Who Had It Coming the Most on 'The Fall of the House of Usher'

By Chris Revelle | TV | October 17, 2023 |

By Chris Revelle | TV | October 17, 2023 |

Mike Flanagan’s newest horror series (and his final Netflix project), The Fall of the House of Usher, is a Halloween season delight that marks somewhat of a departure from the creator’s usual output. The Flanaganverse has typically trafficked in horror rooted in tragedy, in which we connect emotionally with a wide cast of characters all struggling with traumas mundane and supernatural. With Usher, we’re invited to watch some of the worst people this side of Succession meet lurid, grisly ends, as is fitting for a Sackler-esque family who made their money pushing a highly addictive pain-killer and kicking off an opioid epidemic. To be certain, the Ushers very much have it coming (and they get it, in spades), but it’s worth wondering: in a family of supervillains, who deserved their theatrical death the most?

On the other side of this gif are spoilers for The Fall of the House of Usher.

All of the Ushers, with the notable exception of young Lenore, have done or been party to some pretty terrible stuff. Though they’re dying due to a dark deal struck with a supernatural force, their deaths are also answers to their crimes and/or their indifferent privilege as untouchable rich people. The Ushers had it coming, but using a highly scientific method (my opinion, also untouchable [natch]), I have figured out which Usher had it coming the most.

While Prospero aka Perry was a callow hedonist who waltzed through life with the barest awareness of Fortunato Pharmaceuticals’ activities and had the grisliest death via acid rain in his fledgling sex club, he’s just a garden-variety rich asshole. Similarly, Napoleon aka Leo is a feckless layabout who “develops” video games, but mainly seems to indulge in expensive benders and cheat on his doting fiancee Julius. He kills Jules’ cat while blacked out, and Verna uses this to kill him in turn, but Leo is also shown to be more emotionally affected by the deaths happening all around them than most of the other Ushers.

Victorine also shows sadness over her lost siblings, but she’s also taking the Elizabeth Holmes path to medical heroism by performing unethical experiments on chimps and falsifying the results. In a family where the Usher children seem to mostly despise one another, it’s notable when one of them sheds tears for one another. Alas, Camille showed no such pain and seemed to delight the loudest in being awful as the family and company’s go-to PR spin-master. Her issues with Victorine drive her to try “busting” her sister and despite Verna warning her her death could’ve been in her sleep, Camille marched right into that deadly chimp lab.

Tamerlane seems so wholly focused on launching her wellness brand Goldbug that the first words she usually exclaims at the news of another dead sibling are, “BUT MY LAUNCH!!!” Seeing someone so detached from her relationships, and who outsources both sexual and emotional intimacy with her husband to sex workers who look like her, be destroyed by her reflection in the mirror was poetically satisfying. Roderick and Madeline have it coming more than most for the simple fact that their dealings with Verna set off this entire chain of events. At least Roderick has the decency to take responsibility to some extent, but Madeline is a defiant sociopath to the end.

That leaves only Frederick aka Frauderick, the eldest Usher son. His descent into darkness is a slow burn but a stark one. Freddie begins as the mealy-mouthed and be-ponytailed corporate shill for Fortunato, but takes a hard left turn once his wife Morrie is discovered as the only survivor of Perry’s sex club. Jealousy and paranoia grip Freddie as he traps Morrie in their home and inflicts what I can only describe as a Nice Guy-flavored Misery experience on her. Drugging and berating Morrie before performing some unspeakable acts of dentistry on her is what sealed Frauderick’s fate as the Usher who had it coming the most. Verna seemed to agree as her treatment of Freddie is by far the most ruthless and his death is a deliciously gross riff on The Pit and the Pendulum.

Who’s your pick for the Usher who had it coming the most?

This piece was written during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike, the series being covered here wouldn’t exist.