Western Animation / The House (2022)

The House is a 2022 stop-motion animated Anthology Film divided into three chapters, each one with its own directors: Emma de Swaef and Marc James Roels, Niki Lindroth von Bahr, and Paloma Baeza. It stars Matthew Goode, Claudie Blakley, Mia Goth, Jarvis Cocker, Susie Wokoma, Helena Bonham Carter, Paul Kaye, and Will Sharpe. It premiered on Netflix on January 14, 2022.

The film takes place in a mysterious stately home somewhere in England, and though the time period, characters, and personal challenges all shift depending on the chapter, all of them focus on how the residents cope with the strange and often nightmarish side-effects of living there - along with other threats from outside the house.

The three chapters are as follows:

• I - And heard within, a lie is spun: At some point in the 19th century an impoverished former member of the gentry by the name of Raymond is unexpectedly approached by a wealthy architect and given an unprecedented opportunity to live in a mansion once again. Raymond, his wife Penny, and young daughters Mabel and Isobel all move into the house in short order, and are immediately overjoyed by the new standard of luxury in their life. Unfortunately, with her parents all but entranced by the place, Mabel soon discovers that their new home might just be more than they'd bargained for...
• II - Then lost is truth that can't be won: In the 21st century, a property developer (who just happens to be an anthropomorphic rat) renovates the house in preparation for display and sale, and with the bank breathing down his neck, begins cutting corners wherever possible. Alas, the developer soon finds that the house has a pest problem that not even his best efforts can get rid of. And in the disastrous aftermath of the viewing, the only buyers are a strange couple with a decidedly unhealthy interest in the house...
• III - Listen again and seek the sun: In the distant future, floods have consumed most of the area, but somehow the house still stands. Now owned by Rosa (an anthropomorphic cat), it's inhabited only by her and two other tenants (also cats); none of said tenants can pay her in anything other than fish and stones, frustrating Rosa's efforts to renovate the house. Things only get worse when hippy cat Cosmos arrives with an offer to help rebuild the house, and with the floodwaters continuously rising, Rosa has to confront the fact that her dreams of finding new tenants and house a financial success might all be for nothing...

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This movie provides examples of the following tropes:

As a whole

• Call-Forward: Mabel's dolls are felt mice, and the main character of the second story is an anthropomorphic mouse.
• Central Theme:
  • Obsession, madness, wealth, and the pursuit of true happiness.
  • What a house can represent to someone. In Chapter I, it represents class distinction; in Chapter II, it represents material wealth; in Chapter III, it represents sentimental value; in the closing credits, it represents nothing more than "a collection of bricks."
• Character Development: If one considers The House itself as a character - and considering its able to exert its will through the unusual goings on, it may as well - it actually has a very subtle sembalance of thought and arc going on:
  • In the first segment it's built by Schoonbeek to toy with a family. While it does this masterfully, it also ultimately leaves it witnessing an act of love while destroying what could have been a happy home and driving a child and her baby sister into the snow.
  • In the second story, after an untold time falling apart, the Developer takes a chance with The House. At first nothing supernatural really happens as The House seeming allows his renovations go unimpeded. As he cuts corners all over the place, and the open house event fails to actually bring in a new family to make The House a home, it opts to make the strange elderly Couple and their family as a last resort. It fails to take into account that, as former bugs, they don't have any money to actually buy The House with. And their squatting, coupled with the Developer's fraying mind ultimately leads to them acting like the insects they are, and causes the Developer to devolve into a verminous state (respectively), fully destroying its interior and whatever actual improvements that were made.
  • In the last segment The House seems to not do anything particularly supernatural, but it's influence is implied to be what makes Rosa obsessed with making it a home(as well as ignore the fact that the tenants can't pay her due to circumstance), and draw Cosmo in. It allows Cosmo to renovate it and as everyone leaves, Rosa pleads with The House to let her go, which ultimately allows her to make the choice to embrace change, and allows The House to survive in a new world as a boat.
• Crapsack World: All three chapters take place in very gloomy settings in their own way, and the House is often even worse:
  • In chapter 1, the setting is a lonely 19th century countryside where the rich look down on the poor and Van Schoonbeek plays sick games on the desperate for apparently little more than his sick amusement. The House, meanwhile, is an Eldritch Location that preys on the residents.
  • In chapter 2, there's a recession on, the supermarket can't get anything right, and the only way to sell a house is to cut corners wherever possible. However, it's not made clear if the rest of the world is like this or if staying in the house has given the developer bad luck, though if the potential customers and the police are of any indication it is a full blown World of Jerkass. Furthermore, the House is a bug-infested nightmare where nothing works and the developer's efforts to improve it all come to nothing.
  • In chapter 3, the world has been flooded, the population has been forced to seek higher ground or take up a permanently seabound life, and the waters continue to rise. The House continues to fall to pieces, and ultimately proves to be an anchor keeping Rosa from leaving despite the danger of drowning.
• The Constant: The House, of course, remains present throughout all three segments — in the 19th century, in the 21 century, and in the post-apocalyptic future. It starts out as a lone mansion on a forested hillside, becomes a townhouse in the middle of a city, before finally becoming the only building still above the waterline. And then it becomes a boat, escaping its foundations to become part of the new seagoing society of this post-apocalyptic world.
• Eldritch Location: There's something very strange about the House, especially in Chapter 1: It can be rebuilt without anyone hearing the noise, food appears on the dinner table without any sign of servants or catering staff, the upper-story corridors turn into an impassable labyrinth, Mabel and Isobel fall asleep in the attic and wake up to find themselves outside the drawing room, and the House somehow manages to survive the drawing room fire. In chapter 2, the developer seems cursed with bad luck simply by staying here, as things keep breaking and insects keep returning to the building no matter how many times the developer exterminates them, even mutating them into beings capable of impersonating potential buyers - assuming they weren't like that before. In Chapter 3, Alien Geometries return with a vengeance when Rosa falls into the basement, only to wind up in Cosmos' tent... and in the ending, the House is so weird that Cosmos is somehow able to modify it into a sailing ship with the contents of a standard toolkit.
• Genius Loci: The Mansion, though it itself makes no actions, seems to cause horrible things to happen to everyone who owns it. To the point that it can turn people into decorations, vermin into speaking individuals, and make people seemingly obsessed with its upkeep. Rosa certainly seems to believe that the House has a mind of its own - enough for her to beg to be allowed to leave. It's implied that the influence of Schoonbeek is the initial cause of this intelligence.
• Greater-Scope Villain: While appearing only in the first chapter, Van Schoonbeek is the one who built the House in the first place and is thus indirectly responsible for all the troubles of the film as a whole.
• Greed: A running theme across all three stories. Each character (sans Isobel and Mabel, due to Children Are Innocent) finds themselves focused on wealth and materialism to some extent or another, eventually becoming an obsession with the House:
  • In Chapter 1, Van Schoonbeek encourages this in Raymond, turning his depression over his loss of status into a poisonous obsession with the finer things the House grants him. In turn, it makes both Raymond and Penny neglect their daughters and destroy the belongings they once treasured. As a result, they become fineries themselves, transformed into furniture and left to burn alive.
  • In Chapter 2, the developer longs for the life of a Wealthy Yacht Owner and resorts to Cutting Corners all over the place in an effort to avoid losing money - even as he takes out business loans in order to make the most extravagant renovations to the House. In the process, he's reduced to a joyless existence living in a basement, holds long phone conversations with an estranged lover who is really just his dentist, fails to escape his financial difficulties, and reverts to feral madness in the mutant-infested wreckage of the House.
  • In the third story, Rosa is obsessed with getting rent money from her tenants so that she can renovate the House, and continues to obsess over her dream of making the House a paradise despite being trapped in a flooded post-apocalyptic wasteland - to the point of ignoring the rising floodwaters. It nearly ends with her Dying Alone in the flooding House, only managing to escape with the help of her friends and tenants.
• Leave the Camera Running: Many shots in this film focus on the house, and not much else. These can last for up to a minute.
• Light Is Not Good: As noted by some reviewers there is a strong light motif in the series:
  • In the first segment Van Schoobeek comes in a lit carriage, the parents are hypnotized and corrupted by the electric lights and Mabel and Isobel are drawn to the light of the fire, that consumes everything.
  • In the second segment the one gadget that the Developer tries to show the most is a bulb in the oven, which fails him when he needs it most.
  • In the final segment the world is covered by an eerie white fog. But Light Is Good is also present as an emancipated Rosa follows the light of the sun at the end.
• Meaningful Name: A trait almost all the characters share across the stories is how their names describe them.
  • In the first story:
    • Raymond: Germanic in origin, combining words for "advice" and "protector." Advice plays a key role in what happens to him and he ultimately helps to protect his daughter from the fire he set.
    • Penelope: Greek for "Weaver" she hand sews many of the families' fabrics, and the point her obsession grows around are drapes she wants to make which she also uses to save her daughters.
    • Isobel: Hebrew for "God's Promise" who is saved by everyone else from the House's influence to live on.
    • Mabel: Derived from the Latin word for "Lovable". She's the main character for the first story and her parents love for her and Isobel is what has them ultimately subvert The House's will and save them from their fate.
    • Schoonbeek: Low Germanic combo of "beautiful" and "creek." As a Jewish name, notably, it is ornamental.
  • The second story in stark contrast to the others, has no named characters apart from a reference to the previous story in Isobel. They only have their titles and pet names. This is implied to be in order to ultimately see them how the house itself sees them, as vermin.
  • In the third story:
    • Elias: Variant of Elijah, who biblically led the Israelites to God. It's revealed that he was planning on leaving the House's island, and leads the others, including Rosa, to eventually follow suit to freedom.
    • Jen: Welsh for "Fair One," "White and Smooth" and "soft." She's the one Rosa is the most open with in conversation, and is gentle and spiritual in how she tries helping her friend understand what she's doing is hurting herself. Another translation of the name is "White Wave", and she lives in a world swallowed by water which she joins her friends in riding on top of, like a wave.
    • Cosmos: Aside from the obvious, it's also British/Italian for "order," "decency" and "beauty." He's an outside influence who proves to be just what everyone, including the house, needs.
    • Rosa: Means "little rose" and biblically is associated with the Virgin Mary, connecting to not only Rosa's obsession with fixing the house making her ignore Elias' subtle attraction to her, but also the fact that she is the Matriarch of the house. It's also a more on the nose connection to the flower and How Rosa emotionally blooms by understanding how alone she'll really be and embracing change.
• Nothing Is Scarier: While there is a theme to why the House causes things to happen (Greed and Status), the distinct reasons why it does so are so unknowable that it's just a slow build of dread as the characters are driven to their fates.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: Slides from the latter to the former as each story progresses. Chapter I is pure psychological horror without any comedy or levity, with the characters doomed to fail against an Ambiguously Human Invincible Villain. Chapter II is still bleak, but it's not afraid to interject the darkness with comedy and the character's dilemmas are much more his own fault than anyone else's. Chapter III completely discards the cynicism, has the sympathetic protagonists overcome their issues, and ends the last story with an unambiguously happy ending.
• Surreal Horror: Though advertised as a "Black Comedy" the uniting thread across the three stories is this. All take place in a house (which may or may not be the same) where perceptions of reality are twisted beyond recognition and symbolism runs rampant and the protagonists struggle against borderline eldritch factors outside their control.

Chapter I

• Abnormal Limb Rotation Range: As Raymond stares at the unlit fireplace on all fours, Thomas comes in with his chair to burn. His head unnaturally swivels 180 degrees to look at Thomas and visibly creaks into place, the same holding true for when he turns his head back to look at the fireplace. This is an early sign that he's being transformed into a piece of furniture.
• Adorably Precocious Child: Mabel is quite mature for her age. She's unfazed by her relatives' condescending attitude and is the only one who's unaffected by the House's hypnotism. As her parents grow more neglectful, she steps in to care for baby sister and miraculously doesn't break down in tears when the House continues to torment her.
• The Alcoholic: Raymond drinks to numb his disappointment, a tendency he apparently inherited from his father. However, the House displaces this particular addiction...
• Alien Geometries: In the ending, the House's upper corridors don't appear to connect to the rest of the house, eventually giving way to a labyrinth complete with a crossroads that shouldn't fit within the confines of the building.
• Ambiguously Human: Van Schoonbeek is introduced in a floating sedan chair in the middle of the woods. Other than that and his apparent powers (which include Offscreen Teleportation, growing to gigantic sizes and turning people into furniture), you’d be forgiven for just thinking this guy is just an eccentric architect.
• And I Must Scream: The awful fate of Raymond and Penny, transformed into furniture and left almost completely paralyzed but still conscious enough to be aware of their plight. In the end, they can't escape the fire that Raymond has accidentally set... though given their misery, it's doubtful that they'd ever want to.
• Arc Villain: Van Schoonbeek, who lures in Mabel's parents, Raymond and Penny, to their dooms and builds the house for that purpose. Though this chapter is the only one he makes a physical appearance in.
• The Bad Guy Wins: Given that the transformation and death of Mabel's parents was apparently what Van Schoonbeek wanted all along, then he ends the chapter victorious, escaping without a single repercussion.
• Bizarrchitecture: The House is continuously rebuilt in weird and bewildering ways, to the point that Mabel wakes up to find that a new room has been built right outside her bedroom window, to say nothing of the sudden disappearance of the staircase and the cellar door being positioned four feet in the air over an ascending staircase.
• Burn Baby Burn: At the tail end of his corruption, Raymond burns all the family possessions in the withdrawing room fireplace, concluding with Mabel's dollhouse. This last one ultimately results in a fire that spreads to the rest of the room, in which the newly-transformed Raymond and Penny burn alive.
• Brutal Honesty: When Mabel asks if Raymond's relatives are nice, he bluntly tells her no.
• The Corruptor: Van Schoonbeek seems to want nothing more than to corrupt Raymond and Penny into a lifestyle of self-destructive materialism, tempting them with greater and greater luxuries until they're prepared to abandon everything they once treasured. More worryingly, Raymond claims that Van Schoonbeek was a friend of his father - a man well-known for losing everything to his addictions. If so, he's successfully destroyed both of them by the end of the chapter.
• Creepy Dollhouse: Mabel owns a dollhouse which looks suspiciously similar to the House. The story even begins and ends with it. It foreshadows the family's fate, but at the same time symbolizes Mabel's love of her old familiar life instead of her strange new materialistic one.
• Deal with the Devil: While it’s not clear what Van Schoonbeek really is, he happily offers a lavish mansion to Raymond and his family seemingly without expecting anything in return from them. Too good to be true, indeed, as he and the House eventually corrupts Raymond and Penny into obsession with materialism, reaching its peak by making them burn their treasured belongings and turning them into furniture, before finally dooming them to burn alive.
• A Degree in Useless: One of Raymond's relatives states that he has an (unknown) education, yet he is only barely able to make a living while looking after his wife and daughter.
• Downer Ending: Raymond and Penny are completely corrupted by Van Schoonbeek and reduced to furniture before (in all likelihood) being burned alive; Mabel and Isobel are able to escape unharmed, but are left alone in the world, not to mention stranded in the middle of a snowy wilderness with no help in sight. Van Schoonbeek suffers no punishment for his crimes, and worst of all, the house survives the fire long enough to continue to make life a living hell for others in the other two chapters of the story.
• Drowning My Sorrows:
  • After the miserable visit from his relatives, Raymond goes on to drink his pain away, hence how he ends up bumping into Van Schoonbeek in the first place.
  • Near the end, Mr. Thomas is shown drinking after being driven mad by his employer's constant modifications to the house and his own guilt over dooming the family.
• Dying as Yourself: In their final moments, the transformed Raymond and Penny finally overcome their corruption and beg for Mabel to save herself and her sister, even opening the window to help their children escape the fire.
• Emerging from the Shadows: In one especially creepy moment, Thomas is seen whimpering in terror in a darkened room, seemingly alone... only for a giant version of Van Schoonbeek to suddenly ooze out of the darkness behind him, giggling maniacally.
• Evil Laugh:
  • Mabel walks in on one of the workers rebuilding the House around her, and he lets out a very creepy laugh before going back to work.
  • Van Schoonbeek lets out some malignant-sounding chuckles as Raymond's sanity gradually degenerates before his eyes.
• Evil Old Folks: Van Schoonbeek was supposedly a friend of Raymond's father, and though his exact age isn't mentioned, he generally seems a bit on the elderly side - being white-haired, leaning on a cane, and being shorter than the other adult characters. By the end of the story, he's also engineered the corruption of Mabel's parents, followed swiftly by their deaths.
• Exact Words: According to Raymond, Van Schoonbeek promised to build him a mansion that will be like "a beacon on the hill." The chapter ends with Van Schoonbeek arranging for the drawing room to go up in flames with Raymond and Penny trapped inside, resulting in a beacon-like fire that can be seen on the hilltop for miles around.
• Foreshadowing: The new clothes that Van Schoonbeek designs for Raymond and Penny, which appear to be made from curtains and seat cushions. In the ending, Raymond and Penny are literally transformed into a chair and a set of drapes, respectively.
• For the Evulz: Van Schoonbeek seems to be motivated by nothing more than malicious jollies, given that he can blow vast sums of money on building extravagant and possibly eldritch homes in which to torture his clients. Certainly, he didn't seem to get much out of arranging for the corruption, transformation, and death of Mabel's parents other than cheap laughs.
• Giggling Villain: Exaggerated with Van Schoonbeek—he only giggles throughout the entire story. What makes it worse is that he's capable of speech, since we see him talking normally from a distance, and so he's choosing to do nothing but let out high-pitched chuckles whenever he appears.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: A shot of the house has two illuminated windows become Van Schoonbeek's eyes as a phantom overlay of his face fades in front of it, signifying his unnatural influence on it.
• Hard-to-Light Fire: Raymond has trouble lighting up the fireplace and fails to do so until his old house's furniture is used instead of normal wood. Considering the house is an Eldritch Location, this circumstance is almost certainly supernatural in nature.
• Heroic Sacrifice: At the end of the story, Penny and Raymond beg their children to escape. Penny opens a window and uses her now curtain body to allow her children to climb out of the house as it burns down; losing her life but allowing her children to escape.
• Humanoid Abomination:
  • Van Schoonbeek, the architect and creator of the House. He appears generally human, but is somehow able to teleport himself and his sedan chair around the countryside, can apparently make himself invisible as will, and create houses that feature Alien Geometries and other weird effects, and at one point, he even emerges from the shadows behind Mr. Thomas as a giant. It's not certain if he's an Evil Sorcerer, Satan, or some other eldritch being.
  • Van Schoonbeek's workforce; like their boss, they appear human, but are seemingly emotionless and mute except for the occasional Evil Laugh, and can somehow make impossible modifications to the House without anyone noticing. Generally, they come across less like individuals and more like extensions of Van Schoonbeek's will.
• Impoverished Patrician: Raymond used to be as wealthy as the rest of his family, but his father reputedly blew the finances on gambling and booze; as a result, despite his upbringing and education, Raymond is left living in a small but comfortable cottage in the middle of nowhere with only a few small keepsakes of his old life. Those of the family who weren't bankrupted by his father's downfall are disgusted, and rub his poverty in his face on the one occasion they bother to visit.
• Improbable Infant Survival: The infant Isobel is able to survive through things that most babies wouldn't, including tumbling down a stone stairway without so much as a wail and falling several feet into snow without issue.
• It's All Junk: In the ending, Raymond is so desperate for something to burn in the fireplace that, when prompted by Mr. Thomas, he eagerly disposes of the family's old possessions, reasoning that it really is all junk now that they have so much better things in the House. It's ultimately a sign that Van Schoonbeek has well and truly corrupted him into abandoning everything he'd genuinely cared about in favor of mindless materialism - especially when he destroys Mabel's dollhouse.
• Jerkass: Raymond's relatives; all of them spend their visit regarding the cottage with open disgust, sneering at Raymond's impoverished fortunes without offering to help, and vocally dismissing Raymond as a weakling and a failure like his father.
• Just Following Orders: Thomas, sobbing, declares he’s just an actor for Van Schoonbeek.
• Karma Houdini: Van Schoonbeek is last seen chuckling over the transformed Raymond and Penny, satisfied with his handiwork, and by the time Mabel arrives in the room, he's long since vanished without facing any repercussions for his crimes. Even the fire doesn't seem like much of a setback considering the house somehow lingers on despite the damage.
• Laughing Mad: An early sign that Raymond is being corrupted by the House is the fact that he abruptly bursts out laughing at the sight of his cottage being pulled down by Van Schoonbeek's men.
• Mad Artist: Van Schoonbeek is referred to as an artist as well as an architect, creating weird and eldritch houses seemingly for the love of it... and takes great delight in watching Raymond and Penny degenerate over the course of the story.
• Mouth of Sauron: Mr. Thomas, Van Schoonbeek's representative; while the architect is apparently able to speak for himself, judging by his conversation with Raymond in the sedan chair, but he prefers to make his commands known through an intermediary. Thomas suffers a breakdown in the ending and admits that he's just an actor given a script to follow.
• Mobile Maze: Van Schoonbeek constantly redesigns the House, and his carpenters are in a constant process of renovating the place - moving around furniture, building new rooms and corridors, and erecting new walls. Given that this process is somehow accomplished without anyone seeing or hearing it happen, it's a sure sign that something is horribly wrong with the place. Mabel, Isobel, and Mr. Thomas all end up trapped in the upper floors of the building by the end, driving Thomas to a sobbing meltdown.
• Objectshifting: In the finale, Van Schoonbeek transforms Raymond and Penny into an armchair and a set of curtains, leaving them barely able to move and fully aware of their plight.
• Oh Look, More Rooms!: Played for Horror. Van Schoonbeek's carpenters are constantly building up the house, but its appearance from the outside never changes. Mabel wakes up one day to find that her window to the outside is suddenly a window into a new, windowless room. She and Isobel eventually end up lost within the constantly expanding interior, and are at real risk of death by starvation.
• Parental Neglect: Entranced by the luxury of the House, Raymond and Penny gradually lose interest in their children in favor of their petty obsessions, to the point that Mabel has to look after Isobel herself. By the ending, Raymond can't even bring himself to pay attention to Mabel's desperate pleas for help, not even when it becomes clear that she and Isobel are going to starve to death if they can't escape from the upper floors of the House.
• Promotion to Parent: After Raymond and Penny die in the withdrawing room fire, Mabel effectively becomes a parent to her baby sister.
• Pyromaniac: Raymond grows increasingly obsessed with starting a fire in the withdrawing room's hearth, especially once it becomes clear that nothing will burn... except for possessions of sentimental value.
• Sanity Slippage: Being Van Schoonbeek's assistant plays merry hell with Mr. Thomas's nerves over time, and he can be seen reacting with growing terror at the sight of the ongoing renovations - to the point that he's left crying in a dark room as his boss approaches with the latest instructions. After ending up lost in the attic, Mr. Thomas suffers a complete meltdown and descends into alcoholism over everything he's had to do.
• Sinister Whistling: The first time Van Schoonbeek appears to make a deal with Raymond, a strident whistle is heard. The same sound is repeated multiple times throughout the first part, always associated with his looming influence.
• Taunting the Transformed: Close to the end of "And heard within, a lie is spun", the influence of Van Schoonbeek causes Raymond and Penny to slowly transform into furniture - the former an armchair, the latter a set of drapes. Just before this transformation comes to a close, Van Schoonbeek can be seen gloating over them, laughing triumphantly as his two victims succumb.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: As Van Schoonbeek and the House corrupts them, Raymond and Penny grow progressively more neglectful of their children, even snapping angrily at Mabel when she calls their bizarre-looking new clothes "foolish." This comes to a head when Raymond callously destroys Mabel's dollhouse simply because he wants something to burn in the fire.
• Uncertain Doom:
  • At the end of the story, Mabel and Isobel may have been able to escape the house, but it's the middle of winter, they don't have any food, the nearest house/village is probably miles away, and they likely have no idea where they are going. We never find out what happened to them, so they may have survived, however, and the track that plays during the ending coupled with the sun rising in the distance suggests hope instead of despair.
  • Mr. Thomas. Unlike Mabel and Isobel, he's never seen escaping and his chances don't look nearly as good given the state he was last seen in, though frankly dying could be considered preferable to servitude to Van Schoonbeek.
• The Voiceless: Van Schoonbeek is seen talking to Raymond at a distance, but never says a word onscreen, instead only laughing at the family's suffering.

Chapter II

• Affably Evil: The Odd Couple never say an unkind word to the Developer at any point, and even show up to retrieve him from the hospital when everyone else seems to have abandoned him... but they have no intention of ending their parasitic squatting, nor do they seem to care that they are driving the Developer insane. They're actually giant mutant versions of the bugs that have been infesting the place. But hey, at least they allow the Developer to join them!
• Ambiguously Gay: It is revealed that the supposed lover the Developer has been talking to throughout the story is in fact his male dentist. However, it's not made clear if he actually is gay or if living in the House has made him delusional enough to mistake the dentist for a woman, although he doesn't seem particularly upset when the facts are brought to his attention. Earlier on he talks about his "relationship" to a clearly male investor though he might have meant it in a more professional tone.
• Animal Metaphor: This is a world populated by rats and parasitic insects, both of which we identify as pest species. They not only subvert (and play straight) their own stereotypes with the twist ending but they also fittingly emphasize the subtle conflict of "true ownership" of the House.
• Angrish: As the disasters stack up, the Developer's dialogue becomes increasingly incoherent in moments of stress, until he's reduced to randomly screaming vowels as he starts ripping papers off his bulletin board. In the end, he loses the ability to speak entirely, reverting to animal intelligence.
• Awesome, but Impractical: The renovations made to the House look pretty extraordinary, but have very little utility and easily break down.
• Bad Bedroom, Bad Life: Despite the lavish upstairs rooms, the Developer sleeps on a cot in the bare, dreary basement. It's definitely a reflection of his unhealthy life and mind.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: As it turns out, the Odd Couple staying in the house are actually human-sized bugs, as is discovered when their extended family welcome the Developer home: on top of sporting additional arms, they proceed to devour the House alive while crawling all over it like cockroaches.
• Black Comedy: Although the whole anthology was advertised as a black comedy, this is the only segment that makes actual use of it. The protagonist is an outright Butt-Monkey suffering a lot of bad luck and the beetles' destructive antics are played for laughs.
• Bratty Half-Pint: One of the potential house-buyers brings their daughter, who spends the viewing tracking mud across the white carpet. She also uses her ice cream to draw on the fish tank and later drops the dessert into the water without any reprimanding from her parents.
• Burn Baby Burn: The Developer gets rid of all his extraneous rubbish by setting it on fire in the backyard, unwittingly scorching his face in the process.
• Catchphrase: The Odd Couple keeps saying “We are extremely interested in your house.” It turns out they just want to trash and eat the place.
• Creepy Cockroach: The bugs are actually fur beetles (Dermestidae) but they largely invoke this, being played for revulsion and horror throughout the chapter. Especially when a giant family of them lay waste to the House's interior.
• Curse Cut Short: During his first attempt at poisoning the bugs, the Developer can be heard snarling expletives at them as they flee, but the scene ends as he's in the middle of his one F-Bomb, immediately cutting to a scene of him lying unconscious in the middle of the kitchen.
• Cutting Corners: Desperate to save his pennies, the Developer dismisses his entire construction crew in favor of carrying out the renovations himself and opts to carry out DIY pest extermination instead of calling in professionals. This turns out to be a disastrous strategy: his renovations are based on style over substance, with him trying to impress potential buyers with expensive fittings and appliances while necessities like taps barely work. Meanwhile, his attempts to kill the bugs are all surface and do nothing about the thousands of bugs lurking under the floorboards.
• Despair Event Horizon: After his attempt at killing the Odd Couple backfires and he ends up in the hospital, the Developer mentally throws in the towel and starts rolling with whatever's thrown at him.
• Disney Acid Sequence: At one point, the Developer trips over his printer and bangs his head on the floor, and experiences a bizarre sequence in which all the bugs in the House appear and perform a Busby Berkeley Number.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Subverted, The Developer yells at the couple using the bathroom, and stops mid sentence to stare at the naked female member of the two. Later its revealed that he is possibly gay, if he isn't just deluding himself into thinking his dentist is his wife, or girlfriend. (Though he could also be deluding himself into thinking the dentist is his husband or boyfriend.) This, coupled with the fact that he's middle aged and is staring someone described as elderly, seems to point to him being more shocked than anything.
• Downer Ending: The Developer's dreams of success end in failure, the House is claimed by the insects and their giant cousins, and the Developer is driven so insane he reverts to animal intelligence. And once again, the House lives on.
• Dramatically Missing the Point:
  • The Developer angers his supposed lover on the phone by calming them darling, so instead he promises to never call them that again, in the process calling them sweetheart. Cue phone getting put down.
  • The Developer makes a phone call to the police about the Odd Couple, whilst his own doorbell is being rung. When he answers it, he's greeted by two police officers, and in spite of the fact he had just phoned the station seconds ago, believes they're here in response to that. Instead, and furthermore, the police are there to tell the Developer that his Dentist, whom he believes is his lover, is threatening to press charges against him if he continues to harass and stalk him with unwanted advances. The Developer's response is to acknowledge he has been doing this but also state he's done nothing wrong and that it's not important to his own grievances.
• Exact Words: The Odd Couple repeatedly tells the Developer "We are extremely interested in your house." Note that they never say they're interested in living there. Their fascination is a lot more literal—they're giant insects planning to eat the entire place.
• Extreme Omnivore: In the climax of the chapter, the invading family of giant insects proceeds to devour almost every single one of the Developer's renovations, consuming the upholstery, the wiring, the carpets, and the furniture.
• Foreshadowing:
  • After finishing the renovations, the Developer tells his lover that he managed to save three thousand pounds in the process, and is apparently told "piss off", a statement the Developer seems to believe is being said in the context of "I don't believe you." It's actually being used in the context of "piss off and leave me alone." The guy he's calling isn't his lover after all, but a dentist that he's been harassing with unwanted advances.
  • In the Developer's living quarters (read: the basement) there is a poster for a dental practice on the wall. His "lover" is later revealed to be his dentist, with the poster likely serving as a basis for his delusion.
  • While poisoning the bugs, the Developer doesn't wear a mask and can often be heard coughing; notably, the first bug-killing scene cuts to him lying in the middle of a floor covered in pesticide and dead insects, suggesting that he might have passed out. This lack of safety precautions ultimately results in the Developer accidentally poisoning himself while trying to kill the Odd Couple, leading to his hospital visit and final descent into madness.
  • The Odd Couple ask about the House's insulation, and seem very happy when it turns out to made from natural fabrics. It's because, as giant insects, they're intent on eating the stuff.
  • Also, the Odd Couple are seen wearing bathrobes with cockroach patterns. They're actually insects themselves.
• Furry Reminder: Early on, the Developer eats a candy bar in rodent-like fashion. Takes a more extreme and unpleasant turn when he goes full-animal at the end.
• Horrible Housing: The Developer lives in the cellar of the House while renovating it, and the barren surroundings and lone camping bed are sharply contrasted by the sumptuous-looking rooms upstairs. For good measure, it's clear that he's at his most miserable down here.
• I Reject Your Reality: When confronted by two police officers on the grounds of harassing his dentist by pretending their his lover over the phone, the Developer claims it's not important and that he's done nothing wrong. A rewatch of prior events implies he's trying to force this delusion into the Dentist's own life whilst ignoring the wrongness of it all; his comments to the cops demonstrate he's fully aware that he's been calling his dentist, so it's not a mistake on his end, and when he's hung up on for the final time, the Developer shouts "Dammit!" coming across as angry at the recipient for not playing along rather that upset that his partner has cut communications.
• Kafka Komedy: The second act focuses on a house contractor trying to renovate the house. It doesn’t quite go as planned, as several fur beetles and a mysterious couple start infesting the home during an open house, all played for really dark laughs.
• Naked Nutter: Having been driven completely insane by his experiences over the course of the episode, the Developer is last seen almost completely naked except for his fur, having clearly chewed through most of his hospital gown at some point during the ending montage.
• No Sense of Personal Space: During the viewing, the Developer is so anxious to make a good impression that he frequently gets too close to the prospective buyers, at one point touching a guest's hand while gathering around the kitchen island. Needless to say, the guests find this off-putting.
• Obliviously Evil: Although the Odd Couple's antics are causing misery to the protagonist, they seem genuinely oblivious to this, and may even hold some affection for him, considering they are there to pick him up at the hospital.
• Police Are Useless: The Developer calls the police to get the Odd Couple out of his house, as he does rightfully own it and they have essentially squatted and taken advantage of him. Unfortunately two officers who come to the door a moment later are only there to issue a warning from his dentist, but they leave in a huff without bothering to listen to his complaint, presumably having written him off as a mentally-ill stalker - though admittedly, the Developer doesn't help his case by acknowledging his harassment. As such, there's no visible response to his actual call to the police, to the point that nobody notices him being removed from the hospital by the accused squatters, or that the horde of people who came in never left and are crawling up walls.
• Rage Breaking Point: The Developer is reduced to incoherent screams as he realizes he's stuck with two parasitic customers, he's hung up on by his supposed lover, tearing down paper and breaking his laptop, and the police won't help him on accounts of his crazy behaviour.
  • The Developer's so-believed lover (read: his dentist) reaches one themselves; angered by the Developer's many inappropriate phone calls where he refers to them with pet names, they call the police and threaten legal action should he continue.
• Red Right Hand: The Odd Couple; ostensibly, they're anthropomorphic rats like the other characters in the story, but their body shape is quite dissimilar: the male has a squat, wide body, while the female has a long, slender frame with an oddly-segmented bone structure. It turns out that they're giant versions of the insects infesting the House.
• The Reveal: The "sweetheart" the Developer is talking to? It’s his dentist, who isn’t happy about the attention.
• Removing the Earpiece: Throughout the story, the Developer wears an earpiece as part of his image as a savvy real estate developer, rarely ever removing it except in his lowest moments; even when he ends up in the hospital, it remains firmly clipped to one ear. However, after completely losing his mind in the finale, he throws it away. More specifically, he kicks it away with his hind leg, having regressed to animal intelligence and chewed off all his other items of clothing.
• Sanity Slippage: The Developer may not have been completely sane to begin with, but he really starts to lose it after the failure of the viewing - to the point that he even tries to murder the two squatters with pesticide. After this fails, he's left staring at the wall of his hospital room in a catatonic trance. After finding himself sharing his home with the bug people, he reverts to animal behavior, eating garbage and living in a burrow behind the oven.
• Scenery-Based Societal Barometer: The fish tank is an easy shorthand for the state of the House and by extension, the Developer's sanity. At the beginning, the one fish appears in good health, but the tank is otherwise empty; as the Developer's renovations grow more desperate, it can be seen gaping at the surface of the water as if hungry; in the viewing, the tank has been equipped with a lush coral display to reflect the latest measures to impress potential buyers - only for a child to immediately begin writing with an ice-cream cone on the side of the tank; in the disastrous aftermath of the viewing, the fish can be seen eating the cone. In the finale, with the Developer completely insane and the House in ruins, the fish is dead and floating belly-up in the tank.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: The Developer's ringtone is a ridiculous version of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik as performed by various cats and dogs... and the only time we get to hear it is when he's being wheeled through the hospital on a gurney after accidentally poisoning himself.
• Spiritual Antithesis: The second story is this to the Creepshow story "They're Creeping Up on You!" Both are about the main character living in a fancy house while trying to keep it clean for the sake of their work. Both the Developer and Upson Pratt constantly call individuals who grow annoyed at their behavior. Both environments get swarmed by bugs and roaches, from the inside of the walls to the technology installed across the buildings. Even the side characters (The Odd Couple and Mr. White) are symbolically seen as giant bugs. The difference is Mr. Pratt is a rich man living up in a fancy condo, looking down at what he sees as the poor people, while the Developer is a poor rat living in a basement, looking up at the buyers who are his only chance at getting out of his financial problems. And in the end Mr. Pratt dies from his obsession to rid his home of the bugs, while the Developer accepts the vermin and becomes one of them himself.
• Straight Gay: Possibly. The main character's offscreen lover is eventually revealed to be a male dentist; assuming that the Developer is actually gay and not just deluded by the House, he has no stereotypical features or mannerisms.
• The Thing That Would Not Leave: The couple who are "interested" in the House never actually buy it, instead sleeping on the property, lounging in the hot tub, watching TV, and having the Developer wait on them, even inviting their entire extended family to stay. They're actually giant versions of the insects that the Developer's been trying to eradicate.
• 13 Is Unlucky: The House is located at 13 VanShoonbeek Lane and indeed, the Developer is put through the wringer trying to get it renovated and sold.
• Through the Eyes of Madness: Throughout the story, the Developer is on the phone with an apparent lover, often begging for affection from them despite their low opinion of him. In the climax, it turns out that he's been talking to his dentist, who is not happy at being constantly harassed by an overfamiliar patient and sends the police to warn him off. For his part, the Developer doesn't even seem to understand why this is a problem. It's also implied that the Odd Couple and the strange happenings are all in his head.
• Trash the Set: The chapter ends with the family of giant bugs trashing the house, devouring anything edible in an orgy of gluttony and filth, with all the Developer's chintzy renovations being destroyed in the process - to the point that the last scene involves the Developer retreating into a burrow dug behind the once-prized rotisserie oven.
• Unanthropomorphic Transformation: After being driven mad by the events of the episode, the Developer begins crawling around on all fours, eating garbage, and chittering like a real rat, ending the episode by crawling into a burrow dug behind the oven.
• Unnervingly Heartwarming: After the Developer accidentally swallows poison and has to be taken to the hospital, the Odd Couple eventually visit so they can take him back to the House - where their extended family is hosting a welcome home party for him, even applauding him as he enters. However, as sweet as this is, it's still undeniably creepy because the Developer has been driven insane by the Odd Couple's unwanted squatting... and the family are starting to look very weird. And the final scene features the Developer regressing to animal intelligence and joining the family of giant beetles in destroying all his hard work.
• Visual Pun: The infesting bugs are identified as "fur beetles". The Odd Couple has fur like the other rats but they are actually beetles.
• Wall Crawl: In the finale, the Odd Couple and their family can be seen scuttling up the walls and ceilings, a sign that they're actually giant versions of the insects infesting the House.
• Wealthy Yacht Owner: The Developer fantasizes about retiring to a yacht after successfully selling the House. This plan doesn't pan out, of course.

Chapter III

• Animal Metaphor: What better animal emphasizes the dire situation of living in a flooded world, and the contradiction of surviving in it, than a cat?
• But Now I Must Go: Elias ultimately decides to leave the House; the hippie couple follows suit.
• Flooded Future World: The world has been completely flooded, leaving Rosa and her tenants to make due with living in the House.
• Hidden Depths:
  • Elias is revealed to be a talented artist and leaves some of his work to Rosa before departing.
  • Cosmos turns out to be a lot more practical than he first appears. Not only does he build a boat for Elias, but he also converts the House itself into a boat so that Rosa can escape.
  • Jen also counts. Despite (or rather, because of) her archetype, she's less of a Cloud Cuckoo Lander than she appears and is better able to see and accept reality for what it is.
• Hope Spot: Towards the end of the chapter, Rosa finally manages to get some clean water from the tap, allowing her to mix a working batch of wallpaper paste and successfully renovate one of the rooms... And then the Ominous Fog arrives, ruining the entire room.
• Horrible Housing: The House is worse than ever by now; the plumbing regularly spews brown gunk instead of water, the floorboards are beginning to peel up, and it's in danger of being inundated by the rising flood. Subverted in the finale, in which Cosmos' modifications transform it into a very functional sailing ship.
• Implausible Deniability: The town is sunken, the House is following suit, and most of the tenants have already fled, yet Rosa insists on carrying on business as if everything is normal.
• Implied Love Interest: It's never outright said, but Elias is implied to have a crush on Rosa (signified by longing stares, making her the focus for a lot of his art and staying around long enough to join Rosa along with the others when she comes out to sea), and she is just not acknowledging it because she is fixated on fixing the House. On some level it's also implied Rosa reciprocates, as she seems particularly hurt to learn he wants to leave, sad when he does without saying goodbye - but leaves art for her, and has a vision that emphasizes him being gone.
• Lighter and Softer: Despite the apocalyptic setting, this final story is nowhere near as dark or unsettling as the previous chapters. It also has the least amount of supernatural happenings and the one time something does happen It's a benefit that helps the main character have their epiphany.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Cosmos. Jen knows he's coming without really having a way to communicate reliably, he seems to understand the vibes of the House, and has an umbrella that somehow becomes a tent implied to be fully furnished and somehow connects to the House's basement. But he never does anything fully unnatural, and we never see the inside of the tent either.
• New-Age Retro Hippie: Jen's archetype. She loves meditating, dancing to new age music, has a mellow personality and pays in healing rocks. Her partner Cosmos also fits the bill, being even mellower than Jen and prone to performances of throat-singing and the digeridoo. In a surprising divergence from how the trope is generally presented, however, they are shown to be the most willing to face reality for what it is, and maturely decide to move on together, encouraging Rosa to follow suit.
• No Antagonist: Unlike the first two segments, this one's devoid of any antagonistic characters; the conflict comes from Rosa's stubborn refusal to let go of the lost cause that is fixing the house and how she comes to grips with the ugly truth of everything.
• Ominous Fog: As the floodwaters continue to rise, they bring with them a colossal fog that quickly envelops the House. Quite apart from the fact that it's a sure sign that the House is within hours of sinking beneath the waterline, the fog itself easily infiltrates the House itself, leaving Rosa stumbling around in a blind panic as she struggles to find Jen.
• Selective Obliviousness: Rosa is actually completely aware of the flooding but refuses to face it, simply telling Jen "there's nothing to talk about" while water is already pooling at her feet.
• Skewed Priorities: Even with the world in ruins and the House in danger of being consumed by the floodwaters, Rosa is still carrying on with her plans of renovating the House, acting as if the building will one day see paying tenants. She even insists on demanding money instead of fish from Elias, claiming that she needs the money to renovate the House... even though money is essentially useless, there's nobody selling what she'd need to improve the building anyway, and the fish would probably be more useful under the circumstances.
• Surprisingly Happy Ending: After the two previous downer endings, this one ends on a happy note with Rosa setting off with the other tenants into the floodwaters, using the House as a makeshift boat.
• Tender Tears: It's subtle, but Elias starts tearing up when Rosa first demands her rent from him. At first we're led to believe he's just upset at being shouted at, but it's more likely that he was actually troubled by Rosa refusing to move on from her delusions of renovating the flooded House.
• Ungrateful Bastard: What the tenants come across as at first, frustrating Rosa by making requests of her in addition to being focused on being practical and wanting to have the resources to fix the House up. However on an isolated island, what they have is actually invaluable to survive (Elias can fish, Jen keeps her emotionally stable and has a garden, and Cosmos is a handyman). It's implied on some level that part of the reason Rosa is high-strung and deluding herself is because she's upset that she doesn't have skills like the others do and views the House as all she is worth. Elias is also constantly portrayed as being incredibly guilty about not being able to pay, even being driven to tears in the first confrontation.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: Rosa thinks she's found hope when Cosmos reveals that he's a handyman and is willing to follow through with her renovation project. She quickly regrets it when she discovers that Cosmos has not only failed to follow through on any of her plans, but also removed several floorboards to make Elias a boat.

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