Luke C

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A near-masterpiece on the folly of man and depths of human nature, only tainted by the very obvious and dissonant insertion of the current popular political views of the writers, particularly at the end, with some statements directly contradicting the central messages of the show. Instead of raising the question for the audience to ponder through allegory and metaphor, it verbally asserts the alleged problem and it’s preferred answer. Sadly this “tell don’t show” approach (embraced solely right at the end) pulls you out of the fictional world back into the real one so that you are sufficiently detached from the story - and as a result the ending loses a lot of its otherwise deserved heft. And since this occurs near the very end, there is minimal and insufficient time to reinvest yourself in the narrative before it concludes. At the end; you cant help but partially praise or lament at least some of unavoidable and directly stated political positions from todays fleeting politics - rather than focus solely the narrative mastery that just unfolded on the screen. It’s particularly disappointing because in the earlier episodes the writers had successfully addressed the underlying themes of their political positions, in a way I would’ve otherwise called timeless: subliminally and with subtlety, without affecting the quality of the show. You briefly noticed but remained engrossed in the shows world, and only found yourself thinking about those subliminal messages later, removed from the immediacy of ones watching. Unfortunately, whoever approved the last bit of preachy punditry seemed overtaken by the desire to make an overt political statement for todays (and soon to be yesterdays) like-minded audience, rather than a masterpiece with subtle messaging that addresses the broader underlying questions and themes, is palatable to all including generations to come, and could/did provoke new thoughts even in those who might otherwise disagree. Yet, this seems to be all too common in entertainment for the better part of the last decade, and The Fall of the House of Usher distances itself greatly above that field when in comparison.