Florence Bravo
Dr. David McCall (David Hayward) and his wife Emily (Lori Cardille) move into a new house in Pennsylvania, hoping for a fresh start after the doctor's recent case of adultery. The house is said to have formerly been owned by the wicked man-hater Florence Bravo (Lauren Klein), who murdered her own husband Charles for similarly cheating on her. Florence's vengeful spirit soon appears before Emily, and desires to make the young woman her new companion by deciding to recreate her husband's death. Emily soon overhears her husband talking to Julian Hanratty (Carol Levy), the realtor who sold the McCalls the house, mistaking their conversation as a sign that he's about to commit another case of adultery. When David tries explaining things to Emily, she's unfortunately too far gone to listen.
Tropes:
- Ambiguous Ending: What happened to Emily after she killed David? It's likely that she either went insane and started seeing Florence full-time, or was killed after she killed him and became a ghost herself, but neither theory is proven true.
- And Then John Was a Zombie: Emily apparently ends the episode becoming a man-hating ghost just like Florence.
- Artistic License – History: Florence Bravo was a real woman who really did murder her husband, but she actually lived in England, while the episode is set in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
- Awful Wedded Life: David and Emily's marriage is strained after David committed adultery, and thanks to Florence's gaslighting, Emily goes insane enough to murder him.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Florence succeeds in gaslighting and manipulating Emily into killing David, and the poor woman evidently becomes a demented, man-hating ghost haunting the house right alongside her.
- Card-Carrying Villain: Florence's ghost makes no attempt to hide that she killed Charles, and paints herself as a devoted man-killer.
- Catapult Nightmare: Emily has one where David and Julian, the latter dressed as Florence, make love in Florence's rocker.
- Chill of Undeath: The room where Emily and David find Florence's old rocking chair is said to be rather chilly. Julian dismisses it as the persistent drafts found in old homes, but Florence's ghost manifests in the chair to influence Emily into doing her bidding.
- Cold Ham: The villainous Florence remains calm and stoic as she talks to Emily.
- Does Not Like Men: Florence detests the male gender after catching Charles cheating on her and killing him, and manipulates Emily into killing David for her own sadism.
- Foreshadowing:
- The start of the second act has David and Julian looking through the historical records about Charles Bravo's murder, and combined with Florence's vivid description of the incident, she killed him in the exact same way in which Emily kills David.
- Earlier, a discolored section of the floor prompts David and Julian to suffer a sudden bout of dizziness and almost faint. We later learn that Charles died on that exact spot, and so does David when Emily gets through with him.
- For the Evulz: Florence pressures and gaslights Emily into thinking that David is planning to cheat on her again and prompts her to kill him, both to have a new friend and because she's bored haunting her house all the time.
- Haunted House: Florence's old house, where her ghost pressures Emily into killing David to recreate how she murdered Charles.
- Hearing Voices: Florence's ghost gets into Emily's head this way, since we don't see her face until late in the second act.
- History Repeats: Emily kills David in the exact same way Florence killed her own husband Charles, to the letter.
- The Killer in Me: Some implications of the ending hint that Florence actually possessed Emily to kill David, then killed her herself, as evidenced by the ending showing the two sitting together and laughing while they hold hands.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Was Florence's ghost real all along, and manipulated Emily into shooting David? Or was the ghost merely a series of hallucinations Emily conjured up after she went insane following David's adultery? The latter theory carries some evidence since David asks Emily if she's been taking her pills, and she reveals that David's adultery gave her a nervous breakdown that put her in a mental hospital.
- Mrs. Exposition: Julian, who tells the McCalls about the story of Florence's murder of Charles.
- My Greatest Failure: David considers his cheating on Emily as his greatest shame, so he decides to move the couple into Florence's old house for a fresh start. Florence's vengeful ghost manipulates Emily into thinking that David can and will easily cheat on her again so she can kill him.
- Nightmare Fetishist: Florence was one in life, as hearing the news of her husband Charles being shot and lying in a pool of his own blood was to smile and eagerly hope he was dead.
- Not What It Looks Like: Emily eavesdrops on David's conversation with Julian, the realtor who sold them Florence's house, under the ghost's suggestion. As David explains that he wants to sell the house because of how it's giving Emily's mind too much to work with, the portion of the conversation she overhears makes it seem like David is propositioning the realtor for sex.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: Emily's dialogue hints that she's still quite bitter about David's adultery case, and Florence makes good use of that later on.
- Riddle for the Ages: The supernatural interpretation of the ending. If Emily did indeed become a ghost like Florence, how did it happen? Did she kill herself after killing David? Did she tell the police what happened and resisted arrest? Did she get convicted and sentenced to the death penalty? We get virtually no answer as to how she died.
- Straw Feminist: Florence detests men of all kinds and killed Charles for cheating on her. Julian even notes that her behavior was ahead of her time.
- Vengeful Ghost: Florence murdered Charles before she died, and she still inhabits her old house in death, gaslighting Emily into killing David.
- Very Loosely Based on a True Story: Florence Bravo
was a real person who did indeed murder her husband, but the key difference in the episode's portrayal of her is that her house resides in the United States, while the real Bravo lived in England. - Woman Scorned: Florence might be the prime example of the trope, as she caught her husband cheating on her, viciously killed him, and manipulates Emily into doing the same to David after he cheated on her long ago.
