It’s that time of the year again when the writers for Biff Bam Pop get to write about their favourite scares. As a professional Spirit Investigator, I decided to go with one of the scariest series on Netflix: The Haunting anthology series which includes The Haunting of Hill House and The Haunting of Bly Manor.
The Haunting of Hill House
The Haunting of Hill House is a product of Mike Flanagan that is featured on Netflix and was adapted from Shirley Jackson’s original novel, The Haunting of Hill House. Two films later, one in 1963 and one in 1999, Flanagan offered a different approach via ten episodes where viewers were allowed to slowly partake of the horror in a more detailed experience. What Flanagan was able to do by spreading the story out in ten hour-long episodes, was to coerce us us to be part of the plot by getting to know the characters in a more intimate and frightening way.
The 2018 series, which was written and directed by Flanagan, has some amazing actors beginning with Henry Thomas, Carla Gugino, Timothy Hutton, Annabeth Gish, Robert Longstreet, Michiel Huisman, Elizabeth Reaser, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Kate Siegel and Victoria Pedretti.
The story begins with family Hugh (Henry Thomas) and Olivia Crain (Carla Gugino) and their five children (played by these amazing child actors: Paxton Singleton, LuLu Wilson, Julian Hilliard, Mckenna Grace, and Violet McGraw) moving into an old house to remodel and then sell for a profit. It isn’t long before the house lets its guests know that it is in charge. The children are the first ones that the house goes after, and it does this subtly enough where the parents just chalk it off to an active childhood imagination. That is until the night the father (Henry Thomas) flees the house with the children, leaving the mother behind.
We learn through flashbacks what happened and what is still happening twenty years later through the eyes of the children who are now adults. The oldest boy is now a famous writer who has written about the haunting at Hill House. Even though he does paranormal investigations, he doesn’t believe in ghosts. That will soon change when one of the siblings dies in the house.
Conclusion
I’ve done many house investigations, plenty of them in historic haunted places, and I need to tell you that this series kept me up at night. What people don’t realize is a home can have a soul or memory of its own. Some homes are happy and full of love, but some homes… A house remembers all the people who have lived within its walls; people living, laughing, crying, fighting…and even…a murder that is committed under its roof. It remembers! A home can pick up on who is sensitive (psychic) and feed off that power. It can take hold of your emotions, and slowly change you for better or worse.
Hill House was born evil. It may have been the land itself that was cursed. Whatever the cause, the house fed on the people who lived there, and we realize this immediately as we observe that everyone in the family had the gift, everyone! The father ignored what was in front of him until that fatal night when he took the children to safety. This is a series that you must watch, especially in October, when the veil between life and death is the thinnest. But be forewarned that you might want to sleep with all the lights on if you do.
The Haunting of Bly Manor
As much as I loved The Haunting of Hill House, I found myself mesmerized with Mike Flanagan’s second investment in the franchise. It is a good scary story that is based on Henry James’ novella, The Turn of the Screw. The Haunting of Bly Manor is more of a Gothic tragedy taking place in the 1980s that features a few of the cast members from Hill House. It is a ghost story that is told at a celebration by a woman (Carla Gugino, The Haunting of Hill House). We notice immediately that this woman doesn’t quite fit in with the other guests. She explains that it isn’t her story and that it happened to someone else.
The Haunting of Bly Manor stars Victoria Pedretti (The Haunting of Hill House), Rahul Kohli, Amelia Eve, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Henry Thomas (The Haunting of Hill House), Amelie Smith, Oliver Jackson- Cohen (The Haunting of Hill House), Kate Siegal (The Haunting of Hill House), and the amazing T’Nia Miller. The story begins when Dani Clayton (Victoria Pedretti) from the States applies for the job of au pair for two children. Miles (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth) and Flora (Amelie Smith) have not only lost their parents but also the au pair who had the job before Dani. Their uncle, Henry Wingrave (Henry Thomas) is holding back a terrible secret, but we do know that he loves these children, especially little Flora.
The children are a delight to watch even though at times, their actions and words will scare the bejesus out of you. Miles is the scariest because his actions betray his young age.
Dani is recovering from a tragedy involving her fiancé. Her guilt on how the accident occurred haunts her via reflective images, and so she covers every mirror to avoid seeing this specter. While adjusting to her new position and the children, Dani begins to notice the strange things going on between the children and the huge dollhouse that is an exact replica of Bly Manor and the strange little talisman dolls that Flora plays with. The other staff who work at the house seem quite normal and very likeable beginning with the cook, Owen (Rahul Kohli) and the gardener Jamie (Amelia Eve), but it is the housekeeper Mrs. Grose (T’Nia Miller) that holds our attention in a most dreamlike state. Why does she never eat? Where does she go when her mind wanders? What do the cracks in the walls mean? Who are the candles for? Who is leaving the muddy footprints in the manor? Who is the lady in the lake? What is her story?
If this isn’t enough to keep you glued to the story, we then learn more about the former au pair Miss Jessel (Tahirah Sharif) and her doomed love affair with Peter Quint (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) a former employee of Henry Wingrave, who has mysteriously disappeared.
Conclusion
Sometimes, my little poppets, it is the living who haunt a house. Sometimes, the dead don’t know that they are dead. It isn’t until the last few episodes that everything ties together to explain the children’s weird behavior. We learn who the woman is that is telling the story at the wedding rehearsal, and we learn that this ghost story is really a love story that still goes on from the grave.
I’ve been wondering, since watching both series, if Mike Flanagan doesn’t have a touch of psychic ability in him. He surely has shown a true understanding of the other side. You can watch both series on Netflix but do so with the lights on.
