The Fall Of The House Of Usher Is Netflix’s New Spooky Halloween Watch
With Halloween inching closer, it’s becoming increasingly tempting to binger through all of the horror series before spooky week arrives. Netflix is adding another into the mix thanks to its latest creation, The Fall of the House of Usher, which is set to land this week.
The eight-episode miniseries tells the story of an apparently cursed family dynasty, which is stricken by a series of sudden deaths, in an adaptation of the story by the original master of horror, Edgar Allen Poe.
What is The Fall of the House of Usher?
Netflix seems to have a thing for troubled pharmaceutical companies at the moment, with its powerful drama Painkiller telling the story of the opioid crisis that landed last month. But The Fall of the House of Usher is a decidedly creepier affair.
A pair of ruthless and power-hungry siblings, Roderick and Madeline Usher (played by Bruce Greenwood and Mary McDonnell respectively) have built and grown the Fortunato Pharmaceuticals company into a vast business empire, making themselves both richer more powerful than they had ever imagined. However, death and misfortune seem to have descended upon the privileged family, and the heirs to the fortune suddenly begin to drop down dead.
As the bodies begin piling up, it becomes apparent that there are dark secrets linked to Roderick and Madeline’s past, namely a mysterious woman from their younger days who seems to be behind the deaths of Usher family members.
How close to Poe’s story will it be?
In Poe’s original story, the titular House of Usher is not just a family but an actual decrepit old house that is described as having “absorbed evil”, and it looks like the author’s iconic vivid descriptions will be brought eerily to life in the series.
The miniseries also features a demonic shape-shifter, Verna (Carla Gugino), who has the ability to change form into a raven as an homage to the most famous Poe story of all. Gugino herself describes the show as “batshit crazy in the best possible way” with “quite a lot of very dark humour”.
Who else stars in The Fall of the House of Usher?
The rest of the cast of Netflix’s series include Samantha Sloyan (Scandal), Rahul Kohli (Midnight Mass), Henry Thomas (The Haunting of Hill House), Kyleigh Curran (Doctor Sleep) and Sauriyan Sapkota as other members of the doomed Usher family. As well as Carl Lumbly (Altered Carbon) and Star Wars legend Mark Hamill who will appear in a guest role.
The Fall of the House of Usher is written and directed by Mike Flanagan, who helmed The Haunting series on Netflix as well as Midnight Mass.
Is there a release date?
The miniseries arrives on 12th October.
