HBO's 2022 miniseries The Baby is being highlighted as an underappreciated horror-comedy worth revisiting, praised for using the "demonic child" trope to explore the anxieties of motherhood rather than just deliver scares. Created by Lucy Gaymer and Siân Robins-Grace, the eight-episode show follows a woman whose resistance to parenthood is upended when a sinister infant enters her life, using dark comedy to probe fears about identity, autonomy and the pressures placed on women to have children.

The series centres on 38-year-old Natasha, played by Michelle de Swarte, a contentedly child-free woman alienated by her friends' transitions into motherhood, whose life is thrown into chaos by the arrival of an outwardly adorable but genuinely malevolent baby. The article situates the show within a long horror lineage of sinister-child stories, from Rosemary's Baby to The Exorcist and The Ring, arguing The Baby stands out for blending genuine unease with satire of the pressures and fears surrounding motherhood.