In episode 9 of A Haunting of Hill House, Mrs. Crain has a migraine while in her reading room that she tends by going downstairs for a glass of water. Next, she went back up stairs to her room and once she opened the door, she saw a Morgue, and her twin children as adults, Nellie on the table and Luke on the floor dead. At first, she didn’t realize that these were her children but with a closer look and her sensitivity to the paranormal, she knew those were her twins. Unfortunately, there she understood that her “dream” was alluding to her children’s death. And from there she vowed to always protect her littles ones, even if it came to the point in which she would keep them safe from the house by attempting to poison them, as seen in the same episode. Eerily, in episode 1, Shirley Crain had been done placing make up on her late sister in prep for her funeral and her body is laying down on the same table and with the same hair and make-up just as experienced by their late mother. As she was about to turn off the lights, she saw her mother laying on the table next to Nellie’s just like her mother saw her youngest daughter laying down the table of a morgue. Therefore, Olivia became more protective of her kids and in a specific dream she had one night, Poppy Hill, of the house’s former residents appeared to her and asked her if she would do anything to protect her kids from the pain and suffering of the outside world to which she said yes. Therefore, Mrs. Crain could not be hallucinating because in the kids’ adult life, Nellie dies. In fact, the dreams she had about Poppy Hill and the old lady, one of the house’s former residents, were real. She was even convinced by Poppy that she needed to give herself to the house and her children to keep them safe from the outside world but the ghost really wanted to increase the house’s residents. Thus, she took her children and Mrs. Dudley’s child into the red room to drink tea that was poisoned so that she’d end “their suffering and her suffering from the outside world”. In fact, the house was the one that made them suffer. Fortunately, her husband came into the red room and saved their children but Mrs. Crain hurt her head by being pushed against the wall by her husband while trying to escape with the children. She was then tempted by Poppy to end her life which she did by falling to her death from the spiral staircase. Here, it can be understood that Mrs. Crain foresaw her death in her children’s death because as a mother, she understood that she would do anything for her kids, even if it meant that she had to pass away. She attempted to take the twins with her to the spirit world but learning that her husband had taken them away, she chose to end her own suffering and become a part of the house.

In a interview with Kevin McCarthy from FOX 5, from the cast of A Haunting of Hill House, Michiel Huisman, Elizabeth Reasar and Oliver Jackson-Cohen were asked if they had any real life experiences, whether ghost encounters or any nightmares. Michiel spoke first saying that he always had night terrors about being kidnapped by a witch and that they would always be reoccurring, and Elizabeth spoke up and said that she also had night terrors about being kidnapped, just not specifically by a witch. Oliver had a fear about being possessed. From what we know, these nightmares come from a fear of the unknown and that fear of the unknown is what sparks curiosity inside of us. These fears of nightmares, unconsciously, drew these actors after all these years to take on the role of the Crains and even other roles in horror series and movies. Ultimately, partaking in these works fuel actors or actresses’ curiosities of the unknown, just as experienced in their dreams. As written in the article, 5 Reasons We Enjoy Being Scared,”Our world is easier to engage with when things make sense to us; and so, some may choose to engage further with ‘the unknown’ in order to better make sense of the situation”(Psychology Today). That being said, the cast experienced something that they can not make a meaning out of and although they may not consciously state that they would like to gain more of an understanding, unconsciously they would like to understand and thats why a series like this one and horror films help fill that void.

Citation:
Dwyer, Christopher. “5 Reasons We Enjoy Being Scared”.Psychology Today, 19 Oct. 2018, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thoughts-thinking/201810/5-reasons-we-enjoy-being-scared

Episode one begins with the Crain Family living at the Hill House, also known as the most haunted house in America. In the series, four siblings have encountered many experiences during your childhood which can not be explained and with no luck,they have a mother and a father that do not believe what they are experiencing. In a particular scene in episode 3, Carla Gugino, who plays the role of the mother, Olivia Crain, has migraines and these migraines allow her to see and sense energies about people, objects, and certain situations. Maybe this ability has a certain connection to her own death. During episode one, Mr. Crain awakes his children to tell him that they need to leave the house and never look back and takes his three girls, Shirley, Theodora, Nell and his one boy, Luke, to his station wagon while he looks for this other son, Steve. When he finally returns with Steve, all of the children turn to him to ask about their mom to which he does not answer and drives away. Steven Crain, the eldest son, says that he sees their mom looking down from the window on the second floor and his father responds by saying to not look at her because that is not their mother. Ultimately, he never told his children what had happened to their mom and later on in life, when he did, he told them that their mom was mentally ill and that she had passed away without clarifying any details. But, this raises a false flag! Mr.Cain does not believe the paranormal encounters that his children had experienced but all of a sudden one night he tells Luke, while waiting to take him to the car, that he is afraid of the house and then when they get the car tell his children they have to go without bringing their mother along with them? That to me sounds a little too fishy and the dad should positively be labeled as a suspect. And in episode 1, it is made known that, as adults, Nell Cain died under mysterious circumstances. Consequently, that night, Nell called her father and asked if he was okay to which the change of scene shows Nell parked in front of her childhood home. Next, and Older Mr. Crain gets up from his bed and goes to visit his daughter which is then presumed dead by her father but will not disclose the information surrounding her death to his other children. This is the second time he does this to his family and without any explanation. It seems more like we have a murder mystery in front of us than just mere ghost stories. Yes, the Hill House was in fact haunted but maybe there was something more dark at the time, maybe the stresses surrounding their new home mixed in with the hauntings caused a younger Mr. Crain to become mentally ill and murder his wife. This is just something we will have to see as the show goes on!