For me the sign of really transcendent fiction–be it a movie, novel or whatever–is when it can not only weather different interpretations, but thrive as a result of them.

Which is exactly how I feel about Netflix’s The Haunting Of Hill House. I have already done a review which covered how impressed I was by Mike Flanagan’s series, though even while watching I could tell that that there was more to it than I could find the words to express at the time.

That there were other places, other Red Doors to be opened if I could just find the key.

Which leads me to The Haunting Of Hill House and the Madness of Family, an article by Lauren Michele Jackson on Vulture.com.

Ms. Jackson’s interpretation strips the story of most of its supernatural trappings, to reveal a family in crisis, gamely going about doing what they believe it is that families do.

She removes the skin of the unknown, revealing…us, which in a way is perhaps even more terrifying because from her perspective there are no haunted, hungry edifices waiting to swallow us whole.

And the Red Door lies in each of us, and despite the harmony of kin we all walk alone.