The Haunting of Hill House (Netflix)
- Thread starter Malevolence
- Start date
Finished this recently. I really like horror and I really dislike most TV shows and their ‘drip feed’ format.
I did really like this series and it’s ‘anthology-esque’ intro episodes. The mix between drama and creepy was excellent and the show had two of the best jump scares / jolt moments I’ve ever seen, set out below with other comments.
Cast generally good but the mum was a bit too slick and ‘American TV’ for me. That’s me being very picky though.
Good show - would recommend
I did really like this series and it’s ‘anthology-esque’ intro episodes. The mix between drama and creepy was excellent and the show had two of the best jump scares / jolt moments I’ve ever seen, set out below with other comments.
- When the dad said it’s over... it’s oveRRrrRrRrrrr!!!!
- In the car when the girls are arguing. Holy crap that got me!
I really liked the ending and it’s ‘love will save the say’ tone. Furthermore, there were only a few dopey moments in the whole show:
- The whole family in the psychiatric ward backstory bit was disappointly cliche.
- The whole ‘not tell the police about the dead child’ was a bit ehhhhh and unbelievable... but they were weirdos.
- The story of the runny egg eyes was grim but the realisation was laughable.
- In the car when the girls are arguing. Holy crap that got me!
I really liked the ending and it’s ‘love will save the say’ tone. Furthermore, there were only a few dopey moments in the whole show:
- The whole family in the psychiatric ward backstory bit was disappointly cliche.
- The whole ‘not tell the police about the dead child’ was a bit ehhhhh and unbelievable... but they were weirdos.
- The story of the runny egg eyes was grim but the realisation was laughable.
Good show - would recommend
the above resulted in me requiring a change of underwear as a little bit of pee managed to escape. scared the utter bejesus out of me!!
finished the other evening and yea the ending actually felt like a bit of a let down for me but i can forgive it considering what came before. i must be one of the few who would have liked to have had the alternate ending!!
Soldato
- Joined
- 22 Oct 2007
- Posts
- 3,155
- Location
- Hull
Enjoyed it overall but the first half was definitely better than the second, also the ghosts started getting daft. The Asian lesbian was nice though 
They did partly film this covering the building of the house and the Hills. Hopefully as they didn't have room to fit it in this time they can use it for S2
Yes there's less than 5 'jump scares' the rest are things you notice in the background.
There are many ghosts you will struggle to notice on a first viewing, I guarantee it.
It's bad. And I'm not talking about the Neil Breen kind of bad, which is so bad it's actually good on a certain level.
This show is just plain dumb.
Yup, there are several ghosts just stood or crouched in the background that the camera never focuses on and the characters never notice, little hidden easter eggs.
A bit like how there was a 5th housemate in The Young Ones hidden throughout the show in the background that hardly anyone ever noticed until they are shown.
Really good show that proves that horror can work well in a TV show format. I feel like it ended perfectly and really hope the rumours of a season 2 I have heard are not true 
. I'd much rather the guys that made this film put their talents into something new, rather than dragging this out.
EDIT:
Oh no, that's even worse. Nothing more immersion breaking for me than having the same actors playing different roles. This is one reason i just can't get into American Horror show.
. I'd much rather the guys that made this film put their talents into something new, rather than dragging this out.EDIT:
Oh no, that's even worse
. Nothing more immersion breaking for me than having the same actors playing different roles. This is one reason i just can't get into American Horror show.So I heard all the hype and thought 'might give it the old college try.' The trailers didn't inspire confidence, but trailers can be misleading.
In this case, I really wish they had been.
The premise of this series is dumber than dirt. A family of seven somehow finds the money to buy a four storey mansion the size of Delaware, which the father plans to fully renovate and resell. He intends to do all of this in—wait for it—just eight weeks.
I have some experience in real estate (including renovation and flipping) and I know for a fact that this is absolute ********.
Incredibly, the father claims that re-selling the house will make the family rich. Viewers are not invited to stop and consider the fact that you cannot buy a house of this size in the first place unless you already are rich, so... uh??? Perhaps he means the family will become billionaires instead of just millionaires? Who the **** knows.
It's all a moot point anyway, because throughout the entire 10 gruelling episodes we barely see more than a few scant minutes of what could generously be described as 'renovation.' The father makes vague noises about replacing the wallpaper (yes, all 90 square kilometres of it) but this never gets done.
It turns out that half of the walls are suffering from excessive damp due to sheets of water pouring down inside them for no apparent reason. In response the father footles about with some fans and plastic sheeting, but this half-arsed token gesture towards the problem is quickly forgotten and never mentioned again, so I guess the walls didn't get fixed either.
At some point the father accidentally cuts the back of his hand on an industrial fan which inexplicably lacks a guard across the blades. The wound is severe, clearly requiring minor surgery, a ******** of stitches, some nerve reconstruction, a professionally applied bandage, and at least a week of inactivity before the hand can be used again.
The father wraps a thin bandage around it, and continues his lame attempts at DIY. A few scenes later he's using the hand like nothing happened.
Anyway, the kids start seeing ghosts but nobody believes them and they get traumatised in various ways.
One of the kids becomes an author who gets a vasectomy(!) One of the kids becomes a junkie(!!) One of the kids becomes a neurotic, self-absorbed bitch who hates everyone and works at a morgue(!!!)
One of the kids becomes insane, and marries a black man(!!!!) One of the kids becomes a psychic lesbian with daddy issues(!!!!!) who sexually assaults women and inflicts domestic violence on the one who becomes her unfortunate on-again-off-again partner. When the partner complains, the offender gaslights her and the cycle begins again. Charming!
The mother is insane right from the start, and it's suggested that this madness runs in the family. The father is in denial about everything, because of course he is.
The house is inexplicably furnished with acres of antiques. I guess they just came with the property? /shrug
The main cast consists of dull, unrepeatable characters with bland, fully interchangeable personalities. The children are portrayed both in their youth, and as adults.
The child actors are pretty abysmal. One of the boys looks and sounds like he belongs in a Neil Breen flick. One of the girls is given lines that are completely unrealistic for a child her age. The adult actors are little better, and one of them has a forehead the size of the Eiffel Tower, which is as distracting and unpleasant as it sounds.
Anyway, the house is full of ghosts (mostly portrayed by sub-par CGI) who spend all their time wandering around the place for no apparent reason. Occasionally they scare the kids with jumpscares and loud noises, but apart from this they pose no threat.
Some of the scenes are just laugh out loud stupid. When a supernatural storm blows out every window in an impossibly long hallway, the housemaid responds by futilely dabbing at the huge piles of glass with a small dustpan and brush. Never mind the fact that you would literally need a team of half a dozen people with brooms, shovels, and a skip to get the job done; she reckons it'll all be done in a few minutes with her feeble ******* around.
It's a moot point anyway, since this scene is never revisited and we're not told if the windows were actually repaired at some point.
Further shenanigans ensue as the story continues, with the plot becoming increasingly convoluted. It soon becomes obvious that half of the writers had walked out in the first week. The narrative switches backwards, forwards, and occasionally sideways in time. This happens frequently, and with little purpose except to confuse the viewer.
There is much speculation about what is real, what is imaginary, and what is merely dreamed or mis-remembered. Different scenes are presented from multiple perspectives in non-chronological order, but little is done to organise them in the mind of the viewer. Why? Because **** you, that's why.
The series becomes completely bogged down in its own self-importance somewhere around episode 5, and never recovers. From that point it's a long, slow crawl to a predictably messy end that screams 'Well, we managed to cram every other tired old horror trope into the plot, so why not this one too?'
The epilogue is classic American shlock, as you should expect at this point. Everyone acts as if everything has been resolved, even though virtually nothing has been.
I rate The Haunting of the Haunted House on Haunted House Hill that was Haunted by Ghosts at 9.99 on the Haglee Scale, which works out as an excruciatingly cringeworthy 3/10 on IMDB.
In this case, I really wish they had been.
The premise of this series is dumber than dirt. A family of seven somehow finds the money to buy a four storey mansion the size of Delaware, which the father plans to fully renovate and resell. He intends to do all of this in—wait for it—just eight weeks.
I have some experience in real estate (including renovation and flipping) and I know for a fact that this is absolute ********.
Incredibly, the father claims that re-selling the house will make the family rich. Viewers are not invited to stop and consider the fact that you cannot buy a house of this size in the first place unless you already are rich, so... uh??? Perhaps he means the family will become billionaires instead of just millionaires? Who the **** knows.
It's all a moot point anyway, because throughout the entire 10 gruelling episodes we barely see more than a few scant minutes of what could generously be described as 'renovation.' The father makes vague noises about replacing the wallpaper (yes, all 90 square kilometres of it) but this never gets done.
It turns out that half of the walls are suffering from excessive damp due to sheets of water pouring down inside them for no apparent reason. In response the father footles about with some fans and plastic sheeting, but this half-arsed token gesture towards the problem is quickly forgotten and never mentioned again, so I guess the walls didn't get fixed either.
At some point the father accidentally cuts the back of his hand on an industrial fan which inexplicably lacks a guard across the blades. The wound is severe, clearly requiring minor surgery, a ******** of stitches, some nerve reconstruction, a professionally applied bandage, and at least a week of inactivity before the hand can be used again.
The father wraps a thin bandage around it, and continues his lame attempts at DIY. A few scenes later he's using the hand like nothing happened.
Anyway, the kids start seeing ghosts but nobody believes them and they get traumatised in various ways.
One of the kids becomes an author who gets a vasectomy(!) One of the kids becomes a junkie(!!) One of the kids becomes a neurotic, self-absorbed bitch who hates everyone and works at a morgue(!!!)
One of the kids becomes insane, and marries a black man(!!!!) One of the kids becomes a psychic lesbian with daddy issues(!!!!!) who sexually assaults women and inflicts domestic violence on the one who becomes her unfortunate on-again-off-again partner. When the partner complains, the offender gaslights her and the cycle begins again. Charming!
The mother is insane right from the start, and it's suggested that this madness runs in the family. The father is in denial about everything, because of course he is.
The house is inexplicably furnished with acres of antiques. I guess they just came with the property? /shrug
The main cast consists of dull, unrepeatable characters with bland, fully interchangeable personalities. The children are portrayed both in their youth, and as adults.
The child actors are pretty abysmal. One of the boys looks and sounds like he belongs in a Neil Breen flick. One of the girls is given lines that are completely unrealistic for a child her age. The adult actors are little better, and one of them has a forehead the size of the Eiffel Tower, which is as distracting and unpleasant as it sounds.
Anyway, the house is full of ghosts (mostly portrayed by sub-par CGI) who spend all their time wandering around the place for no apparent reason. Occasionally they scare the kids with jumpscares and loud noises, but apart from this they pose no threat.
Some of the scenes are just laugh out loud stupid. When a supernatural storm blows out every window in an impossibly long hallway, the housemaid responds by futilely dabbing at the huge piles of glass with a small dustpan and brush. Never mind the fact that you would literally need a team of half a dozen people with brooms, shovels, and a skip to get the job done; she reckons it'll all be done in a few minutes with her feeble ******* around.
It's a moot point anyway, since this scene is never revisited and we're not told if the windows were actually repaired at some point.
Further shenanigans ensue as the story continues, with the plot becoming increasingly convoluted. It soon becomes obvious that half of the writers had walked out in the first week. The narrative switches backwards, forwards, and occasionally sideways in time. This happens frequently, and with little purpose except to confuse the viewer.
There is much speculation about what is real, what is imaginary, and what is merely dreamed or mis-remembered. Different scenes are presented from multiple perspectives in non-chronological order, but little is done to organise them in the mind of the viewer. Why? Because **** you, that's why.
The series becomes completely bogged down in its own self-importance somewhere around episode 5, and never recovers. From that point it's a long, slow crawl to a predictably messy end that screams 'Well, we managed to cram every other tired old horror trope into the plot, so why not this one too?'
The epilogue is classic American shlock, as you should expect at this point. Everyone acts as if everything has been resolved, even though virtually nothing has been.
I rate The Haunting of the Haunted House on Haunted House Hill that was Haunted by Ghosts at 9.99 on the Haglee Scale, which works out as an excruciatingly cringeworthy 3/10 on IMDB.
Last edited:
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Associate
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- 31 Oct 2005
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- 1,583
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- Wirral
Enjoyed this more than I thought I would
Initially thought it was a bit creepy and it took me a couple of episodes to get into it.
But after finishing it, I don't think it was particularly scary at all and in fact I found it a little sad at the end.
Initially thought it was a bit creepy and it took me a couple of episodes to get into it.
But after finishing it, I don't think it was particularly scary at all and in fact I found it a little sad at the end.
Lol, thats possibly the longest post I've ever seen on Ocuk
Just keepin' it real for the peeps!
