S01.E02: Open Casket

[HollyG]

A devastating family tragedy stirs memories of traumatic losses, reminding Shirley of her first brush with death -- and awakening long-dormant fears. 

 

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

Edited October 15, 2018 by 17wheatthins
Added episode description and fixed season/episode tag

[Whimsy]

10 hours ago, HollyG said:

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

I agree. Not everyone regrets NOT looking at the body. I was forced to look at my not-close-to-me great grandmother when I was a child. It traumatized me and I haven’t been able to look at another body at a wake since. 

[rainsmom]

11 hours ago, HollyG said:

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

I agree too. Bugged me every time they did it.

Honestly, I'm not loving this show so far. I don't love the jumping from time to time. It's not even just two time periods -- they're showing scenes from different adult time periods. It's confusing and boring. The cast is too big -- 6 people in the main cast, young and old, plus a fair number of other people. I have trouble figuring out who is who, and I'm not sure I really care. They're traumatized, got it. Can we get to the freakin' house?

[non sequitur]

12 hours ago, HollyG said:

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

Agree! It also seems outrageous that the funeral directors in both scenarios are leading the kids around, forcing them to look.  Very strange.

[leocadia]

12 hours ago, HollyG said:

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

Have none of them seen Sybil???  ;-)

[calliope1975]

As a kid I refused to view deceased relatives' bodies, and I maintain that as an adult. It was never a big deal. Someone in the family would ask if I wanted to go up to the casket, I'd say no, and we all moved on. So, the insistence that the kids absolutely had to look was weird to me, but then we wouldn't have gotten Shirley's light bulb career moment. 

[Nancy Drew]

The nicest funeral home in our city when I was a kid posed the bodies on a bed. I still haven't recovered. If some rando funeral director had tried to force me up to the bed I would have flipped out.

The kittens did me in this episode.

[Token]

I've never understood the need people have for viewing a dead body.  You know the person is dead, it's not like everyone is lying about it.  Why do you need to stare at a dead body?  I don't get it.

[BeeBop88]

I guess the time of 3:03 am when Shirley sits up in bed, is the time that Nelly kills herself. And what does Shirley mumble when she sits up. Is it "Nelly is in the red room?"

 

This whole family is weird to me, and I don't necessarily blame the haunted house for their weirdness. The father just looks strange to me, as well as the mom.  

[Megan]

I am really enjoying this show, the spooky/dread level is right up my alley.

Regarding dead bodies - the first time I saw one was at my brother in law's funeral. I didn't want to, it felt disrespectful somehow? I didn't like that the first time I saw him he was so vulnerable. He was also the only dead body I ever saw until my Dad died. My BIL had gone through the embalming process and did not look like real. I saw my Dad right after he died and it was much better.... or you know as better as seeing someone you love dead can be. Which is not really "better" in any sense.

Also in my home town the mortuary had an awning/carport kind of thing at it's main entrance and I always thought they posed the bodies in the front window and the families would drive through to see them.

 

I think Henry Thomas is wearing blue contacts and it makes him look weird. The whole animals in horror/scary movies will die trope is awful. I hate it.

Edited October 14, 2018 by Megan

[Whimsy]

8 hours ago, Megan said:

 

I think Henry Thomas is wearing blue contacts and it makes him look weird. The whole animals in horror/scary movies will die trope is awful. I hate it.

He is. To match Timothy Hutton’s eyes. I had to look up both actor’s ages. It was as I thought, they are only 11 years apart. Timothy Hutton can look rough, but it was odd to me that they used someone only 11 years older than Henry Thomas to play someone 26 years older. No disrespect to TH,  because I’m a fan, but they should’ve aged up HT. 

[bilgistic]

23 hours ago, Nancy Drew said:

The nicest funeral home in our city when I was a kid posed the bodies on a bed. I still haven't recovered. If some rando funeral director had tried to force me up to the bed I would have flipped out.

The kittens did me in this episode.

I'm going to need more information about dead bodies being posed on a bed!

I couldn't deal with the kittens dying! And they kept showing the first kitten! I yelled, "Stop!" at the TV.

[Cheezwiz]

14 hours ago, Whimsy said:

He is. To match Timothy Hutton’s eyes. I had to look up both actor’s ages. It was as I thought, they are only 11 years apart. Timothy Hutton can look rough, but it was odd to me that they used someone only 11 years older than Henry Thomas to play someone 26 years older. No disrespect to TH,  because I’m a fan, but they should’ve aged up HT. 

I thought this was a bit weird as well - Timothy Hutton & Henry Thomas do indeed share a physical resemblance, but they are only about a decade apart in age. They could easily play brothers or half-siblings in some other film, but the time gap in this story is probably around 25 years or maybe even a bit more. They probably should have gone with an older actor to play Thomas's aged part.

On a completely unrelated note, I had a huge crush on Hutton when I was a youngster (Ordinary People days). He's looking a bit rough, but not rough enough to be character who has supposedly aged as much as this one. It's also a bit odd watching Thomas, as all I can see is Elliott from E.T. each time I look at his face! I guess he hasn't played enough other iconic parts to put that role firmly in the past for me. But he appears to be aging nicely.

Am totally with everyone else on the open casket thing. Those poor kids. I don't understand why that is even a tradition - it's so macabre.

Also agree with the number of characters - I feel like there are too many of them. They should have stuck to four kids - Theo seems extraneous to me, but maybe she'll play a bigger part in future episodes.

[Slovenly Muse]

On 10/13/2018 at 10:36 PM, Megan said:

I think Henry Thomas is wearing blue contacts and it makes him look weird.

 

15 hours ago, Whimsy said:

He is. To match Timothy Hutton’s eyes.

Yeah, this is really bothering me. His eyes look SO WEIRD. I would honestly not mind if young Hugh and old Hugh had different coloured eyes, and would probably never even notice, but the contacts draw attention to it in a way that completely defeats the purpose. It makes him look possessed, and NOT in the intentional haunted house kind of way. Plus, I feel like blue eyes are the easiest to cover up and would look more natural with darker contacts, so why isn't Hutton the one changing his eye colour if it's such a big deal? (I know, because he's more famous and gets to refuse things like that in his contract. But still.)

 

On 10/12/2018 at 11:15 PM, HollyG said:

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

Yeah, that bothered me too. When my grandmother passed, there was a viewing held before the service for those who wished to see her, and then a closed-casket funeral. My parents though it would be upsetting for the kids to see her, so everyone got to make up their own mind about what they wanted to see, and wanted their kids to see. I was not taken to that viewing, and for that I remain eternally grateful. No one should be forced to look at a dead body, especially of someone they care about. Although I do understand that in Shirley's case, she seems pathologically obsessed with "fixing" dead loved ones, and it could be an intentional signal to the audience of her unwellness that she feels like she can "help" children by forcing them to look at the bodies she "fixed," and is unable to accept that there is nothing she can actually do to fix death. But mostly I think it was just clumsy writing.

1 hour ago, Cheezwiz said:

Also agree with the number of characters - I feel like there are too many of them. They should have stuck to four kids - Theo seems extraneous to me, but maybe she'll play a bigger part in future episodes.

I am also having a hard time keeping track of the characters. I think it's because young Mom, adult Shirley, adult Nell, and adult Theo ALL look the same. And so, apparently, does Shirley's employee at the funeral home (whom she directed to go get the body), so there are three nearly-identical women just in that one house alone. Thank goodness Leigh is blonde or I'd never be able to tell ANY of the female cast apart. Honestly, if the Crain women all have to be brunette with similar features, couldn't at least one of them have a distinctive short haircut or something? In the pilot, when Nell was dancing through Hill House before her suicide, I genuinely couldn't figure out if that was Nell, or if that was a flashback to what their mother was doing after the family left her (I mean, it could have been both, but I couldn't tell which actress it was). They need to start physically differentiating their female characters, or they run the risk of the audience seeing them all as interchangeable.

All in all, I wasn't hugely impressed with this episode. The banging in the walls was an interesting nod to the book, but it didn't seem to go anywhere or mean anything, and could have just been a dream (the mask and the cats followed through to the present day, but the banging was just a one-off, and seemed to just be there because it was in the book, not because it's a part of this story). There wasn't much happening here that was actually spooky, and they really lost me with the flashing porch light at the end. I think if the final moment had taken us to Hill House, and the porch light THERE had been flashing, to call all the children back "home," that could have been really effective, but the tiny flashing light on the theoretical model of a house that doesn't even exist didn't mean anything and looked a bit cheesy. It makes me wonder what role Hill House will be playing moving forward, and wish I had a sense of how the family is connected to the house in the present, besides just through memories and shared experiences from their past.

I suppose I will push on and see where the story goes!

[AnnieHeights]

ITA about the blue contacts......I had a hard time getting past them to pay attention to what was being said.  I do think the casting is great from the standpoint of everyone actually looking alike but it does get hard to keep them all straight. 

The whole purpose of having the children see the dead folks was so they could see them as 'fixed' like young Shirley said to the undertaker(?) when she finally looked at her mother.  Current Shirley wanted the little boy to see his grandmother as he normally had seen her so he wouldn't be fixated on the scary version he had in his mind.    I think to most people it would be more comforting to have the last image as normal as possible.

[bilgistic]

The last image I have of my grandfather is of him in his casket, and I really could've done without that. He died in 2000, and I still have that image fresh in my mind as the day I saw him. I was 26 at the time. Of course, I have many other memories from growing up with him in my life, but I truly wish I didn't have that last one. It's just artifice to me.

I have told my family that they better not put my body in an open casket or I will come back and haunt them.

Edited October 17, 2018 by bilgistic

[tennisgurl]

I think the reason people want kids to look at dead relatives is so the kid "understands what death is" or something, which I've never gotten. Most kids know what dying is pretty early, even kids who arent exposed to much death, and they dont need to literally stare at it in the face. 

The blue eye contacts on the younger dad make him look creepier than the ghosts so far. I keep thinking that he is actually some kind of demon or something, and no one wants to mention it. Also, I dont want to see dead kittens! No!

[Anela]

On 10/13/2018 at 2:15 AM, HollyG said:

A devastating family tragedy stirs memories of traumatic losses, reminding Shirley of her first brush with death -- and awakening long-dormant fears. 

 

Why on earth are the adults trying to make the kids look at their deceased relatives. Not everyone feels the same about that. I feel upset for the kids.

I've been talking back to the TV, whenever they do that. My mum died two years ago - I'm an adult, and I didn't want her in an open casket. I was in denial to a point, but I did NOT want to see her that way. I'd asked if I could be in a separate room - I almost didn't show up - and as I walked in, ready to go into another room with my tea, and spend some time alone, I saw her right there, in an open casket. My legs almost went out from under me, and I sat down in one of the chairs. People kept following me into the other room, and then outside when I went out to get some air, and to try to get a bit of time to breathe and prepare myself. I texted my friend who had lost her mother the year before, and she told me that it was fine that I did that. People kept insisting that I look at her, and I told them I didn't want to - that it wasn't her (and when I had seen her, it didn't look like her at all. 

I looked away as Shirley was working. I also didn't need to see the dead kittens. 

I want to go and watch the third episode, and I'll be taking my cat George with me to the couch. He just somehow tipped off the side table, when he was sleeping. 

[HollyG]

4 hours ago, Anela said:

I've been talking back to the TV, whenever they do that. My mum died two years ago - I'm an adult, and I didn't want her in an open casket. I was in denial to a point, but I did NOT want to see her that way. I'd asked if I could be in a separate room - I almost didn't show up - and as I walked in, ready to go into another room with my tea, and spend some time alone, I saw her right there, in an open casket. My legs almost went out from under me, and I sat down in one of the chairs. People kept following me into the other room, and then outside when I went out to get some air, and to try to get a bit of time to breathe and prepare myself. I texted my friend who had lost her mother the year before, and she told me that it was fine that I did that. People kept insisting that I look at her, and I told them I didn't want to - that it wasn't her (and when I had seen her, it didn't look like her at all. 

I looked away as Shirley was working. I also didn't need to see the dead kittens. 

I want to go and watch the third episode, and I'll be taking my cat George with me to the couch. He just somehow tipped off the side table, when he was sleeping. 

Aww, I'm sorry for your loss Anela. I felt the same way when my Dad passed away.  It's really a personal choice and shouldn't be forced on anyone....adult or child.

[iMonrey]

I know some people who find comfort and closure in seeing their loved ones for a final time, and there are an equal number people who are wigged out and prefer not to see that. There shouldn't be any stigma or judgment for either side and it really angered me how Shirley kept pushing that little boy and telling him he'd be sorry later if he didn't look at dead grandma. Nobody has the right to make that choice for someone else, I don't care if it's a kid. I really dislike her for that.

So far I'm not digging this series. It's more gross than scary and I had to look away during the embalming process. I didn't need to see Shirley open up her sister's chest cavity and pull out a bag of internal organs or sew her scalp back on. I didn't need to see a box of dead kittens either. I also think there are way too many time jumps. It's one thing to go back and forth between the main characters when they were kids, living in Hill House, and now, when they are adults, but within the adult storyline they are jumping around into flashbacks and it makes for a messy narrative. 

The real meat of the story seems to center around their time as children in Hill House so all the present-day stuff seems like filler designed to pad a story into a 10 episode season.

[rainsmom]

21 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

I also think there are way too many time jumps. It's one thing to go back and forth between the main characters when they were kids, living in Hill House, and now, when they are adults, but within the adult storyline they are jumping around into flashbacks and it makes for a messy narrative. 

The real meat of the story seems to center around their time as children in Hill House so all the present-day stuff seems like filler designed to pad a story into a 10 episode season.

I had the same issues when I started watching. Episodes 1 and 2 are especially bad, but it gets easier from here.

(No more dead kittens either.)

[Mrs. DuRona]

I had heard about this show in passing, so I thought I'd give it a go.  I had heard about people passing out/throwing up, getting nightmares, etc.  So far, the most disturbing things has been the dead kittens.  So, so disturbing.  I actually yelled at the TV "Stop showing the dead kitten!!"

The only funeral I went to with open casket was my maternal grandfather.  I saw him in the casket, and it was more fascination than closure.  He worked for the funeral home, so my first thought was "Wow, they did a good job on him!"  With a grandfather who worked in a funeral home, and a minister for a father, death was not really a big deal for me.  I have memories of my sister and me sitting in the back of the station wagon in the cemetery while Dad did a graveside funeral, haha.  I also have a twisted, morbid sense of humor.

[AnnieHeights]

20 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I know some people who find comfort and closure in seeing their loved ones for a final time, and there are an equal number people who are wigged out and prefer not to see that. There shouldn't be any stigma or judgment for either side and it really angered me how Shirley kept pushing that little boy and telling him he'd be sorry later if he didn't look at dead grandma. Nobody has the right to make that choice for someone else, I don't care if it's a kid. I really dislike her for that.

I get that it is a personal choice to view a loved one or not, Shirley wanted him to see his Grandmother so he would remember what she looked like back when she looked 'normal' so he could have that last image in his mind as opposed to the 'scary' version he currently had.  She was very relieved when she saw her own mother as 'fixed' as opposed to the gruesome way she apparently looked when she died.  I seriously doubt Shirley would be insistent at all if he had not been having nightmares about the frightening version he had created.           

[iMonrey]

Except that Shirley is projecting her own bullshit onto that poor kid, and given the nature of this show, you know that poor kid isn't just "imagining" dead grandma sitting on his bed every night. She's in the house.

[seahag50]

My dad was the youngest of 16 I had 57 first cousins on his side...from the time I can remember someone was always dying in the family....I was made to go to the casket kneel down and say hail marys….now trust me when you come from a very very catholic family and part of them are irish….funerals are like family reunions....I never forced the kids to view a body......it was their choice..my grandkids on the other hand...…..I swear are ghouls....march right up and stand there touch the body and talk about the person.....say prayers....and throw kisses...…..its all in how you look at life.....after you die....the you that you are is gone...….

Edited October 20, 2018 by seahag50

[Madding crowd]

I love scary stuff but I don’t like gore especially things like embalming scenes! My husband’s family was in the funeral business when he was young and he said they would never attempt to counsel children. The parents would be advised to see a counselor.

I agree many of the female characters look a lot alike. Also think the original parents seem creepy for some reason. I’m still interested in seeing where this will go.

[Bethorz]

My dad runs a funeral home in a small town, and I found Shirley’s scenes rang very true for me (though the funeral directors taking the kids up to see the bodies was really odd, though I thought it was really odd in kind of a sweet way). My dad is a huge, genuine believer in the value of open casket wakes, he would never try to change  anyone’s mind who was very against it, but would usually recommend it in most normal circumstances if the family is asking for advice. It’s easy to be  to be cynical about that, since we probably make more money in that case, but he really actually genuinely believes it’s healthy to have that closure. For me, I have been lucky enough not have had to attend a huge amount of funerals myself, but any I have attended have been open casket. I don’t think you should force a kid to see a body, but on the other hand, I have never wanted to do it, sometimes with a reaction like young Shirley beforehand, (even without any genuine trauma to cause it) but I’ve always eventually done it and I’ve never regretted it, it was usually just anticlimactic. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that attitude from a funeral director portrayed on tv in a way that felt real, (full disclosure I’ve never seen Six Feet Under) so I liked that, but then maybe it will be shown later that it’s just because she’s fucked up, I haven’t finished the series yet. 

 

I’m a few episodes past this now, but I actually love when a series jumps around and more pieces of the puzzle are put together as it goes on, it’s way more satisfying when it eventually makes sense.

[Blue Plastic]

WHY must scary shows always have something sad about a pet or pets that die/get killed?  Just leave the kittens alone.  Damn show.  Stupid effing writers and producers.  I was liking the show okay until that happened.  Stupid stupid stupid.  Also the special effects for the kittens just weren't that good so they should have left it out anyway.

It is strange how they keep jumping around in the so-called present.  Back and forth to past and present I can get, but why multiple jumping back and forth in the present?  I kept wondering why everything was so slow.  All the siblings wake up when Nell dies and the dad gets all frantic and starts packing his bags but then everyone is just sitting around and nobody seems to be worried about Nell at all.  Then I finally realize they are time jumping in the so-called present.

This could have been an interesting/fun premise.

[Lady Calypso]

I'm glad I came on here before the dead kitten stuff because I immediately started looking away when that happened. Nope, not in it for the grotesque stuff. 

I have my own fears about dead bodies. It's weird because I'm fine with watching dead bodies on TV but when it comes to real life, whether it's dead human bodies or dead animal bodies, I can't do it. I remember when I was 7 and my grandfather unexpectedly died, I could barely look at him in his casket and there's an Italian tradition where you're encouraged to touch the dead body as a sign of respect. I was so freaked out about doing that and I never liked funerals or tried to go to many after that. 

So yeah, I was getting angry with Shirley pushing the kid Max to have to look at his grandmother. Like she said, he was a smart kid so...he didn't need to see her to get the closure. Shirley seemed to be projecting more about her own issues. I didn't like Steven much last episode but I definitely wasn't a fan of Shirley this episode. I get it; trauma affects people in different ways and all but I wasn't really a fan of her actions in the present day, especially when Steven was trying to tell her what happened with Nellie.

I still like the series so far. It's a bit confusing with the jumping around, but I'm slowly getting used to it.

[FENJI]

Ok, she notices movement after death, followed by the bug. A recurring vision. one other thing i noticed in this episode, in the end before the 2 flashing lights to come home, there was a bunch of urns on the wall. all the urns were out of focus, but one, a blue urn. just stating what i noticed.

[JenE4]

I didn’t notice any jarring blue contacts. But I don’t know any of these actors, so maybe it’s a matter of expecting someone to look another way. The only eye discrepancy I have an issue with is how little Luke looks as if he could potentially be classified as legally blind and yet adult Luke doesn’t even wear glasses. I think you can only correct so far with contacts. Lasik surgery? Seeing the spirits changed his vision outright? But on the opposite end of the spectrum is how ALL of these women with their gorgeous dark wavy hair look exactly alike. Kudos to the casting director, I guess, but it took me through the next episode watching back to back to finally be able to tell them apart.

i don’t have any real-life opinions on Shirley as a child and now adult Shirley with another child forcing the kids to see the deceased. This is just her origin story, along with the cats and her mother dying, and how she has to fix her sister just like the funeral director fixed her mom... The whole episode was simply to illustrate how her childhood experience with Hill House shaped who she became as an adult—and why. Hmm. I always wondered why anyone would choose to work in a funeral home. Wonder no more! Yikes, enough said here! Lol.

[Nancy Drew]

On 10/14/2018 at 6:55 PM, bilgistic said:

I'm going to need more information about dead bodies being posed on a bed!

I couldn't deal with the kittens dying! And they kept showing the first kitten! I yelled, "Stop!" at the TV.

Here's an article with more information. They must have stopped JUST before this article, or I wouldn't be old enough to remember. One of the most haunting memories of my childhood is my grandmother's best friend laid out on a blue silk canopy bed...dead. Patterson's was also in a super old house that was creepy enough without the beds. Some horror director should use that image, because it was just as awful as it sounds. http://articles.latimes.com/1985-07-22/news/mn-6067_1_funerals

Also, the kittens bothered the hell out of me. 

[bilgistic]

Nice research! You need to find a director to make your horror movie! I'd watch the crap out of a movie that explored a haunted funeral home that posed dead bodies on a bed.

I would not go to a funeral home that posed dead bodies on a bed.

[Black Knight]

Personally I haven't minded open caskets when people actually look like themselves. My maternal grandmother had a long slow decline from cancer when I was a child and it was really something of a relief and healing to see her once again the way she'd looked before all that, because otherwise I feel like my memories of her would have been completely dominated by the phase where she lay on a couch for months dying. The most recent funeral I attended, on the other hand, well, I lived next door to the man for 13 years (including when he was perfectly healthy) and would have sworn that I'd never met him before in my life. That was creepy to me.

Edited October 25, 2018 by Black Knight

[wrlord]

I really don't understand this thing the goyim do of looking at the dead bodies of loved ones - especially the creepy description and depiction of dressing them up and paining them like dolls. It's disgusting.  How is "I'm going to fill your grandma up with chemicals and glue a wig on her" supposed to reassure a little boy?  

[Aliferously]

I think I would have flipped out too if someone MADE me look at a dead body in a casket. The kid said (numerous times) that he was at peace with her passing and didn't feel the need. Stop banging on about how it'll help him cope.

I thought the made up dead Nellie looked artificial. Like, nothing like in that wedding picture. I watched that corpse make up scene through my fingers.

My great grandmother was laid out on a bed at the funeral home. She looked peaceful and it really helped me process. I don't think a casket would have had the same effect. It's the whole confined space effect that freaks me the fuck out. Open casket funerals are luckily not a thing here.

I don't think I can look at kittens the same way ever again. 

I'm not sure if what freaked me out more about the last five minutes of this episode. It replayed in my head for hours.

[bilgistic]

I ALWAYS think dead and embalmed and made-up bodies look fake and waxy. They never look "natural" to me. I live in North Carolina and it's pretty standard do open caskets in the South. People always say, "She looks so natural!" No, she looks dead and waxen. I remember my grandfather looked so unlike his real self. I just didn't need that last image.

[Saidy]

The whole series is creepy, weird, bitty, inappropriate and not right. Shirley has a face like the Grim cartoon character, no one is more than 1 dimensional, and forcing children to look in caskets is just wrong. This whole show is insidious. None of these grown up siblings are decent people and characters just disappear eg. dad after receiving his suicidal daughters call. And what the hell did happen to their mother. The show would have been far better kept to just one episode, with the children being taken into care, by social services, at the end of episode 1, away from those useless money obsessed neglectful and in effect abusive parents. 

[Paloma]

Hubby and I watched this episode right after the first one tonight (Halloween) and we are definitely drawn in. But the kittens thing was very upsetting to me because something very similar happened to me a few decades ago when I was living on a farm with a lot of cats. A mother cat got run over shortly after giving birth (maybe a couple of days), and I tried to keep the kittens alive by feeding them milk with a dropper--they needed to be fed every couple of hours, and I even took them to my college classes so they wouldn't be left alone too long. Sadly, they were too young and/or weak to survive without their mother, and one day I found them dead in their box with maggots on them. Didn't really need the reminder of that awful time in watching this show.

[methodwriter85]

On 10/14/2018 at 10:04 AM, Whimsy said:

He is. To match Timothy Hutton’s eyes. I had to look up both actor’s ages. It was as I thought, they are only 11 years apart. Timothy Hutton can look rough, but it was odd to me that they used someone only 11 years older than Henry Thomas to play someone 26 years older. No disrespect to TH,  because I’m a fan, but they should’ve aged up HT. 

Yeah, at this point I thought they should have just aged up Henry Thomas. Hell, if Mandy Moore with a still-dewy thirtysomething face can play a 68-year old on This Is Us, they could have aged up a late 40's guy to play 70-something.

Elisabeth Reaser and Lulu Wilson played mother and daughter in Ouija: The Origin of Evil, and it was pretty good casting. My only issue is that Shirley looks clearly older than Steve (and I believe ER is about 7 years older than Michael Huisman), but I can also believe that running a mortuary probably aged her a lot.

[toolazy]

The kittens didn't bother me because I thought they looked very fake.  

My grandparents started dying when I was 3.  My two grandmothers died exactly a week apart when I was 7. I was living in New Orleans so you better believe open caskets are a thing.  I recall being more interested than upset about seeing them in their coffins. The only time I was bothered by an open casket was my dad's funeral because they did a terrible job on him.

We were with my mom when she died and we were able to spend time with her for several hours after while we waited for my brother to arrive at hospice.  She was cremated so we never had to see her artificially preserved in her coffin and I've always been grateful for that.

[kieyra]

Since this thread got bumped ...

I rewatch HHH now and then because it’s such a compelling cast and visuals, but I have to skip this episode most of the time. I know it’s silly, but it is what it is. 

[Anela]

I had forgotten about the kittens, so I'm listening more than watching this episode, I'd also forgotten that the eldest daughter was psychic via her dreams. The others I almost listed, but then realized that they're shown in future episodes.

[AnnieBananie]

This episode upset me a lot, between the open casket and the kittens. Uncle! Uncle!!

I haven't even noticed the blue contacts because it's always so dark all of the time 😆

[Bruinsfan]

On 10/15/2018 at 1:41 AM, Slovenly Muse said:

There wasn't much happening here that was actually spooky, and they really lost me with the flashing porch light at the end. I think if the final moment had taken us to Hill House, and the porch light THERE had been flashing, to call all the children back "home," that could have been really effective, but the tiny flashing light on the theoretical model of a house that doesn't even exist didn't mean anything and looked a bit cheesy.

When the shot kept that model house in frame for the longest time I thought to myself "they're not going to have it light up like Nancy's model in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3, are they?"

On 11/1/2018 at 10:01 PM, methodwriter85 said:

Elisabeth Reaser and Lulu Wilson played mother and daughter in Ouija: The Origin of Evil, and it was pretty good casting. My only issue is that Shirley looks clearly older than Steve (and I believe ER is about 7 years older than Michael Huisman), but I can also believe that running a mortuary probably aged her a lot.

Almost all of the spectral shenanigans apparently passed Steve by, which could explain why most of his younger siblings look older than he does. I guess the ghosts decided their haunting needed a control group?

[Mabinogia]

1 hour ago, Bruinsfan said:

Almost all of the spectral shenanigans apparently passed Steve by, which could explain why most of his younger siblings look older than he does. I guess the ghosts decided their haunting needed a control group?

Oh, now I love the idea of this family being nothing more than lab rats for the ghosts who were testing out their haunting techniques and the resulting damage to the human psyche. Maybe one of them was trying to get their masters in haunting so they could get a really good haunting gig, like a castle or something. Those jobs are hard to come by. 

[lucindabelle]

I am a teacher and fall asleep a lot in front of TV (cause get up early) I must have slept through the kittens dying and  am SO GLAD.

why do they call things that have nothing to do with a book by the same title? Like “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” back in the day which invented a whole Dracula backstory that doesn’t exist in the book.

 

THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE is literally the most terrifying book I’ve ever read. When the walls started breathing! The weird tea party!

 

I came to this because I watched THE HAUNTING OF BLY MANOR which is inspired by THE TURN OF THE SCREW - but at least has a different name. That was very scary until the middle when everything got explained.

anyway I knew going in this would not be like the book. I’m intrigued- but not that intrigued and don’t know if I will continue.