Hellah Horrah’s Scream Pick: The Possession

Written By Tya Alisa Anthony

When a Yard Sale Goes to Hell

Well, well, well, my darklings, grab your garlic and clutch your crucifixes—it’s time for tonight’s midnight morsel of horror. And oooh baby bats, this one is a warning straight from the underworld: never, ever trust a thrift store treasure.

Enter The Possession (2012)—a film that makes my raven-black heart skip a beat every single time. Why? Because it centers on one of the creepiest concepts ever: the dybbuk box. Yes, my loves, a little wooden container filled with an evil spirit so nasty it could make Dracula himself sleep with the lights on.

🩸 The Setup:

A newly divorced dad—played by the hauntingly talented Jeffrey Dean Morgan (yes, that’s right, our favorite tough guy from Supernatural and The Walking Dead)—buys an antique box for his young daughter at a yard sale. Sounds innocent enough, right? Wrong. If you’ve ever strolled through a thrift store and thought, “Hmm, this has bad vibes”—this movie proves you were right.

🪦 The Horror Hook:

That box is cursed, sugarplums. A demon spirit seeps out like a bad perfume, twisting the daughter’s innocence into something sinister. The way the little girl changes—from wide-eyed sweetness to dark-eyed horror—is bone-chilling. And Morgan? He does what every horror dad must: fight the shadows with all the grit in his soul while trying desperately to protect his children. It’s equal parts heartbreaking and horrifying.

💀 Why It Works:

This movie plays on one of my biggest fears: cursed objects hiding in plain sight. You think you’ve scored a deal at the flea market? Nope—you just brought home an ancient demon ready to redecorate your soul. No thank you! Hellah doesn’t do haunted tchotchkes. IKEA only, darlings.

And Jeffrey Dean Morgan? Delicious in his darkness. He goes toe-to-toe with the evil, and watching him unravel while holding his family together is pure gothic cinema candy.

🕷️ Final Shriek:

The Possession reminds us that evil doesn’t always knock—it sometimes comes home in a box you paid $5 for. And that, my fiends, is true horror.

So next time you wander into a thrift shop, remember: that “cute little jewelry box” could be your one-way ticket to demon town. Stay spooky, shop wisely, and keep your boxes empty.

🖤 With claws and cackles,

Hellah Horrah – Mistress of the night

Tya Alisa Anthony

Tya Alisa Anthony is an American artist, photographer, writer, and independent curator whose work explores memory, mythology, ancestry, and the quiet ways people leave themselves behind in the objects they touch. For more than twenty years, her practice has existed at the intersection of visual research, education, and cultural storytelling, investigating resilience through the body, the landscape, historical archives, and the natural world.

Working across photography, collage, cyanotype, botanical collections, handmade books, and mixed media, Anthony approaches each body of work as an evolving archive rather than a finished statement. She is drawn to weathered photographs, heirlooms, medicinal plants, folklore, ritual objects, forgotten architecture, and the symbolic language that connects cultures across time. Her work asks how identity is preserved, transformed, and remembered.

Alongside her studio practice, Anthony has spent more than two decades building educational programs, exhibitions, and community-centered initiatives that expand access to the arts. Her leadership has helped shape institutions, mentor emerging artists, develop sustainable systems, and create spaces where creativity becomes a lifelong practice rather than a privilege.

Anthony’s artwork is included in the permanent collections of the Denver Art Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver’s Octopus Collection. Her work has been exhibited nationally and is held in numerous private collections.

She is currently creating Organic Tarot, a 78-card hand-collaged tarot deck and accompanying memoir that intertwines mythology, autobiography, botanical symbolism, and the archetypal journey of transformation. The project reflects the central thread running throughout her career: that art is not simply something we make—it is a way of understanding ourselves, preserving what matters, and leaving a map for those who come after us.

http://www.tyaanthony.com
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