The Haunting of Hill House: Explaining that frightening ending

If you just finished watching Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House, you probably have a lot of questions. For answers, you came to the right place!

The Haunting of Hill House isn’t just one of the best horror series to arrive on Netflix, it’s one of the best shows on television in general. The horrors Hill House delivers are not your typical jump scares, blood and guts filled thrills. These frights are deeper. They feel more realistic than most movies and shows we’ve seen in the genre. The characters truly place you inside their shoes, making you feel their every chill and shock. Not to mention, at the center of it all is a family drama with real issues and grudges, but unconditional love no matter what.

Instead of diving into a cave of horrors in the final moments, as most projects do, Hill House is a slow burn, keeping us on the edge of our seats the entire time. Fans have been rewatching the last episode to try to make sense of it all.

Please note: Major spoilers are ahead if you are not caught up on The Haunting of Hill House. 

While we do learn some of the secrets of the Red Room and what happened to Olivia Crain (Carla Gugino), there are still lingering questions. What exactly happened in the finale? Let’s break it down…

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The Crains: You probably don’t need an explanation for this part, but we’re quickly recapping this anyway!

The Crain family consists of Hugh (Henry Thomas), Olivia, and their five children. They moved into Hill House, a mansion Hugh and Olivia plan on restoring to sell for a nice paycheck. But, as it turns out, Hill House is a sinister, haunted place.

What is the Red Room? The Red Room lures victims in and makes them see their biggest regrets. We’re not sure why the Red Room wants them inside. Our best guess is it clings to people, it needs to feed on them (not literally) and keep their victims there for…company, perhaps? Olivia was consumed by it, but even if the rest of the family was able to escape, the evil in the house never let go, which is why they all continued to have minutes of disturbances and visions.

Nell is eventually tricked into entering the room and dying. Olivia refuses to let the rest of her children go. Hugh Crain makes a deal with his wife in order for the remaining four of his children to escape alive. He’ll stay with Olivia and their daughter Nell, passing ownership of the house to Steve (Michael Huisman). He explains to his son that many other ghosts live in the house, so destroying the place is out of the question. Thanks to this detail, we learn that those who die inside Hill House, stay in Hill House, which gives us American Horror Story vibes.

Why was Hill House haunted in the first place? Audiences still don’t know what was up with that house. Who the ghosts were, how they died and came to haunt the place, or what they want, exactly. In an interview with Thrillist, showrunner Mike Flanagan revealed that they intended to shoot an explanation, but ran out of time and resources.

While the mystery of not knowing is nice and all, we’re all hoping to dig into the history of the home in a prequel. Make it happen, Netflix!

A happy ending? For the most part, yes. It’s been a couple of years since that terrifying night and everyone is living happy lives. Luke (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) is celebrating his sobriety, Steven has patched things up with his wife, and so has Shirley (Elizabeth Reaser) with her own husband, while Theo (Kate Siegel) has finally decided to commit to a relationship.

Together forever? Maybe! As we state above, if you die inside Hill House, your spirit stays there. Will the Crains journey inside the home to be reunited after death?

The Haunting of Hill House is streaming on Netflix. If you haven’t watched it yet, you’re missing out!

Fun fact: In the same interview with Thrillist, Flanagan revealed they hid up to 12 ghosts in each episode. If you were thinking of going to rewatch the series, this is a fun little game to play — can you spot all the ghosts?