#so you know in the first scene? steven and theo wake up and steven tells theo to go back to sleep

[elizabeth-mitchells]

*young nell crain crying her little heart out after seeing a ghost that will haunt her for the rest of her life*

me: ah my comfort show <33

[zoominlumen]

Steven Can Taste Ghosts?

I have a theory regarding The Haunting of Hill House. I am rewatching for the 3rd or 4th time right now and I’m in episode 3: Touch.

It seems to me that each of the Crain children has a different sensory connection to the apparitions of Hill House.

Nell: Sound

Luke: Smell

Theo: Touch

Shirley: Sight

Which leaves

Steven: Taste?

In this episode, Luke and Nell are trying to figure out the communication system with a pipe leading from one of the spare rooms to the kitchen beside the dumbwaiter. Theo says it’s like a telephone for inside of the house, and takes Luke upstairs to the other end. When they enter the spare bedroom, they have this exchange:

Luke: Ugh, what is that smell?

Theo: What smell?

Luke: You can’t smell that?

Theo: Smells the same in here as the rest of the house.

Luke climbs up onto the bed and only once Theo touches the pillow does she say, “This was a sick bed.”

Luke, by the way, only sees the Tall Man from far away, and as the day after Nell’s death passes, the Tall Man begins to get closer, but only coming up behind Luke, where he can’t see. Luke has to rely on his other senses, and the Tall Man doesn’t make any noise when he moves; he glides. But he may be close enough to smell:

Remember that later on in the episode, as Liv gives Theo her first pair of gloves, she says that, when they first moved into the house, Nell said it was ‘Loud’.

That got me thinking about how Nell, on multiple occasions after her death, interrupts the family when they are yelling at each other, like she is still listening. There is the scene where she knocks over her own casket after Steve shouts “My problem is that the wrong parent died!” And there is the scene where Nell appears as a ghost to scream at Theo and Shirley while they’re yelling at each other on the drive to Hill House.

Shirley is a sleep talker, and the first time that we see her sleep talking, she says ‘Dancing in the red room’ which we find out later, Theo does. She is also the only one of the Crain children who, when they all wake at 3:03 as Nell dies, says, ‘Nelly’s in the red room’. She sees things, but mostly in her dreams.

(I would also argue that Shirley sees the most apparitions leading up to the Crain family’s return to Hill House.)

Everybody knows that when Theo touches something, she has an innate ability to understand that thing, so I won’t bother explaining.

That only leaves Steven and the sense of taste. ‘Steven can taste ghosts’ sounds ridiculous, but, the way that the red room manifests for him includes his estranged wife kissing him and feeding him fries, with a bowl of fruit on display beside them. She tells him to eat, because it’s the best cure for writer’s block. Watching the scene again, I swear there is a moment of confusion on Steven’s face, both in the moment after the kiss and the moment after she feeds him the fry. And as his fantasy breaks down, the apparition of Leigh calls him an ‘Eater’ and says that their baby will be an ‘Eater’ too.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk about how Steven Crain can taste ghosts, for some reason.

[bloodnikki]

Thoughts on The Haunting of Hill House...

I think we should all take a moment to look at why The Haunting of Hill House is so good both as an adaption as well as it’s own piece.

Let’s start with it as an adaption.

As an adaption of a book/movie, it is very different. It has it’s own feeling and a wildly different story. Where as the book dealt with a group of people studying the haunting of Hill House, the series deals with a family coming to terms with their haunting.

But it isn’t so far removed that it feels too different! And that is important, because this makes it feel respectful to the source. The names of characters are taken from the book. There are scenes that are clear references to the original work and lines that are almost taken straight from the text of the book. 

In short, it is clear that the Tv Series and the Book are two different houses, but the ground work/the frame is the same. The core of it is the same while we, as viewers, enter unsure of the layout of the building we are about to enter. So, old fans have a lot to look forward to when they sit down to watch it.

As It’s Own Piece... 

There is a lot to say on it. It is truly a work that shows the beauty of visual storytelling. It has a very strong opening and closing episode, much like the book has a strong opening and closing. But I’ll touch on this in a little bit.

1) Lighting! So, for everyone use to watching horror or even passing viewers to the genre, you know that most horror series/movies are very dark. They use darkness to showcase the larking monsters. Normally lighting only the main character or just enough to give a sense of dread.

Hill House series doesn’t have overly dark scenes. In fact, it does the opposite. All scenes in Hill House are well lit. Even scenes taking place in the dark of night, have a good amount of lighting. This is because the house is a character. In fact, the house is just as important a character as the family.

So, every scene in Hill House is well lit. You are always aware that you are in Hill House or you become aware of the swift to Hill House easily. Details of the rooms in Hill House are always clear to see.

2) This is because, Details are very important. The series uses a lot of symbolism to convey meaning. In the use of color, to the use of personal relationships, the details in a scene are important. 

3) Due to the fact of how things always Cycle back. The book and the series have an open and closing that cycle back into each other. This is an element that is reinforced throughout the show. Events keep getting circled back to, much like Nell’s bent neck lady, to enhance the story. Sometimes even showing there is no clear start or finish. Time isn’t a fixed idea. We learn something new from each retelling and pick up new elements that flesh out the story with each cycling back. Each family member has a piece of the story and each piece doesn’t make sense without the others. Everything cycles back near seamlessly 

2) details. Details that make the viewing enjoyable when you rewatch it. There isn’t a wasted scene or line to be found. We either learn something important to a character or we see something important to the over all narrative. Case in point Shirley waking up to say “Nell’s in the red room” in the first episode and start of the next. 

This is brought up a few times. It is said when Huge goes to bed to his wife “Shirley is sleep talking again” Shown twice as they repeat the scene of her waking up saying that in the second episode, after we just saw in the first, and again by Olivia in a later episode in the scene where she talks to Theo about them being sensitive people.

By the way, can we all agree that the way we are introduce to the family, in the Hill House flashback, is amazing. It perfectly sets up each of their characters. Shirley pretty much sleeps through Nell’s cry for help. Theo is unsure how to help Nell, but she waved away and doesn’t even come to the room to help. Just goes back to her own room/world. Steven, the older brother, tries his best to comfort Nell, but can’t. Huge comes in trying to make things better while Luke is ignored. He is quickly forgotten in the scene. Huge is the last person to talk to Nell before he leaves the room to check on the kids.

Much like he is the last person to talk to Nell before she enters the house. He calls to tell Steven to check on her since he is closest. Luke is all but ignored as they play telephone in the first few scenes. In fact we don’t see him until after Nell dies. Shirley passes Nell’s call off, not evening speaking to her youngest sister. She let’s Steven do it, much like Theo let Steven handle Nell that night with the nightmare, while Theo has nothing to do with the game of telephone much like Shirley sleeping through the events of the nightmare. In this way, it shows a bond between the sisters that is reinforced later by showing they sort of live together.

Porch light on means come home. Shirley’s model of the forever home being smashed by possibly, most likely in context of the scene, her mother’s ghost. I could list on and on about the use of color and little details.

Details that are easy to over look, but really make a difference to the overall story. It’s the way that events cycle back that are just so enjoyable to watch.

4) Just like the transitions between scenes are enjoyable. The cuts are just so beautiful done. They flow so nicely from one scene to the next. Making it hard, at times, to place the start of one scene to the next in our minds. A visual cycling back to the idea that there is no real start or finish to a moment. Time isn’t a line of events that happen one after the other, but a series of moments happening all at once around us. The opening of a door or fridge, leads effortlessly into the opening of the past, a memory of what happened in Hill House. Going down a hallway leads you down a different one.

The biggest weakness to The Haunting of Hill House, is Shirley. Her character, both young and old, doesn’t do much within the story. Her damage due to the house feels rushed compared to the others. We don’t get as much time with her compared to her siblings. Steve, Theo, Nell, Luke and Huge are big center pieces. They feel like main characters while Shirley feels, at times, like she’s still in bed sleeping. I put her on the same status as the Dudley’s. They are there and they are important to the story, but they aren’t the soul of the story. They are merely there while things are happening, a causal force in the over all narrative. 

I am not saying that her character isn’t important or could have been removed. Shirley’s character is needed. It helps setup a bunch of events. It helps move the story along faster and keeps the locations to as few places as possible. It also keeps the cast smaller, leaving more time to showcase the family. Her character helps keeps the story from becoming muddy through useless/not as important events or meeting people that won’t be important later. 

Rather, what I am saying is that I wish there could have been more done with her. Sadly, I don’t honestly think there could have been a way to do that without taking away from her siblings and the story. In a family of seven, one person always ends up having to get lost in the shuffle. That person is Shirley and for this story, the way it had to be told, that’s okay. It’s okay that Shirley slept through most of the events. It’s okay she doesn’t get up in the middle of the night to comfort her sister who is crying over the bent neck lady. It’s okay, because those that were most needed got up and were seen. 

I honestly could send more time talking about the series and the elements that I enjoyed from it. It came out on the 12th and of writing this, it is the 15th. I have sat through the show twice. I clearly haven’t picked up everything in it. I couldn’t possibly do that in two viewings. But this is just an overview of the things that I felt made the series work. 

[frankenstein-girl]

anyway you ever think about how luke was fulfilling his mother’s misguided prophecy whenever he used? like obviously he and nellie are pushed toward the very thing their mom wanted to save them from by her own actions, but luke literally picks up where she left off.

first of all, as a lot of people have theorized, the ghost with the hat is a manifestation of his trauma from that night. it also serves as a metaphor for his desire to use that follows him - and he explicitly says that he started using to cope with things from his past coming back. my interpretation of that scene is that the whole time the ghost is following him, he is tempted to relapse. when the ghost turns around and is revealed to be olivia, she says, “come home, my love,” obviously a parallel to the ending when he’s literally dead and she says, “we’re home, my love” - she wants him dead/awake. (this interpretation is even more supported if it actually is olivia’s ghost, and it could be because she says that she could hear him all these years, and he’s able to see the ghosts at other points in the series - specifically nell when he wakes up in rehab, nell and olivia at the funeral; although it also could be him projecting his trauma in a way that he understands).

also, when the twins in olivia’s vision or whatever ask what would happen if they had a bad dream, they refer to luke’s future drug use as poisoning himself, which is self explanatory. then luke and nellie both witness abigail’s death, whether or not they consciously remember it. a lot of people have suggested that they both have repressed that memory so much that it manifests itself in different ways - like the ghost in the hat - which is similar to theo’s case with mr. smiley. then luke at some level would know that his mom tried to poison him, and as he got older, he coped with that fear (his rational for his addiction) with drugs, but also continued down the same path that his mother had started. my theory is that he internalized that experience so much that he ended up emulating it.

and then the scene in the red room. the room manipulates him into basically relapsing by injecting himself with a lethal dose of rat poison. this clearly connects his addiction to his trauma from that night. then at the tea party, when he realizes that he is dead and says he doesn’t want to die, olivia tells him that of course he wanted to be there, he had been banging on the door for years. this implies that luke, at some level, wanted to die - which makes sense when you think about how self destructive addiction is. or this is a misinterpretation by olivia, and all luke wanted was a way to escape from his trauma. either way, if he didn’t get clean, he was going to end up dying, fulfilling her initial fears and her intention to poison him that night (and this, to me, makes steven’s reaction to luke seeing the ghosts at the funeral way more understandable - he isn’t just being an asshole, he just doesn’t want him to die - and he’s been watching his brother slowly kill himself for years. anyway).

tl;dr luke had unknowingly been fulfilling his mother’s wishes and worst fears as a way of coping with the trauma that he’s repressed for years and perpetuating that trauma at the same time

[aberorca]

New Cast: Part Two

Okay, guys. Part Two was really good tonight, really good. I’ll admit I still had/have some reservations about the cast after Part One but Part Two has smoothed many of those away.

Part Two opens with my favourite piece of choreography, led by Nuno Silva. Nuno didn’t come out of stage door tonight which was a shame because I wanted to tell him how glad I am that he’s stayed on. For those who don’t know, Nuno plays Bane, as well as other ensemble roles but his most important role is Movement Captain. He is basically Steven Hoggett’s (Movement Director) right hand man among the cast and he works with the rest of the cast to coordinate all the complex routines that are carried out on stage, often with very large set pieces. You could really see what Nuno does among the new cast today, how he guides them and the confidence in what he does.

Samuel continues to be the star of the new cast. He really is outstandingly confident and a total natural - you’d think he’d been doing it for years and the audience is absolutely focused on him  and him alone when he’s on stage. I think it was @mrsellacott who said that James Howard told her he loves his new son, and that shows. Samuel and James have a great chemistry on stage. As James is my favourite of Cast 2, I was really looking forward to tonight because Draco has his best scenes in Part Two. His first scene, in the Voldemort timeline did not disappoint. @bounding-heart did a post about why James is so good in this role and that is never more obvious than in this scene. But he also shows love and a sadness and a pain that flows under a Malfoy cover. He rarely shouts, which I like. He exudes menace and intimidation without doing so but he has softness hiding there. When he pinned Scorpius to the desk in this scene, he released him and then shook and twitched in his left hand, the hand he had used to pin Scorpius down. He was physically expressing regret with the movement, as though it physically pained him to be violent with his child. It very much felt as though violence had become a part of who he was in this version of the world, that it was now second nature but that deep down it wasn’t welcome there, a darkness that grips to him like a parasite. So, so good from Mr. Howard.

Elizabeth Hill is an excellent actress. She plays a firm, sporty Hooch with a cool Northen accent in Part One, and a bitchy, snotty Petunia, but in Part Two as Umbridge, she is genuinely unnerving. Her Umbridge relishes in the way she speaks. She’s posh, or at least pretends to be, and she milks it for all it’s worth, letting every word slither off her tongue in the most regal way possible in her desire to feel and to be seen as royal. Her laugh doesn’t induce laughter from the audience like Helena Lynberry did - it is really sinister. Her movements when talking to Scorpius were almost flirtatious, but in a really sickening way that made my skin crawl. Superb debut in the role.

David Annen as Snape - I was really looking forward to seeing David in this role and he didn’t disappoint. He is much more like book Snape than Paul was. He doesn’t raise his voice and he appears bitter and reserved. I never liked the dynamic between Snape and Hermione in the last cast - I get that they were working together but they were too touchy-feely for my liking. That’s gone with David. His “whatever you are” to Hermione was deliciously sarcastic and snotty The “How very pleasant for me” line dripped with sarcasm and the “I exist to serve” line was wonderfully but subtly aggrieved. When he threatened Scorpius with punishment, he deliberately and obviously moved his robe to reveal the pocket in which he kept his wand, making the threat very real. It was a cool detail. When Snape is taken by the Dementors, heave the most horrific scream once they had enveloped him in their cloaks. It really did sound like someone who was losing their life in a horrific manner.

Theo came out of his shell in this performance. Yesterday in Part One he showed signs of being good but he was visibly terrified (his first professional job is one of the biggest roles in a show that has won nine Oliviers - even John said that was terrifying for them) and as a result he was very stiff (I felt bad for Jamie G in the blanket scene in Part One because I felt Theo was giving him very little to work from). But the audience was great yesterday and I think that has put some of the cast (Theo was not the only one who was clearly nervous) at ease a bit more. I think Theo is going to be very good and I look forward to watching him evolve in the role. Also, for all you Scorbus shippers - if you shipped them with Anto and Sam, you’re going to go nuts for Theo and Samuel. They obviously already have a very close relationship as actors and the chemistry between them is fantastic.

Samuel, when he came out of the lake and saw his Dad, put his arms out for a moment as if he wanted to hug him but then lost his courage. It was sweet. James just pointed him in the direction he wanted him, with military-level authority. I really liked it. Alex often used to grab Scorpius by the scruff and march him off stage; I like this less aggressive approach from James because I think it contrasts the differences between Draco in the Voldemort timeline and in the present much more.

One of the Hogwarts kids slipped in some of the water left on the stage but luckily they didn’t go down and carried on.

Jamie finally started to show some Harry-temper in the scene where he visits Albus in the Slytherin dormitory although he only got half-way there.  I reserved judgement on Jamie in Part One yesterday. I agree with @torestoreamends that it’s very important not to compare Jamie G to Jamie P because I think we always knew that Jamie P’s Harry would always be incomparable and I’m OK with that, because I always knew that watching Jamie Parker was a privilege. In fact, it’s very important not to compare any of the new cast with the old cast - it’s not fair on them. Of course we love the old cast, but the new cast have to be given a chance to be different and make the role their own (within the context of the character, of course). But Jamie G certainly lacked something yesterday, for example, he did not sound nearly as desperate as a parent should when searching for their missing child in a forest. I think Jamie G was another cast member who was very nervous but he did much better in Part Two today. I think he needs time and I hope that with time he will push the role and feel his way further into it. This scene wasn’t as heated as it should have been and as a consequence, the argument with Ginny where she asks how heated it got, didn’t work as well.

More Samuel gushing - in the dormitory scene when Albus is sleeping and he wakes him up, he did it in the most brilliant way that beats Anthony and James. He first whispered Albus’s name. He then said “Pssst!” When this didn’t work, he tiptoed over to Albus’s bed and in a really high-pitched but soft voice said “Albus?”. Finally, he shouted it right into Theo’s ear and Theo reacted brilliantly. I always felt Sam underplayed the comedy of this moment slightly but Theo didn’t disappoint. He sat bolt upright with a yell and then turned and started whacking Scorpius with his pillow. It was fantastic.

Annabel as Delphi - finally, finally, I have seen Annabel’s Delphi and she is supremely unnerving. John said he thought she was smashing it. Her Part One Delphi is quite awkward and bumbling and Tonks-like, which I liked. Her Part Two Delphi is almost unhinged once she is revealed and it’s scary. Some stand-out moments for me were what appeared to be genuine, yet mocking pity for the shock and horror on Albus’s face after she kills Craig. It was pity, yet it was patronising. “Aw. Did you not understand?” Brilliant. Then, when explaining how the kids fitted in to the prophecy she kissed Albus. It was “Albus” *kisses his cheek* “is the unseen child who will kill his father”. It was the most possessive, horrifying action; that Albus is this most invaluable object to her that will make her dreams come true. Somehow it reminds me of the way in which Umbridge loves her kittens:  a repulsive obsession.

Emma as Ginny did much better in Part Two - she was another I was reserving judgement on yesterday. Yesterday I really felt that she lacked Ginny’s ovaries - her “So was mine” just didn’t feel strong enough. She definitely improved on that today, although I don’t feel the same warmth from her that I’d like to feel. Like Jamie G, I think she needs some time, perhaps. But I’m optimistic.

Jamie G in the Dumbledore scene was good. I’m so much more optimistic about him than I was yesterday. He can genuinely act and his break down in Albus’s bedroom was even better. He’s not Harry yet, but there is potential there. I’m looking forward to seeing him grow into the character. Harry and Ginny kissed twice when getting Albus's message, just like in the script. (It used to be that they only kissed even though the script called for two.

On the other hand, perhaps I’m just too hard to please, because all the main cast (Albus, Scorpius, Draco, Ginny, Ron, Hermione and Harry) got a standing ovation at the curtain call. I was slightly gutted for the rest that they didn’t but audiences do vary and I’m sure that there are shows when they will. The past two nights had a very good audience and the stage door reception was lovely. I think the cast that came out definitely felt the love and I’m glad because I think it will give them fuel.

Speaking of stage door, April Hughes, who plays Myrtle (and is outstanding - didn’t think anyone would beat Annabel but she smashed it and even Annabel said so) was absolutely adorable. I sang her praises to her and she seemed really touched and happy and asked if she could give me a hug, so we had a hug. She’s a sweetheart! As is Sarah Miele who plays a now-Scottish Polly Chapman with purple hair (we asked her about this and she said it was just something she was told they were going to go for with the character this time). James Phoon (Craig) is adorable. I can’t remember how we got onto the subject but we were talking about the Friday Forty and I said that all my CC friends had won it at least once and I never had. He said that he played the Friday Forty every week ever since the play opened and he never won it either (he’s such a FAN!!). I told him “Now you’re in it! Even better!” and then asked if that meant that I’ll be in the play next year too. He gave a dramatic gasp and said “Oh, my God! That’s it!” and then grasped my arm and said “I’ll root for you for next year.” I told him to show me the ropes when I get cast. What an absolute doll he is. Again, the cast that came out all seemed so touched by the reception and I’m really pleased they’ve been given that confidence.

On Sunday 21st, I met Sonia Friedman. I found her at the back of the stalls and approached her, told her how much I loved and related to the play and congratulated her on all her success. I asked if I could show her something and she said “Of course” so I showed her my poster and she said she loved it because she was a dog person. I thanked her and didn’t see her after that until I passed by her yesterday when she was talking to Jack Thorne at the end of Part One about the pacing of the new cast (they had been a bit slow on a couple of bits). I don’t think she saw me as they were deep in conversation. Anyway, tonight, she came out of stage door briefly to watch the reception that the new cast received. No one realised she was there as she just lingered in the doorway and watched for a few moments - she didn’t go to greet fans. She had her hair different to usual and was wearing sunglasses so I actually didn’t recognise her even though I saw her right in front of me but she recognised me (we were standing right in front of the stage door at the barrier). She went back in to speak to someone but then came out again and came and stood next to me and said quietly “So, what did you think?” I then realised it was her and apologised, telling her I didn’t recognise her with the sunglasses and she said something along the lines of “I like to go incognito sometimes”. @torestoreamends , @mrsellacott and I had a nice chat with her and she thanked us for the support of the new cast.

I was hoping John Tiffany might come out of stage door but he didn’t (because I didn’t ask him to this time =P - I’ll tell that story in another post). My train got delayed on my way to the show this evening and I got in really late (I think @torestoreamends was panicking that I wouldn’t get in on time, she gave me big hug when she saw me and told me she’d been anxiously waiting in the aisle of the stalls to see me come in). Anyway, John was at the back of the stalls (he didn’t sit near the front like he did on May 21st - maybe he didn’t want to be inundated by fans again - more on that in another post) but anyway, I’d spoken to him on Sunday and as I walked past this evening, he looked up from his phone screen and so I gave him a big grin and he smiled back. Then in the interval, I had a brief freak-out with @torestoreamends at the Girls’ Bathroom (obviously) about how good Part Two was and then she let me go to the loo and went back to Stalls. :P On my way back, John stepped out of the Mens’ right in front of me and went back to the Stalls so I was following right behind him, seriously worrying that he was going to think I was stalking him. He noticed me and I immediately apologised and said “I’m really sorry, I swear I’m not following you, you just stepped out of the Mens’ room right in front of me.” He laughed and patted my arm and said “Don’t worry.” We got back to Stalls, right by the tech box where @torestoreamends appeared out of nowhere and we had a lovely chat with him for a few minutes. John is such a lovely, warm person, he’s so happy to talk to fans about the show. I told him that I thought it was great that the first show of the new cast had gone so smoothly and that I thought it was funny that there had been no technical hitches, given that there were so many on the 21st with a cast of fourteen months’ experience. He grinned and said “Because I kicked arse, that’s why”. So yeah. Sounds as though the tech team got a spanking for the screw-ups on the 21st.

And that’s all I’ll say about the new cast! I look forward to watching them develop and I hope everyone going to see them keeps an open mind and shows them the Potterhead love. I really think in particular that Scorbus is going to be sensational - even more so than it has been and we’ve all got lots to look forward to. I thought the ultimate test would be whether they could make me cry and they did. Happy Cast Change, peeps! x

[metawitches]

The OA takes a break from…the OA in this episode, in order to revisit the home dimension and check in with Betty and the boys. Rachel leads the way on a transformative road trip whose purpose hasn’t become fully clear yet, but with this show, it’s best not to rush things.

Distorted images of the OA’s drawings of Betty and the boys decorate the opening credits. They fade to show Prairie’s body in her coffin, ready for her funeral. When OA jumped to another dimension, the body she left behind, now without its soul and gravely wounded, died.

Steve drives Jesse down a country road, as fast as he can manage without losing control, way over the speed limit. A cop pulls them over, but lets them go when he realizes that they’re the kids who stopped the school shooting and that they’re coming from Prairie’s funeral. He even tells them they’re brave and to get home safely. They don’t know what to do with authority figures who are nice to them.

Buck’s parents didn’t let him go to the funeral. They are moving the family out of the neighborhood to a safer place for their kids. His mom tells him that the movers are coming the next day, so he should tag anything he wants to keep. Buck does some combination of ignoring her and giving her the silent treatment, which is probably 80% ignoring.

This is a continuation of the scene that ended episode 2. Buck is sitting on his bed and hears a hum from his mirror. He goes to check it, but is interrupted when Steve texts him to come to Angie’s house and bring French. Steve says he has a plan.

Once everyone is at the house, Steve tells them that he’s taught Angie the movements. He thinks they’re in a bad dimension, but they can leave. They can all do the movements and get out, right now.

Everyone else is a bit blindsided by this sudden development. French tries to convince Steve that Prairie is dead, but Steve insists she traveled. They argue over whether Prairie’s story was true or she was mentally ill, and whether there was any meaning to the whole adventure.

Steve believes, absolutely, in the literal truth. Buck has been thinking about the coincidences involved and the metaphysical meanings. Angie defends Steve. Jesse silently observes. French hasn’t changed his mind since finding the books convinced him that her whole story was a lie. No evidence can sway him.

Steve and French get into an argument, as is typical for the two alphas. The insults fly, until French jumps on Steve. After that, everyone leaves. Without Prairie and Betty, they’re missing important elements of the group dynamic.

Steve decides to make a recruitment video similar to the one OA made in Part 1, but Angie doesn’t think it’s safe. Some people think the shooter should have shot the boys and Betty the minute they stood up to do the movements, and want an opportunity to finish the job. Angie doesn’t want to recruit strangers unless they go through a metal detector. Steve understands her fear.

Betty is asleep in a hotel room, having a dream while Wheel of Fortune plays on the TV. In the dream, she’s looking at a diner menu when her brother Theo appears behind her and asks for help. Betty wakes up with a nosebleed, which means it was a prophetic dream.

Back at Buck’s house, he’s woken up by more humming in the mirror and gets up to investigate. This time, he catches a glimpse of Rachel in the mirror. He turns to look behind him, but she’s not there. When he looks back at the mirror, she’s gone, but his own face is reflected multiple times, and one reflection looks a lot like Jessie to me.

Buck kept Prairie’s book about angels from the box under her bed, and statues of angels can be seen in his bedroom. Besides the kinship he and Rachel share in their life stories, Buck is probably the most open to supernatural phenomenon.

These look a little odd because I lightened the exposure to make Rachel more visible.

She’s definitely there.

Buck rushes to Angie’s house to tell Steve what he saw. He bursts in on Angie and Steve in bed. Steve is angry until he hears why Buck is there. Buck tells Steve that Rachel sang a little. (I didn’t notice it.)

Steve stares at the mirror, but Rachel doesn’t reappear. He asks for every detail of her appearance and wonders why she didn’t choose him. The bottom line is, Buck’s door was open, so Rachel came in.

French works on a social media profile picture while he waits to met with Abel Johnson, in the public library, which is surrounded by beautiful trees. When Abel arrives, they discuss the funeral and French’s attempts to prove that Prairie’s story is true.

He tells Abel about the box of books. Abel chuckles, and says that he wondered where those books had gone. Prairie’s counselor suggested them for her. The counselor thought that it might help Prairie for the family to accept her story and discuss it with her openly.

French thinks that means that the counselor thought that Prairie lied, because either the story is true or it’s not. There’s no room for gray in Alfonso’s world. Abel becomes indignant, because he doesn’t think she lied. He tells French that Prairie had begun telling the boys the story before the Johnsons ordered the books.

French’s world is turned upside down. Before he can recover, Buck calls him to come over.

Jesse walks home from school while listening to a meditation tape.

“It does not matter what you have experienced over the course of the last 18 hours or so. This meditation is a place for you to release everything that weighs you down. Chance occurrences…”

He unplugs as he reaches Buck’s house and joins the others on mirror watch.

Except Buck didn’t tag the mirror, so his mom sent it to Goodwill. Once they’re done being upset that they’ve inadvertently lost Rachel already, they organize a trip to the thrift store to find the mirror.

But first, French has to compare Buck’s Rachel sighting to his stress hallucination of Homer in Prairie’s mirror in Part 1. Buck doesn’t let him get away with it. He tells French, “You thought that she’d made up Homer’s head wound because she’d been staring at yours all night. So you saw him. It was a trick of the brain. That was different. I was… visited. I’m not asking you to believe in OA. I’m asking you to believe in me. Something happened through that mirror.”

We should all be as wise as Buck.

Mrs Vu isn’t going looking for the mirror when she CLEARLY told Buck to tag it. French offers to drive Angie’s parents’ station wagon so they can check for the mirror before the store closes for the day. They get there just in time, but their local store passed on the mirror and sent it to the Goodwill in Gary, Indiana.

Gary is a two hour drive from Crestwood. The grumbling starts up again, then Jesse asks what Rachel sang to Buck. She sang tones, rather than words. Buck hasn’t thought about what they were: the notes B,B,A. Everyone is back on board to visit Betty Broderick Allen.

BBA is a little overwhelmed, since she lost her job the last time she got involved with the gang. She’s preparing for a trip out west to visit her Uncle Carl, who’s dying. She already has her train tickets. Steve convinces her that they can all drive to Gary together, then drop her off in Chicago so she can catch the train from there.

They find the mirror in the Gary Goodwill. Rachel doesn’t appear immediately, so they assume they’ll have to wait until dark. BBA will have to change her train tickets again. They wonder if they can stay in the Goodwill all day, and have what sounds like one of their first whole group conversations about what happened that day in the cafeteria.

Steve: “When the sun goes down, Rachel will be back. I know it.”

Buck: “She might even say something.”

Betty: “Hmmm. I guess I can wait. I’ll have to call Amtrak about getting the next train. And you’ll have to call your parents, all of you.”

Steve: “Yeah. No problem. Whatever.”

Betty: “Don’t whatever me, Steven. I won’t go through all that with your parents again.”

Angie: “Just screw his parents. We almost died. Everything’s different now.”

Betty: “Well, I’m not sure everyone sees it that way, Angie.”

Angie: “Well, who cares how everyone sees it? We were there. When Steve stood up, or when you all did, and then the gun went off… I thought…”

Alfonso: “It is weird. That she was right there in that exact spot.”

Betty: “Almost like she drew the bullet into herself.”

Buck: “And away from us.”

Silent pause.

Steve: “Look, we call our parents, and we wait for dark. It’s that simple.”

They are approached by one of the Goodwill workers, so Buck asks if they can stay in the store until dark. The worker, Sonja, offers to let the whole gang stay with her and her dad in the church where her dad is youth pastor. She recognizes them, and would be honored to host them. They buy the vanity, and remove the mirror for transport, strapping it to the top of BBA’s car.

On the drive, Angie proves that Steve has great taste in women, and that she’s every bit the truth teller that the OA is.

Angie, looking at a church: “Do you see all of those little, like, peaks, over the windows and doorways? Early churches stole that sh– from the pagans, but they didn’t realize that stuff was to remind you of a vag. So every church in the f–king country, like every church door, is just, like, open vages, just like welcoming folks home.”

Betty: “That’s blasphemous, Angie.”

Angie: “Well, only if you think God didn’t create vaginas.”

Sonja says they can sleep in the sanctuary and eat whatever they want from the kitchen. Sonja’s dad says the sanctuary is for any pilgrims of faith who might be passing through. She asks if they’re pilgrims of faith and they don’t know what to say.

They may not be pilgrims of the Christian faith, but they are certainly pursuing the great mysteries which transcend religion, based on their faith.

Steve and Buck set the mirror up near the altar and light some candles, then wait for dark. They all stare at the mirror for hours, but nothing happens.

Alfonso gets tired of waiting, and goes outside to scroll through his Grindr account. He chooses a guy in his 40s, who picks Alfonso up within a few minutes. They go to the guy’s apartment and get into the hook up without much ado. I doubt it was Alfonso’s first time doing this, but it didn’t seem like he’d done it many times, either.

Meanwhile, Jesse breaks into the church’s collection box and steals the cash, then uses it to buy oxycontin from a local dealer. He tells the dealer that he can’t sleep because he has too much on his mind and has nightmares all the time. Jesse asks the dealer what Oxycontin will do. The dealer says he’ll just float, but to start with only one pill. He dry swallows the pill as the dealer leaves.

Jesse is always quiet, but he’s been exceptionally quiet during this episode. He was the only one who didn’t add anything to the conversation about the shooting. It sounds like he’s still dealing with trauma from the incident, and he’s dealing with it alone.

Handley, Alfonso’s hook up, makes milkshakes for them when they’re done in bed, because why wouldn’t you make milkshakes while naked? Alfonso starts to get dressed, feeling nervous now that the sex is over, but Handley encourages him to stay for a while.

They chat over the shakes, and French ends up telling a condensed version of OA, the shooting and the mirror. I think Handley is the first nonthreatening, impartial person that French has been able to talk to about this, and it helps him clear his head. He still doesn’t know what the truth of the situation was, but he doesn’t seem as stressed about it.

“I don’t know if she was an angel or a liar or a schizophrenic. And now she’s dead. She’s dead, and we almost died with her. My friends, they think that she’s trying to send us some sort of sign. Through a mirror. A message.”

Handley is open to the idea of a message from the beyond, and suggests they visit his Aunt Lily, a famous medium who just moved from Gary to Nebraska. He promises she’ll be worth the 500 mile drive.

When French returns to the church and gets ready to bed down in the sanctuary, the mirror is humming again. One of the church’s stained glass windows is reflecting in the mirror. It looks like a man and a blonde woman are hugging. Is Rachel sending a message about OA and Homer? This reflection is only there for certain characters’ points of view, which makes sense, but it’s framed too perfectly to be an accident.

Can anyone tell me what these windows depict? Is it Easter through the Ascension?

French gets up for a minute, but the mirror acts normal. When he sits down again, the meaningful reflection is back, plus gasping, heavy breathing and sobbing can be heard. Rachel doesn’t want to talk to the skeptic.

Maybe she’s waiting for some time alone with Buck again, or with some preferred combination of the group.

In the morning, French shows Aunt Lily’s website to Steve, suggesting they give her a try. He figures if they exhaust every possibility for communicating with Rachel, Buck will be satisfied and let it go. French tells Steve she comes highly recommended. Steve is impressed, if amused, by her 4 stars on Yelp.

Steve looks at French and tries to figure out what changed his mood so drastically overnight. He jokingly asks if French got laid, then realizes he’s right. Steve guesses it was Sonja, and is jealous French managed to have sex in the church, because he’s suffering.

French says, “It wasn’t Sonja. It, um…it wasn’t a girl.”

Dramatic pause while Steve processes this new information and follows the implications until the end of the line…

“You’re totally into me.”

Yup. All of those arguments were just sexual tension. If you haven’t written the fan fiction yet, you were just given permission. Personally, I’m sticking with shipping Buck and French, although French does need to relax and learn to accept the angels. And, after watching him with Handley, I think he might have a thing for older guys.

They laugh and tease each other. French looks up the route to Nebraska and realizes it’s 500 more miles away. They confess that neither has called their moms.

The organ plays the BBA pattern by itself, over and over.

They get on the road again, settling in for a long drive. It’s uneventful until it’s not. When it’s his turn to drive, Steve hits an animal in the road, and slams on the brakes. The mirror to slides forward off the car, onto the pavement, and shatters. Buck is beside himself and thinks they’ve lost Rachel, but the others think they should still wrap up the broken mirror and take it to Aunt Lily.

Jesse is the only one who pays attention to the injured armadillo behind the car. He picks up a heavy rock, and, steeling himself, hurls it down on the animal to kill it quickly and end its suffering. Angie watches him from a distance. No one else notices or thinks about how hard that must have been for Jessie.

Since none of the kids have called home and they’ve been gone overnight, the parents report them missing. Buck/Michelle is now a missing child in two dimensions. His mother blames the “cult” he’s part of for kidnapping him.

The gang makes it to Aunt Lily’s house. There’s a momentary stand-off, as they try to make sense of each other, since this is such an unusual situation. Lily thinks it’s especially odd that someone who has passed, and came from another dimension, would make contact with someone they don’t know. She suggests one of them might be a medium, and not know it yet.

I suspect both Buck and Betty are.

Steve pulls out the broken mirror to show Lily how Rachel made contact. Turns out broken mirrors are bad luck in the world of mediums, and not just in popular superstition. She tells them to cover the broken mirror and every mirror in her house, quickly. Rachel’s spirit will be looking for a new home, and if she chooses one of Lily’s mirrors she’ll be trapped in the house. Lily doesn’t want that.

After a few minutes of drama, with Lily insisting they leave after the mirrors are covered and the gang begging her to help them, Lily relents and agrees to help, but she’ll have to charge for the deluxe package. Lily is a shrewd business woman.

The deluxe package includes a séance and a blank photographic plate. The spirit can write on the plate, then Lily will interpret the markings. They sit around a table, holding hands, in the light of a lamp with a red bulb. Lily warns them that it could take hours, but they can all feel something happening.

Buck, who is most sensitive to Rachel, gets up from the table and follows her pull into the TV room. Rachel turns the TV on and skims through channels, looking for what she needs to create her message. This will be more elaborate than a scratch on a plate.

Images repeat and forms patterns. They figure out that Rachel is showing them a blind woman coming out of a bunker, then going into another dimension. The meaning is clear: OA survived the jump.

Next Rachel trims the clips into words and letters, until it says “Only safe for BBA to go.” Rachel repeats the message on the TV a few times. The kids read it each time, until it becomes a chant. BBA stares at the TV, wondering what it means. The last word on Lily’s TV screen is “mystery”. Then the image changes to the rose stained glass window from the green puzzle house.

This moment is the reason for this episode’s existence.

BBA is drawn, slowly, to the image of the rose window that Rachel has sent for her. In the other dimension, this window was one of the three essential elements that all of the dreamers saw. There is something profound about it.

Betty approaches the screen as if in a trance. Her nose is bleeding, universal scifi sign for a woman using immense power. Everyone else in the room is also transfixed, but Steve asks, “What’s happening?” He senses that there’s something powerful going on, beyond Rachel’s simple message.

In the background, Lily yells, “Betty, look away! Stop! Betty! Betty!” She tries to get Betty to turn back, right up until the moment when Betty touches the screen. It shatters in a spider web pattern and turns black.”

Did Betty just undergo a transformation?

Commentary

This is the most detailed look we’ve had yet of the rose window. It can be seen to be a garden of red flowers in these images. Plant imagery has already told us that flowers are important. Liam came out of the house with the rose window with a plant growing out of his ear and rants about having 47 selves. The Garden of Forking Paths?

And the window garden is red, signaling spiritual development.The entire sequence was lit in red, which means that everyone present made spiritual progress. Betty touched the symbolic window, so her change was the deepest.

This dimension’s arc has fairy tale qualities to it, just like Karim’s. The Twelve Wild Swans is what’s coming to my mind the most, with a dash of Hansel and Gretel for the dangerous enemies and distracting indulgences, such as sex, drugs and fighting. Both have a sister who rescues her brother(s). This is definitely a story about siblings who need to save each other, and, as in The Twelve Wild Swans in particular, the burden seems to be on Betty, the lone sister.

[I should have mentioned it earlier, but Nina Azarova (not OA) is quite clearly Rapunzel in her locked, guarded penthouse.]

[In episode 2, Hap tries to frame himself and Prairie as Hansel and Gretel, alone in the dark and dangerous woods, seeking a way to navigate and find food/the best dimension. He says to her that when he traveled, he jumped into the darkness, where he could have landed in a version of himself who was brain-damaged or worse. He begs for her to save him from whatever terrible dangers may be out there in the forest/spaces between and within dimensions.

Though Hap is a liar, everything he says here is truthful. But she’s not his sister, and owes him no loyalty, unless we’re doing a different fairy tale which includes jealous step sisters. It does make me wonder. What if it were Hap who lost his memory, and he became the apparently charismatic and lovable Dr Percy? Could the captives be friends with him?]

With Buck’s mom reporting them to the police, Betty and the boys are on the run again. At the end of the episode, Betty was given power. The dream she had early in the episode gave her the task of saving the boys. Rachel wants her to go to the other dimension, to stop Hap, but I don’t think Betty will leave anyone behind in D1, after the loss of her brother, Theo.

The TV is the Magic Mirror, a metaphor for the show and real life. Rachel either knew about or was responsible for Betty’s prophetic dream in the hotel, early in the episode, and added to the Wheel of Fortune motif to her message accordingly. Or Betty has already begun having true prophetic dreams, and Rachel was tapping into symbols she knew would mean something to Betty.

It could be that the movements don’t just open up the mind for interdimensional travel, which is, after all, a psychic ability. They could open up the mind to whatever latent psychic talents the individual has. Maybe extensive practice of the movements acts to develop psychic abilities, as well.

Taken as a whole, this episode had many ritualistic elements. There was an animal sacrifice, chanting, the singing of the BBA note sequence, Betty meditating while listening to the organ plays her notes, some sex magic, candles, food and drink. Betty swam as her ritual bath, various activities with mirrors, and then the séance.

After she’d been prepared for a day or so, Betty accepted that she was the chosen one and walked toward the rose window. She had no idea what it meant. But Rachel has the power to travel through dimensions at will and the TV had its own power. The life and power of the TV was the final sacrifice of the episode. The screen cracked the same way the cafeteria window did, when OA was shot.

The energy from the séance, the movement on the TV and the death of the TV may have been enough to send Betty to the other dimension, with a nudge from Rachel, but she didn’t want to go, or at least wasn’t ready to go alone. So she’ll stay here in D1 for now, with whatever new power she just acquired.

I’m certain she took some form of power into herself, and since she didn’t use it to travel, it will open her mind to the other dimensions. I think this season OA’s tribesman need to reach the state of angel and be able to travel with her. BBA fulfilled that portion, through her suffering, bravery, empathy and wisdom.

This episode continues the quest motif begun in the previous two episodes. The boys and Betty are on their own journey, with their own spirit guide (Rachel) and helpers who arrive at the right time to provide them with what they need, whatever form that may take.

Circumstances conspire to get them on the road, with nudges from Buck’s mom and the Crestwood Goodwill guy; then Sonja offers them a place to stay, in a spiritual haven, no less; Handley acts as a personal guide for French and points the group toward Aunt Lily the medium; and Aunt Lily helps them open up to Rachel’s message.

Rachel is a spirit guide, but she seems like an unsanctioned ghost, rather than a strong presence like Khatoun. Maybe it’s that she’s newly dead, and hasn’t gathered much power in the new realm, or maybe Hap has grown that much stronger. Either way, she’s attempting to give Betty a mission, but hasn’t been able to fully explain it with her limited abilities. It seems like she carried D2 Rachel’s aphasia into the afterlife, which is unexpected.

Aunt Lily is obviously a real medium, and is probably right that at least one, and maybe more, of the gang are also mediums. They all have some sense of other dimensions from doing the movements that probably made it easier for Rachel to come to them, and there’s been a link between Buck and Rachel since he saw her accident in Part 1. But what Rachel did with the TV signal took strength far beyond what she’d been able to do so far or the psychic expected. Betty and Buck seem to have a sensitivity to Rachel. Steve is very sensitive too, but he has a hard time focusing.

How did I never realize how much Betty and Homer have in common? Betty is never going to be to the boys what OA was to the captives. She’s closer to Homer, the heart and moral compass who doesn’t have the authority of an enforcer.They’re both almost too nice for this world and get taken advantage of because of it, but they’re so warm and lovable that you have to forgive them when they dither and backtrack. I think that heart and sensitivity will eventually lead to something important for both of them.

The other dimension added Karim as a major character, and this dimension added Angie as a regular. Does that mean that Angie and Karim are a matched pair? They are both independent and empathic but blunt and truthful, but otherwise we still hardly know Angie.

Where will Rachel’s spirit go, now that she’s delivered her message and transformed Betty? Will she continue to guide them, find a body in this or another dimension, or move on to another plane of existence? Do spirits of the dead have the ability to be reborn as infants/reincarnated, I wonder?

It was poignant to see the late Scott Wilson one more time. I didn’t think he’d be in this season. He’ll be missed.

Between the humming, OA’s ears ringing, and the dimension hopping, this is starting to feel like Castle Rock.

The cracks are getting more complex. More people involved, more dimensions and layers to the mystery.

  Images courtesy of Netflix.

The OA Part 2 Episode 3: Magic Mirror Recap The OA takes a break from...the OA in this episode, in order to revisit the home dimension and check in with Betty and the boys.