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The Outsider, also known as El Cuco is a supporting antagonist of the Stephen King multiverse.

Serving as the titular main antagonist of the novel The Outsider, its TV series of the same name and the posthumous overarching antagonist of the novella If It Bleeds.

Biography[]

The Outsider is a paranormal shape-shifter that feeds on humans and their suffering. Having murdered people for many years, the Outsider eventually shows up in Dayton, Ohio, where he collects the blood of a retirement home orderly named Heath Hodges. The Outsider then transforms himself into Heath and steals a vehicle, using it to lure two young girls away before violently raping and murdering them, before ejaculating on their bodies. He then steals the blood of Terry Maitland as his next target. The Outsider proceeds to hide the girls' bloody underwear in Heath's house and hides out in a nearby cemetery to feed on the grief of the girls' loved ones. After the Outsider flees town in a stolen van, Heath is falsely convicted of the crime and hangs himself in jail.

Months later, the Outsider completes his transformation into Terry and uses his van to travel to Flint City, Oklahoma, and abduct Terry's eleven-year-old baseball student, Frank Peterson. The Outsider then rapes Frank with a tree branch, driving it so far up his anal cavity that it comes out of his stomach, biting off chunks of his throat, chest, and stomach, and finishing by ejaculating on the body. He then leaves Frank's corpse in the local park.

A number of eyewitnesses confirm that they saw Terry with Frank Peterson before the murder and Terry with blood on himself afterwards, leading to the real Terry being arrested in front of the entire town for the crime. The Outsider then collects the blood of ex-convict Claude Bolton and begins a new transformation.

Terry's daughter, Grace, is visited multiple times by the Outsider, who torments her over her father's death. Frank's mother also has a heart attack and dies, further feeding the Outsider.

As Terry is being delivered to the Flint City courthouse for his arraignment hearing, the incomplete Outsider shows up to revel in the crowd's chaos and is briefly seen by lead Detective Ralph Anderson and his partner, Yune Sablo. Frank's older brother, Ollie, pulls a gun on Terry to avenge his brother and mother, fatally shooting the man before being gunned down himself by Ralph. As Terry lays dying, he confirms his innocence to Ralph.

Having lost his entire family, Frank's father, Ted, attempts to hang himself in his backyard. As he suffocates, he sees the Outsider watching him, before going unconscious and being cut down by his neighbor. Ted ends up in a coma.

The Outsider's clothes are found in a barn near Flint City, and Ralph's rival, Detective Jack Hoskins, is sent to investigate. There, the Outsider sneaks up behind him and caresses his neck, leaving behind a poisonous patch.

As the Outsider continues his transformation into Claude, he notices Ralph investigating his existence and travels to Texas, where Claude Bolton is staying with his mother. The Outsider uses his powers to project parts of himself in Flint City, threatening Ralph's wife and people around him to stop pursuing the case. The Outsider also appears to Hoskins, falsely telling him that the poisonous patch on his neck is cancer, knowing that Hoskins watched his mother die from skin cancer. The Outsider offers to remove the "cancer" if Hoskins stops Ralph from interfering.

Ralph, with the help of Holly Gibney, discovers the Outsider's true nature and his next target: Claude. The two, along with Yune, Terry's lawyer, Howie Gold, and his private investigator, Alec Pelley, travel to Texas to protect Claude and hunt down the Outsider before he strikes again. The Outsider sends Hoskins after them.

The four investigators discover the Outsider's hideout in a cave pit. When they go to search it, the Outsider has Hoskins ambush them. Hoskins kills Howie and Alec, and injures Yune before being bitten by a rattlesnake. Hoskins is then shot to death by Ralph to avenge his friends, and he and Holly enter the caves.

In the cave, Ralph and Holly confront the Outsider, now almost fully transformed into Claude. The Outsider points out that if Ralph shoots him, then the cave will collapse and kill Holly. He then explains who he is and insists that he only kills because he has to in order to feed. Holly counters this by pointing out that he raped and ejaculates on his victims, meaning that he derives pleasure from it and is therefore nothing but a hypocritical serial killer and child molester. Enraged, the Outsider launches himself at her, at which point she takes out a heavy sock full of ball rings and beats him to death. The Outsider's body disintegrates and turns into a swarm of worms, who quickly die as well. Ralph and Holly escape.

Months later, Yune is healed and Terry's name is cleared in the public consciousness, and Ralph and Holly work together to move past the lingering trauma of their encounter with the Outsider.

Trivia[]

  • It is very possible that The Outsider is either the same species or originated from the same dimension as other Stephen King monsters like It and The Crimson King, evidenced by having similar powers and by the fact that they all feed off of emotions, thought it’s unknown if he is a species from The Dark Tower.
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