Fans of director Mike Flanagan (or, as they are dubbed by Netflix, Flanafans) have been singing him praises for his episodic shows since the release of The Haunting of Hill House in October 2018. From the hauntingly beautiful story of the Hill House family, the tragic and devastating occurrences of Bly Manor, the extraordinary hopelessness of Midnight Mass, all the way to the macabre fascination with death and what happens after in The Midnight Club, Flanagan has found a way to captivate his audience using new avenues for horror.

However, fans will have to follow him to a new streaming service. Deadline announced earlier this month that Flanagan and his creative partner Trevor Macy signed a multiyear exclusive deal with Amazon Studios. This new partnership will bring new ideas and content to fans, but what could that look like? Let's explore.

How Mike Flanagan Approaches His Audience

Hamish Linklater as Father Paul in Midnight Mass.
Netflix

His reliance on deep emotional connections between the characters and the audience rather than gore and jump scares sets him apart from other directors in a way that keeps viewers obsessively waiting for his next project. Flanagan has his finger on society’s pulse regarding mental illnesses, addiction, and loss, and he uses these strategically in his creations not only to draw heavily on the audience’s empathy, but he also strangely manages to make the horror genre more frightening by playing on those emotions.

If you need a great example of how Flanagan accomplishes this, look no further than episode four of The Haunting of Hill House. Nell’s (Victoria Pedretti) twin brother, Luke (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), was at the forefront of this episode. In the first few episodes of this season, Luke is painted as the drug-addict brother who does nothing but break his family’s trust and bleed them dry to feed his addiction. It became easy for his family to devalue his experiences and needs because they only saw the external conflict of drug abuse.

Related: Mike Flanagan and Trevor Macy Exit Netflix and Head to Amazon Studios

Here is where Flanagan worked his story-telling magic. Flanagan made sure his audience saw what he wanted them to see with what Luke was doing. To start by portraying Luke as a drug addict worked so well in reaching audience members on all sides of addiction. The entire situation was meant to feel uncomfortable, frustrating, and sometimes hopeless.

When it is revealed to the audience that both young and adult Luke had turned to his addictions because of this, it starts a downward spiral of emotions that many were not prepared for. It took the negative connotation and outlook on addiction and gave it a very real and devastating personification.

Flanagan forced the audience to experience not just the addiction struggles of his character, but he also forced them to experience and see a root cause. He used addiction to portray horror and horror to amplify addiction. He continued to use this approach to emotional horror in his subsequent series, as well. He seems to have perfected the art of creating powerful emotional bonds between his characters and the audience.

Flanagan Uses Architecture to His Advantage

Haunting of Bly Manor
Netflix

Another consistent story-telling device Flanagan uses is the presence of a house. For many, houses represent family, love, and stability. What better way to set an audience on edge than by taking the symbol of family and stability and making it feel like the opposite of that?

In his first two series, Flanagan creates an unsettling backdrop with houses that have been haunted for years. In each of these shows, the families attached to these houses always suffer terrifying supernatural occurrences that take place within the houses. Some family members also suffer an inescapable terrible fate.

In Midnight Mass, the house was a church. Not unlike a home, the church can be a place of comfort or refuge for people. However, in the midst of the strange new priest and other peculiar and supernatural happenings in the island community, that house became more of a source of contention than anything else.

Related: Mike Flanagan Still Wants to Adapt Stephen King’s Dark Tower as His Dream Project

The Midnight Club’s use of a house as a hospice for terminally ill teenage cancer patients accomplishes the same. The building and the grounds it is located on allegedly have some sort of magical property that some characters believe can heal them.

All of these buildings with uncontrollable paranormal happenings play into Flanagan’s ability to reach his audiences on a more psychological level. To take a symbol of security and protection and turn it into a place where uncertainty abounds and frightening things happen is a genius move on Flanagan’s part to make his audience even more emotionally unsettled.​​​​​​​

What We Can Expect Next

Iman as Llonka in The Midnight Club
Netflix

In his next project, Flanagan will undoubtedly continue his previous uses of audience engagement as he tackles The Fall of the House of Usher. This retelling of the Edgar Allan Poe short story includes many well-loved repeating cast members from his previous projects such as Zach Gilford, Carla Gugino, Kate Siegel, and Henry Thomas as well as newcomers to the Flanaverse, like Mark Hamill. It is set to premiere sometime in 2023 on Netflix.

Since this Poe story centers on family, tragedy, and a house that seems to personify misery and hardship, Flanafans are sure to be in for another emotional rollercoaster that will plunge them straight into the horror they crave.