There are eight official Leprechaun movies, released between 1993 and 2018, and Warwick Davis plays the gold-obsessed killer in the first six. This guide covers every Leprechaun movie in release order, who is in each one, how scary each actually is, and how the Irish legend of Lubdan connects to a franchise that eventually sent its villain into space.
Leprechaun film series: the key facts
- 8 films in the official series, all now owned by Lionsgate, which bought original studio Trimark Pictures in 2000.
- 1993: Leprechaun opens in January on a budget of roughly $1 million and earns about $8.6 million in US theaters. That is enough profit to guarantee sequels.
- 6 appearances by Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun, from 1993 to 2003.
- 2 theatrical releases in the original run (Leprechaun and Leprechaun 2). Every sequel after that went straight to video, apart from the 2014 reboot’s limited release and a 2018 TV premiere on Syfy.
- 3 continuities: the loose Warwick Davis run, the 2014 reboot Leprechaun: Origins, and Leprechaun Returns, a direct sequel to the 1993 original that ignores everything in between.
All Leprechaun movies at a glance
| # | Title | Year | Subgenre | Scare level | Where to watch |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Leprechaun | 1993 | Horror comedy, creature | 2/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 2 | Leprechaun 2 | 1994 | Horror comedy | 2/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 3 | Leprechaun 3 | 1995 | Horror comedy | 1/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 4 | Leprechaun 4: In Space | 1997 | Sci-fi horror comedy | 1/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 5 | Leprechaun in the Hood | 2000 | Horror comedy | 1/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 6 | Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood | 2003 | Horror comedy | 2/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 7 | Leprechaun: Origins | 2014 | Creature feature | 3/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
| 8 | Leprechaun Returns | 2018 | Gore comedy | 2/5 | Peacock (seasonal), digital rental |
Release order and the order you should watch them in are mostly the same. The one wrinkle is Leprechaun Returns. If you only care about the “real” story, you can watch the 1993 film and jump straight to the 2018 sequel.
Story order vs release order
| Continuity | Films | How it connects |
|---|---|---|
| Original run | Leprechaun (1993) through Back 2 tha Hood (2003) | Very loose. The Leprechaun simply turns up again in each film with little or no explanation. |
| Reboot | Leprechaun: Origins (2014) | Standalone. It has a new creature and new rules, and no Warwick Davis. |
| Legacy sequel | Leprechaun (1993), then Leprechaun Returns (2018) | Direct follow-up 25 years later. It skips films 2 to 7 entirely. |
Is the Leprechaun movie series actually scary?
Here is the honest answer for anyone searching “leprechaun scary movie”: mostly no, and that is the point. The Warwick Davis films are horror comedies built around a villain who rhymes, cackles and makes terrible puns while killing people in creative ways. The gore is real and occasionally nasty. The dread is almost nonexistent.
If you want a genuinely scary leprechaun, Leprechaun: Origins is the only entry that plays it straight. If you can’t handle gore at all, skip Leprechaun Returns, which is the bloodiest of the bunch even though it is also one of the funniest.
The series sits in the same bin as killer-clown and killer-doll movies. Its appeal is the villain’s personality. You might compare Warwick Davis’s cackling imp to Tim Curry‘s Pennywise the dancing clown: both performers take a premise that looks ridiculous and commit so hard that it lands anyway.
Leprechaun (1993)
Mark Jones wrote and directed the original Leprechaun for Trimark Pictures, and it opened in US theaters on January 8, 1993. The setup is simple. Years ago, Dan O’Grady (Shay Duffin) stole a pot of gold from Ireland and trapped its owner in a crate in his North Dakota farmhouse. Ten years later, J.D. Reding (John Sanderford) is moving into the old place with his daughter Tory, and the crate does not stay shut.
Leprechaun cast (1993):
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– Jennifer Aniston as Tory Reding
– Ken Olandt as Nathan Murphy
– Mark Holton as Ozzie Jones
– Robert Gorman as Alex Murphy
– John Sanderford as J.D. Reding
Yes, that is Jennifer Aniston in her first film role, the year before Friends turned her into the most famous haircut on the planet. She has joked about it in interviews for decades. Her performance is perfectly fine, but the movie belongs to Davis. He plays the Leprechaun as part pixie, part sadist. He has a compulsion to polish shoes and a hatred of four-leaf clovers.
Why it earns the top spot: the 1993 Leprechaun movie has real practical makeup, a creepy farmhouse and a pogo-stick kill that horror fans still quote. It is more cheesy than scary. It is also the only film in the franchise that plays its suspense scenes like an actual horror movie.
Leprechaun 2 (1994)
Rodman Flender directed the first sequel, which moves the action to Los Angeles. The new rule is that every thousand years, on St. Patrick’s Day, the Leprechaun can claim a bride. His pick is Bridget (Shevonne Durkin), a descendant of the woman who escaped him a millennium earlier. Her boyfriend Cody (Charlie Heath) has other ideas.
Leprechaun 2 cast:
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– Charlie Heath as Cody
– Shevonne Durkin as Bridget
– Sandy Baron as Morty
It was the last Leprechaun movie to get a proper theatrical run, and it barely made a dent, grossing a little over $2 million. Watch it for Sandy Baron’s sleazy uncle Morty and a drinking contest that plays like a vaudeville sketch with a body count. It is a step down from the original but still has that early-’90s Trimark charm.
Leprechaun 3 (1995)
Brian Trenchard-Smith took over for the third film, which went straight to video and dropped the Leprechaun into Las Vegas. A pawnshop, a casino and a magic gold coin that grants wishes do most of the work. College student Scott McCoy (John Gatins) gets bitten and starts turning into a leprechaun himself, which is as silly as it sounds.
Leprechaun 3 cast:
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– John Gatins as Scott McCoy
– Lee Armstrong as Tammy Larsen
– Caroline Williams as Loretta
Horror fans will spot Caroline Williams, Stretch from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, having a great time as a vain casino worker. John Gatins later became an Oscar-nominated screenwriter for Flight, which makes his transformation scenes here even more fun to watch. Plenty of fans rank Leprechaun 3 as the best of the sequels because it finally leans all the way into comedy.
Leprechaun 4: In Space (1997)
Trenchard-Smith came back for the entry everybody knows by its title alone. A squad of space marines raids a planet where the Leprechaun is trying to marry an alien princess. It all ends up aboard a spaceship run by a mad scientist. The film takes place far in the future, so don’t try to fit it into any timeline.
Leprechaun 4 cast:
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– Brent Jasmer as Books
– Jessica Collins as Tina
– Guy Siner as Dr. Mittenhand
– Debbe Dunning as Delores
This is the franchise at its most unhinged and least scary. Guy Siner’s half-man, half-machine Dr. Mittenhand chews more scenery than the title character does. Treat it as a so-bad-it’s-good comedy and you will have a better night than most “serious” ’90s sci-fi horror delivers.
Leprechaun in the Hood (2000)
Directed by Rob Spera, this was the first Leprechaun movie released under Lionsgate’s ownership. Three aspiring rappers steal a magic flute from music producer Mack Daddy O’Nassas (Ice-T), and the flute belongs to the Leprechaun. The joke is a fish-out-of-water one. Davis’s villain swaps his tweed for bling and takes the mic.
Leprechaun in the Hood cast:
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– Ice-T as Mack Daddy O’Nassas
– Anthony Montgomery as Postmaster P.
– Rashaan Nall as Stray Bullet
– Red Grant as Butch
– Coolio as himself
Ice-T is the reason to watch. He plays it completely straight while everything around him gets dumber. The film has a cult audience that has only grown since 2000, helped by the Leprechaun’s notorious rap number. It is not scary in the slightest, and you should go in expecting a comedy with some kills.
Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood (2003)
If you searched “leprechaun back in the hood 2”, this is the one you want. The official title is Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood, directed by Steven Ayromlooi. Emily Woodrow (Tangi Miller) and her friends find the Leprechaun’s gold and dream of escaping their neighborhood. Then the owner shows up to collect.
Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood cast:
– Warwick Davis as the Leprechaun
– Tangi Miller as Emily Woodrow
– Laz Alonso as Rory
– Page Kennedy as Jamie
– Sherrie Jackson as Lisa
This was Warwick Davis’s sixth and final turn in the makeup, and it is darker than its predecessor. Laz Alonso, later of The Boys, gives it more weight than a sixth sequel deserves. It is the closest the Davis run gets to a straight horror movie since 1993, though the comedy never fully goes away.
Leprechaun: Origins (2014)
Eleven years later, Lionsgate and WWE Studios rebooted the series with Zach Lipovsky directing. Four American backpackers in rural Ireland are lured to a remote cabin. They learn too late that the villagers have a bargain with something in the woods. The film had a small theatrical release and came out on demand in August 2014.
Leprechaun: Origins cast:
– Dylan “Hornswoggle” Postl as the Leprechaun
– Stephanie Bennett as Sophie
– Andrew Dunbar as Ben
– Melissa Roxburgh as Jeni
– Brendan Fletcher as David
– Garry Chalk as Hamish
This is the only entry that tries to make leprechauns scary in the traditional sense. The creature is a feral, mostly unseen monster with no lines and no jokes. Wrestler Hornswoggle is buried under the costume, and the film never lets you get a good look at him. Fans hated losing the personality, and critics hated nearly everything else. Judged as a cheap cabin-in-the-woods creature feature, though, it is fine on a dark night.
Leprechaun Returns (2018)
Steven Kostanski, the effects artist who co-directed The Void, made the best Leprechaun sequel by ignoring all the others. Written by Suzanne Keilly, it premiered on Syfy in December 2018. Lila Reding (Taylor Spreitler), daughter of Aniston’s Tory, joins a sorority whose eco-friendly new house sits on the site of the old North Dakota farm.
Leprechaun Returns cast:
– Linden Porco as the Leprechaun
– Taylor Spreitler as Lila Reding
– Pepi Sonuga as Katie
– Sai Bennett as Meredith
– Mark Holton as Ozzie Jones
Mark Holton coming back as Ozzie, a quarter century on, is a lovely touch for longtime fans. Porco nails the Davis-era mischief without imitating him. The practical gore is gloriously gooey. If you only watch two films in this series, make them the 1993 original and this one.
How Leprechaun Returns connects to the 1993 film
Spoiler warning
This section spoils the ending of Leprechaun (1993) and the opening setup of Leprechaun Returns.
The 1993 film ends with the Leprechaun hit by a four-leaf clover and knocked down the farmhouse well. He is dead or near enough. Leprechaun Returns picks up from exactly that point. The sorority’s new water system draws on the well, and that brings him back. Tory is said to have stayed away from the farm, and Lila treats the legend as family baggage, which ties the two films together far more neatly than any of the Davis sequels ever managed. Watched back to back, the pair works as a closed two-part story.
Lubdan: the Irish legend behind the Leprechaun
Searches for “Leprechaun” and “Lubdan” overlap because of medieval Irish myth, not because of anything in the films. Lubdan is a common modern spelling of Iubdán, king of a tiny people in the medieval Irish tale usually called The Death of Fergus mac Léti. In the story, Iubdán and his queen Bebo travel to the court of the Ulster king Fergus mac Léti. Iubdán is held there until his people pay a ransom, and he finally buys his freedom by handing over his enchanted shoes.
That tale is one of the oldest written sources for the figure that became the leprechaun (Irish luchorpán, “small body”). It also helps explain two of the franchise’s running gags: the bargaining over treasure and the obsession with shoes. Later folklore made the leprechaun a solitary shoemaker who guards a crock of gold. Mark Jones’s 1993 script took that version and added teeth.
To clear up a common mix-up: the official Leprechaun films never call their villain Lubdan or give him any real name. He is simply “the Leprechaun” in all eight. The Lubdan name has also turned up on micro-budget indie horror, which has no connection to the Trimark and Lionsgate series.
What’s next for the Leprechaun film series
Lionsgate still owns the series, and trade reports have described a new Leprechaun film in development there. Treat that as a studio project in the works, not a confirmed release. Lionsgate has not announced a date, so it could still be years away.
The likely direction is easy to predict from recent horror. Leprechaun Returns showed that the legacy-sequel approach, which brought back characters from a beloved original and ignored the weak middle, works for this franchise the same way it has for Halloween. A new film will almost certainly keep the humor. The Origins experiment showed fans want a Leprechaun who talks.
Where to watch the Leprechaun movies
Because Lionsgate controls all eight films, they tend to move between services as a bundle. In recent years Peacock has carried the full run around St. Patrick’s Day, which is why “watch every Leprechaun movie in order” is such a popular March search. Streaming catalogs rotate monthly, so check a streaming tracker before you plan a marathon.
If the films are not streaming where you are, all eight are usually available to rent or buy digitally on the major storefronts. Physical collectors can find the Davis-era films in multi-film DVD and Blu-ray sets, which are often the cheapest way to own the whole series.
If you liked this
Jeepers Creepers (2001): another monster with a strict rule set and a rural setting, but far scarier.
Gremlins (1984): the original small-creature horror comedy, with a similar mean streak.
Critters (1986): tiny killers, cheap effects and the same “laugh, then flinch” rhythm.
FAQ
How many Leprechaun movies are there?
There are eight: Leprechaun (1993), Leprechaun 2 (1994), Leprechaun 3 (1995), Leprechaun 4: In Space (1997), Leprechaun in the Hood (2000), Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood (2003), Leprechaun: Origins (2014) and Leprechaun Returns (2018).
What order should you watch the Leprechaun movies in?
Release order works best, because the original six barely connect anyway. If you are short on time, watch the 1993 original and then Leprechaun Returns. Those two form the only real continuous story.
Was Jennifer Aniston really in a Leprechaun movie?
Yes. She plays Tory Reding in the 1993 Leprechaun, her first film role, a year before Friends premiered. Her character’s daughter is the lead in Leprechaun Returns.
Who played the Leprechaun?
Warwick Davis played him in the first six films. Dylan “Hornswoggle” Postl played the very different creature in Leprechaun: Origins, and Linden Porco took over in Leprechaun Returns.
Which Leprechaun movie is the scariest?
Leprechaun: Origins is the scariest, because it is the only one played as a straight creature feature with no jokes. The 1993 original comes second. The rest are horror comedies first.
Is the Leprechaun called Lubdan in the movies?
No. He is never named on screen in any official film. Lubdan, or Iubdán, is a king of the little people in a medieval Irish tale that helped shape leprechaun folklore.