 Truly speaking, this was actually kind of a fun show to work on. Ooh, that's a hot mug guy! Hey guys, this is my review for the Fall of the House of Usher series, the last Mike Flanagan series that he's going to be doing for Netflix. I actually have a bit of a kind of a twofold, not only is this a review, but it's also a little bit of a retrospective because I worked on this show. To say that this was a fun time the whole time is not true. There were some moments that were quite crazy. There were some requests that were a bit insane. And then there was also the massive amount of reshoots where we had to recast Frank Langella, which I'll talk about later on in the review. But at least to say this is definitely one of Flanagan's best series. I think it's better than Blind Manor for sure. I wouldn't say it's better than Haunting of Hill House. Hill House is fantastic and so is Midnight Mass. But it's really interesting to see a take on these characters when all of them are basically despicable. But he still is able to make you almost care about them. He's able to weave in narratives of despair, loneliness, greed, jealousy, very intrusive and dark human aspects and features that Edgar Allen Poe would always put into his stories. And there were also some really cool surprises too like Pym played by Mark Hamill. One point he passed me by at the office in all of this winter office with a big fur coat, scarf and a toque. And I wondered like who the heck was that? And the guy across from me was like, that was Mark Hamill. Now, admittedly, that was February in Vancouver. So I imagine that was probably like negative 50 for someone who lives in LA all the time. He is actually definitely one of the best parts of this because he just gets to play something that's so different from what you're used to. And he is literally the black hand of the Usher family. And you get all of these tiny little tidbits about who he is. And out of all of the books that I've wanted to find and read about from Poe, it's the one about Pym that I want to read the most. The story is sent around Roderick Usher played by Bruce Greenwood and the fall of his family, his sons and his daughters, all from different relationships are all being killed off in very mysterious circumstances that don't really warrant murder if anything, strange suicide or circumstance. But it's all connected to something that him and his sister have a past and a history with. And they're all being haunted by this mysterious figure being played by Carla Cagino. As I always do when I work on shows, I refuse to read the script unless I absolutely have to. When I go location scouting or have to do something that's associated with what my job is, I will read the notes or ask for what the notes are, but I will try and refuse to read the script. The only thing I knew about was what happened at the end of episode two, which was there was no way we're getting around that because trying to clean all that up was like disgusting. But this is also a coup de gras essentially for Mike Flanagan with Netflix. He brings back almost every single person he's worked with over the years. There are a few people from Haunting of Hill House and also from Bly Manor that he doesn't get into this, but the amount of people that he does have in this is bonkers. He has probably the most amount of alumni that he's ever had. Also Bruce Greenwood coming back from Gerald's Game, even though he wasn't the original Usher, he wasn't the original Roderick Usher. Now I'll talk about the Frank Langella thing. We were about 70% of the way through the show. And then, well, if you haven't seen it, I'm gonna post it here. Frank got fired because he did some no-no touches. I wasn't on set during that day. I usually would not be on set. I was kind of behind the scenes, kind of that more aspect of my job. But from what I heard from makeup ladies and whatnot, yeah, it was it was a bit creepy. It was just weird because I actually thought that Frank Langella was a perfect casting for the character of Usher because you want to despise this guy, this old fucker who has just done all of these awful things to get the power that he has. But by switching it with Bruce, one, Bruce's voice is fantastic. You're gonna hear his voice quite a lot in this when he's having his conversations with the district attorney who's been trying to put him in jail for the last 30 years. Their conversations are the center point and they keep coming back to them as the story of the fall of the house of Usher is being told. And Bruce's voice is fantastic. Bruce also is great because he gives you a bit of a sympathetic edge to him because it's him. And he's able to do that, I think, in a way that Frank would have never been able to do. I never saw Frank act on the set, so I can't say. Just in my personal opinion between the two actors, I think Bruce was able to just naturally give that more sympathetic edge, which helps in terms of how the story is played out with the events that are happening and the characters and all of the awful, evil things that are happening. On the other end, I actually have to praise Mary McDonald. She's actually probably one of my favorite characters in the show. The last time I saw her was in Battlestar Galactica, so to see her in this was like, oh, let's see what you're gonna do. And I thought she was really, really good. I liked her vicious coldness. I liked her being basically the one who has the ability to make the decision that Roderick can't do. While Roderick is the one who technically has the family, has all of these bastards and all of this wealth under his name, it's really been her who has helped push that, who has helped deliver that, which does bring me into probably the biggest negative I have about this show. We're seeing two different stories in this. We're seeing what's happening with his family because his whole family dies within the span of two weeks. And this big key moment that happened back in the 70s, 80s, that's it. You only see these two. You really don't see much in the middle. You see kind of like when they were kids before that and then you come up to this point and then you jump to this point. I really wanted more in the middle, like even just some flashbacks of some sort because the amount of awful shit that Roderick's done to the drug that he's made that has killed millions from addiction and whatnot, it just kind of glossed over and you're kind of hearing the things he's had to do to do what he's had, like to get where he's had to get. But you kind of wanted to see that visually. You wanted a little bit more reason to hate his character or to despise his character. That does come across kind of at the, in the latter end of the show, but you really do side with him for a bit of it. And I think that maybe might have been the balance that Flanagan was trying to do with this, was trying to make him despicable, but also kind of make you sympathize slightly side with him. So I don't know. I kind of wanted a little bit more on that end. It would have made me feel a little bit more justified in this guy's actions and the repercussions that he's facing for what he's done. But overall, the series has great pacing. You're going to want to watch each episode after you finish it. There is a point in the middle that it did start to feel a little bit draggy. I think episode four or five, but it picks up again. It's kind of like the lowest point of the whole thing and then it just keeps on going with that blow. It's also got some really good humor in it, like some dark humor. I laughed way more than I expected. Being that this is the last thing that Flanagan's going to make for Netflix, he moved on to Amazon. He's making a movie for them, which is weird because he went to Amazon to do the Dark Tower series. So I guess we have to wait until that's all said and done before he starts that, because that's going to be a task in itself. Fall of House of Usher was fun to work on for most of it. It was really interesting to see a lot of this process from the office and the behind the scenes, bit chaotic at times. For instance, a lot of the bits at the church that you see both at the beginning and kind of in the middle in the end, that whole bit took a lot out of me because we had to try and set that all up within like two weeks. When normally you would want a month of prep for that, I was getting up at three in the morning and driving out to Vancouver to help set up with this for like a week straight almost, if not more. The houses that we got to work in were amazing. The one that they keep going to, his house, the house that's like the wood mahogany and the bar, that's a house that we got to shoot at. And it's beautiful. I think the house is worth like 20 something on million dollars. That whole area where they're sitting and having dinner and doing the contracts, that window on the wall, as far as I know is actually part of the place because it's a wrap around two floor. Like there's a balcony above it with bookshelves. It's something out of Beauty and the Beast, honestly. And then the bar that they're in, this lady hired a guy, the lady who owns the house, she hired out a guy from England to hand paint murals into the ceiling. Like this house was fuck off money. And then the one that had the bowling alley, that's one you can actually apparently rent on Airbnb. And then there's the glass window house. That was a cool house. But that was an area where we were going to shoot at that house. Like literally I had spent weeks setting up deals with all of the houses in the area about like renting out driveways because we were going to be shooting night stuff there. And then the fucking day before we were supposed to shoot there, I have to go and tell everyone that we have to reschedule because Frank was sick, but really we, they were firing him. That was a bit chaotic to deal with. And that was a bit, oh my God. It felt really aggravating considering how much work I had done. And then I was going to have to go back there and do it all over again. So that took a bit out of all of us, but oh well. This show went from being about six months of filming to almost eight, if not nine months of work, which I'm not going to complain. That's exactly what happened with Midnight Club. We shot the entire first episode and then reshot it all over again because Mike didn't like the person that he had chose for the lead. He recast her as one of the side characters and then brought in those other actress to take on the lead role. And we essentially just got another episode of work. But in the end, I guess I should give my rating for the Fall of House of Usher. I think it's wonderfully acted by everyone. Everyone does ace acting. The writing and the pacing is very, very good. If, like I said, for the dip in the middle and also the twist that happens at the end of the last episode, I called that from the start. Not only because if you've read Poe's books, you will know what is happening in that certain sequence. You'll be able to telegraph it as well. And I'm not even like, I didn't read the notes. This was nothing. I actually don't even know where they filmed this bit. I could just tell. I knew what was going to happen. And it's so easy to see from the start that I don't know if Flanagan thought that you weren't going to get it. But it is probably the most lackluster twist of all of the stories he's ever done because it's like, oh, okay, I know exactly what's going to happen here. But that aside, it still is phenomenal. The acting's great. The characters are despicable, but so interesting and unique. The horror elements is really well done. This definitely the most raunchy, violent, and grotesque and mature story that Flanagan's ever done. I think all of the swearing that he's held off and all of the other series he's done was purely so he could throw it into this one, the coup de gras. I definitely, definitely recommend it. I recommend that for all of Flanagan's projects, if maybe not Midnight Club. Midnight Club is a fantastic character study, but the plot is about like, I don't know, big as a business card. But in the end, my rating for the fall of the House of Usher is a six out of seven. It was really good series. It was fun to work on. It was crazy to work on. But I can proudly say that this is the best thing I've ever got to work on, bar none. Any project that I've ever worked on, this is the best one. But those are my thoughts about it. I'm curious to see what you guys would say. It's been out for a little while now, so I guess you all have your thoughts. So let me know in the comments below and just see what you guys have to say. Where do you place this in the Flanagan? Oh my God, I can't believe that. I forgot that Netflix called it. For me, it's kind of tied with Midnight Mask, but haunting of Hell House is still number one for me. Yeah, like I said, curious to see what you guys would say. Anyways, thank you guys for watching this long review. Hope you guys enjoyed some of the stories I told. If you liked the video, leave a like. And if you're interested in more, subscribe. Until then, see you guys next time.