Lovecraftian horror largely remains unexplored on the screen. And it is not like filmmakers are not interested in cosmic horror. Some of the greatest horror directors of our time, including Mike Flaganan, Guillermo del Toro, and James Wan, have expressed interest in translating H.P. Lovecraft’s stories to the screen.
It is just that Lovecraft’s descriptions of cosmic terrors can be so ambiguous and inexplicable in nature that it is notoriously difficult to capture them in a visual medium. Despite this, though, a few shows and movies, like Annihilation, The Endless, Lovecraft Country, and Cabinet of Curiosities, have managed to get Lovecraftian horror right.
Ranking among them, Netflix’s Archive 81 is a rare cosmic horror series that does not shy away from wearing its Lovecraftian influences on its sleeves. The acclaimed Netflix horror show takes only eight episodes to deliver the absolute best Lovecraftian horror on the small screen. Based on a podcast of the same name, Archive 81 is what peak cosmic horror looks like.
Netflix’s Archive 81 Is A Rare Series That Does Lovecraftian Horror Right
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The core themes in most Lovecraftian stories revolve around humanity’s utter insignificance in the indifferent universe and the devastating consequences of seeking forbidden knowledge. Meanwhile, the primary essence of Lovecraftian horror can be defined by a quote from H.P. Lovecraft himself:
“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”
“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”
Perfectly honoring these elements, Archive 81 introduces its protagonist, Dan Turner, as an archivist hired to restore a collection of burned 1994 videotapes. The tapes almost turn into modern “Necronomicons” as he gradually gets pulled into the maddening pursuit of seeking the unknown.
Similar to H.P. Lovecraft’s stories, like The Call of Cthulhu, Archive 81 also introduces a human cult. Like Lovecraft, Archive 81 shows how the cult members are naive and deluded, knowing little about the multidimensional entity, Kaelego, they are worshiping. Just like Cthulhu and the other Great Old Ones, Archive 81‘s Kaelego, too, is completely indifferent to their worship.
Kaelogeo’s influence bleeds into the central Visser apartment building, represented by a strange moss. This seems reminiscent of H.P. Lovecraft’s Color Out of Space, where a mere color spreads and “infects” the minds of humans it comes in contact with.
Through brilliant sound design, Archive 81 even draws parallels to Lovecraft’s The Music of Erich Zann, showing how music in itself can become a channel for evil.
Archive 81’s Found Footage Style Brilliantly Overcomes A Lovecraftian Challenge
To convey how his “monsters” defied human comprehension and scientific beliefs, H.P. Lovecraft often described them using adjectives like “unnamable,” “indescribable,” and “non-Euclidean.” Owing to the “eldritch” and “abnormal” nature of their appearance, Lovecraftian entities can never be accurately captured on the screen.
Perhaps this is why most cosmic horror movies either seem a little too ambiguous or over reliant on familiar horror tropes.
Archive 81 overcomes this challenge by using found footage as a narrative device. It cleverly avoids revealing the true nature or form of its overarching cosmic entity. Instead, it captures how pervasively the being manipulates the characters’ perceptions and distorts their sense of reality through videos and audio.
Even as a viewer, it is hard not to immerse yourself in the Netflix horror show’s Lovecraftian terrors, believing that its dark influence is somehow seeping into the real world.
Archive 81 is a 2022 supernatural horror series centered on archivist Dan Turner, who is hired to restore damaged videotapes recorded by documentary filmmaker Melody Pendras in 1994. As the footage reveals Melody’s investigation of a dangerous cult inside the Visser apartment building, Dan discovers a mysterious connection between her disappearance and his own life.
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