The Villain of Edith Finch

Script - jphanderson.wo...
Twitter - / jph_anderson
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[@loxartofficial]

Excuse me, that shark falling down the hill is an artistic masterpiece.

[@tattycakes2k2]

That was so unintentionally hilarious and slapstick lol

[@lov_eli]

​@@tattycakes2k2 I don't know how unintentional that was, like, come one, there ain't no world where that shark ain't funny af

[@eva1585]

Felt like it was a much needed pause from the general feeling of "WTF" and unease from Molly's story. Especially with it being the first POV you go through. It gives you a quick chuckle to ease the tension but following that it wasnt hard to get back into the story.

[@The-S-H3lf-Eater]

when is it???? please i beg you its been 4 years.

[@icecreamchats]

@@The-S-H3lf-Eater10:38

[@BRICK101]

Walter's line "Even a monster on the other side of the door starts to feel normal" is revealing because Walter is separated from the train by a wall, but he is separated from Edie by a door.

[@melonhead8760]

Like she thought he was monstrous?

[@TwofoldEthics]

​@@melonhead8760 It's possible, but I think they were implying the monster on the other side of the door was Edie; That Edie is the monstrous one. Walter was willing to bust through a wall, but not go through the door

[@melonhead8760]

@@TwofoldEthics ah, I understand!

[@thumtak_]

@@TwofoldEthics i took as though the curse was outside his door

[@annieandelsieofarendelle3294]

@@thumtak_ Maybe it's both.

[@Itariatan]

And the hero they deserved was child protective services.

[@aturchomicz821]

b r u h

[@Michipicoten]

Yes

[@Michipicoten]

4 likes. I’ll take it

[@tazymomo9394]

Yeah probably, except edith died in child labor and number two she was 17 of course she was reckless and stupid I'm 18 and I could most definitely say I'd easily make the same mistake edith did, Especially if I was completely alone with no family or anyone to stop me. I'm not saying she's not accountable for her actions but what 17 year old would be a responsible mother Especially when she is completely alone with nothing but her bizarre childhood home and unstable life to give to the child

[@Itariatan]

@@tazymomo9394 I never mentioned Edith.

[@Leon-yg5gm]

i love the way the devs portrayed dawn as kind of a bitch, even someone childish with sealing the rooms while edie was the supportive grandmother as you're first going through the game. Then as you progress you realize that dawn has extremely good reasons for acting that way, and maybe edie is a bit more nefarious than just the kindly grandmother.

[@justincruz5720]

I have to admit, I was hoodwinked.

[@EJD339]

It’s like when you see someone being an ahole at that current moment and judge then and then you actually get the story why they were acting that way and it’s understandable.

[@Justin-og9gu]

Dawn is relatable, but wrong. The entire point there is insulating her kids from the stories of death WON'T protect them from it. Eddie is living proof of that. She is the most immersed in stories of death and most given to the idea of the curse, yet she is also the longest-live Finch. I feel like this video takes the position of "Dawn was right" when the reality of what happens in the game shows that she actually wasn't.

[@nightperson1012]

​@Justin-og9gu I think it's actually in the middle. Grandma Edie is obsessed with the deaths of her family and glamorizing the so- called curse, to the detriment of her living family. Dawn, meanwhile, is acting out of trauma and trying to suppress this information completely, clashing with Edie's glorification. This suppression only made it easier for Edie's stories to get to Milton and Lewis and led to their deaths (implied, in Milton's case). Neither are right, and the issue is the family "curse" and generational trauma manifesting in different unhealthy ways. Edie came from a traumatic background and initially made sense of it by turning it into a story that slowly got bigger and more out of hand, twisting the entire family into a tragic mindset of obsession and the glorification of death. Dawn is pushing back against it, but only feeds it as a result, losing her children in the end.

[@ShinySpinarak]

​@@Justin-og9gu I don't agree. In my opinion, Edie has lived so long because she didn't didn't believe in the Death Curse. The Death Curse that has caused a lot of weird, and traumatic twisted thoughts in the family, that has caused them to ignore some pretty intense situations. Because they'll die by the death curse, so, who cares? That attitude is bad, a lot of these people wouldn't have died if they were more cautious. Lewis, in this interpretation, is a victim of being obsessed with death and the stories in a completely twisted way. Seeing them grander than his life, in a time where he was suffering a great depression, caused him to do what he did.

[@dr.loboto1171]

I like to think that Milton figured the truth about the "curse" and ran away, leaving behind that flipbook as an explanation for his disappearance that he thought his family wasn't mentally well enough to see through.

[@DiaryofBloom]

so Milton left the house. Wow smart.

[@binarybus11000]

I never thought of that. I know there’s a comment about the unfinished swan but I’m still with you on this. I hope he recognized what was really going on and ran away. Very brilliant.

[@phylippezimmermannpaquin2062]

@@Todd-_-Umptious honestly i would have prefered if it remained a reference but milton actualy ran away from the curse

[@lopamurblamo]

@@binarybus11000 In the Reddit AMA, the developers basically confirm that Milton's story wasn't over even by the time of WROEF. He's probably still out there.

[@binarybus11000]

Logan Blackwell Interesting. I look forward to seeing what lies ahead for him.

[@nerocrescendo1306]

There’s a huge hint in Edie’s room about her pride in enshrining the dead in the form of binders. Three, thick as hell binders labeled “shrine sketches” “Barbara sketches” “Molly sketches” Even her pet birds have their own tiny shrines, with portraits of them inside their cage next to the window you come in. I remember thinking “how insane do you have to be to literally fill up a binder of sketches for your dead children’s gravestones?”

[@SmileytheSmile]

WH-WHAT?! HOW?! I ONLY WATCHED YOUR LIE IN APRIL THIS SUNDAY! IT'S A RELATIVELY OBSCURE SHOW! AND YET, AFTER PLAYING A RANDOM GAME I GOT A LONG TIME AGO AND GOING ON A RANDOM VIDEO ABOUT IT, I FIND A PERSON WITH KAORI PROFILE PIC!

[@yourlocalpunkposer8107]

@@SmileytheSmile If it's on Netflix, it isn't obscure

[@SmileytheSmile]

@@yourlocalpunkposer8107 I said relatively obscure. It's a dtama anime from 2016, if I remember correctly, about a very specific topic. I wouldn't have known about it if I didn't discover its first opening in a Top 100 anime openings list.

[@asdfgidji879]

@@SmileytheSmile any anime could be considered relatively obscure as far as TV goes but your lie in april is reasonably popular among people who watch anime

[@maggieent3215]

she was insane...

[@movieclipsvideos1781]

Fun Fact: I have always been afraid of going all the way round on a swing no idea why, so actually having to make a character do it was way to intense.

[@Henrix1998]

Good because it actually isn't possible without special swing

[@titosfilippotis7039]

I know.My fear of heights didnt help when I started doing loops and shot off into the sea.

[@rylee_dads_bestie69]

Being afraid of heights definitely helps (not)

[@phylippezimmermannpaquin2062]

that scene was awful for me because *besidesseeingachilddie* ive had multiple dreams as a child where i would get violently launched into the air and i always hated the feeling of the g force and the impending doom of smashing into the ground

[@movieclipsvideos1781]

Oh crap this got a lot of likes

[@jackb3982]

Don’t know if anyone has already said this but something that occurred to me was that it actually makes total sense that Molly would envision death/the family curse coming for her as a sea monster since probably the first story she had heard of the curse was when Odin Finch went down at sea with the old house. To a little girl, it’s probably like a sea monster had swallowed him whole, and I wouldn’t put it past Edith Sr. to make it sound that way when she described it to Molly.

[@jimin6813]

This makes so much sense! Especially with her painting of a sea monster in her room

[@maiiau]

Regarding Edie's death and her door, I assumed she intentionally killed herself rather than leave the house, and that she spent that last night drilling the peephole, putting her name on the door, and sealing it up so her room would match all the others. It would make complete sense for someone like Edie to already have her own fancy door decorations ready for her own death.

[@gryphtube]

That actually also explains the fact that she has a monument on her tombstone like everyone else. Otherwise it makes no sense to have one because Dawn never would've according to this theory.

[@lizziemarie7877]

Yeah she had her pills with alcohol so maybe that caused her death?

[@notsurewhy3263]

@@lizziemarie7877 yea, she probably did what is classic for elderly dying people in cartoons, locked herself in the room until she died. Only thought is, the door is still sealed- so how did they remove her body? She possibly sealed the door from the outside and then died elsewhere in the house, which would makes a lot of sense

[@NafNav32]

Did you notice all the wine bottles and beer cans in the crawlspaces and passageways? I think Edie spent her last night revisiting the memorials, getting ready to join them.

[@haileyroberts1103]

@@NafNav32 Did Dawn lock everything again then?

[@shatteredXmirror]

Finally someone said it! "You don't leave a baby alone in the bath!" The whole time during this scene I was yelling at the mom.

[@nunyabisness1979]

you know what scares me most about that story..... i was a baby left alone in a bath and i was legally dead for a period of time before my father revived me (luckily he was military and had CPR training) .... that thought scares the hell out of me anytime i see any drowning scene. part of me thinks that might have been the straw the broke the camels back and finally lead to my father divorcing his then wife.

[@shatteredXmirror]

@@nunyabisness1979 I'm sorry that happened to you. I'm so glad you're still with us today. I can't imagine the anxiety you must have been feeling during that scene.

[@nunyabisness1979]

@@shatteredXmirror don't worry too much about it, it might cause me discomfort but I've learned to deal with it, contrary to popular belief you can be afraid forever but you can't let it control you forever

[@2phonebabykeem913]

Nunya Bisness oh god just hearing your story scares the hell out of me. I’m glad you’re alive.

[@cozy_kelpie]

That section was the only one that actually upset me. I have a nephew that age. My ma taught us when we were still kids that you never leave a baby (or toddler) alone in the bath. Phone rings? You ignore it or you pick the baby up and take him with you. Doorbell rings? You ignore it or you pick the baby up and take him with you. You need to step out for like 10 seconds just to grab something you forgot and you'll be right back, no big deal? Take. The. Baby. With. You

[@axse996]

you can hear the narrator's voice crack when talking about the baby's death. I feel like it really hit him home with that one

[@coolattas6309]

Neringa Mecelyte I know this comment is kind of old but maybe it’s because Edith doesn’t want the same fate for her baby

[@0xabhi]

@@coolattas6309 I think he's referring to the narrator of this video, instead of the narrator of this game Edith finch

[@sopiegut]

Thanks for the info I skipped that part cause I couldn't relive the nightmare.

[@PANCHO15108]

Yeah that one hit me hard I was balling....

[@lakay683]

i’m pretty sure he has a son, so i’m sure this hit really hard.

[@sofiamansour-tehrani4727]

Edie’s shrines are definitely to the family members’ deaths, not them themselves and their lives. Like, Barbara is immortalized forever with her crutch, inspiring Edith to add it to her own drawing of her in the journal, and it’s what Walter keeps to remember her by in the bunker; through the glorification of her death, it’s turned into this iconic item. But that wasn’t her crutch! It was her boyfriend’s! She only held it once that we know of when she was defending herself from whoever her attacker was in reality. It wasn’t important to her at all in life, but it was part of her death. So it’s one of the key things that represents her.

[@RichArchilles]

The attackers were most definitely a gang of home invaders mentioned in the radio earlier. They were even described as wearing masks. Whether they were actually from the convention or not is another thing, but I don't believe Rick had anything to do with it. The police blamed it on Rick because they found one of his crutches, but the other was with Barbara, so how did he escape with a broken leg? I think it also goes in line with the pattern of the romantic partners of the Finches falling to the same curse. Gotta say though, that comic came out just one year after her death. That's pretty fucked up.

[@millerblaylock]

​@@RichArchillesI thought the radio was only to set up the fictional monster attack just for the tabloids. I had always thought the most probable death was Barbara being murdered by her boyfriend.

[@goodeveningduchess]

​@@millerblaylockI think it's intentionally ambiguous - one of those crimes that you will unfortunately never know the real answer to. IMO there's even a couple of clues to suggest that her father was the one who killed her - the hook hand right after Sven hurt his hand, AND her ear ends up in the music box that he made for her. I'm not saying that's what happened, just that the whole story plays out the way many true crime stories do where there's a plethora of possibilities and no real answer.

[@tomato5499]

I personally believe that Edie made Barbaras comic based off how the comic artist knows about the interior of the house, even down to the key in the music box. I don't think that Barbaras death was never truely found out, which is why it ended in such a bizzare way. Edie can infer that Barbara used the key to unlock the basement and maybe kick someone off the patio onto the chandelier, but what actually killed her is a mystery

[@giantWario]

@@millerblaylock Her boyfriend is 100% dead too, how would he escape a manhunt without his crutches while barely able to walk?

[@roybenari]

I mostly came to the same conclusions. It first hit me when I realized how insane it would be to keep raising a child within the same room he grew up with his twin, not changing a thing, and even keeping the chalk marks while adding on to the surviving child. Imagine being Sam, growing up with a constant reminder of your dead twin, right in front of you, when you go to sleep, when you wake up, when you hang out to do your homework or whatever. Edie is batshit crazy. Also, something that suddenly occurred to me - how did Dawn ever got found and rescued after her dad fell to his death? This is a fantastic game.

[@anemxia9393]

Yeah Edie is really batshit crazy. And for the thing with Dawn, im really sure they had phones back then and that she called for help (just propeply on a flip phone)

[@Tamaki742]

I could only imagine that it's probably her way to cope after losing Molly in the first place. On top of already losing her father and husband. It's still insane but, she can't help but cling whatever left of her children at that point.

[@jettstorm2253]

@@Tamaki742 I agree. I think it's just her way of grieving, and memorializing them in such symbolic, poetic and intricate ways is her way of finding closure.

[@Tamaki742]

@@jettstorm2253 Yeah, but at the same time I really can't deny how it's horrible that she couldn't even think about how her children are dealing with it. In her mind, she's trying to leave this grandiose legacy that her family would be remembered by, because one day the Finches would probably be no more. But the fact that it extends to neglect and profiteering from your children's deaths? Edith obviously needs help. Help which she refused.

[@MFESPFTWKF]

Dawn was a teenager so I think she had enough knowledge to find her way back to the house and after all it was Sam who taught her to be tough

[@yodaleiheehu3280]

The line "Every Finch is buried somewhere in the library" is now more creepy

[@Memnto_Morii]

You have one of the best usernames I have ever seen.

[@McBehrer]

@@Memnto_Morii agreed

[@abzu235]

@@Memnto_Morii could you explain that to me? I don't understand what's so funny about it

[@farazriyaz9078]

@@abzu235 Try yodeling to his name

[@abzu235]

@@farazriyaz9078lmao thanks that's a good one

[@tostsoup]

I know this video’s 3 years old already but since it wasn’t very obvious, and no one has seemed to figure it out yet, the true cause of death of Gus was that the giant totem pole crushed him. You see in the flashback that when the wind and his kite picks up the tent, it hits the totem pole causing it to rock, and then the camera goes out of frame as Gus stumbles to the ground. When as Edith on the beach we see the totem pole knocked over on the beach right where Gus was standing in the flashback.

[@4to5MouseHive]

omg that is so smart! I remember looking at the totem pole while playing as Gus and thinking it was strange how it was directly behind him

[@cookiesyruplover]

This is so important! It's because totem poles symbolize hierarchy or "marking a family's lineage and validating the powerful rights and privileges of the family". It shows how the neglect of the parents, in every generation of the Finches, doomed their children. Making the curse "real".

[@4to5MouseHive]

@@cookiesyruplover that's so scary!!!!

[@pundertalefan4391]

I never even noticed that. Woah.

[@marcosgranero9719]

YEESS. I remember watching the trees and wondering why there were plastic chairs on top of them, now it all makes sense

[@lachlankidd6517]

The worst part to me is that Edith Sr. put the plaque for Gregory on the door of the bathroom, where he would have died, and not his room. It would have been a constant reminder.

[@BladeTheDarkWarrior]

Except Gregory's room is shared with his siblings and since we don't see the actual outside of that specifically the door we don't know if Edie didn't put a plaque to both Gregory and Gus on that door since we never se a plaque for Gus.

[@atemephii]

@@BladeTheDarkWarrior considering that she made his son sleep in the same room where his brother decided to fly, not sure if the other siblings were of her concern.

[@greenliongirl07]

I actually have a theory on that which also explains why Edith Sr and Lewis's room were sealed off and had the peep holes with the plaque. The entire game, we play as Edith Jr but it's her journey as interpreted by her son. Even if Dawn was determined to keep her other children from the stories, sealing up those rooms would've made no sense because they were still being used, especially the bathroom. Even within the context of the story it makes no sense because in order to get to Edie's room, she and anyone else would have to go thru Molly's room and out the window. Edith says she'd never been in Molly's room before, but there's a picture of her with Edie and Dawn that was taken inside Edie's room. The more likely scenario is those rooms were not sealed, but because Edith wrote about all the rooms being sealed with the peep holes . . . Actually I don't remember Edith saying Edie put up the plaques. I guess what I'm saying is this is how Edith's son imagines the house because odds are he's never been inside. This trip to visit Edith's grave might be his first trip to the house. He's told that the rooms of dead relatives are sealed and have peep holes, except for Walter's room which is the only room Edith specifies wasn't sealed. Since Edie seems obsessed with honoring the dead, something like plaques would make sense even if they weren't there in reality. Think back to the end with Edith's room has power even though at the beginning of the story we're told the power had been cut off before she and Dawn left.

[@Terrxrzecke161]

What confuses me about gregorys dead and what i didnt saw anyone point out yet is how he turned on the water that drowned him in the first place. Its not him reaching for the thing in the first place and he seems to be to small to do so in the first place, his imaginative flying frog did. How did Gregory really die then? Who turned the water back on?

[@technothehedgehog203]

​@@Terrxrzecke161I would say that unbeknownst to the player the drain and water handle may have had a bit of wear and tear (and just have been cleaned but not thoroughly replaced) so it isn't too unrealistic to think that the baby may have thrown one of his toys with enough force to cause the handle to turn on and for the plug to have gotten slowly shifted to the drain while the water ran

[@mikey_m114]

the fact that you can hear people crying out in fear and panic as Lewis bows his head down… holy _shit_

[@acebee46]

Wait really omfg

[@mikey_m114]

@@acebee46 yeah! maybe I’m reading too far into things, but when the music crescendos to a stop and Lewis sees that last bit of reality right before he dies, it sounds like you can hear the sounds of other factory workers screaming for someone to stop him

[@jjadac3529]

@@mikey_m114 Yeah, that part scared me so bad I put my monitor to sleep thinking there was going to be a jumpscare 😆

[@Exhausted905]

As someone who actually hasn’t played the game and only found out about this game through this video essay, damn. I think it makes Lewis’s suicide worse as this implies he killed himself via the fish cutter, maybe putting his neck under it, mirroring the his dream world’s decapitation. Which uh, is certainly a method of death. I do wonder why he chose that method instead of the more common methods. It could’ve been impulsive. He’d been haunted by all these suicidal thoughts but one day during work, he was like “fuck it, I’m done with this world” and impulsively killed himself using the only dangerous thing around. And a thought I had, people who have attempted suicide but survive often feel sudden regret and wanting to live. Maybe Lewis felt that too as the fish cutting blade fell.

[@rileysmith9929]

@@Exhausted905he 100% killed himself with the fish cutter. The sound of u cutting the fish is in the background through his whole story and it almost fades away completely at the end before the music stops and all you hear is that sound after he puts his head in the guillotine

[@WaffleT1]

The shark is the best thing in all of gaming. You may say it looks crap but I love that shark with every fiber of my being

[@blazikentwo]

You like it until it gets stuck on the motherfucking trees!!! It happened to me two times, still pissed about it

[@WaffleT1]

If you never got stuck then that precious moment would have gone too fast. I never stopped laughing and getting stuck made it even funnier as then you got to awkwardly jerk around your land shark

[@Jskid666]

With this shark and Sharkle from Night in the Woods 2017 has been a really good year for sharks in videogames.

[@blazikentwo]

I mean get literally stuck, couldn't wiggle my way out.

[@doctordungus7774]

I got to that part of the video and I said "The shark is your only complaint? That was by far the best part of that sequence."

[@lasusifer5557]

The foxglove (a poisonous, sometimes deadly plant) surrounding the house is such a nice touch that I didn't notice till later on

[@josszarnick2393]

It is deadly, it’s a beautiful plant but it will literally stop your heart. People used to brew it in tea by accident mistaking it as other plants. It’s also used in modern day heart medication!

[@Deg40000]

@@josszarnick2393 yeesh that kinda defeats the point of taking the medication

[@fuynnywhaka101]

@@Deg40000 its used to hopefully fix irregular heart palpations or irregular heart beats

[@Deg40000]

@@fuynnywhaka101 well that makes more sense now.

[@DesignThinkerer]

@@Deg40000 The dose makes the poison & the cure :)

[@Perseuslfou]

A) Walter was in his 20s when he went to go live in the basement. B) Walter's calendar read 2005 in the end when the original one was in 1975 or so. This means that Edie was repeatedly giving Walter new calendars to make him understand he'd been wasting his life. She offered no support. Or love. He was only a moleman to her C) When you enter Barbara's room, the first thing you see is a replica of Barbara's body with a severed head This story is so haunting

[@Why_does_this_exist_YouTube]

I feel the worse for Walter because he was the most cut off from his family. He would probably have still been alive if had proper support from his family but he was literally shut off

[@andreariverapizarro]

Where is the replica body though? The closest thing to I’ve seen is a mannequin next to her comic memorial

[@Christiantheforestdweller]

​​@@andreariverapizarroI think that's what they mean

[@devinkerr5474]

I wondered about the updates on the calendar. I hoped this was always some supportive member of the family trying to help him, but I know how silly it is to hope that.

[@guzcalp]

@@andreariverapizarro Crawling to enter Barbara's room you see a dress thrown into the tunnel and there is a drawing by Milton of a "head" as if it fell out of the dress

[@EvolvePlaysGames]

The Lewis section of the game is actually phenomenal.

[@laster3753]

And fucking sad.

[@dsfisher]

Arguably one of the best ones (tied with Walter and Gregory IMO) Plus, great music

[@thatchick115]

TrEs-2b or not to be walters was the saddest

[@EvolvePlaysGames]

LeadFaun I don't know about lower end rigs but it ran perfectly and smoothly on mine. No fps drops throughout it.

[@jon-umber]

The exact moment I decided I loved the game. So creative and artistic, would have liked to have been a fly on the wall when the team was mapping that sequence out.

[@whynotanyting]

One more chilling detail: "Last time I was in Edith Sr. Room was when I was 10 and she was painting my portrait." Edith says this when looking through Edie's peephole. This could mean Edie was already trying to memorialize Edith.

[@ssssssloth]

Oh my God... Thanks so much for this

[@sloanemactire8780]

"Unless you want another tetanus shot..." I can only imagine how Dawn would have reacted to finding Edith in Edie's room, Dawn's grandmother painting her daughter's portrait, illustrating that she believed Edith's death to be coming so soon... wow.

[@J0hnHenrySNEEDen]

Jeez thats dark

[@theflowerhead]

Maybe expecting death like they all seem to?

[@nanamiharuka3269]

That’s so sick (in the bad way)..

[@ariane1269]

I know I'm super late to the party but there is one thing I noticed just recently about the house, it's that the garden and the forest have foxglove everywhere Foxglove is a highly poisonous flower, so having them on your property when there are children around is just waiting for an accident to happen I really like this detail, this idea that this family is just poisoning itself out of negligence, and that it is their own inaction and carelessness that kills them. They believe so much in their curse that they make it happen, they tempt fate all the time because they think it's all set in stone anyways. It's subtle and almost meaningless in the grand scheme of the story but it's so telling and I love it

[@DragonRoost1]

Oh yeah, when I was watching a playthrough of this game the first thing I noticed when the youtuber was commenting on all the pretty flowers was that they were foxgloves. Definitely pretty. Absolutely lethal.

[@ghost14224]

Pretty sure the fact that the foxglove was everywhere which like u said is highly poisonous and nobody in the finch family cared or noticed is developer metaphor for how the curse Is just ignorance and carelessness

[@shaunalynnmaddox1424]

Foxglove is also symbolism for lies and dishonesty, like how all the stories get glorified and fantasticated

[@AGuy-vq9qp]

Just don’t eat them. It’s maybe dangerous for very young children, but 4 and up should know not to to eat dangerous flowers.

[@sedonam4458]

I search what foxgloves mean and it said: a gift of foxgloves would carry the symbolic meaning of “I am ambitious for you, rather than for myself.” It’s a small detail that I think somehow fits into the story.

[@Shiloh_has_a_bird]

I also find the name “dawn” really interesting. Every other character in the story has a common historical name, but dawn, the only one who understood what was going on, has a modern name meaning “new beginning”

[@bigbay1159]

Eh not truly since she also had old world ways of doing things like repression which is a beloved old school practice. You can't deal with problems if you repress anything. She may have understood the stories were an issue but how she handled things wasn't exactly modern...

[@evandrofilipe1526]

@@bigbay1159 but I still think her name marks a turning point.

[@emilybarclay8831]

Dawn is a very old name, it was very common in the 50s and 60s

[@awetistic5295]

She didn't understand what was going on, her method of dealing with loss was just as unhealthy as Edie's. In a way, she also believed in the old stories just as much. Edie wanted to preserve the moment of death, like it would keep the person or pet around. She had fully accepted the idea of a curse and didn't even seem to fear it that much. Dawn thought she could "escape the curse" by never talking about what happened to the family. When Milton disappeared, she sealed the rooms. Airtight. Why, when it wasn't even clear that Milton had gone missing in the house? They were surrounded by steep cliffs and a forest full of toxic plants. When Lewis died, she wanted to leave. Lewis wasn't killed by the stories, though. He felt guilty for not being able to protect his brother. He was highly creative, but forced to work in the most monotonous, grim environment possible. He felt like a failure. He could have been saved by leaving the factory, not the house. But Dawn blames everything on Edie and her stories when, in a way, her own actions make the curse seem way more real. Both Dawn and Edie had harmful ways of coping with death, just like everyone in the Finch family. Edith was the one who tried to deal with it in a more healthy way.

[@Awfullurker]

@AWEtistic I don't think either of them were healthy in their coping methods. Edie was obsessed with the idea of a deadly curse, and Dawn buried herself in denial of it. Also, after Sanjay's death, she probably thought that the "curse" followed her and tried to erase it before it claimed her children. I can't really blame either of them for Lewis's death (since their family has a long history of ignoring obvious problems, including mental health issues) since both of them have some sort of ptsd due to their upbringing. However, I do like Dawn a bit better just because she moved away from that damn house. If only she explained things to her daughter; but then again, we wouldn't have this game if she had.

[@kaitie-m-edits]

My thought was always that the shaking in Walter's story is meant to represent the trains. The trains never *actually* stopped coming, rather it's part of a larger metaphor with Walter's line "if you wait long enough, you get used to anything". Eventually, after 30 years of hearing the trains come & go at the same time every day, it subconsciously became routine for Walter. The trains were still coming, but by then he was so used to hearing them that he stopped noticing the effects altogether - so he thought perhaps it was safe to go out into the real world.

[@atree9284]

Kaitie M I think he was a PTSD victim. He depended on a schedule. The train was late one day, because of a malfunction, a late conductor whatever. He noticed the train, but was too shocked to move.

[@realrobrose]

I took it as something a long the lines of undiagnosed Parkinson's that he just.... got used to

[@zoeleene]

My theory is that the train tracks could've been under repairs/construction for the week, and Walter was just unlucky enough to get there the day they finished.

[@bradleygalo4775]

The trains start coming and they don't stop coming, nice reference

[@nizarch22]

@@zoeleene Still leaves the shaking and the broken tracks unexplained.

[@masterplusmargarita]

The two details that are the most unsettling to me are young Sam's bedroom and Dawn's bedroom. Young Sam shared a room with his dead brother's completely untouched room, and Dawn eventually wound up sleeping in a tiny alcove with a view of the memorials to her two dead brothers. It's just such a grim picture, seeing Dawn's comfy little living space full of books and decorations and turning to the right to see Gregory's cradle.

[@elizabethtangora4353]

Watching this video, I noticed that in the photos from Sam’s death there’s a photo of waking up Dawn while it’s still dark. Looking at the background it looks like she’s in a small bed and the bars of Gregory’s infant bed are behind her. So it looks like Dawn eventually moved to a loft but for a while she was sleeping between the memorials of her dead brothers.

[@Imperium83]

Holy shit go outside and touch some grass

[@lusteraliaszero]

@@Imperium83 you don't understand what touching grass means.

[@lilwayn1000]

when u said just the janitor my mind jumped to the janitor from the game Control...go play the game or watch a playthrough of it if u didnt one of the best thrilling stories in games

[@minhthaile6553]

@@Imperium83 uhh why is this comment even here?

[@jokezm5982]

It's kind of horrifying how the entire Finch family is borderline suicidal. Like a soldier who seeks a glorious death, they take their death as some sort of badge of honor.

[@Sleepycreature687]

Except for lewis he defiantly was not borderline.

[@Pitman856]

Despacito 2 of course he was depressed, he had a gaming PC and smoked weed lmao

[@forickgrimaldus8301]

Hahaha nothing bad ever happens to the Finchs aaaaaa!

[@forickgrimaldus8301]

@Conor MCFADDEN who would win a daemon One shovel boy

[@rokukou]

it‘s like orcs in TES. common belief among the orc families is that a warrior should not grow old and frail.

[@guzkus1]

The mistake about Edie and Lewis' rooms being sealed can be explained as Edie spending her last few moments turning both of their rooms into shrines, just like the other rooms.

[@Gaster601]

yep, ingame they said that she was already gone when they tried to get her into a nursing home the next morning, but it never stated that she simply went to bed. I also think that she used the remaining time to create another time capsule for herself by sealing the door and adding another peep hole. Seeing how many times she already did that, she's probably really fast and efficient in it.

[@popatoeman5739]

Dawn was the one who sealed the doors, Edie was against that

[@guzkus1]

@@popatoeman5739 No but Edie would want it to all be uniform, so she sealed the doors, and drilled the peepholes to match the other rooms, completing the shrine to her dead family.

[@trialerrorsharer9398]

@@popatoeman5739 Dawn sealed the doors and Edie drilled the holes.

[@amberlewis561]

For the last 2 rooms... Lewis's and Edies rooms - those are the only 2 that dawn might not have done well maybe she did do her son Lewis's one. And then Edie did her own room out of spite because Dawn stopped her daughter from reading Edies story.

[@impermanentLucidity]

From my experience, food poisoning often feels like a deep hunger at first, so Molly's dream makes sense to me.

[@roomtemperature7096]

That's a good one. Dev really do a good job I still find new things after all this time

[@staryoshi06]

there's also the theory that she has pica

[@liviwaslost]

@@roomtemperature7096 that’s what a good game does.

[@borat3105]

I mean, she did eat poisonous berries

[@whybother5741]

You know, everyone’s congratulating the devs and stuff, meanwhile I’m just wondering how the heck you experienced food poisoning.

[@Elefantebailarin]

"What remains of Edith Finch" doesn't refer to the Edith Finch we control in this game. It refers to "the curse", her morbid mania, passed from Edith Jr. to her son. He goes to a house he didn't grow up in because of the story Edith Jr. wrote because Edith Finch Sr. told her to. Edie Finch remains.

[@myrrhfortheroad]

Ooh, that’s interesting.

[@Cyfaeras]

Technically, the topmost layer you play, Edith's son, is also "What Remains" of her. Multiple meanings, just like everything else in the game.

[@mp6471]

That is exactly what I thought. The Edith Finch in the title is Sr., not Jr., and what remains of her is her story, her magical thinking, which killed all of the Finches but it's still living within Edith Jr's son

[@liampoulton-king7479]

I hope not. That’s a very dark take: that the game is just about inevitable cycle of abuse, with no escape. I think the game is a little more sympathetic to Edie’s decision to turn her family legacy into stories than this video implies: it’s through these stories that Edith’s son has a connection to his past. It makes him less alone.

[@karhu7581]

It works both ways, as by the time the game starts Edith Finch is dead and the book, the contents which comprise almost all of the game, is effectively all the boy knows of Edith jr, assuming she died in childbirth.

[@carolynrupp7162]

One of the things I have only now pieced together after watching this, was one of the reactions I kept having while I was playing. There are books, EVERYWHERE. As someone who is a self-proclaimed book worm, I kept thinking to myself while playing that there were so many books. Now, looking back, I realized that it might have been a clue from the developers that STORIES are the danger. The house is engulfed in a story of this curse, and so Edie probably surrounded herself with books. Its common for someone suffering form serious paranoia/mental illness, to rely on escapism. This could be that tie.

[@iCrabcore]

Yes, and in contrast to a myriad of folktales and other stories, as well as Odin's "The Mysteries of Death and Thereafter" and "Joining the Great Majority" (I believe there were more death-related ones); on Dawn's table we can find a few books about critical thinking, and she even wrote a book on rational teaching. Strange that nobody pointed it out yet, but for me it was a clear example of antithesis. Dawn did use religion as a way to cope with her sons passing away, but she was ashamed of it, and she didn't get in the fatalistic loop of the "curse", because she still had a child to take care of. She did what Edie couldn't do when Molly died.

[@Smiley_Face_Killer]

Makes me wonder if I'm using books as a coping mechanism for something. Huh.

[@dingfeldersmurfalot4560]

Or any addict. Self-medication is to make life more tolerable even more than to make it more fun, as people keep up addictions far longer than they can still feel the fun factor.

[@dingfeldersmurfalot4560]

@@Smiley_Face_Killer Almost everything in life is a coping mechanism for something. Even for just being alive. You get a pet because you feel the absence of one, or because you're lonely or bored. You overeat because you are hungry or you are trying to build a wall of flesh around you because you were molested and don't want anyone coming near. You isolate because you fear people and/or the world at large. You marry because you would be unacceptable in society or to your family if you didn't, because you're lonely, any number of possible reasons besides love even if you are doing it for love. You buy toys to stave off boredom or having to spend time alone with your thoughts and think deeply about life and your destiny and the part you play in it. You compete to get richer at all costs no matter how rich you are because you are trying to fill some sort of hole in your soul that needs to be fed. You become homophobic because your own sexuality frightens you. Of course you are using all kinds of coping mechanisms, whether for something specific or just from the essential loneliness and uncertainty and fear that comes from being alive ... and even from contemplating that soon enough, you won't be!

[@anyabarnett8476]

@@iCrabcore and she could have maybe been ashamed to admit that religion was helping due to the Bible technically being another story.

[@ABalloonInNeed]

I love that Dawn, for all her contentious relationship with her mother, still named her daughter Edith after her. Really adds to the game showing how hard generational trauma is to escape even if you recognize it.

[@wildandbrey]

Damn I hadn't even thought about that

[@wolfganggrimmerdoesnotdese6822]

I think Edie was her grandmother instead of mother lol

[@zaddyfaye6880]

@@wolfganggrimmerdoesnotdese6822 ye, kay's dawn's mother

[@ABalloonInNeed]

@@wolfganggrimmerdoesnotdese6822 ah, well, point still stands - the name is still passed down despite the family history

[@geesent6828]

in my opinion i think it could represent a new start. like how edies was brought across the sea to escape such curse. dawn wanted the curse to end aswell. idk i think i just like thinking of it like that!!

[@lydiam7678]

I like to think that Edie's door is sealed shut because we're seeing Edith's son's interpretation of the story he's reading. He may have read that the doors were sealed with peepholes early on and imagined that all of them were sealed in that way, even when it wouldn't make sense for them to be. I see it as another reminder of the unreliable narrator.

[@mrlobsterguy4928]

That's.... Actually quite fitting. Just like how Edie Sr book had the other page blank when it got ripped in two.

[@someguywithamic9]

Wasn't one thing Edie said was "all the doors were locked and had peepholes"? So anything said could become literal because of the viewpoint

[@djyonkyo6636]

Lydia M - This is very smart! I’m so glad you thought of this! It does make a lot of sense, doesn’t it?

[@akaiyoru2681]

@@Generic8864 I think Dawn had to shut Edie's door too, her room is perhaps the most dangerous for her children out of all of them. If she left it open for Edie to use, she'd just get Dawn's kids in her room, without any possibility of Dawn stopping her. She knows all of those stories, because she is obssesed with the family curse, so she doesn't always need to take her grand-grand-children to those other rooms. And perhaps before Dawn locked her room out,, she got out all of her neccessities, but as Dawn and Edith were leaving that day, she chose to die (also because she didn't want to leave the house alive), and left her a one last story, also because Dawn told her, they are leaving a day after Lewis's funeral. And as we know, Dawn only shut those doors, not secret entrances, that's how Edith was able to get to the journal, and move around the house years later

[@user-dx8nj7qj2g]

this almost works until you remember that edith couldnt just go through lewis's door, she had to go around and enter through another way

[@Lin-rn3kz]

Gregory always gets me. He was the only Finch who was completely and utterly helpless to his fate.

[@toribaker5860]

not so true. dawn was sick

[@phunter-footballmanagermob5665]

@@toribaker5860 also Molly was helpless as she was starving and her only options poisoned her.

[@not_a_worm9713]

I actually cried when I played his story in the game

[@Lyrici17]

And top it off, the game makes you (as the player) be the ones to initiate turning the water on; I was like Darth Vader in "...Episode III...".

[@ramencup7132]

@Gregory Steedley better be careful of taking a bath now

[@billybyrns2557]

I saw a 52 minute video, and thought to myself: “I’m not gonna watch this whole thing.” I watched the whole thing. Take my sub, you hypnotizing bastard.

[@glctcthnkr8059]

Now he’s making 5 hour long videos on the Witcher lol

[@hollanderson]

@@glctcthnkr8059 Only 5 hours? You sure about that?

[@herobrinezombie867]

I did the same thing

[@yhh3602]

Just did the exact same

[@travisdobbins2777]

Drown de babi

[@liajoyner6937]

For Barbara's story: another clue that the boyfriend killed her is from the narrator. The narrator refers to Barbara's BF as her "biggest fan". He also then refers to the 'monsters' that kill her as "fans" that came to celebrate her. I think it's implying that the BF's sick obsession with Barbara (as a character, not a person) overcame him that night, and he hurt/killed her in anger to hear her scream. Probably after the failed scare, like you mentioned. So the BF was the monster after all.

[@thornels]

Funny, BF can stand for Biggest Fan as well as BoyFriend. Not saying that's intentional, just fun coincidence

[@angela.luntian]

​@@thornels holy shit youre right tho. Why would they mention that her bf is specifically "her biggest fan"? she probably also wasnt practising her scream

[@Lady_lulyS2]

Ok but.... If he killed her, how did he escape? He couldn't walk thanks to Barbara not giving him his crutch back

[@atemephii]

@@Lady_lulyS2 most premeditative murderers tend to make an excuse, he could have been faking it. Like that one murderer who faked a disability to initially mooch off his family and gf but later used to excuse his murder.

[@Lady_lulyS2]

@@atemephii i don't think he was faking but, in another video i saw a coment that suports the theory that he killed her: "Rick was trying to get a scream from barbara. I think Walter saw Rick dressed up as the Hooked Man from the rádio and hid underneath his bed. Barbara, with the crutch, investigated upstairs, and Rick scarred her. She slid on the rollerskate and fell over the banister, breaking it. She fell to her death. Rick, in Panic, grabbed her body and ran for it. Dumped it somewhere and dissapeared. Walter witnessed it all" ( said by @Libertasparty) If Rick killed her, i don't think he did it intentionally. He was her biggest fan remember? And he was presumably trying to get her to get back into acting after she moved on from it (as can be seen by her room, wich shows evidence that, what she wanted to attend that Halloween was a prom not a convention for movie fans) and the dead can't act. I mean, yes he was a douchebag but he wasn't a murderer. He just cared more about Barbara the actress, than about Barbara, the person.

[@skydrawz]

Another weird detail about Edie: she had the pictures of Sam's death PRINTED. I went through the game and after the photo death scene you can see that there's an order form right above the pictures, meaning that someone had to go to a place to get them printed out. And by then the only adult left was Edie, so it had to be her. Really creepy..

[@skydrawz]

And! The totem outside on the beach displayed in Gus's death has some of the Finch family members, mainly Barbara. I'm now turning this into a comment for pointing out weird/creepy details in the game

[@gamerchurl3639]

Thinking about that photo, it's also pretty creepy it was taken in the first place, and it raises the question of who it was that took it.

[@FebiMaster]

Gamer Churl Sam’s death was taken by the camera on a timer Sam has set himself, afterwards he ran to Dawn to take a pose before falling over the cliff

[@gamerchurl3639]

@@FebiMaster My bad, got Sam's death photo mixed up with Sven's!

[@windchime7011]

@@gamerchurl3639 That is a good question though,there wouldn’t be any reason for someone to photograph Sven.Someone (Presumably Edie) had to purposefully photograph a man falling to his death in the middle of a construction project.Its simply bizarre.

[@tombullard123]

I remember seeing a theory about how historically many “family curses” were actually mental illness being passed down, i think thats what this was about, many of them died because delusion or how they see the world

[@kykycupcake1]

Honestly makes sense My family is "cursed" This game hit way too close to home for me for several reasons But a lot of the people in my family suffer from serious mental health issues At first glance, it just seems like a bunch of misfortunes But if you really look, everyone who died, died from either directly or indirectly from someone's mental health destructive choices

[@rumory]

it's strange how a disease can be passed down through genetics

[@cyanmanta]

It could be mental illness, but I don’t think it has to be. It can just be that the Finches have been conditioned for generations to subscribe to a form of magical thinking, that they’ve effectively been disarmed of their common sense self preservation instinct by the idea that the family is “cursed” and there’s nothing they can do about it. It makes them bold and daring people, to be sure, but it also leads them to take a lot of unnecessary risk and do foolish things. Dawn saw her father put himself in an insanely dangerous position and get himself thrown off a cliff for it. I think that may have been a moment of clarity for her, when she realized that there was no curse. She tried to keep her kids safe from it, but in the end they couldn’t handle being cut off from that family legacy. It didn’t matter if the curse wasn’t real, because real or not, it was all they thought they had.

[@joelcrafter43]

I actually just found a video that covers this idea in more detail kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6Gup2lmjquUers

[@willhuey4891]

i always thought family curses were ones who had nothing but bad luck and other misfortunes or dying in freak accidents.

[@korakb5213]

Nice detail: Lewis dreaming of visiting the distant kingdom isn't a random choice either. In the map he goes to Calcutta, the same place his father, Sanjay was from, obviously because of the Orientalist stories Edie had told him about the place.

[@nomousecat]

Also Edith mentions how they moved back in when their dad died, and their dad died in India (newspaper article in the classroom). It's likely Lewis lived in India until their dad died so it's him coming home.

[@27TheMunchkin]

theres also the connection with his brother going missing who had a literal castle built for him & wanting desperately to see him again

[@den2335]

Lewis always has an Indian flag hung up in his room so he clearly at the very least identifies himself with Indian culture.

[@superjonh1000]

@@den2335 yes, there's even a dialogue when Edith look upwards the flag where she says that Lewis was very proud of his India heritage.

[@rtab722]

Also there were Hindi characters all over the coasts of the river that he was sailing on

[@ThatSpaceKraken]

I think what is especially ironic about Sam's death, is that he is a Vietnam vet. He survived what was some of the most traumatic and deadly events for many people, but what did him in in the end was a peaceful hunting trip.

[@dream6562]

I like to think the curse was real, that has a better ring to this story for me

[@Pitohui_]

@@dream6562 Every single one of these deaths by the Finches was caused by neglect and was completely preventable. The idea that some supernatural curse is the reason the children should die or gain mental illness is disgusting, personally. It's just a way for the parents to avoid blaming themselves, almost justifying their actions as if they couldn't have made better decisions. People are so eager to find closure through curses just because it sounds better.

[@mattgroening8872]

@@dream6562this comment has A. Nothing to do with the original comment B. The most “missed the point” argument ever

[@bacicinvatteneaca]

Not "ironic" at all. He was a soulless murderous invader trying to enforce a fascist dictatorship abroad for the interests of US corporations. It's completely unsurprising that he'd due from killing animals from leisure, and doing it with no attention towards whether the animal actually died (so, no care to reduce its suffering) and no attention towards his own daughter's worries and shock.

[@mattgroening8872]

@@bacicinvatteneaca woah dude ok calm down

[@historiclift27]

I kind of felt when Edie drank the wine and made the toast that she chose her death. It felt like maybe she sealed her own room up as one last shrine. She said herself she would never leave.

[@TheYoshieMaster]

My assumption was also that Edie sealed her own room.

[@EclipseSeth]

Wasn't she in a wheelchair? If she managed to seal and peephole two doors in different parts of the house while sick of something that is killing her, all of that in one evening and in a freaking wheelchair, then she is the most badass old lady I have ever seen in fiction.

[@reservoirchannel5576]

@@EclipseSeth what if she didn't need a wheelschair? what if she was alright and just masked her ability to walk?

[@Ozraptor4]

Additionally, there is Edie's headstone in the graveyard that commemorates her 2010 death. Somebody must have erected this after Dawn and Edith fled the house (and presumably after Edith snr's death. Since she was gone by the following morning, she would only have a few hours in pitch blackness to set up her grave, seal her bedroom door, fix the memorial plaque and drill the peephole.) Wonder if this is related to the gate at the the beginning where Edith observes that somebody has entered the property before her.

[@AmberKeey]

I think Dawn sealed the door right before leaving so Edie couldn't take anything that reminds of these stories to the senior house.

[@windchime7011]

I think that Edith's son’s bandage at the beginning might represent the inevitability of the ‘curse’, as he was already growing into the reckless nature that the Finches were famed for, and died from.

[@CGFillertext]

Or it could be a sign that the curse is breaking. the son has a broken arm but unlike the other Finches that suffered a major injury, he’s still alive

[@sshwc2286]

@@CGFillertext Well I don't know if that is true. In this video at 41:23, the recklessness that leads to all of the family's death is exhibited with Calvin's broken leg. We only see the death scenes hence only their major injuries. But there are probably countless times where they got hurt and survived that weren't in the game. The fact that the developers decided to show Edith's son with a cast on his arm and venturing to a place alone, where he has never been and "killed" all of his family members, at a seemingly young age, shows that the curse lives on.

[@andriagassi]

The way I see it, it's a smart way to make you forget/not realized that the person on the boat reading the book, is not the same person navigating the house. At a glance, the cast and the long sleeve that Edith wore can fool you into thinking they're the same person if you don't really pay attention to it. If one of them doesn't have anything over their arm it would be more obvious and the reveal at the end would be less strong. At least that's how I experienced it, or maybe I wasn't observant enough to notice that was indeed a cast.

[@softcatsocks9618]

Edith also pregnant at only 17 years old .

[@liampoulton-king7479]

The thesis of the video is there is no “curse”, there’s just a familiar tendency to neglect their children and behave recklessly, because they’ve self-mythologised death.

[@greenisthedevilscolor784]

I think it's also very telling that Edith decided to put a book as the decoration to her tombstone. Every grave has a sculpture of something that characterizes each of the respective Finches buried there, usually their passion: Sven had a saw for woodworking, Calvin a moon and a rocket for his love of space, Molly a cat for her kitty ears and her fantastical transformation, etc... Edith had many talents. She was a painter, she did embroidery, she possibly even picked up sculpting. But on her own grave she chose to put a book with floating words as the thing that represented her the most, showing that first and foremost, she considered herself a storyteller.

[@matheusviolante8364]

Flawlessly pointed out. At that point in the story I didn't make the connection, but yes, she is just a woman who loves creating and retelling fantastical stories. This is the way she copes with her children's deaths.

[@shamusteneyck-johnson2818]

Oh shit

[@tonyplushyt2685]

so that"s why hollywood uses green screens

[@Gay-Raccoons]

@@simple-gl7tw Im pretty sure you can do it with any colour

[@gingerdog8203]

Edith or Edie?

[@multiverseleader101]

I’m one to agree that the very nature of the Finch household is a hazard in of itself. While you did say that the swing being very close to a poorly built fence and on a cliff, I’d also like to mention that the whole house is built in such a way that it looks like it’s only being held together by magic. I’m really surprised none of the Finches died by misstepping near the edge of the balconies.

[@kikrinman1450]

I think it's a neat visual storytelling element to show that this family has always tempted fate.

[@chocomelo454]

yeah I was playing today and was surprised how Edith didn't fall down the higher she got, considering how she crawled through windows and stuff.

[@thatonejeanne817]

I’m incredibly late to the party here, but another interesting thing to note would be the extensive pet cemetery. I feel like pet deaths are often notoriously attributed to neglect or mistreatment, which would go along quite nicely with the theory that the Finches are just careless by nature. Absolute quality video, btw!

[@nomousecat]

Also Edith herself admits that two of her three gerbils died because of her.

[@billjefferson9216]

Dunmeri Secret she wasn’t even the worst at keeping pets, most of the names were nearly the exact same; stuff like durpy, slurpy, flurpy, etc.

[@yaggy3818]

I think that Edie just thought thought the curse existed. You know how some people neglect pets the older they get, because they know they will die soon, or they put them down. I think that’s how Edie felt she started to neglect them even though they were fine causing them to die and her delusion of the curse to furthermore continue.

[@ryanne.5172]

That definitely goes with Molly’s story. Why did her gerbil have rotten food in its cage like that?

[@dingfeldersmurfalot4560]

@@yaggy3818 Just because they become careless, not because they know they are going to die soon. Everything becomes too much trouble as you get older, so they start to neglect all kinds of things -- hygiene, combing their hair, wearing clean clothes, washing dishes properly, cleaning out the spider webs ... anything ... just almost all of it. Doesn't happen with every old person, but the older you get, the more likely it is, and some people just die before they get to that state rather than of old age completely. This fits in with the risk-taking/carelessness theme just fine, though.

[@spacequeen2046]

I interpreted walter's story as paranoid delusion. His sister's death traumatized him badly, but on top of that his other sister was supposedly killed by a "monster" and his mother was obsessed with a curse that was coming to get them all. In his mind, the rattle of the train passing by was a monster at his door. The shaking WAS the monster. He conflated his fear with the tremors until the two were the same. The monster comes for him at 12 every day. One day, the monster doesn't show up-- the train is running late. He decides to make his escape. But the train makes its late appearance, and Walter is killed by the monster anyway. That's how I interpreted it in my playthrough, at least. It makes sense to me, because I think most/all of the Finches have an underlying predisposition to mental illness. It would make sense that Walter's trauma could intensify delusions and cause them to become paranoid and debilitating.

[@susiepilled]

oo yesz,,

[@yukiandkanamekuran]

It sounds like hereditary psychosis. Each of the family members deal with some sort of delusion, obsession, or hallucination.

[@nixnox1962]

why were there train tracks on an island? everyone else arrives there by boat...

[@Hanagigi]

He says that the train did not come for a week though. I think that he was delusional. But the game seems intentionally vague on these details.

[@andriagassi]

@@Hanagigi maybe there was some maintenance, a broken track, or something like that. And it was just unlucky (or a curse, if you would) that the moment he stepped out is the day the train starts again.

[@digiornogiopizza7856]

Here's a pretty spooky detail with Lewis's story. At the end when he's "bowing his head to take his crown", when he actually bows his head, you can see the yellow and black caution line from the blade machine on the other side before it happens. Just a little something that I thought was a bit noteworthy.

[@DeathnoteBB]

DiGiorno GioPizza Also, the entire thing is a giant guillotine. It’s harder to tell unless you see that line, or look up (which apparently people don’t usually do in games). There’s a guillotine blade

[@NafNav32]

His last glimpse of reality.

[@Vexin980]

Maybe he knew. He knew it was a blade and just thought the crown was worth it.

[@F1areon]

Also RIGHT before the screen cuts to black you hear people yelling for him to get his head out of there.

[@eridexx]

Walter's death always hits me the hardest. I think it's because he got so close to experiencing freedom and real happiness and it was violently ripped away from him at the last second. The last line of his letter will never fail to make me tear up, it's absolutely heartbreaking.

[@blooms454]

Same his death got me in such a chokehold. I was broken-hearted when I watched it the first time

[@fayehearts]

it’s such a quick thing too. he literally stated that he didn’t care if all he had was a week left and ended up dying the minute he stepped out. it’s so heartbreaking i almost cried.

[@jammiedodgers13]

It was suggested on another vid that Milton died within the walls of the house, either being trapped when things were sealed up (not sure how the timeline works with that one) or just getting into an accident in one of it's many secret, sometimes unfinished passageways. His drawings are all over the secret passages, so he used them frequently. In his flipbook, he is shown creating his own passage and disapearing into it forever. There's the line "Whatever Milton found in the house, mom didn't want it to get out", so it's not like he disappeared into the wilderness. In Wilson's room, Edith says "none of us make it very far" and earlier she says that she felt like the house had 'swallowed' him whole.

[@justanotherladevotee9829]

it’s an interesting theory, but I’ve heard that Giant Sparrow confirmed that Milton is the protagonist of The Unfinished Swan, another game from the same creator.

[@soundsofstabbing3627]

@@justanotherladevotee9829 I have never played the unfinished swan nor have I seen someone play it, but given that Milton doesn't show any signs of existence after he disappears, I'm going to guess that he doesn't return to the real world at the end of the game. if this is true I would say that the game could be an imagined world, a last little spark of life before he dies in the house. I know the "he was dreaming/dead all along" theory is overused in fiction but I feel like it's the best answer to what happened to Milton without adding any supernatural elements to the story

[@graceygal2664]

@Tekno Pathetic what if it was somewhere they wouldn't smell. The basement would work or Maybe in an airtight space

[@soundsofstabbing3627]

@Tekno Pathetic dude did you see how big the finch house was??????

[@RpRm]

@Tekno Pathetic Depends on the airflow and where exactly he's gonna stuck. A body can also mumify pretty quickly, leaving almost no hint of a small. There was a case where a worker in a kitchen or storage(?) went missing one day and years later they found a body behind a fridge or locker or something. It was the type of worker who regularly slept at work and the top of the fridge/locker/whatever was his favourite spot. So one day apparently he fell behind the thing, got trapped in this small place and nobody could hear him scream, because of the ambient sounds around the place. I think it was a fridge, because with the warmth a fridge gives off, I'd imagine him mummifying a lot quicker. Also don't underestimate peoples ignorance to stuff they can't explain. Was visiting my mom and smelled this rancid smell, traced it to the couch and found a spot that made me nearly puke, after pushing it aside there were some decomposed potatos, that rolled under it, when she brought home some groceries and dropped them, apparently. I needed to get really pushy to get her to admit there was a rancid smell...

[@bobertjoe9038]

At the end of the story, Edith says that she never saw Edie again, when the nursing home van came the next day, Edie was "already gone". I took this to mean that they didn't find her body dead from mixing alcohol and medication, but that she was actually gone from the house. It seemed to me that Edie walked out to her childhood home in the ocean, and died reaching it.

[@ManiacalBlueberry]

That would make the whole peephole thing make sense since she could have been the one to do it. Personally I think it means she died since they didn't say she was gone from the house but just.... Gone. Since that is synonymous with death in english language at this point it makes sense. Not to mention Dawn was the only adult left so I always assumed that she was the one to plan the funeral and out of completion of the house, she sealed the door. Knowing Edie, her death was probably planned so she more than likely made the peephole for her door to be put on. Since Edith was young, she didn't know most of the details and I'm assuming that that's why its left ambiguous.

[@windums560]

@@ManiacalBlueberry I didn't understand could you write that again

[@croquemaster314]

@@windums560 dou yu ar hav stuped,/?

[@windums560]

@@croquemaster314 foor to be put on. I didn't understand from there. English is my second language. I am proud of how much I understand. It doesn't mean I am stupid. It means you are rude

[@bucca2]

The alcohol with her medication could still contribute-maybe it put her in a severely altered state of mind.

[@carmirhodes6851]

I just thought of something, Sam is the only character who writes twice about other members of the family, Calvin and Gregory, the way he talks about both of their death tells you a lot about how this romantisation of the curse affected him mentally. He tells us in his letter for Calvin that he finally managed to fly, in the way a child would to comprehend death but the way Edie justificies it all in the curse, and not on the fact that her own son plunged to his death because of neglect, prevents Sam from comprehending death as anything but glorious and mystical. So when he son dies he doesn't tells it for what it is, the horrific death of drowning baby, but as something beautiful to some degree, he tells his wife that Gregory was happy after all. I feel like it's a given but I don't think anyone would rationalize it that way, anyone but someone that has always understood death as being the accomplishment of their family legacy essentially.

[@axie545]

Thanks, this helped. That letter was the most disturbing part to me and made me hate the character for the callousness of that assertion, and also made me concerned for the message the creators were trying to send with it. This makes it tie into the weird Finch fatalism much more clearly to me.

[@agrainofsun]

Also, Sam is later characterised as being the member of the family who (excluding edie) gave the greatest importance to the "fate of the finch", the curse, always looking for a "glorious death" as a soldier and then a hunter

[@Ikxi]

This whole story is so dark, how 1 crazy person can influence an entire families life and even death.

[@LaLa-ey6hc]

I feel like Sam is actually one of the more tragic characters, because in his letters he does show the bit of self-blame and humility that his mother lacked, when he questions what could've prevented those deaths, including his own actions. But its obviously too much for a child, so he had to believe that his brother wanted it in some way. And the scars from that moment come back to him having to believe that his own child was happy in his last moments.

[@rtab722]

Even Dawn had written a poem for her brother Gus’ death, probably under the instructions of Edie and Sam, since she was still very young at that time. I’m in awe that she eventually grew to be very different from her upbringing and decided to end this family tradition of death-romanticising.

[@anastasiagirl1342]

When my sister died at the age of seven (she was in a car accident with my paternal grandmother. Both passed). My mom hired a family therapist and my Dad didn’t want us to touch her room. It lay untouched for a year. Her toys were right where she left them, bed undone, and her homework still on the desk. Then the therapist slowly brought up the option of quietly cleaning it and eventually spending time in it. I now know she did this because the concept of keeping things as is can be more harmful then good. That not moving on can cause things like the fall of a family or ideas of “curses”. Which is why this game really got under my skin. I’ve had a “shrine” in my home and luckily my Dad finally let us make little changes. It took him over ten years to finally fully begin to move on. It was easier for me because I was three when she passed and she’s more of an idea. A voice I only hear in home movies. It’s been over twenty years and our family is still going and curse free. We visit her on Christmas and birthdays. My parents didn’t divorce and my remaining siblings do not speak of her like a saint. She stole things from our older sister, and pulled pranks like all kids. She was also a sweet girl and I’m sure she would’ve grown up to be a chef. We live with a strange trauma, but we’re okay. I can’t say the same for Edie Finch.

[@marh7289]

Reminds me of the scene from the Lovely Bones where Susie’s mother finally goes into her room, cleans it, and makes the bed at the very end of the movie. I’m so sorry for your loss.

[@jimin6813]

Thanks for sharing this. I’ve also lost my brother due to suicide, he also was addicted to weed which got under my skin. Seeing my family cope with grief, I realised how easy it is to give death some sort of meaning or to glorify it because it temporarily makes it easier for everyone - just like the people in the game did. But the game showed me how dangerous this could get. We now talk about my brother just as he was - the good sides and the bad sides. We keep it realistic

[@OhNoTheFace]

It's a normal reaction when suddenly losing someone. Leaving their room as a shrine and/or tomb. As you experienced, moving on is when you can approach it. I am happy you guys got help during it. That helps!

[@spring.on.neptune]

edie probably had mental issues and was too stubborn/couldnt find a therapist

[@cookiecatmustapic1058]

This comment is beautiful

[@Coopsickle]

I think the most distressing thing about Edie's son isn't his broken arm, but the fact that he's alone. He's a young boy who is reckless enough to pursue this on his own or neglected enough to be allowed to.

[@kuro-kuromi32]

For chrissake, he piloted an effing boat on his own to a treacherous island with dangerous landscape, he’s definitely reckless and/or neglected to have the time to do so!

[@mrdeadinside9462]

He probably has a father or guardian with him just letting him read the book and pay his respects

[@hilary3219]

@@kuro-kuromi32 I'm pretty sure someone else is driving the boat. It seems like it's a ferry.

[@Blkpants]

@@mrdeadinside9462 why would you think that? Every character is always alone except in photographs

[@Dinanysos]

@@Blkpants Because someone had to give the book to him in the first place, tell him the address, give him money or means of travel to even get there. And he definitely isn't the one steering the boat, because he is sitting on a side bench while the boat keeps going.

[@cubablue602]

I think the death of Molly was key here. An important detail you missed, Molly states in her diary she would not be around much longer - she was already sick with something serious (at the time in children) probably Scarlet Fever that can cause the rash you visibly see on her arms & hands. She then ate the toothpaste/holly berries which exacerbated her weak condition. She died in her sleep after writing in the journal, her imagination fuelled by the toys & pictures in her room. The references to choking & hunger sadly reflecting what she was feeling as she wrote. I don’t think Edie had anything sinister or particularly morbid in mind at this point. Holly is a natural decoration for Christmas when the event takes place. The danger of eating the berries was probably just overlooked or unknown to Edie. Molly had been naughty and locking children in isn’t that unusual if they won’t go to bed and just keep coming out (especially at the time -1940’s). Here’s where you made a very important point. Edie was probably overcome with guilt here and the old family curse story became the perfect outlet for her to cope. She became absolutely obsessed to the level of psychosis (Lewis later reflects the same mental illness, it seems to be a trait in the family, taken to varying levels from their various obsessions). Anyway, Molly’s story and this game as a whole is simply a masterpiece of storytelling. Amazing amounts of small, scattered details that link & relate beautifully to one another. So much that is very easy to miss but make you gasp when you eventually see them. This is an extremely talented studio.

[@elmtree9951]

I don't think that's what she meant when she said she wouldn't be around much longer. She had already turned into all the animals and reverted back to herself (in her mind) before she wrote the diary you find in the game; she thought at the time the tentacle monster was under her bed and was about to eat her.

[@typeterson2421]

Your theory is a good one and I do like it but there’s one detail that you missed. Molly’s door was lock from the outside. (Although is may just be that she didn’t want Scarlett fever but I think that’s too much of a stretch. It would also mean that lock was intentionally built on the outside.

[@ronnickels5193]

@@opsun31 I thought she had cancer of some form, slowly eating her away. Of course I'm probably biased from personal experience.

[@jessikaaustin2638]

I think the spots on Molly's arms are just freckles. Walter has the same spots on his arms

[@BM-yy8db]

@@typeterson2421 I don't see how that's a missed detail. It's a door that can be locked from both sides, and as Cuba Blue says "Molly had been naughty and locking children in isn’t that unusual if they won’t go to bed and just keep coming out". It's not Molly locking herself in because she's naughty, it's Edie locking Molly in because she's naughty

[@darwinwatterson6865]

It was also mentioned by Edith that she saw Edie bringing food and supplies in Walter's supply part of his bunker where she thought she was "hiding presents". Edie didn't just allow Walter to live under the house like a moleman instead of bringing him to therapy, she also encouraged his behavior by bringing him supplies and restocking his food so that he won't ever need to leave his bunker ever again. That woman is seriously messed up...

[@mikelewis7922]

Its almost as if the circumstances of their deaths outweigh their lives in Edith's point of view. The romanticization of their tragic falls are shown to be so important from a young age that they internalize their own demise before they ever have a chance to find their own identity. Their identity is their death.

[@sleepythemis]

Yup. Barbara's crutch was noteworthy enough to Edie that it's in Barbara's death portrait... except it's not even her crutch. It's just the thing she had on hand to use to try, and ultimately fail, to drive off the person or people that killed her. Molly had a rabbit and a fish, but what animal is she loosely portrayed as on her portrait? A cat, the first creature she "became" while hallucinating before her death. Plus the newspaper clippings and literal photograph of her husband dying. And you know the rest. They're not memorials made to celebrate life, they glorify snapshots of her family members in the moments of their deaths.

[@miss.mirana4061]

​​​@@sleepythemisanother thing that shows how edie glorifies their death not their lives is with her husband sven, the guy was a creative and talented builder he built the whole house along with its secret passages and made a music box for Barbara and probably built the cemetery yet what is he most remembered by ? The dragon shaped slide that he died while making And like you said molly had and was interested in different kinds of animals including birds and bugs yet she is only remembered as a cat Lewis Also has a crown on hes grave even though he had more to his he was proud of being an India yet this part of him isn't immorilized but the fantasy he was daydreaming about that it not being real caused him to hate himself and eventually commit suicide

[@abracadaverous]

Walter didn't just go underground because of witnessing Barbara's murder. That dragon slide Sven died making was supposed to be Walter's 13th birthday gift, several years after Barbara's death. After that was when he went underground. Think about that photo of Sven in the moment the slide broke; that picture was probably taken by Sam. Both Sam and his dad Sven were photographed (by Sam) in the exact moments they fell to their deaths. The totem pole that Edie and Sven made to commemorate Molly, Calvin, Barbara, and Odin was what got knocked over by the tent in the storm and killed Gus, adding another layer of tragic irony to the story.

[@daniellund9153]

I love this theory so much but if it were to be true Walter probably would have included Svens name in the list of all the people who have been killed by "the monster". He only mentions Barbra, Molly, & Calvin.

[@Kelaiah01]

@@daniellund9153 Good point, but it's also possible that Walter witnessed his father's death, so he knew for certain that a monster didn't get Sven. He didn't see what happened to Molly or Calvin, although it's ambiguous where Barbara is concerned. I have a theory that Walter accidentally caused Barbara's death by trying to scare her, which resulted in her falling off the second floor balcony (the balcony clearly has traces that part of it had been broken at some point; yet the music box has no trace of blood, suggesting that the severed ear was a detail made up for the comic), and Walter suppressed the memory out of trauma and guilt.

[@iamsocoolz]

I think "the monster" refers to their family matriarch, Edie. The three deaths mentioned by him seem to be the ones she directly caused in some way (Molly with the berries, Calvin with the swing cause she likely encouraged him to try to swing around to he point he believed he could, and Barbara was likely a murder committed by a group of stans that Edie probably never tried to protect Barbara from, since being a child star in the day and age she had been it is VERY likely Barbara was abused in the stardom industry since it happens so so often to women and especially children, and even if she wasn't abused the fame she garnered would have been enough to really advance the Finch Curse narrative that Edie was so fond of, so it likely drew a lot of attention to their home which allowed these stans to find and attack Barbara)

[@Kelaiah01]

@@iamsocoolz That very well could be true. However, I'm not totally buying the idea with Calvin, since we have no proof that it was Edie who encouraged him to swing like that. Sam's poem pointed out that once Calvin set his mind to something, he'd do it. In the flashback, Edie called for Calvin to stop swinging and have dinner, only for her son to ignore her... although Edie did say, "Calvin, I'm not going to call you again!" So it's possible that after she said that, Edie stayed true to her word and left Calvin alone. So nobody was around to stop him or catch him. Also, we don't know for certain if Edie never bothered trying to protect Barbara from any fans. All we do know is that Edie had to take Sven to the emergency room, leaving Barbara alone with Walter and her boyfriend. We don't even know for certain if Barbara was murdered or not: we do have proof that somebody fell off the second-floor balcony (there are signs it was repaired with different pieces), but the music box that allegedly had Barbara's ear has no trace of blood-stains; the box is spotless. Considering how much Edie wanted to preserve her children's memories (to the point of unhealthy obsession), it seems unlikely she would have cleaned the box of any blood. So we have proof that *somebody* fell off the balcony just like the comic said, but no proof that any bloodied ear was left in the music box. So therefore, we don't know for certain if Barbara was murdered by monsters/crazed fans or not. If you think about it, Edie's role in the 3 deaths of her children is minimal: -She sent Molly to bed without dinner, a common punishment in those days -She left Calvin alone on the swing because she wasn't going to bother repeatedly shouting at him to come inside -She had to take Sven to the ER, forcing Barbara to miss out on the convention and stay home

[@ErIIIIIIIII41205]

@@Kelaiah01 You are absolutely right about everything except that Edie wasn’t involved in Calvin’s death. She let them have a swing on a tree at the edge of a cliff. Even swinging normally Calvin would have fallen off the cliff if he let go of the swing

[@pinkfurret6245]

The shrine that stood out most to me while watching a playthrough of the game was Gregory's. A baby drowns and Edie decides to put rubber ducks and a bottle of bath bubbles in a cradle? Sounds pretty disrespectful to me.

[@naan000]

honestly this video and the comments are making me realise how awful Edie Finch is

[@12345disneylove]

I think it's really interesting how Edie's memorials cast more of a shrine to the person's death than their lives. It's like she cared more about the curse and the attention their deaths garnered than she cared about them as they lived.

[@Mark-sd5jk]

The disrespect is watching a play through instead of playing it yourself lmao

[@12345disneylove]

@@Mark-sd5jk why u gatekeeping bro lol

[@beyondviolet]

Plus she literally made a comic book about Barbara’s death and fed Walter’s delusions just so she could have that attention… a wtf doesn’t even begin to cover it all

[@ripleyandweeds1288]

Lewis's death scares me the most is the fact that the blade was meant to cut *fish*, I doubt that blade was made to be sharp or strong enough to cut through all the bones and flesh of a human neck. I could be wrong about all of this but the thought that the blade was not enough to kill him and that he bled out slowly rather than died instantly is _horrifying_

[@Mabigato]

I'd imagine given the force needed to cut a fish head, and depending the way he was laid down, assuming it was down like a guillotine. It would've severed his brain stem so he'd have felt nothing and likely died instantly over bleeding out. Also, industrial strength equipment is known to generally be stronger and use more force than would be required to *just* do it as to make sure there's a clean chop every time. Another thing being that the scene instantly cuts back, so it's presented like he instantly died.

[@jesterssworldx7640]

@@Mabigato that's actually insanely smart! Great analysis

[@TheActualMrLink]

Get2thecart you make a good point. But god almighty, imagine what it must’ve been like for the poor bastard who found his beheaded corpse!

[@xander9460]

@@Mabigato Even people being decapitated by actual guillotines where reported to still live for a little while. The last and most believable account is in 1905 France. Dr. Gabriel Beaurieux did an experiment with the person being decapitated. After the decapitation he said his name the head looked up at him. This lasted for about 15 seconds. And even though the brain stem is severed and he cant feel his body anymore he CAN still feel his neck since that is still connected to his brain... Think about that.

[@Michipicoten]

I, too, was confused about the fish guillotine that killed Lewis

[@plzleavemealone9660]

16:00 I only realized this now but it makes sense for the boy to be this scared of going out. Because he actually IS hiding from a "monster". He wasn't just traumatized from seeing his sister get killed. He also saw who did it. He probably felt like he might get killed next.

[@gingerdog8203]

Oh wow.

[@silentj624]

I dont think edie killed her daughter. The boyfriend did.

[@Josuh]

It's a line with many layers to it

[@peterwhite6415]

Its worse when you realize, its not really mentioned if they caught the boyfriend or not.

[@CeliMe007]

I also assumed that the boyfriend probably killed himself. He might have had a broken leg but the Finches' house is situated on a cliff.

[@Firthmax]

In Gus's memory you're stood next to a totem poll. When you're walking from the beach to the cemetary that same totem poll has fallen, I'm pretty sure that's what killed Gus during the storm.

[@rainbolt6099]

Oh dang I never thought of that that's a good theory

[@hvnterly8388]

Also a morbid detail that it wasn’t removed, per Edie’s memorializing the death instead of the person

[@supernova6585]

"My children are dead because of your stories!" Damn, that shit hit me hard, I got an entire flashback sequence of each family members death, tuggin on the heart strings.

[@princelypigeoncosplay]

I'm currently watching through this and got to the part about Gregory's death, and having read through a load of the comments prior (alongside having played it myself), I noticed that nobody seems to have pointed out something you got wrong - his arms don't change colour because he's drowning. Your perspective as the player changes, and you become the frog toy that you'd been controlling prior (hence the specific swimming animation and the green, lumpy arms). In my opinion, this is symbolic of him dying while distancing us from the actual physical act of the infant drowning. Instead, we become the toy that Gregory had been "seeing" do some tricks and proceed to go down the drain; representing the death of the child's imagination (his potential/imagination went "down the drain", a clever play on words).

[@13orrax]

The old house is the bad guy. Not Edie. She was farmed

[@Oofle_the_Worm]

@@13orrax Why did you respond to this person...?

[@rylee_dads_bestie69]

C B I think what he meant was that in the game his arms turned green not because of turning into the frog (even though we know that’s what happened) but because when you are suffocating, your skin turns a different color say, green?

[@miIkbear]

Zander-notch77 that’s not really how it works though.. your lips tend to turn blue due to lack of oxygen (called cyanosis because of the characteristic blue color) and to a lesser extent, your face can, but I’ve never heard of someone’s arms changing color. Plus his arms didn’t just change color, they took on a froglike appearance (his fingers look webbed and his skin becomes shiny and bumpy), so I think they just meant to represent him becoming the frog in his mind.

[@rylee_dads_bestie69]

tety yeah or it could be a metaphor or something

[@Jack_Garland78]

As the father of a 1-year-old at the time of playing this game and also someone who has struggled with ADHD, Gregory's death was painful to get through as the thought of losing a child through a sudden lapse of attention is without a doubt my single worst fear. It was the first time I wished a game had come with a trigger warning.

[@cawareyoudoin7379]

Man, I feel you so much. I probably have ADHD, and I can barely take care of myself. I have two dogs and I keep them alive, but a baby needs so much more supervision and care, there is so much more that can go wrong. I'm definitely not ready. I wish you and your kid all the best.

[@jimin6813]

@@cawareyoudoin7379 They won’t be babies forever and time flies fast. It’s just a few years we have to be super attentive! Think about it like that

[@cawareyoudoin7379]

@@jimin6813 Hah, yeah. Thanks for the encouraging words

[@bookeddays]

I felt the same way. I was utterly horrified as the scene started and felt physically nauseated. I also have young children and suddenly all the times I've given them baths as babies came flashing before my eyes- the what if there was a lapse of attention that caused immeasurable pain. Absolutely horrific.

[@emmersksksksk]

Yeah I agree about the trigger warning - should've been given for both Gregory and Lewis. I had to skip through Gregory's scenes and every time the video cut back to them I started to cry. (I'm crying right now writing this comment.) Suicide is so intensely personal to so many people and I think should've been given advance warning as well,,, but such a visceral depiction of a baby drowning?? That's above and beyond disturbing to me. If I had advance warning I could've skipped it or braced myself but coming across that section unprepared made me wish I hadn't watched this video at all, even though it was fantastic :/// I really appreciate when creators a) warn viewers in advance about potentially upsetting topics and then b) provide time stamps for us to safely skip through the content. Anyway, I hope that everyone who watched this video and was upset by Gregory's story is feeling safe and loved :')

[@MontyBoosh]

Oh I see; Molly ate poisonous berries and other rotting/inedible stuff, which caused her belly to start rumbling (which she interprets as hunger in her dream) and her to choke (like she does on the rabbit). She desperately needs air and water, like the shark on land, and as that wave of sickness passes she begins to dream of a monster choking people to death. I'm thinking that maybe she got up to vomit (hence the monster coming up through the bathroom) and wrote the entry as she went back to bed and the sickness caused her to panic and hallucinate. She then goes to sleep and chokes on her vomit, or something similar. I doubt the berries and moldy food were enough to kill her outright, but choking would certainly do the trick.

[@ArmoredSoul1]

Toothpaste is also really toxic if you eat a whole tube of it.

[@arturofernandez4058]

I think those are not really poisonous berries. Her death takes place in December, close to christmas. My thought was that those could have been christmas decorations. Made of rubber or, more fitting for the time period, ceramic. She chewed and swallowed a set of ceramic balls which, in turn pierced her stomach and intestines, and that's how she died.

[@ArmoredSoul1]

@@arturofernandez4058 Well I mean chances are she would've tasted if it wasn't a berry, or at least described it as not a berry when eating it. I do consider the fact that the fluoride in toothpaste being toxic, and the fact that she ate an entire tube of it to be very likely her cause of death.

[@enbashira]

It's Holly berries, a common Christmas decoration, and it is poisonous. A lot of people thinks that Molly was probably hallucinating because of the poisoning from the berries and all the other inedible stuff she ate.

[@sonyafirefly3879]

If the berries are holly, they are quite poisonous, and ingesting more than twenty berries can kill a child. We only see her eat three, but I'm guessing that the developers didn't do enough research.

[@crumblyairship]

about Calvin's death: on most swings, especially ones for children, you can't swing all the way around like that. there's a point where the swing stops you from doing that. so that means that whoever made the swing did a horrible job and it was dangerous for a child to be on it in the first place

[@arnowisp6244]

I'm telling you. The Finch family should be renamed the Darwin family.

[@mrwizard5012]

I mean why is there a swing set parked facing a sheer cliff in the first place, eh?

[@tyrantfox7801]

Parental negligence. This isn't the first time , Molly's death is a result of parental negligence. Same with Gregory

[@lawrencesmeaton6930]

Not sure about that, almost all the swings in parks and the like when I was growing up could swing all the way around.

[@parnthesis]

@@lawrencesmeaton6930 woah what- Where did you live? That is so unsafe

[@xActingxBabyx94]

I know other deaths are more ambiguous, but the one that's really bothering me for some reason is Walter's. I don't think he was hit by a train. I'm not convinced there really were trains running out there. I think the train motif came from them having built the house over some old train tracks, and him having taken up an interest in trains when he was young. After watching Barbara die, in a way to cope, he fixated on something familiar -- trains. They were harmless, they were *normal*. They have nothing to do with his sister, or some fantastical curses. You see the train toy models in the bunker. He could lock himself away with them and they weren't gonna hurt him. But he was traumatized, and it preyed on a thing that he loved. I believe the shaking of the bunker by "trains" was a manifestation of anxiety or panic attacks. He worked through them with repetition and focus, opening those peaches over and over. They weren't scary anymore, they were routine. S/o to the line about the monster becoming a friend. Friends are just people you get comfy having around -- that's what his mental illnesses became. Think about what living 30 years underground eating only peaches would do to your body. I know the pantry had other food, but look how full it was -- he probably was really only eating peaches, because they were the focal point of coping with aggressive anxiety. I'm sure the "house shook" several times a day. He was severely malnourished, probably approaching death as it was. But routine was holding him together.... until it wasn't. One day, he didn't have a panic attack. It was jarring. The one thing he knew was gone. It spurred him to do something different. He got up, knocked a hole into the wall, and completely exhausted himself doing it. He likely hadn't had any form of real exercise in 30 years, on top of being malnourished. It was a moment of adrenaline and of uncertainty. He burst through the wall, saw the light and the fresh air, and then... his heart gave out. It's sad but it fits. He was living in a state of mental turmoil for decades but, for him, that was holding it together. Then, experiencing the very first sign of improvement to his mental health was when, for him, it all fell apart.

[@NafNav32]

When Edith goes through the hole, you get to see the broken tracks. I wonder if he was so dazzled by the light/view that he just walked off the rails...

[@xActingxBabyx94]

@@NafNav32 True!!! Very valid point, I think I like your ultimate conclusion better lol

[@elmtree9951]

I don't think he was only eating peaches. If I remember correctly, when you are playing as him, you eat a can of peas (or pea soup?) at the sound of an alarm clock. Also, there is a pit just beyond the room that has a mountain of trash in it, of all types of food.

[@user-gf6iy3bz8n]

im literally breathless thats such a perfectly horrifying thought

[@iomoon3608]

Yeah... Looking at the landscape, I don’t think there ever was a train that passed by the house.

[@carysbebard3690]

Another thing pointing to Edie being responsible for Molly's death in particular is that Molly as the cat and bird highlights that she's chasing and eating a "mummy bird" then just a "rabbit" and THEN a "mummy rabbit". I think this demonstrates that Molly had picked up on a lack of care from Edie, and maybe felt like she was being a burden to her family in some way. Her being a "monster" - through behaving badly like young kids do - leads to her upsetting her mother and getting locked in her room, leading to her own death. Molly doesn't blame the curse in her dying writings, she blames herself :( A great game, thanks for the 2nd suggestion to stop and play it, I really loved playing through it 😀

[@dicklessvonloser4916]

Also, I doubt a kid would be THAT hungry after missing one meal

[@arielthacker4704]

In that time period, sending a child to bed without dinner was a common, and even encouraged, practice. The fact that this little girl just *accepted* her punishment, and instead of pleading with her mother (who brushed her off like she has heard all the whining before), she almost immediately takes stock of what she can eat means that this was not the first time, either. The carrot, or even the Holly, could have had mold growing in it, or a reaction to any kind of preservative with the fluoride in the toothpaste, or...the holly might not have even been real berries. Every one of the stories, especially the younger children, was absolutely heartbreaking, but so very well written.

[@cattatron]

@@dicklessvonloser4916 food poisoning can do that sometimes

[@ozdal3434]

@@dicklessvonloser4916 food poisoning feels like a deep hunger at first

[@x___3scap3r3ality___x6]

@@dicklessvonloser4916 you’d be wrong 💀

[@Augcliffe]

I’m surprised no one talks about the insane amount of wine and liquor bottles in the house. May not be abuse related but certainly neglect at a minimum (of the children). Outside swinging on the swing set , unsupervised while parent(s) are inside plowing through wine.

[@AlexisHiemis]

Yeah, I think the video misses this and the implied mental illness in the family.

[@AlexBobalexRavenclaw]

The wine may be a big problem, but kids playing in their yard outdoors should be fine.

[@Tokuijin]

@@AlexBobalexRavenclaw, not when you live in the edge of a cliff

[@sleepythemis]

@@TokuijinIt was even pointed out in the video that the fence there, even if back in the day it wasn't broken yet, was basically an array of short wooden stakes right in front of a swing. That choice was just as intentional as putting the swing by a sheer cliff.

[@johnadams934]

after exploring the rooms of molly, barbara, and calvin, you come back to the house through a glass case of wine

[@magixshiz2543]

I actually stopped to play “what remains of Edith finch” before I watched this video, and it was so worth it. This game is... insane

[@kin4245]

I did the same! I was like, damn, I recall getting this game with the PS Plus thing and never even considered playing it. Now I did and I absolutely had a blast.

[@Jeff4theRaid]

I expected to keep the other half of Edie's story since you have the half that matters, and maybe hear what your mother experienced in life before she died, but i feel since they both represent the different sides to Edith, that it would be inappropriate to do so and talk about their lives differences, but I really expected you could come back to the finished book and see what was in those 2 family branches, but Its fine the way it is and works for what it is. A story of making bad things look better, despite knowing the dark and sudden realities of unfortunate events, its just made beautifully and doesn't really make me optimistic or down about it, its just kinda a story that I respect for being what it is. A story as puzzle piece as the house they lie in. I wont even try to explain it better, he already did.

[@gamerxd6149]

The foxglove (a poisonous, sometimes deadly plant) surrounding the house is such a nice touch that I didn't notice till later on

[@LilVeehive]

Yeah same, well I don't have the game and just decided to watch a yt video of it (decided to watch Jacksepticeye's pov of it) and found it really fascinating. It still had lots of questions like wth happened to Milton and stuff, but it was really fulfilling to come back to this video knowing the story.

[@Schmatzediekatze]

Omg no way, i did. the same and I was shocked. And i freaked out when i saw the house for the first time, since that’s basically my dream home 😅 The story is insane and the layers you get to explore yourself are always so intense and especially, *creative* I loved this game and i would recommend everyone to give it a try themselves. To be honest, you always know where to go but in some situations you have to try around and find out for yourself. The game really leads you on in such a nice way and to the point where you can kinda sit back and listen but still have to interact with everything. That aspect really sucks you in and doesn’t let go for a while.

[@LeastInsaneUtsu-PFan]

29:09 When Lewis bends down to face the ground, you can hear panicked voices around him. It’s better if you have headphones. The only one I can make out is: “Oy!” “Stop him!” It’s very very faint.

[@yeethan7352]

Wasn't he working alone though?

[@wesleyevans2981]

@@yeethan7352 All the stories are very dramatized for artistic purposes. While it's not impossible he was literally alone, the scene of him standing by himself could also signify how alone he felt

[@wesleyevans2981]

@@yeethan7352 Just want to be clear I don't think your interpretation is wrong! Just that this game allows interpretation with the stories, and I interpreted it differently :)

[@WEB-0813]

Shit, that must have been terrifying for the other workers. Just imagine you’re working with someone else in the same factory, you maybe hadn’t talked to them all too much, but you know them well enough to know their name, and the “curse” behind it. Maybe you kept a bit of an eye on them, held them a little close to your heart since you were a little speculative on when that “curse” would catch up. You think that he may sadly die in a grand accident, maybe even saving someone in a factory accident, after all, the rest of his family had interesting stories behind all their deaths. And then, suddenly, you see him lower his head towards the fish cutter. You’re worried, you were wondering when, but you never encouraged it. While curious, you still valued his life and his friendship to you. You cry out “Stop him!” “Oy!” Hoping he’ll hear you, but it’s too late. You see his head and his now dead body, and you’re devastated. A good man took his own life, and sadly, you’re only idea as to why was: “That curse finally got him”

[@mrreemann8313]

Oh shit you're right.

[@nezumisty]

The thing about Edie keeping death reminders of the family and things that were even disrespectful to the dead is one of the most clear signs of her obssession to me. If I keep my dead dog's collar, her toys, pictures of her, it's clearly just a way to keep a part of her with me. To keep her alive in the smallest, ordinary details. But if I mummify my dog's dead body and keep her posed somewhere in my house for me to look at her corpse every day, it's clearly sickening and agonizing. Keeping a reminder of the dead is not keeping a reminder of their death. It is keeping a memory of when they were living.

[@Grant-dx3qt]

It would be like putting up your dog's picture and then leaving a toy car next to it to memorialize that the dog got hit by a car. She's only interested in how they died, not how they lived.

[@PremiumCheeses]

@@Grant-dx3qt That last sentence is excellent quote-material

[@girchu]

This also explains why there's so much taxidermy throughout the house. Aside from family photos, framed collections of dead bugs are the most common item on the walls. Edie really took your mummification idea seriously 💀.

[@whatteamwildcats4033]

the same thing with keeping the already insensitive comic about Barbra, instead of any other one

[@ShatteredGlass916]

@@whatteamwildcats4033 the same with Lewis as well. Lewis suffers from that extreme daydreaming pretending to be a great 'king' of sort, to the point that it took his world and even his life. And you wants us to remember him by putting a freaking crown on top of his grave? The symbol of something that took his life?? Gtfo

[@nk-hg1dm]

"We believed in a curse so much... we made it real." That's such a cool line, jeez. Also, anyone else notice how cute it was that when they were eating Chinese food at the table, Edith held a chopstick in each hand, Dawn used a plastic fork, and Edith Sr. used chopsticks normally? Just a quirk.

[@eu4league716]

nice observation

[@gloom9799]

I like to think that it's a reference to how Edie believes in the curse (chopsticks), Dawn refuses its existance (using the opposite of chopsticks, a fork) and Edith being influenced but not believing fully (knowing parts of the curse but not all of them, so she uses chopsticks but not correctly) That's my interpretation to this random detail hahah

[@TheMurrmursonbottle]

White-Van Helsing Sporks. Those are the true godly legends. Everyone needs golden sporks encrusted with rubies.

[@LegendarySpaceRipper]

@@TheMurrmursonbottle Real Americans eat their food off pistols and rifles, am I right?

[@TheMurrmursonbottle]

Yugoslavia/Soviet Union/Third Reich/Khmer Rouge Yes we do, always gobbling down our overly sized mcdonald’s dinners using our AR-15s as cutlery

[@unholybasketcase]

I'm surprised you didn't draw a parallel between the only two characters to share a name. The matriarch (the villain) and the main character. Edith never really stood a chance against the curse - she was born to believe the curse, inheriting it the same as she inherited her great grandmother's name.

[@jacemasood3019]

Also the double meaning. What remains of the first Edith is her stories, but what remains of the younger Edith is her child, the framing device. Theres also something to the motif around stories coming out of their pages and the childbirth scene imo.

[@jackcassidy9963]

If anything other than Dawn maybe Edith was the only Finch who knew there wasn't an actual curse and her family simply became blinded by stories

[@espantapajaros33]

I also feel like this tells sus something about Dawn, since she was most likely the one who picked her daughter's name.

[@Jemagenda]

Honestly, this is straight up wrong, but it raises an interesting point. I don't think Edith believed in the curse at all. However, the parallel between Edith and Edie kind of reflects their attitudes towards the 'curse'. Edie thinks of her familiy's deaths as the result of something supernatural. She embraces and glorifies the narrative of the family curse, she thinks it's all true and embellishes the stories of her family's deaths to sound more interesting. This is reflected in her very name, as she decides to go by 'Edie' rather than 'Edith'; opting for a more 'interesting' name, she transforms it into something else. Meanwhile, Edith (the one we play as) inherits both her name and the stories of the curse from Edie. While she is curious and wants to find out how everyone died, she doesn't feed into the curse narrative. She doesn't want embellishments, she wants the truth. She embraces the truth of her family, and the truth of her name. No embellishment.

[@jackcassidy9963]

@@Jemagenda Pretty good explanation

[@user-ld6th3vw8e]

I saw a post somewhere claiming that Milton suffocated in the walls of the house, which at first seemed far-fetched to me but became more likely when I connected all his paintings from the hidden passageways, his dissapearing-into-a-painting book, the house "swallowing him up", and it stands to reason that the sealing of all the doors could make it so no one found him and that Edith jr couldnt find everything in the whole house

[@TheMasterUnity]

Actually no, the devs confirmed that Milton is the king in the unfinished swan

[@user-ld6th3vw8e]

@@TheMasterUnity if you don't want an answer that is supernatural though it's ok to use what they made to make a story-compliant answer

[@TheMasterUnity]

@@user-ld6th3vw8e True, but that is the canon fate of Milton

[@acebee46]

I agree with this theory, the house is massive and there's plenty of passages locked away, Milton could be anywhere

[@ShwintyKat]

@@TheMasterUnity Death of the author. I prefer that he died lost in the house.

[@clownslikebilly]

It's truly sick that they named the bathroom that Greg died in "Greg's room". It's like they think he's haunting it or something, imagine the pain his mother must have felt from witnessing or hearing about the "shrine" Edie made to "honor" the death of an one year old by his mom. Fucking disgusting.

[@logannowak5265]

Literally that's what graves are. Is everyone who honors the dead disgusting now?

[@n4th4n444]

@@logannowak5265 absolutely not the same thing. a literal shrine dedicated to not the actual person but how they died instead?? not even close to a grave.

[@birdmcturd1626]

I guess you could chose to see it as a constant reminder. Don’t let babies out of your sight when they’re in the bath- especially not in THIS family. Obviously,it’s still terrible but there could at least be a somewhat decent or good hearted reason? Probably not,knowing who Edith SR is

[@nightperson1012]

​​@@logannowak5265You don't put the graves in the rooms where they died and glorify their deaths with a whole shrine, do you?

[@chocomelo454]

​@@logannowak5265it's chosen bc he died in that room because of the bathtub tho. if it wasn't he wouldn't have had the plaque there. it would've been on the actual door to his room like everything elsem

[@octogirl555]

The guy dying on the house in the water sets up the theme really well. What he did was reckless, and only meant to venerate a past he was dragging behind him out of fear of letting go--and it killed him. Edie sees this combination of recklessness and ambition conclude in death, and instead of judging his actions as misguided, she learns to canonize his actions and teaches her family to do so

[@mono8476]

exactly! that nutcase was the start of it all

[@michaelweston409]

How the hell did great great grandpa Odin sail a whole frickin house from Norway to Western Canada. Honestly I didnt get that part. This was before the times of the Panama or Suez Canals. Its implied he sailed across the Atlantic around the southern tip of South America or went around the Horn of Africa & thru the Pacific but those two routes would be incredibly long. The only other thing I can think of is he sailed around Greenland, Northern Canada & Alaska but even that journey is extremely difficult, cold, & hard to accomplish with even modern icebreakers. Who knows I guess.

[@mono8476]

@@michaelweston409 i guess thats the beauty of fiction right? That they can do all kinds of wacky things. Same with the hse of balloons frm Up

[@EveTanner]

@@michaelweston409 I think it's purposefully exaggerated to show just how unwilling the Finches are to conform to any sort of normalcy. It's a crystal clear indication that the Finches aren't cursed, they're just so obsessed with the idea that they must be cursed that even a voyage across the Atlantic , which is already risky on its own merit, must be taken to the extreme just to "challenge fate" or something. That's how I see it.

[@noel2641]

@@mono8476 honestly don't think he was the start of it all, just a generation we see at the start, as by the point he buries his baby it's already known as a "Family" curse, specifically attached with the finches

[@hidinfromdacops2246]

I know this is EXTREMELY old but at 29:08 when Lewis looks down you can see a black and yellow line, the EXACT same line where the fish got their head chopped off. I know the connections between his head getting chopped off like the fishs’ was very obvious, it was just an extra detail I vividly remembered and hoped would be mentioned in the video

[@Kiss_My_Aspergers]

Good on you for noticing! Also, your profile pic... is that from Ghost Stories? Or something else?

[@empel1584]

@@Kiss_My_Aspergers WATCH OUT SHES A GHOST AND A BITCH

[@SwizzleDrizzl]

@@Kiss_My_Aspergers Pretty sure their pfp is ghost stories

[@silentj624]

I noticed it but didn't make the connection! The details in this game are amazing.

[@pho_is_not_interesting]

Oh i noticed that but i thought it was that warning line that's on train stations

[@voidlessvoid6206]

See, me and my sister noticed this while she was playing through the game. Almost a direct quote from both of us "all these people died of idiocy or neglect, and it's obvious." And I'm glad I finally found someone saying this.

[@Jeff4theRaid]

I think old man Odin just got unlucky, imagine crossing the atlantic ocean in a house just to sink when you reach the shore, but edie wants to be like her adventurous dad and die in the magnificent house like her father before her of sickness.

[@ametsunami4070]

What about Edith? She died in childbirth, I don’t think that was from idiocy or neglect. It applies Everyone else though

[@voidlessvoid6206]

@@ametsunami4070 yea, excluding Edith and Dawn. Because ofc those were the most sensible of the family.

[@OrionDawn15]

@@ametsunami4070 I don't think Sam dying was from neglect or idiocy, I think with a shot like that you'd think the deer died, nobody could've anticipated that it would still be alive and knock him off a cliff

[@jr9973]

@@OrionDawn15 I’d say that’s idiocy. Let’s stand at the edge of a cliff to take a picture with a half dead deer. Even after his daughter warned him it was still moving.

[@WebbedManiac]

It's kinda chilling and tragic that despite Dawn having realized what was actually going on, she still failed to protect her children from the family curse. She tried too hard to protect Lewis, trapping him in a normal job and a mundane life, which only made him long for the kind of fantastical lives the rest of his family lived, leading him to commit suicide. Milton straight up ran away. And by the time she tried to get her remaining family away from the house (something which she should've done a long time ago) it was too late. The curse had already taken hold of her daughter. Edith Sr's stories had already planted a seed in Edith Jr's mind, which is why she comes back to the house despite being 22 -months- weeks pregnant. And because of the book/journal Edith Jr wrote, the curse has probably taken a hold of her son too. That's why he also comes to explore the house.

[@berry2254]

I think that Edith Jr. broke the curse just by essentially writing everything about what happened. She told the entire truth without really presenting it as fantastical like Edie did. By just writing the entire truth down and showing it to her son it prevents anyone from really having to actually go into the house again.

[@dafilmqueen556]

@@berry2254, that's so cool. The boy can finally break the curse and actually live a normal life. No fantasies, no glory, no romantization of death, just straight up truth and understanding of reality where fiction takes place.

[@awetistic5295]

I think the point is that Edith's journey breaks the curse. Neither Edie nor Dawn had a healthy coping mechanism and it's hard to blame them after they all they have been through. Edie tries to preserve the past by essentially freezing time the moment someone dies. She accepts the curse as part of the family identity. Dawn tries to bury the past, doesn't talk about any of her trauma and tries to run away from the curse. But she still believes in it. Milton disappears. Dawn seals the rooms. Lewis kills himself. Dawn blames Edie's stories and thinks running away in a hurry is the only way to escape the curse. So for both Edie and Dawn, the curse is real, they just have polar opposite ways to deal with it. Edie gets to understand both women while discovering her family story through exploring the house. She finds a middle ground and leaves it behind for her son. That's what remains of her - her legacy. Now it's up to her son to find his own way to deal with the generational trauma. Maybe he can return and see the house for what it is. Not a cursed place, just a house.

[@birdmcturd1626]

@@awetistic5295While I’d agree,I will say that the fact her son already has a broken arm is concerning. It could be nothing but it could also imply he’s reckless or,worse,self destructive. Keep in mind,that was before he read the diary his mother left him.

[@raerohan4241]

​@@birdmcturd1626 I think the detail about so many children/characters being hurt and in casts is meant to represent they're hurt on a mental level. They're not meant to be physical injuries, but emotional hurt made manifest. We don't know what kind of life Edith's son lived, but we do know he was orphaned at birth (unless his father took him in, unlikely considering Edith was a teen and the father probably would have been too). Having that in mind, we can infer he's likely not had the easiest life. I think that scene was meant to represent that you can be hurt, but still pick yourself up and keep going, confront your past, accept it, then leave it behind. The flowers were a nice nod to this - unlike Edie who memorialised everyone through stone and paint - things meant to last a long time - he left cut flowers that wouldn't last more than a week or so.

[@DolanDark]

This was a spooky game

[@ragephil5609]

Dolan Dark Change your Profil pic to sully from Monster Inc you hack.

[@sclarinet9088]

It really was

[@sansan-dt9em]

Indubitably

[@gedehahsen429]

you have no pp dolan dark

[@internationalinternetexplo3546]

Holy shi-

[@RFFrules]

So about Walter's death, the point of the rumbling was that it had happened everyday at the same time for 30 years, 12 o'clock sharp, and ran late one day. Walter took that as a sign of nothing to be afraid of anymore when in reality, the train he'd been afraid of for years, the curse, the tremors, the monster, was only a few minutes behind schedule. Or so that is how I had come to understand it. And the holly berries and toothpaste Molly ate likely gave her a fever dream before she choked on her vomit in her sleep later in the night. Once again this is just speculation, and open to debate as well.

[@newtears6688]

Quick note: The train stopped a week before Walter left the bunker. It was probably undergoing repairs.

[@jacoblieverse5279]

It ran an hour later because of daylight savings time

[@potatolord7319]

@@jacoblieverse5279 but in 30 years daylight savings must have come and gone many times

[@ivebeenrobbed]

Walter was still my favorite, even though he met his demise, he managed to overcome his demons and take a step towards changing his life. Even though his demons were of his making, and his lifestyle his own choice, the fact that he managed to be brave and actually change was inspiring. Hey, he got what he wanted, a different day. He ate train tracks instead of peaches.

[@Nyaaaaa14]

@@Generic8864 Theres a small shrine just outside of the tunnel where he died if you look around.

[@Brackewolf]

I think Gus was crushed by the totem pole being knocked over by the tent, when you go back to the shore as Edith you can see it lands directly where he was flying the kite. It also explains why they spend so much time establishing the pole on the shore and in the flashback and even in barbs flashback, since Sven gets cut while making the totem

[@TheCaliforniaHP]

Yes indeed I saw those totems in Barbara's flashback but didn't connect it to being fallen down on the beach. You could say the whole bungled visionary creation of the house and it's offshoots is Edie's brilliant design to mess up her children in death.

[@thatinternetshipperyouknow632]

Hi :D

[@pops1183]

I thought maybe a hurricane came in, because everything flying around while there was a storm, and that knocked over the totem pole and killed him

[@roseolivas08]

I really really appreciate that the story doesn't pin down the "curse" to any one thing- many family members have significant signs of mental illnesses (mostly Bipolar and Scizophrenia) but not all, many family members die from outright neglect but some from fully natural causes, and Edith's son is shown to have a bit of the Finch carelessness despite knowing nothing of his family prior to this. It's somehow realistic and supernatural that way.

[@loomick]

Ediths death was presumably due to carelessness too. The over exertion likely caused a premature birth.

[@juke9674]

damn never thought about that

[@loomick]

@TheDuckGenie1020 having sex isnt reckless, but without protection, certainly - if thats in fact what she did

[@adamperry4610]

@TheDuckGenie1020 your assuming she had the choice

[@OSCARMlLDE]

Those tend to put the child in danger more than the mother

[@DahConor]

I don't think this is the case here. She clearly states to be 22 weeks pregnant: a premature birth at that time would definitely result in the baby not surviving. It would still be possible but I think it's a little stretch. As pointed out in the video, however, Edie is in fact being careless exploring the house while pregnant!

[@goldgem2]

In a newspaper you can read that there was a natural disaster (A flood I think?) that was meant to have the whole area evacuated, but Walters mom stayed behind (saying she wanted to protect the house) but she was really staying for Walter. As everyone had been evacuated, the train wouldn't be working, thus the pause that Walter heard and led to his death.

[@pipedream2556]

wait, do those timings really add up? if so, that's amazing

[@Eirien]

It was a wild fire not a flood.

[@SA-wz9wu]

It doesn't add up because she says she was 72 when she refused to evacuate and Walter died in 2005. We know that Edie was 80/90 when Edith was a child (and Walter died when she was six) so that happened long before Walter died.

[@CrystalWilliamsBrownArt]

@@SA-wz9wu I thought Edie died when Edith was 10?

[@MFESPFTWKF]

Crystal Williams-Brown that’s Lewis your thinking of

[@chuckpatriot]

i'm like months late, but I think the real proof that this is all true is the title of the game. "What Remains of Edith Finch" is referring to Edith Sr. It's the acceptance of the curse and the recklessness that comes with it is "what remains". We can see it in the son's broken arm and stuff. i dont know it makes sense to me

[@Nuvizzle]

The other layer to it is her withering family tree and her role in diminishing "what remains" of her genetic legacy. I think it should be fairly apparent to most people that the title is referring to Edith Sr., but it's a bit less obvious that the title is directly referring to the character the game starts and ends with who, if my math adds up here, is the last living descendant of Edith Finch if you ignore the one that "ran away". In the very opening of the game you are shown all that remains of Edith Finch: this one living child, these stories passed down to him, and the cast that at least hints at these stories having the same effect on him that they did on all those that died before him (or, if you'd like, it signifies the curse).

[@SC-ss8vb]

This is so mind-blowing to me because I have never thought that Edie could be the problem and I actually felt bad when Dawn took Edith and just left her like that. And it further makes me realize how easily I got carried away by the storytelling and felt obsessed about the family curse and death, maybe just like many of the family members.

[@celines.]

Damn, that comment hit me… I felt exactly the same.

[@AdityaReizoPrakash]

Didn't you miss the part that you see Milton's handprint and name in all those secret passages? I think Milton found those stories himself and that somehow contributed to him vanishing, which would also explain why Dawn believes he isn't dead.

[@maxbud8435]

Aditya Prakash So: A)he ran away after, hoping to outrun the curse. B)he realized what effect Edie’s stories had on everyone else in the family and tried to escape the same fate. Right?

[@fyrefrost1898]

Aditya Prakash I mean he could’ve just seen them normally and used the secret passages as a fun way to sneak around the house, Dawn didn’t seal up the doors until after Milton went missing.

[@fkle32rw14]

Milton is the king in "The Unfinished Swan", confirmed by the devs

[@maximillian1109]

When I went through this game one big thing that stood out to me was how selfish, irresponsible, and crazed the adults seemed to be. To me it was never about a real magical curse, but rather bad parenting, arrogant people, and mental illness.

[@perrym7357]

Did anyone else notice the yard around the house was covered in foxglove?? Definitely adds to the idea of neglect, as foxgove is very very poisonous if eaten and is sometimes mistaken for a plant that can be turned into tea

[@annoyingann]

Foxgolve also means: "my regrets will follow you to the grave"

[@curleyqreviews9793]

Fox glove can kill be touch too. The whole plant is dangerous, even sitting them in a vase then drinking the water that is left can kill you

[@cinderheartmeow6032]

It’s been a few years but I i’d like to point out that molly actually ate holly berries, not mistletoe. Correct me if i’m wrong. I might be mistaken on this. The common christmas holly can be easily mistaken for mistletoe and holly can have some not so nice effects on children when compared to mistletoe. Vomiting and diarrhea are much more severe when it’s happening to a child who’s stomach is empty. I might just be overthinking it but the moment after she ate the holly is the moment that the story and perspective broke away from reality. She also talks a lot about how hungry she is, that’s basically what the whole story is about, it comes to the end with her hunger consuming her and she dies of starvation or dehydration. That’s what I concluded.

[@hairymcnipples]

It was a mistake that surprised me because the shape of holly leaves is so distinctive! Also, hanging mistletoe isn't part of the Christmas tradition here, but aren't the berries usually white?

[@cinderheartmeow6032]

@@hairymcnipples - Yes they actually are white, but holly has been used to take the place of mistletoe because mistletoe can be invasive and dangerous to grow if you’re not looking to kill all your other plants and trees. Mistletoe berries are usually white but it’s a common misconception that they are instead red (some stores may even paint mistletoe berries red) and the berries on holly can be much more “pretty” compared to the tiny cluttered patches of berries on a mistletoe branch. Sorry for the long paragraph. I just really think it’s an interesting detail and it explains a lot about Molly’s story of her death.

[@TheMasterUnity]

Not to mention toothpaste in the 40’s was not safe to digest and was pretty toxic

[@egret512]

There's a theory that the berries were fake since there is a crunch sound when Molly bites them, so maybe not as bad, but in the 40s pretty much everything was toxic

[@raerohan4241]

​@@egret512 Holly berries are actually hard at that time of year (fall/winter). They also taste really bad at this time. They only become soft after several frosts, and better tasting. The attention to detail is insane in this game - we know it's around Christmastime here, so Holly berries would be hard at this point. The crunch is a nod to that. Another point is that, with them tasting so bad, Molly would have to be truly hungry to even consider not spitting them out immediately, much less actually swallow.

[@estevansolis]

There's one thing none of the comments nor you pointed out in this video. Edie was not sleeping in her room at all. In the sequence where you go get the book in the library, if you stare at the desk with the book and then look directly behind you, you can see that there's actually a bed there, maybe Edie slept in the library rather than her own room.

[@soundsofstabbing3627]

that would make her room being sealed make sense. she was already sleeping in the library so the room was more seen as a memorial to Odin and Sven, some of the most outlandish stories she tells, which is why they were sealed up, and she put her name there preemptively for when she died. still doesn't explain how Lewis' door was sealed and drilled into so fast

[@chaotic_error]

@@soundsofstabbing3627 I don't think this is true, because there's an unfinished memorial portrait of Lewis in Sven and Edie's shared room, which proves she'd still been using it after Lewis' death.

[@DokuDoki]

The most significant and obvious ideology imprint that grandma Edie has left on Dawn is in the classroom. If you look closely, there's a news article next to the blackboard about how "Relief efforts end in disaster" when hundreds of volunteers are injured or killed through a second earthquake. At first I didn't think much of it, but then I noticed the candles, a ceremonial bowl along with incense and a bible, and the photo of Sanjay. That's right, even Dawn has built a shrine of her own.

[@zephronias]

Shoot, now THAT is some detail!

[@kushamisaru]

OHHH SHIT

[@Saffron-sugar]

You’re right. Dawn built a shrine to her husband Sanjay. Also, if you think about it, somebody had to go back and seal up Dawn‘s room and Edie’s room. Edie could have done it on her last night, but she never sealed the rooms up to begin with, Dawn did that. So did Dawn go back?

[@sydneywong8486]

DokuDo

[@meridiasbeacon7669]

DokuDoki my theory infact is that Milton actually died in the earthquake. This would explain the "Disappearing" too, since people's bodies are usually lost in earthquakes, buried under the rubble.

[@TempestAmethyst]

I remember seeing Walter's story for the first time and being like " thats...a train?" Because I live right next to some tracks. Then he got outside of the bunker and my stomach dropped.

[@anaclaramartins2888]

Reeeeally late to the party but I think Milton ran away after realizing the situation at the house. As soon as he moved in and got the castle, he recognized how "the curse" made grandma obsessed. Remember the missing poster, right next to the broken fence? Right at the beginning of the game? I think that broken fence was how he ran away. And I mean- the flipbook he makes implies that he is leaving voluntarily. The house "swallowed" him- it was swallowing him up emotionally, and staying there felt like he was being consumed by a past his grandma didn't want to let go of.

[@notherapy4u]

I know I'm a bit late, but yes, that is the case. The game devs made another game before this, The Unfinished Swan. And in that game, Milton is confirmed to be the character of the Lonely King.

[@dominickeijzer5844]

@@notherapy4u Not really confirmed, just heavily implied. Like a lot of the game's material.

[@notherapy4u]

@@dominickeijzer5844 No, it was confirmed in a AMA with Giant Sparrow.

[@melhupby]

The final page of Edith's story to her son is the real horror ending. She specifically says she's leaving him with these stories, and good luck. It means she fell into the 'curse' as well. The astute player will have picked up on the conclusion Joseph drew here, it's a 'curse' of their own making and down to reckless behaviour, but the ending shows that _Edith_ never reached that conclusion. If at best she doesn't _believe_ the curse, she didn't realize that it was all the stories that pushed Lewis to suicide and Milton to 'something', and she passed them on to her son, leading him straight back to the family home to 'investigate' the curse himself. What remains of Edith Finch continued unbroken to the latest generation of Finch's, Edith Jr didn't break the cycle at all.

[@sourpuss5951]

Edith Finch.... Jr. is the real villain 😎

[@TheBiomedZed]

Like Joseph says Edith probably realises the stories were too dangerous. She probably wrote her journal half for her child and half to help her rationalise her tormented past and lineage. At the end she states she never wants her child to read this; she wants to keep living and shelter them from the “curse”. The sad reality is that she never makes it, whether it was an accident during childbirth or the seemingly undeniable fact that once you learn about the Finch history it comes to get you. Maybe she felt she had to leave her child something or make sure the stories got passed on (I guess the other curse of the Finch family was their inability to let the history die out).

[@gethinblake4826]

In my mind, it's a self fulfilling prophesy of sorts, as if Edith jr is the last Finch to die tragically then she would be heralded as the breaker of the Finch's curse, thus elevating her to a mythological level in the family. The book being "all that remains of Edith Finch" would become the story of how the curse was broken and they would end up in the same trap as before but feeling protected from fate rather than resigned to it.

[@hopoffmydick9574]

but you’re forgetting the impact of NOT knowing these stories, and what it did to them. Lewis killed himself because he never had a creative outlet, or any fantastic stories to keep in his brain, so he fell into his own. Edith went back to the house WHILE PREGNANT because she was so desperate to know the truth. Not knowing is just as bad as knowing, Edith is actually giving her son the best option, know the stories but don’t be involved in the toxic environment. It’s the best outcome.

[@LucyAdroit]

I'm surprised Edith didn't catch on, considering what Dawn shouted at Edie on the last night.

[@SiraSpirit]

The real villain is almost every parent in the game.

[@biljanamikic9463]

Even dawn

[@Endymion766]

Lewis' story hit me the most. I've made, unmade, and remade hundreds of movies in my head while working boring jobs. I thought maybe writing some of them down but they borrow too much from existing IP and would be just fan fiction that probably only entertains me. I might try to write at least one original thing though. I have an idea. Don't worry there will be no "coronation" in my daydreams because even there, I'm not the main character, just the janitor.

[@jonathonharbeck7287]

Lots of famous directors and screenwriters began with mere rip-offs. Don’t stifle your creativity by judging yourself before others even see what you have to offer, we need your gifts!

[@Endymion766]

@@jonathonharbeck7287 thank you for those kind words. I have managed to type a whole page of something, as a start. We'll see where it goes.

[@Onytig]

Wait really I thought I was the only one, Damn. Also if you want to write then write, do what makes you happy. :)

[@axie545]

Janitors have an important role. And if you do sit down to write something wildly self-indulgent and fantastical, who does it hurt? You can always start there, and then decide if you really need to polish it to the point of showing it to the world, or if it was just for you from the start. There are certainly places where you can post fanfiction if you'd like to share it, but there's no rule that says you have to put something out in the world just because you wrote it. If you choose to, great! More power to you and I hope it speaks to someone else, which is the best thing writing can do imo. But if you choose not to, it doesn't mean the work has no value or that you didn't grow from doing it. We don't need every single thing we spend time on to only be in service to producing something of value to society.

[@Roseforthethorns]

I had the same thought about the hand, and then realized about halfway through what was gonna happen

[@juannaym8488]

Honestly as depressing Gregory's and Lewis' deaths were, I can't help but think that Walter's death might've been the most cruel one He lived for 3 whole decades in a basement because the death of his older sister traumatized him so much. Three decades. Having every day be a carbon copy of the last. And the moment he ventured out, the moment he found a chance to live again, he dies When I was first playing the game and at his part, I first tried out to go back up the basement, but a small object on the ground didn't allow me to do so. I thought at first that it was just a gameplay thing, and I might've been, but I think it also tells that he had no other way. That his mind was so damaged that he couldn't have taken the normal way, back to the floor where his sister was killed

[@cacilian4344]

Also, when he menntions 'the monster on the other side of the door became normal', I think he was talking about Edie. She literally glorified his older sisters death with some trashy comic, he was probably afraid of her. I know I'm late, but I just finished the game :)

[@janelpratt5234]

Walter was around 50 when he died, meaning that Walter had lived multiple years outside the basement, causing him to live in fear for years

[@ghost14224]

U guys realize it can't physically be edie right and that I have to agree with the main commenter on this one being the fact that Walters was not just the most complex but also one of the most sad ones though for me what caught my attention is the complexity of it and now you can't really figure out this story and lore without figuring out Barbara's which is equally as complex and heart dissolve being the fact that I don't think edie or Barbara's boyfriend murder I honestly do think it might have been a murder some kind of monster mask or maybe a group being the fact that even if this is wrong which most likely is it has to be something like this being the fact that it has to be something so traumatizing and made water go in that bunker for 30 years and I've been searching for a long time for that answer through tons of KZbin videos and still haven't found one so whoever sees this response please if you know tell me so I can get this damn question out of my head

[@mymusicmen13]

@@ghost14224 slow down and take your time. The lack of grammar and punctuation makes you seem extremely scatter brained. Take it easy big man, no need to rush.

[@ghost14224]

@@mymusicmen13 thanks still would like the answer to that question though