The "woman" known as "Nancy Crater" in Mantrap is not really a woman. She's a salt-vampire, an alien creature native to planet M-113 that is capable of appearing to its victims in any form that is pleasing to them.
The real Nancy Crater was a lady that Dr. Leonard McCoy had once loved, long ago. He had strong, very fond memories of her, which is why the salt-vampire preferred to appear to him in her shape.
Dr. Robert Crater (Nancy's nogoodnik husband) finally revealed that he knew all along that Nancy wasn't Nancy, but he wanted mercy for the murderous beast, on the grounds that it was the last of its kind. The real horror is that Dr. Crater knew that the creature was not really his wife, yet he continued to (gulp) cohabitate with the beast, long after Nancy's death. There's no sign that Crater had even given his wife a proper funeral. Poor Nancy!
A moment of silence, please, for the real Mrs. Crater. McCoy, at least, had genuinely loved her.
We saw the creature adopt several different forms (male and female) as it rampaged, killing at will, but it appeared as Mrs. Crater the most. We don't actually know what sex it was, all we know for sure is that it certainly wasn't really a human woman. When it was finally killed at the end, we saw its true, weird, shaggy form.
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