History Main / OurGhoulsAreCreepier

** ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin Portrait of Ruin']]'': Ghouls are stronger palette swaps of zombies, looking like green corpses in red tunics that feed on corpses. They're elementally strong against Dark and weak against Slash, Fire, Holy, and Stone. There's also a much stronger variant with dark blue skin called the Ghoul King, seemingly a reference to "The Bells" by Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. They come out for battle if a number of ghouls are slain in quick succession and one must be dfeated as part of the optional quest "Defeat the Ghoul King".

** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaCircleOfTheMoon'': Ghouls are stronger palette swaps of zombies, looking like blue corpses in red robes. They're elementally strong against Darkness.
** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaDawnOfSorrow'': Ghouls are stronger palette swaps of zombies, looking like blue corpses in purple torn pants. They are confirmed to be undead in the bestiary and feed on corpses. They're elementally strong against Dark. The rarest drop gained from these creatures is Demon Stomach, which turns spoiled and rotten food into nourishing sustenance. This goes well with the most common drop: Rotten Meat.
** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaCurseOfDarkness'': There are three levels of ghouls, all stronger palette swaps of the three levels of zombies. They look like walking corpses in blue tunics and are only hinted to be undead due to a reference to their rotten teeth. Rather than dead flesh, their favored food is the warm flesh of the living. They're elementally strong against Ice and weak against Fire.
** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin'': Ghouls are stronger palette swaps of zombies, looking like green corpses in red tunics that feed on corpses. They're elementally strong against Dark and weak against Slash, Fire, Holy, and Stone. There's also a much stronger variant with dark blue skin called the Ghoul King, seemingly a reference to "The Bells" by Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. They come out for battle if a number of ghouls are slain in quick succession and one must be dfeated as part of the optional quest "Defeat the Ghoul King".
** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaOrderOfEcclesia'': Ghouls are stronger palette swaps of zombies, looking like red corpses in red torn pants. They are almost certainly alive, being defined as a spirit, and feed on corpses. They're elementally strong against Darkness and weak against Slash, Flame, Light, and Stone. The one potential drop ghouls can leave behind is Spoiled Milk.
** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaLordsOfShadow'': Ghouls look like demonic humanoids with large claws and a maw that can split open in the middle for extra volume. They are explicitly not undead and, for once, weaker than zombies.

* ''VideoGame/{{GU-L}}'': The GU-L Project is one of several projects attempting to create powered superhumans. This project’s scientifically-created ghouls have red eyes and a taste for human flesh.

** From #21 to #23 of ''Mysterious Adventures'', Mother Ghoul was the host of Mother Ghouls's Nursery Tale, a section dedicated to twisted version of well-known fairytales.

** "Mother Ghoul's Nursery Tales: Chicken Little!" (''Mysterious Adventures'' #24): Mother Ghoul is the horror host who narrates the story of "Chicken Little"

** "Sleepwalker!" (''Magazine/CreepyMagazine'' #38): Diane believes herself to be a disturbed human with vampiric habits. Her husband Charles and his friends help her hide the body of a victim she wakes up next to and get a renowned doctor to treat her. Diane, however, keeps having a particular dream and one day follows the dream to its end, waking up as she opens the door on Charles and his friends consuming a corpse. She was never a vampire. They were ghouls and tried to throw her off their trail, but they can't let her off this time.

** "Vampire Slayer!" (''Eerie'' #5): Corinne the vampire and Colette the ghoul are twin sisters. For the longest time, Baron Alexi has been a thorn in vampire-kind's side, so Corinne seduces him in lowering his guard. Alexi is suspicious and during one meeting tries to stake her only to see she casts a reflection. Unaware of Colette's existence and that it was she he fought, Alexi believes he almost killed an innocent human and neglects to arm himself when next he meets with Corinne.

* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'': There are three different meanings to the term "ghoul". The most prominent usage indicates living drinkers of vampire blood or vitae. Another usage, spelled "ghul", is for an independent creature that hunts humans for their flesh. The third usage of "ghul" is a term of insult against vampires used by mummies.
** As per ''Ghouls: Fatal Addiction'', ghouls are living beings who drink vitae, thereby gaining some of the powers of a vampire and some of the weaknesses. For instance, one perk is that the aging process stops, but only as long as a ghoul drinks vitae regularly. Would their supply stop, they revert to their true age, which is deadly for a ghoul past their natural lifespan. Most ghouls exist as carefully selected and devoted servants of the vampires that nourish them, whether those vampires are good masters or not, but there are also self-made ghouls who hunt vampires for their vitae like vampires do humans for blood. There are two notable variants of ghouls: fleshcrafted ghouls and revenants. Fleshcrafted ghouls belong to Clan Tzimisce, who use their powers to mold the ghouls' flesh to suit combat and not much else. The szlachta are the enhanced soldiers, the vozhd consist of many bodies fused together, and the fleshweld ghouls look like regular soldiers but can fuse together at will. Clan Tzimisce also is big on revenants; more than any other clan. Revenants are born ghouls bred from made ghouls over multiple generations. Revenants generate their own vitae and aren't dependent on a vampire, but are loyal servants still because that's the family business.

* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheRequiem'': There are two very different creatures to bear the designation "ghoul": ghouls and ghuls. The former are the drinkers of vampire blood or vitae, while the latter are effectively vampires by a different name. It's insinuated that ghouls are named after ghûls, but for what reason is yet to be shared.
** As per ''Ghouls'', ghouls are living beings who drink vitae, thereby gaining some of the powers of a vampire and some of the weaknesses. For instance, one perk is that the aging process stops, but only as long as a ghoul drinks vitae regularly. Would their supply stop, they revert to their true age, which is deadly for a ghoul past their natural lifespan. Most ghouls exist as carefully selected and devoted servants of the vampires that nourish them, whether those vampires are good masters or not, but there are also self-made ghouls who hunt vampires for their vitae like vampires do humans for blood. Plants are not immune to vitae addiction and ghouls created from them are called mandragora. They are rare, and so are born ghouls. The chances for conception and birth when one of the parents is a ghoul are slim and only marginally better odds are achieved when both parents are ghouls. Nonetheless, some ghoul families exist, mostly in the branch of Ordo Dracul. Born ghouls that don't partake in vitae age, but slower than humans do and they possess stronger bodies and the like, but they're also inherently more servile to vampires than made ghouls.

Ghouls may have their origin in the Bronze Age gallus, demons that dragged people off to the underworld but didn't eat them or anything at all, for that matter. If true, association with the "g'l" sound present in several languages — among which Persian, (Byzantian) Greek, Latin, and Urdu — used to indicate "throat" or "gullet" may be what morphed the ancient gallu (غالو) in the later ghoul. Linguistically, "ghoul" (غول) refers to the male and "ghoulah" or "ghouleh" (غولة) to the female. However, there are folkloric traditions where one or the other doesn't exist and ghouls are a OneGenderRace, usually in favor of the female variety.

** "Don't Make a Ghoul of Yourself!" (''Astonishing'' #16): A hunchbacked ghoul is caught in the act of corpse-snatching by a vigilante. To save himself from being executed, the ghoul offers the man to fulfill a wish, explaining that human corpses give ghouls such power. The man asks to become the richest man in the world, for which the ghoul puts him in the body of a maharaja who is the richest man in the world. Said maharaja is also in the process of expiring and the ghoul, who evidently can teleport, waits patiently until he can claim the corpse.

** "Two of a Kind!" (''[[Creator/ECComics Vault of Horror]]'' #26): The reclusive actress Willow Dree meets the more sociable actor Bradbury Phillips when they're cast as the leads in a play. She's secretly a vampire, he's secretly a ghoul, each secretly wants to consume the other, but they both genuinely fall in love believing the other to be a human. On a ski vacation, they agree to climb the mountain up to a cabin to be alone for a while. A freak blizzard snows them in and as they wait for help, they take from their own bodies to nourish them rather than kill the other. Rescue arrives too late to save them.
** "Sweetie-Pie" (''[[Creator/ECComics Shock Suspenstories]]'' #10): A ghoul has set up a trap at a dangerous turn in a cliff road to force the victims' cars to swerve off. If the victims aren't dead, they are at least in no position to resist. He takes them home and drains them off their blood, only after which he can taste if they're sweet people or bitter people. He eats the sweet ones and returns the bitter corpses, which for a time makes people think a vampire is on the loose.
** "Midnight Snack!" (''[[Creator/ECComics Tales from the Crypt]]'' #26): After reading a horror story, a man starts leaping in and out of awareness while his body moves on instinct. First he awakens in the street at night feeling hungry, but the smell of cooked food makes him nauseous. Next he finds himself at a cemetery with a shovel digging up a fresh grave. He passes out again near a partially eaten corpse and with a mob coming after him. Losing it again and waking up at home, he believes to have had a nightmare until he finds the corpse in his frefrigerator.

* ''ComicBook/{{Providence}}'': Naturally, they show up in the issue based on "Literature/PickmansModel". Seen on-page instead of alluded to, the ghouls show characteristics that Lovecraft just hints at, such as speech, intelligence and a sense of humour. They also grow to large sizes, dig up into graves to feast and live in urban tunnels, as Lovecraft describes them.

** "The Ghoul of Death (''Dark Mysteries'' #1): A ghoul has taken possession of Peter Arrant and makes him commit some of the most horrific crimes the authorities have ever dealt with. He is the perfect test subject for Dr. Barton Hastings, who has devised a means to cut away the part of the brain enabling hate. He succeeds, but unknown to anyone the operation forces the ghoul out. It takes possession of Hastings' fiancée Celia Galloway instead and so the vicious assaults continue until Hastings himself is nearly killed. The police gun down Celia timely, killing both her and the ghoul.
** "Vampires bite!" (''Dark Mysteries'' #10): Ralph Bowan own a carnival freak collection consisting of the Tichard Vinutti the vampire, Rachel Harper the ghoul, and Malo Yoro the witch. Though stored in people vats and, as per Ralph's own words, dead, Ralph can bring them to life long enough to perform tricks for him. The ghoul, for instance, can be made to eat a live mouse.

** "Monster Rally!" (''Magazine/CreepyMagazine'' #4): Doctor Habeas wants to live forever and to do so he collects a menagerie of monsters because they all are immortal. His collection consists of a werewolf, a mummy, a witch woman, a vampire, and while he works on a Frankenstein's monster, his servant Drakow tricks a ghoul fleeing an angry mob into a cage. With all six in his possession, Habeas isolates pure life fluid. However, the townsfolk are on to him and storm the castle. Thinking he can make a getaway by siccing the monsters on the mob, Habeas frees them and is utterly surprised when the six attack him instead. Fire destroys the monsters, but the vial of life fluid Habeas was carrying mixes with the remains of the menagerie and the beams of the full moon to spawn Uncle Creepy.

* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'': There are three different meanings to the term "ghoul". The most prominent usage is to indicate living drinkers of vampire blood, which is known as vitae. Another usage, spelled "ghul", is for an unrelated creature that feeds on the living. The third usage of "ghul" is as a term of insult against vampires used by some other undead.

** As per ''Tribebook: Silent Striders'', ghuls are Arabian creatures that take the forms of beautiful women to trick travelers and feed on them.
* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheRequiem'': There are two very different creatures to bear the designation "ghoul": one are the drinkers of vampire blood or vitae, while the other are effectively vampires by a different name. It's insinuated that ghouls are named after ghûls, but for what reason is yet to be shared.
** As per ''Ghouls'', ghouls are living beings who drink vitae, thereby gaining some of the powers of a vampire and some of the weaknesses. For instance, one perk is that the aging process stops, but only as long as a ghoul drinks vitae regularly. Would their supply stop, they revert to their true age, which is deadly for a ghoul past their natural lifespan. Most ghouls exist as carefully selected and devoted servants of the vampires that nourish them, whether those vampires are good masters or not, but there are also self-made ghouls who hunt vampires for their vitae like vampires do humans for blood. Plants are not immune to vitae addiction and ghouls created from them are called mandragora. They are rare, and so are born ghouls. The chances for impregnation and birth when one of the parents is a ghoul are slim and only marginally better odds are achieved when both parents are ghouls. Nonetheless, some ghoul families exist, mostly in the branch of Ordo Dracul. Born ghouls that don't partake in vitae age, but slower than humans do and they possess stronger bodies and the like, but they're also inherently more servile to vampires than made ghouls.
** As per ''Night Horrors: The Wicked Dead', ghûls are a living equivalent to vampires that hail from the Middle East. They are cursed beings that come into existence when a human commits an act of evil without remorse under certain circumstances. Though powerful, ghouls suffer ever-lasting insomnia and need to consume human flesh, be that fresh or rotting, to sustain themselves.

** "Literature/TheCharnelGod": Ghouls are among the creatures inhabiting the future world of Zothique. They are humanoid beings comparable to jackals and hyenas; they have a crouching posture, their faces are half anthropomorphic and half canine, their fingers end in curving talons, their spiky teeth are longer than coffin nails, and while they can talk human languages, the growls and laughter of the jackal and the hyena come more natural to them. Ghouls are capable of near-unmatched speed and enjoy immortality. One clan has become the priests of the deity Mordiggian and inhabit his temple in Zul-Bha-Sair, which they only leave upon news of a death in order to bring the corpse to their god. In their profession as priests, they wear silver masks shaped like human skulls, flowing purple robes, and fingerless gloves. It is said that the priests are shrouded so in order that no one gazes on them that have seen Mordiggian, but this may be a lie to conceal the fact that the priests are ghouls and keep the human population compliant. It is rumored and likely that Mordiggian, who consumes corpses, shares his food with his priests. Corpses brought to the temple are generally not eaten immediately, but set aside until they're just a little rotten. A rumor regarding this treatment is that the corpses are put to use in dark rites and other ill practices before Mordiggian claims them. This may or may not be true, but it is true that in return for many more corpses, the priests made a deal with the necromancer Abnon-Tha that he could experiment with their stash as long as he never removed a single corpse from temple grounds.

** In "Literature/PickmansModel", ghouls are depicted as horrible and potentially dangerous canine humanoids, capable of growing to titanic sizes, who live in a complicated network of underground tunnels and raid graves for food from the bottom up. They also leave their own young as [[ChangelingTale changelings]] in the place of human children. The young ghoul grows up to resemble a human, but retains a ghoulish mindset, while the fate of the human child is vague. Ghouls also apparently have a morbid sense of humor; one of Pickman's paintings shows them laughing hysterically as one of their number reads off a list of famous burial sites, implying they've raided each of them. [[spoiler:And they aren't just creatures of Pickman's imagination, but ''actually exist'', as Thurber discovers to his horror when he realized he's holding a ''photograph'' of one Pickman used as a reference.]]

* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'' and its successor ''TabletopGame/VampireTheRequiem'':
** Ghouls are the mortal servants of vampires. Regularly consuming a little bit of the blood of their vampire masters grants them a few supernatural powers, but it also makes them slaves to the vampire's will and particularly prone to mental illness and other gruesome drawbacks. There're even entire ghoul families (which ''Masquerade'' calls revenants), who are particularly unwholesome sorts even by ghoul standards.
** There's also a bloodline of special black magic vampires in ''Masquerade'', the Nagaraja, who have to eat human flesh in addition to drinking blood. Though not referred to as ghouls, between the magic and the cannibalism they much more closely resemble the ghouls of middle eastern myth.
** Additionally there's the szlachta, a type of ghoul created by the Tzimisce clan using their skill at fleshcrafting. While their combat prowess is increased, they're also hideously deformed with some of them [[WasOnceAMan not even being humanoid anymore]] by the end of it.
** The ''Wicked Dead'' sourcebook for ''Requiem'' also features the mythic variety of ghul, which feed on corpses (some of which they make themselves) and have the ability to take on the form of their meals. It's disgusting, but they do get quite a few neat powers, and if you really want to live forever, being a ghul is probably a better [sic] option than vampirism.

** "Tough Customers!" (''Magazine/CreepyMagazine'' #35): Some mobsters drain protection money from every store in a sizeable district, but find themselves with a hardhead when Sam's Butcher Shop opens up. Sam is a ghoul and so are his special customers. As a ghoul, he's stronger than the average human and not bothered by getting shot a few times. Surprisingly, he only kills those mobsters that figure out that he's not human; the others he politely tells to leave and throws them out if they don't.
** "Sleepwalker!" (''Magazine/CreepyMagazine'' #38): Diane believes herself to be a vampire not species-wise, but as a result of some psychological hang-up. Her husband Charles and his friends help her hide the body of a victim she wakes up next to and get a doctor of note to treat her. Diane, however, keeps having a particular dream and one day follows the dream to its end, waking up as she opens the door on Charles and his friends consuming a corpse. She was never a vampire. They were ghouls and tried to throw her off their trail, but they can't let her off this time.
** "Vampire Slayer!" (''Eerie'' #5): Corinne the vampire and Colette the ghoul are twin sisters. For the longest time, Baron Alexi has been a thorn in vampire-kind's side, so Corinne sets out to seduce him in lowering his guard. Alexi is immediately suspicious and during one meeting tries to stake her only to see she casts a reflection. Unaware of Colette's existence and that it was she he fought, Alexi believes he almost killed an innocent human and fails to arm himself when next he meets with Corinne.
** "House of Fiends!" (''Eerie'' #10): Living with Hugo Lupus inside his mansion are his wife Camilla, their servant Gromley, and Camilla's niece Rachel. The household asks Dr. Prentice over to declare Rachel insane so they can get rid of her. However, Rachel, in truth a witch made harmless by her relatives, convinces the doctor that the others respectively are a werewolf, a vampire, and a ghoul. Slightly hypnotized, the doctor believes Rachel, murdering the three before freeing her. She thanks him by destroying him.

** "Checkmate" (''Eerie'' #24): The Devil's Chessmen is a chess set in which monsters are the pawns. Present are Voodoo zombies, ghouls, werewolves, vampires, the she-cat as queen and Satan as king. Ghouls take the role of rooks, for they too wait silently in the corners for their chance to strike. And this isn't just symbolically. Anyone who plays using the Devil's Chessmen and loses becomes trapped in the reality of the game.

* ''Film/Blade1998'': Sometimes when a vampire infects someone, it goes wrong and creates a sentient zombie-type ghoul instead. Said ghouls are stated to eat ''anything'', including vampires.
* ''Film/BloodyMallory'': Ghouls are human-demon hybrids who are damned by God, eat the flesh of the dead, and can only reproduce via virgins. When their babies are born, they burst from the mother's stomachs while they're still alive.

* ''Literature/{{Goosebumps}}'': In ''Attack of the Graveyard Ghouls'', ghouls are non-corporeal green mists that were humans at one time and are able to steal bodies.

** Raul Tejada, one of the first ghouls at over 200 years old, in ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' shows that being able to live forever [[WhoWantsToLiveForever isn't exactly a good thing]]; he frequently mentions severe arthritis in his hands and knees and his eyes are covered in cataracts, to say nothing about living with the memories of losing his friends and loved ones. Whether or not the former two are all just in his head and what he can do to move on from them is the focus of his personal quest.
** The ''Lonesome Road'' DLC add-on for ''New Vegas'' introduces a unique type of "super-ghoul" in the Marked Men, existing in the Divide and constituted of NCR and Legion soldiers that were there when the area's nuclear warheads exploded underground. They were ghoulified by the detonation, and in the present, are regularly [[FlayingAlive flayed of all their skin]] by the howling sandstorms, but [[AndIMustScream kept alive]] by the radiation (said in-universe to be so concentrated that even a "normal" ghoul would die). The one silver lining of their tormented, agonizing lives is that it blurred the line between enemies; the Marked Men are united in their shared hatred of the Divide, and those that trespass there.
** ''VideoGame/Fallout4'': John Hancock became a ghoul through the use of an experimental drug he found while on one of his "wild tears". He got into heavier drug usage following his departure from Diamond City after [[MayorPain Mayor McDonough]] [[spoiler:(his brother)]] took over and had all the ghouls of the city thrown out. Hancock in turn became the mayor of the town of Goodneighbor even as a FunctionalAddict; ghouls are apparently naturally resistant to [[FantasticDrug chems]], but it's implied that Hancock was the same even before he was human.

* "The Ghoul of Death (''Dark Mysteries'' #1): A ghoul has taken possession of Peter Arrant and makes him commit some of the most horrific crimes the authorities have ever dealt with. He is the perfect test subject for Dr. Barton Hastings, who has devised a means to cut away the part of the brain enabling hate. He succeeds, but unknown to anyone the operation forces the ghoul out. It takes possession of Hastings' fiancée Celia Galloway instead and so the vicious assaults continue until Hastings himself is nearly killed. The police gun down Celia timely, killing both her and the ghoul.

** "Vampires bite!" (''Dark Mysteries'' #10): Ralph Bowan own a carnival freak collection consisting of the Tichard Vinutti vampire, Rachel Harper the ghoul, and Malo Yoro the witch. Though stored in people vats and, as by Ralph's own words, dead, Ralph can bring them to life long enough to perform tricks for him. The ghoul, for instance, can be made to eat a live mouse.

* ''VideoGame/MiddleEarthShadowOfMordor'' and ''VideoGame/MiddleEarthShadowOfWar'': {{Mordor}} seems to suffer from a country-wide Ghûl infestation. They are a pestilent species of nocturnal, small, hairless bipedal things with glowing yellow eyes, long, dog-like skulls, and sharp teeth and claws. While weak individually, [[ZergRush Ghûls come in large swarms to overwhelm foes]], [[PoisonousPerson some spitting poison on their unfortunate prey]]. It's implied in the Appendices that the Ghûls are growing in number due to the dramatic increase in unburied corpses littering Mordor in the wake of Sauron's return and the spread of the Uruk-hai.

* ''VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}}'': Ghouls are the first stage of a Dead Apostle's unlife, created when a vampire (either a Dead Apostle or a True Ancestor) injects their own blood into a victim while sucking their blood, and said victim possessing both the physical and spiritual fortitude to avoid becoming one of the mindless "living dead" (a zombie, for all intents and purposes). The resulting creature will rise from the grave after a few years as a walking corpse with the mental capacity of a wild animal, and must feed on other corpses to gradually regenerate its decaying flesh, which eventually will end with them becoming a full-fledged vampire.

* ''TabletopGame/Monsterhearts'': Ghouls are undead creatures dominated by The Hunger, which can only be warded off by Keep Your Cool. A ghoul does not necessarily hunger for flesh, but can also feed on such metaphysical concepts as fear and power. Furthermore, the ghoul's sex move also causes sex to become something they hunger for. One perk to being a ghoul is that Short Rest for the Wicked allows one to sleep out death with no downsides except for some lost hours.

** ''Literature/ChasmsOfMalice'': A "long fanged" Ghoul is one of the encounters, and tries to murder you in your sleep with a dagger. A bunch of ghouls can be disposed off with a spell which summons a monstrous pair of hands to drag them to their doom.

* ''TabletopGame/SmallWorld'': Ghouls are one of the playable races. Their racial power is the ability to keep all their pieces in play and continue expanding their territory when they go into decline, unlike other races.

* ''Vigil: The Longest Night '': There are three kinds of ghouls, namely ghouls, ghoul warriors, and the Ghoul King. Homaging the design of the first ''Dungeons & Dragons'' ghoul, ghouls look like humans with injuries to their ribs and abdomen, a reptilian head, high ankles, and claws at the end of all four limbs. The only difference between ghouls and ghoul warriors is that the former fight bare-handed while the latter are armed with axes. The Ghoul King, who resides in Peak of Weep, is distinguished from his servants by his hulking mass of fat and muscle. He is armed with the Ritual Sceptre, an axe-type weapon forged from human bones.

** "Mournin' Mess" (''[[Creator/ECComics Tales from the Crypt]]'' #38): A philanthropic society called the Grateful Hoboes, Outcasts, and Unwanted Layaway Society opens up a free cemetery for homeless people unable to afford a proper burial. A reporter finds the whole thing fishy and decides to investigate, quickly realizing that the land GHOULS bought isn't large enough to hold all the bodies that have been buried there. He falls victim himself before being able to report his findings.

** "A Tasty Morsel!" (''[[Creator/ECComics Haunt of Fear]]'' #5): A man dreams that the creepy innkeeper of the lone End of the Road Inn he's staying at is a vampire who drains his victims' blood to drink at his leisure. When he awakens, he finds that his dream was off in that the innkeeper is a ghoul who drains the blood because he can't stand the taste of it. Incidentally, he's deeply insulted about being mistaken for a vampire.

* ''Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia'': Ghouls resemble old and withered humans. They have their homes in both Narnia and Calormen.

** ''Literature/TheHorseAndHisBoy'': Circumstances force Shasta to spend the night alone in a cemetery rumored to be the domain of corpse-eating ghouls. Although he greatly fears being ambushed by them, it turns out that there aren't actually any ghouls there.

* ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'': In "The Ghoul's Forest" series of {{Game Mod}}s (and its multiplayer sequel, ''VideoGame/GhoulsVsHumans'') most ghouls are huge floating skeletal heads which fly around incredibly fast and eat people. Except for the Creeper, who's just a HumanoidAbomination.

Traditionally, ghouls are the MENA counterpart to European [[OurOgresAreDifferent ogres]]. While still true on a folkloric level, literary diversification began when Antoine Galland translated the ''Literature/ArabianNights''. In the pre-1700s editions of the ''Arabian Nights'', there is only one story about a ghoul, "Literature/TheKingsSonAndTheSheGhoul". Galland transposed its "ghouleh" as "ogresse" in 1704. When the stories in his manuscript ran out, Galland turned to the Hanna Diyab, a Syrian storyteller for more and the latter gave him another story about a ghoul titled "Literature/TheStoryOfSidiNouman". When Galland published it in 1712, he kept "ghoul(eh)" as "goule" and added an explanation what ghouls are. It was this second story, which introduced corpse-eating, that got Europe interested in the ghoul as something other than an ogre by another name.

See also: OurZombiesAreDifferent, OurVampiresAreDifferent, TheMorlocks, [[{{Medusa}} Gorgon]], {{Wendigo}}.

** "[[Recap/TalesFromTheCryptS3E10MourninMess Mournin' Mess]]": A sleazy reporter becomes dinner for the charitable organization known as the Grateful Homeless Outcasts and Unwanted Layaway Society, GHOULS for short, while investigating the murders on the city's homeless population.

* ''Vigil: The Longest Night '': There are three kinds of ghouls, namely ghouls, ghoul warriors, and the Ghoul King. Ghouls look like humans with injuries to their ribs and abdomen, a reptilian head, high ankles, and claws at the end of all four limbs. The only difference between ghouls and ghoul warriors is that the former fight bare-handed while the latter are armed with axes. The Ghoul King, who resides in Peak of Weep, is distinguished from his servants by his hulking mass of fat and muscle. He is armed with the Ritual Sceptre, an axe-type weapon forged from human bones.

* ''Literature/NightWorld'': Ghouls are humans that did not successfully complete the transition into vampirehood, leaving them nearly brain-dead, difficult to kill, and with an insatiable bloodthirstiness. They're also really, really gross.

* ''Podcast/LessIsMorgue'': Ghouls like Riley are born and mortal creatures. They can shapeshift and imitate people's voices.

* ''Literature/RoguesEndMaster'': Ghouls are created by vampires considered disgusting and more trouble than they are worth by Isabella -- understandably so. They have an obsessive loyalty to their creator, but smell terrible, have disgusting eating habits, and are not the brightest creatures around.