The Haunting of Hill House is Netflix’s latest hit series and this week’s most in-demand show.
The horror series premiered on the streaming platform on October 12, and fans are already itching to know if there a chance of a renewal.
The show’s creator, Mike Flanagan, feels he’s done with the Crain family. But that doesn’t mean there couldn’t be another season. In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Flanagan said, “What I will say, though, is that as far as I’ve ever been concerned with this, the story of the Crain family is told. It’s done. I think that there are all sorts of different directions we could go in, with the house or with something completely different. I love the idea of an anthology as well. But to me, I felt like the Crains have been through enough, and we left them exactly as we all wanted to remember them, those of us who worked on it. We toyed with a cliffhanger ending and we toyed with other ideas, but ultimately, in the writers’ room and with the cast and everything else, we really felt like the story demanded a certain kind of closure from us and we were happy to close the book on that family.”
So, fans should know that if the show is, in fact, renewed, it will likely have a different feel, following different characters.
According to Polygon, the show has received a lot of chatter on social media, with Parrot Analytics estimating that the “total audience demands” rivals two of the biggest series on TV: American Horror Story and The Walking Dead.
Flanagan has suggested that he’s thought about where a season 2 would lead them. Speaking to THR, the show’s creator said, “We actually fleshed out a thorough history for Hill House… We intended to shoot it; it was going to open each episode with a chapter from Steven’s book. Ultimately, we went away from that because it felt like that was taking away from the mystery and enigma of it.” So, could another season mean delving into the history of the house? It’s possible.
Flanagan tells EW, “I think more than anything, the show is about haunted places and haunted people, as Steve says, and there’s no shortage of either,” he tells EW. “So, there’s any number of things we could do, in or out of Hill House.”
In a nutshell, the demand for a second season seems to be there, and Flanagan has clearly started to consider what would make for a good story to tell shall another season present itself.
Flanagan, who is best known for his horror films, which he directed, wrote, and edited, is the creative mind behind Absentia, Oculus, Hush, Before I Wake, Ouija: Origin of Evil, and Gerald’s Game.
He was born in Salem, Massachusetts, where he admits to building an interest in the Salem witch trials, along with other ghost stories. Flanagan graduated with a BA in Electronic Media & Film and a minor in theater from Townson University.