverberating voice (alternating with enraged shouting), and is probably the creepiest bad guy on the show. It may be a case of Getting Crap Past the Radar that a common title in diabolism is "His Infernal Majesty."
 * Hades, the ancient Greek lord of the underworld, as depicted on the Hercules series. He acts a lot more like a cartoon Satan than how he's depicted in the old myths.
 * Al Roker from the Proud Family. He makes deals and has been proven to take his prices high. Like when Penny asks for all the parents to go away, he turns them all into Roker Ware slaves. She beat him twice but he's got the demon voice.
 * He was one of the three main characters in the short-lived God, the Devil and Bob.
 * Unicron is, according to recent continuity, giant mechanical transforming planet-eating Satan, although he comes a bit closer thematically to the Zoroastrian Angara Mainyu- a god of evil equal and opposite to the god of good, as opposed to Satan's "former servant" status.
 * In Transformers Prime Unicron
 * For a "former servant gone evil" Transformers also has one, named The Fallen, who comes halfway between this and Judas. He was one of the first 13 transformers God-- er, Primus created, and went evil. And is on fire.
 * Rocko's Modern Life had Peaches.
 * Satan appears in Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil, as the father of the main character. He's not as evil as you might think, but he hates his daughter's boyfriend... a DJ called Jesús.
 * A version of him is the boss on Jimmy Two-Shoes. Not exactly himself; that is "Lucius Heinous VII", living in Miseryville, which is Fire and Brimstone Hell. While Lucy VII (as Jimmy calls him) isn't very dangerous, his family line gets nastier as it goes back. Lucius I... well, he looks something like this in a suit.
 * Trigon the Terrible, Big Bad of Teen Titans season four and father of Anti-Anti-Christ Raven, is very clearly a Satan Expy. In the original comic storyline Trigon was supposed to be Satan, no ifs ands or buts about it, but apparently the writers got concerned that the Moral Guardians would object. Apparently changing the name and adding an extra pair of eyes gets you off scott-free, though...
 * On The Critic, Satan is responsible for many of Hollywood's problems (such as unnecessary sequels and Marisa Tomei winning an Oscar). The cast of Wings once asked him for another season on the air ("There are limits to even MY powers!"). He also appears in the episode "Siskel & Ebert & Jay & Alice" with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert when Gene is interviewing possible replacements:

Gene Siskel: You're Satan, aren't you?

Satan: (transforms back into himself) You win another round, Siskel, but we shall meet again! (growls angrily and disappears through the floor.)"


 * One of the most bizarre and terrifying depictions of Satan (though, if it is true to its original material, it is Satan's nephew, and not Satan himself) occurs in The Adventures of Mark Twain, a claymation film ostensibly intended for children. The segment is based on Mark Twain's The Mysterious Stranger and is viewable here.
 * On the Adult Swim-era Space Ghost Coast to Coast episode "Sweet for Brak", featuring Tenacious D, Satan is revealed to be, and wears "a necktie and a crown of femurs".
 * Satan appears in Re Boot as a Playable Character for the User in a Mortal Kombat-ish game. He is also the first User character to be truly menacing, and he wins. When Satan gets spawned in Mainframe during System Crash Matrix gets to have revenge against him. The character's official name is Zaytan, but thats just some Executive Meddling since his name is clearly pronounced as Satan in the show.
 * Satan made an appearance on an episode of Darkwing Duck, going by the name of Beelzebub. The episode predictably went missing.
 * He appears briefly in the Ren and Stimpy episode "Sven Hoek" after Ren ends up killing everyone when he takes a leak on the Electric Fence board game. Which was the number #1 thing you must not do when playing the game. Satan's cheerful admonishment as they arrive in Hell: "So, you whizzed on the electric fence, didn't ya?"
 * According to some of the sketches done for "Sven Hoek", Satan was apparently supposed to be George Liquor in a devil costume. In the final cartoon, he still looks more than a little like George and is even voiced by Michael Pataki.
 * In The Boondocks, he trains Stinkmeaner in martial arts, sends his spirit back to Earth as a reward, and gets called a "BITCH ASS NYUKKA!" for his trouble.

Real Life

 * Some religions are based around him. As a general rule though, they don't sacrifice goats or anything. In fact, many don't even worship him specifically. La Veyan Satanists don't even strictly believe in Satan, but rather hold him up as a symbol of man adhering to his nature. The idea being that one should do whatever makes them happy, both altruistically and not. As a general rule, most flavors of Satanism are focused on worshipping one's self rather than the actual devil.
 * Some modern Gnostic sects and Gerald Gardner's Wicca venerate the greek god Pan (whose image was the inspiration for the horned, goat-legged devil) as both a horned god and ophite messiah. Because of his appearance, some followers are known to affectionately refer to him as the Devil, and various other synonymous names taken from the bible.