Warning, contains spoilers for episodes 3 and 4 of “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
Mike Flanagan’s Netflix horror series “The Fall of the House of Usher” is a beast! This does not only mean the raven, which runs like a common thread through the episodes and was probably the absolute identifying characteristic of the original Edgar Allan Poe. In episode 3, Chimpanzee can also cause carnage (and certainly bring back memories of Jordan Peele’s beautiful “Nope” for some viewers).
But that’s not all: in episode 3 we also witness how the restless drug addict Leo (Rahul Kohli) rather brutally kills Pluto, the cat of his partner Julius (Daniel Jun), after it attacked him several times. This storyline continues in episode 4 (“The Black Cat”). Leo gets a replacement cat from the animal shelter, but that turns out not to be a sweet cat either, but also attacks the Usher offspring with hard bandages.
This ultimately ends with Leo not only destroying the entire apartment with Thor’s hammer (!), but ultimately jumping off the balcony to his death after trying to push the black pooch off the premises. We then see a black cat climbing over Leo’s body. Mike Flanagan has now pointed this out via X (formerly Twitter).
Does Mike Flanagan really hate cats?
The showrunner, screenwriter and director was asked about the feud between Leo and the cats on the social media platform: “What have cats ever done to you?” a user wants to know. And Mike Flanagan has a response ready, once again drawing attention to a very crucial detail in the Episode 4 finale.
“OK. So… ‘The Black Cat’ was written by Edgar Allan Poe. In HIS version a cat is killed. In my version (SPOILER!) it turns out that the killing of the cat was just a hallucination. In MY version it is the cat healthy and happy. Who hates cats? :)”
User Flanagan replies: “Wait. When will it become clear that it was a hallucination?!?! I know the angry cat was a hallucination, but Pluto didn’t die?”. In fact, it soon becomes clear that the imaginary cat associated with the mysterious woman played by Carla Gugina was not real. But Pluto didn’t die either, which is made clear by the Gucci necklace at the end of episode 4:
“That’s why we put so much emphasis on the fact that Pluto was wearing a Gucci collar, but the new cat wasn’t. Look at the cat wearing that collar in the last shot of episode 4.’
So it is clear that the first battle with the ‘real Pluto’ did not take place. Instead, the animal appears to have simply hidden or lived loose for a few days. This has apparently happened several times, as evidenced by a dialogue between Leo and Julius. One thing is certain: Mike Flanagan is not a cat hater, but has specifically decided not to let any of the cats die – combined with an exciting detail.
All eight episodes of ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’ can be viewed on Netflix.