More than five years after its release, Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House is still regarded as one of the best horror series of all time. Combining a terrifying ghost story with familial drama, the 2018 adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s 1959 novel of the same name kicked off what would become Mike Flanagan’s horror universe at Netflix, consisting of a total of five horror shows. While the follow-up of Bly Manor focused on a new haunting, years later, there are still plenty of ideas for The Haunting of Hill House Season 2.
Dubbed “close to a work of genius” by the King of Horror himself, Stephen King, Hill House is a “modern reimagining” of Jackson’s legendary novel. Per the show’s official Netflix synopsis, the series is “about five siblings who grew up in the most famous haunted house in America. Now adults, they’re reunited by the suicide of their youngest sister, which forces them to finally confront the ghosts of their own pasts… some which lurk in their minds… and some which may really be lurking in the shadows of the iconic Hill House.”
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The show starred Paxton Singleton, Lulu Wilson, Julian Hilliard, Mckenna Grace, and Violet McGraw starred as the Crain siblings in childhood, with Carla Gugino and Henry Thomas as their parents. Michiel Huisman, Elizabeth Reaser, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Kate Siegel, and Victoria Pedretti took on the roles as the siblings in adulthood, as Timothy Hutton appeared as an older version of Hugh.
While Hill House was technically renewed for a second season, the series shifted to an anthology format, but fans have long clamored for more content related to Hill House. Although, it unfortunately seems that Flanagan is done with Hill House. He indicated in December 2020 that there were “no plans” for another season, and he has moved on to Amazon after his contract with Netflix ended. However, there is still an abundance of room for Hill House Season 2. Keep scrolling to see some of the possible storylines that The Haunting of Hill House Season 2 could explore.
“Fear and guilt are sisters”
It is one of the few possible Easter eggs dropped in the season finale, and potentially sets up a storyline focused on the two remaining Crain sisters: Shirley and Theo.
“Fear and guilt are sisters,” Trish says in the finale when Theo is locked in the Red Room and forced to face her biggest fear before Nell brings her back to the present.
Both fear and guilt were subtle driving forces for the debut season, with fear being what made the Crain children susceptible to Hill House and guilt being what brought them back following another family tragedy, and it could possibly take on a much more literal form in a second season. While the Crain family got about as much of a happy ending as one could hope for, they still have an abundance of healing to do and obstacles to overcome, including Shirley’s guilt over cheating on her husband and Theo’s fear of feeling nothing.
The Grattan Murders
Potentially the biggest Easter egg dropped in the finale, and one that would mean a major shift in the story, season two could draw from The Grattan Murders, Poppy Hill’s nursery rhyme that she sings to Hugh. Playing a role in both the book and the series, and believed to reference to Ambrose Bierce’s “The Moonlit Road,” the nursery rhyme refers to the deaths of three generations of a single family.
The first season of The Haunting of Hill House ended with the death of Hugh Crain, killing off one generation of the Crain family, and Nell already succumbed to death, marking the first death in a second generation.
Should The Grattan Murders nursery rhyme be an Easter egg, it would likely mean a major time jump, with season two focusing on a new generation of the Crain family, potentially Shirley’s children when they are grown up.
Shift of focus to a Ghost of Hill House
While Hill House expanded to an anthology series with its second season, a second anthology series directly linked to Hill House could make for an interesting show. Hill House is packed to the brim with ghosts, both up front and center and hidden throughout the show, and an anthology series could focus on a different ghost residing in the home each season.
Hill House introduced fans to a number of Hill House’s ghostly residents, namely Poppy Hill, who was first mentioned by Mrs. Dudley in episode eight and was explained to be a former resident of Hill House who was mentally ill. Poppy met William Hill, whom built the home, while in an insane asylum. Once the Crains moved in, Poppy’s ghost haunted Olivia, convincing her that the only way to save her children was to kill them.
Another prominent ghost throughout the season is Luke’s bowler hat ghost, who we later learn is William Hill, Poppy’s husband. Decades before the Crain family moved into Hill House for the single fateful summer, William bricked himself up in a wall in the ’40s with his cane, which his ghost taps against the floor.
With a number of other spirits residing in the home, the possibilities are endless, and each season could focus on how that particular ghost or set of ghosts came to be a spirit in the home, a route similar to Season one.
Tell the story from a ghost’s perspective
Similar to the option above, and probably a lot less likely, the series could shift to storytelling from one of the ghosts’ perspectives, offering an entirely different viewpoint to the story and the inner workings of Hill House.
Choosing to set up any future seasons in this manner would also allow the series to introduce more of the ghosts, giving Hill House a deeper history.
Shift of focus to Theodora
Theodora was arguably one of the most intriguing characters in the debut season, and as soon as fans were introduced to the glove-wearing middle Crain child, they immediately began calling for the series to give her more screen time.
Given that Theo wears gloves for a very important reason (she is a clairvoyant, meaning she has the ability to sense other people’s feelings through touch), choosing to shift the focus to the character who was the black sheep of the Crain family seems like a no-brainer, as it could easily maintain the paranormal aspect.
Should a second season focus on Theo, it could focus on her life pre-Nellie’s death, when she hardly ever took off her gloves, or post-Nellie’s death and post-returning to Hill House, when she chose to take off her gloves.
Given that Theodora was a main character in Shirley Jackson’s novel, it only seems natural that a second season would focus on her.
The Red Room
The ending that fans saw in the season finale is vastly different from the original ending that director Mike Flanagan had concocted, with his original plan having alluded to the Crain siblings still being in the Red Room as the final credits rolled.
“We talked for a very, very long time about putting the Red Room window, that weird vertical window, in the background of this shot,” Flanagan told Thrillist. “And I ultimately decided not to. It was too cruel. But there was a lot of talk that this peace might not be real.”
While season one certainly seemed to end with peace, season two could pick up and shred that idea, revealing that the Crains never truly made it out of the Red Room and that their happy ending was just a figment of the imagination created by Hill House.
Dr. Montague
The main character in Shirley Jackson’s 1959 novel, Dr. Montague was nothing more than a very minor character in the Netflix series. Serving as Nell’s psychiatrist, he came and went in roughly the blink of an eye. In the book, however, he invited a number of guests to Hill House in an attempt to prove that it was haunted.
Dr. Montague, serving as the focus character in a future season, could potentially venture to Hill House to find answers surrounding Nell’s death and her frequent claims that she was being haunted by the Bent-Neck Lady, discovering for himself the truth behind the mysterious home.
The Dudleys
Another way to naturally issue in a second season would be to shift the focus to the Dudleys, the family that has served as caretakers of Hill House for decades and who have lived in a house on the edge of property to avoid the paranormal activity of the home. Their ties to the house became much more solid following the death of their daughter, Abigail, at Olivia’s doing, and the subsequent death of Mrs. Dudley in the house.
Telling the story from their perspective would allow the show to explore their knowledge of the home and the various families they have seen live there, as well as show what happens after the Crain family leaves the property in the season one finale.
A New Haunting
Should Flanagan ever revisit the series, it’s most likely that he would revisit the series as a whole rather than Hill House as a standalone story. When Hill House was renewed for a second season in 2019, it was confirmed that the show would move into an anthology format, titled The Haunting series, with each season centered on a new story and characters, but with some cast members returning in new roles. Released in 2020, Season 2, titled The Haunting of Bly Manor, shifted focus to an entirely new estate, the mysterious and haunted Bly Manor in England, and followed the story of a young au pair who travels there to tend to two children, a series of mysterious events transpiring after her arrival.
Although it seems unlikely that Flanagan will ever return to The Haunting series, at least not in the near future, fans have floated around ideas on what a new season could be about. Some stories suggested: Wilkie Collins’s 1859 novel The Woman in White, M.R. James’ 1904 collection Ghost Stories of Antiquary, Peter Straub’s Ghost Story, and more. Edgar Allen Poe’s body of work, meanwhile, was long floated as a possible adaptation for Flanagan. Fans hoping to see Flanagan tackle the author’s work got their wish last year when The Fall of the House of Usher debuted on Netflix.
Flanagan himself previously revealed that if The Haunting series had gotten a third season, it would have adapted Richard Matheson’s 1971 novel Hell House. Writing the introduction for the book, Flanagan wrote: “When I adapted Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House as a Netflix series, there was much talk about how to continue the Haunting anthology. We followed Hill House with The Haunting of Bly Manor, based on numerous ghost stories by Henry James. Had there been a third season, I wanted that season to be The Haunting of Hell House. It was actually the first title we explored when Hill House was over, but the rights were spoken for and there did not seem to be a path forward.”
