Netflix: The Haunting of Hill House Episode 7 (Eulogy) recap

Haunting of Hill House — Courtesy of Netflix

After the service, Shirley refuses to ride with Kevin, and won’t go with Steve and Theo either. She ends up riding with Hugh, who starts lecturing her again. Olivia, in the back seat, tells him to stop, and Shirley tells him to stay out of her business.

At Hill House, one of the fans Hugh rented is not working, and he asks Steve to unplug it, which he does. Hugh is distracted as he reaches his hand in, and the fan is on. His hand is sliced open, and Steven insists he unplugged the fan.

Hugh goes to the red room and as he tries to open the door again, we see that his hand is bandaged. He bangs on the door, frustrated.

At Nell’s graveside, each family member throws a handful of dirt on her coffin. Luke is last, and whispers, “I’m so sorry.” He looks up and sees the Bent Neck Lady standing in front of the headstone. We see a decayed version of Olivia reaching up from Nell’s grave, trying to pull Luke down, and Steve pulls him back. When Luke tells him about seeing Nell and Olivia, Steve says he didn’t see anything. In his usual supportive way, he tells Luke to get himself together “so you don’t end up like Mom and Nell. It’s in our genes, it’s a sickness.”

Haunting of Hill House — Courtesy of Netflix

At Hill House, Hugh wakes suddenly during the night, only to find Olivia straddling him, holding a screwdriver to his neck. She is asleep, and when he wakes her up, she is confused, saying she had a horrible dream.

Hugh shows her the master blueprints she drew up. She has used the same shape over and over again on the prints, he gently tells her that it’s the footprint to their forever house. She denies it, but is shaken up. He suggests she visit Janet, and she agrees, saying that she hasn’t been sleeping, due to dreams and migraines.

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At the funeral home, Hugh talks to Luke, telling him he overheard he and Steve at the grave. He says that he sees Olivia every day, it’s normal for widowers, but sometimes it’s NOT normal. Luke says curtly, “Big boys know the difference between what’s real and imaginary, right?” Hugh says he is proud of him, and Luke leaves to “get some air.”

At Hill House, Hugh hears the rats in the basement again, and pulls out some bricks. When he peers into the hole, he sees a body inside, and it’s the thing that came after Luke when he was in the dumbwaiter. He calls the police, and they take down the wall. The office tells Hugh he may have just solved their oldest cold case. William Hill disappeared, and it looks like he not only walled himself in, but tried to scratch his way out.

Back at the funeral home, Hugh takes some pills, then Steve walks up to him. Hugh invites him to join him for a drink at the hotel, but Steve says he has an early flight. Olivia tells Hugh to say he is sorry he didn’t talk or listen to Steve, or wasn’t there for him, that it is the regret of his life. Instead, he just tells him to “fly safe.”

Shirley discovers that her wallet is missing, and Theo’s car is gone. They realize that Luke never came back inside, and that he is the thief. Theo and Hugh see footprints on the carpeting leading into Shirley’s office. They go in and see her model of the forever house has been destroyed. Then, they both see the decayed Olivia crawling out from under the desk. Shirley comes in and asks “who did this?” Hugh’s response is that he can fix it.

We are back at the police station, Hugh gets upset every time the officer suggests that Olivia killed herself, and says the house killed her. The police want to know why he waited three hours to call them, and he insists that he thought she had gone to Janet’s. Shirley woke him up because she saw Olivia in the kitchen, and she too thought she was gone.

We see Hugh running towards the red room…and this time, the door is open. He runs inside, and the end credits roll. What the hell is in that room???

We learned a lot about Hugh in this episode. He always wants to fix everything, be it his house or his fractured family. He wants a relationship with his kids, but he can’t figure out how to talk to them (although his phantom wife keeps telling him EXACTLY how to do it).

Fan of The Haunting of Hill House? Looking forward to more from the Netflix series? Let the other horror heads know what you think in the comment section below.