Mike Flanagan Movies and TV Shows: The Complete Ranked Guide (25 Essentials)

1) The Fall of the House of Usher (2023) — Limited Series

• Run: 1 season (8 episodes)
• Runtime: ~60 min/episode
• Starring: Carla Gugino, Bruce Greenwood, Mary McDonnell, Mark Hamill, Rahul Kohli
• Creator/Director: Mike Flanagan (with Michael Fimognari)
• Genre: Gothic horror, family saga, literary remix (Poe)
• IMDb Rating: ~8/10

Part anthracite-black comedy, part corporate eulogy, Flanagan fuses Poe’s stories into a single morality tale about a pharma dynasty settling cosmic debts. Carla Gugino’s Verna is less a villain than a universal auditor; every “accident” feels like a ledger closing. Long takes stage confession as spectacle, while production design hides allusions in plain sight. Beneath the brutality hums empathy for broken siblings who can’t shed the machinery that made them. It’s maximalist, venomous, and—crucially—achingly human.

2) Midnight Mass (2021) — Limited Series

• Run: 1 season (7 episodes)
• Runtime: ~60–70 min/episode
• Starring: Hamish Linklater, Zach Gilford, Kate Siegel, Samantha Sloyan
• Creator/Director: Mike Flanagan
• Genre: Theological horror, character drama
• IMDb Rating: ~7.7/10

Set on wave-battered Crockett Island, this faith-versus-mercy parable is Flanagan’s most personal work. Homilies become high-wire acts about death and grace; AA shares are framed like liturgy. Hamish Linklater’s Father Paul radiates charisma weaponized by certainty, while the finale stages redemption as communal sunrise. The scares land, but the aftertaste is compassion—a hallmark across Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

3) The Haunting of Hill House (2018) — Limited Series

• Run: 1 season (10 episodes)
• Runtime: ~50–70 min/episode
• Starring: Carla Gugino, Victoria Pedretti, Henry Thomas, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Michiel Huisman, Kate Siegel
• Creator/Director: Mike Flanagan (directed all)
• Genre: Gothic family drama, supernatural mystery
• IMDb Rating: ~8.5/10

Shirley Jackson’s classic becomes a generational trauma diagram where hidden ghosts lurk in the mise-en-scène and grief edits time like a faulty memory. “Two Storms” (S1E6) chains long takes into a thunderhead of regret; the Red Room twist reframes a house as a stomach for unresolved love. Few series balance formal bravura with tear-duct honesty like this cornerstone of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

4) The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020) — Limited Series

• Run: 1 season (9 episodes)
• Runtime: ~50–60 min/episode
• Starring: Victoria Pedretti, T’Nia Miller, Rahul Kohli, Amelia Eve
• Creator/Showrunner: Mike Flanagan
• Genre: Gothic romance, psychological ghost story (Henry James)
• IMDb Rating: ~7.3/10

A love story wearing a ghost mask, Bly trades jump scares for slow-bleed melancholy. Memory becomes a manor’s architecture; time loops like grief itself. T’Nia Miller stuns in a performance about identity fraying at the edges. Softer than Hill House, perhaps, but its bench-scene coda devastates. It proves Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows can be tender without losing their chill.

5) The Midnight Club (2022) — Series

• Run: 1 season (10 episodes)
• Runtime: ~50–60 min/episode
• Starring: Iman Benson, Igby Rigney, Ruth Codd, Annarah Cymone, Heather Langenkamp
• Creators: Mike Flanagan & Leah Fong (from Christopher Pike)
• Genre: YA horror anthology, coming-of-age
• IMDb Rating: ~6.5/10

Terminally ill teens trade scary stories as a stay against the dark. The anthology device lets Flanagan flex tonal range—noir one week, sci-fi the next—while the hospice frame keeps stakes intimate and real. Even when lighter, the series honors storytelling as palliative care, a theme that threads through many Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

6) Doctor Sleep (2019) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 152 min (180 min Director’s Cut)
• Starring: Ewan McGregor, Rebecca Ferguson, Kyliegh Curran
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan (from Stephen King)
• Genre: Supernatural thriller, legacy sequel
• IMDb Rating: ~7.3/10

Tasked with reconciling King’s novel and Kubrick’s film, Flanagan crafts a sober, compassionate sequel about recovery and responsibility. The Director’s Cut adds chapter-book cadence and character breath. Rose the Hat becomes a franchise-grade antagonist, but the film’s heart is Dan choosing service over self-obliteration. It’s studio horror executed with a poet’s conscience—signature Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows energy.

7) Gerald’s Game (2017) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 103 min
• Starring: Carla Gugino, Bruce Greenwood, Chiara Aurelia
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan (from Stephen King)
• Genre: Survival horror, psychological drama
• IMDb Rating: ~6.5/10

Long labeled “unfilmable,” King’s locked-room ordeal becomes a study in naming trauma and walking past it. Gugino’s interior debates—staged as sharp, compassionate self-cross-examination—turn survival into rebirth. The infamous degloving sequence is horrifying but purposeful. Minimalist filmmaking, maximal emotional clarity: pure Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

8) Hush (2016) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 82 min
• Starring: Kate Siegel, John Gallagher Jr.
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan & Kate Siegel
• Genre: Home-invasion thriller
• IMDb Rating: ~6.6/10

A near-silent cat-and-mouse exercise where sound design becomes the villain’s accomplice. Kate Siegel’s deaf-mute novelist survives by iterating like an engineer—testing, failing, revising. Blocking and geography do the dialogue’s work. It’s lean, rewatchable, and a blueprint for how Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows turn limitations into suspense engines.

9) Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 99 min
• Starring: Elizabeth Reaser, Annalise Basso, Lulu Wilson, Henry Thomas
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan & Jeff Howard
• Genre: Possession/period horror
• IMDb Rating: ~6.1/10

An IP prequel that shouldn’t be this good becomes a 1960s-textured family tragedy with a demon in the margins. Period lenses, cue marks, and analog color anchor a story about a widow hustling to keep the lights on. Lulu Wilson delivers a pint-sized powerhouse. Proof that even assignments can carry the soul of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

10) Before I Wake (2016) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 97 min
• Starring: Kate Bosworth, Thomas Jane, Jacob Tremblay, Annabeth Gish
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan & Jeff Howard
• Genre: Dark fantasy, grief horror
• IMDb Rating: ~6.1/10

A foster child whose dreams manifest—the butterflies are beautiful; the Canker Man is not. Distribution woes can’t dim a tender fable about misread pain. Flanagan reframes fear as misunderstood love, a current running through many Mike Flanagan . The ending is less twist than blessing.

11) Oculus (2013) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 104 min
• Starring: Karen Gillan, Brenton Thwaites, Katee Sackhoff, Rory Cochrane
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan (from his short)
• Genre: Psychological/supernatural horror
• IMDb Rating: ~6.5/10

The Lasser Glass edits reality like malicious software, splicing timelines until memory is suspect. Karen Gillan’s vengeance-scientist gives the film a tragic spine: a child who built protocols for ghosts. Visual sleights (apples, lights, reflections) make paranoia tactile. Essential viewing for grasping the grammar of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

12) Absentia (2011) — Feature Film

• Runtime: 92 min
• Starring: Courtney Bell, Katie Parker, Doug Jones
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan
• Genre: Indie supernatural mystery
• IMDb Rating: ~6.4/10

Tight-budget ingenuity births the Rosetta Stone of his career: grief rituals, municipal portals to elsewhere, and monsters that file paperwork. Two sisters circle a tunnel that eats both people and proof. You can feel the blueprint: scale the creature to the emotion, not the budget. A foundational chapter in Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

13) The Life of Chuck (2024–2025) — Feature Film

• Runtime: TBA
• Starring: Tom Hiddleston, Mark Hamill, Chiwetel Ejiofor (ensemble)
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan (from Stephen King)
• Genre: Fantastical drama, existential fable
• IMDb Rating: —

King’s triptych about a life told in reverse suits Flanagan’s fascination with mortality and grace. Expect tonal pivots from apocalypse to intimacy, with music and memory as conductors. If Midnight Mass interrogates faith, this examines gratitude—another pillar of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

14) Oculus: Chapter 3 — The Man with the Plan (2006) — Short Film

• Runtime: 32 min
• Starring: Scott Graham, Erin Oremland
• Director/Writer/Editor: Mike Flanagan
• Genre: Concept horror, found-footage adjacent
• IMDb Rating: —

Locked in a room with a cursed mirror and a camcorder, obsession escalates to ruin. You can watch Flanagan’s craft coalesce: rigorous blocking, editorial games, grief as experiment. A crucial ancestor to the feature, and a reminder that many Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows start as bold constraints.

15) Still Life (2001) — Short Film

• Runtime: 9 min
• Starring: Early repertory faces
• Director/Writer: Mike Flanagan
• Genre: Psychological short
• IMDb Rating: —

An embryonic note that hints at obsessions to come: time held, emotion leaking through the frame, fear as a sibling of empathy. Minor in scale, major in DNA. Even here, you sense how Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows will privilege compassion over cruelty.

16) “Two Storms” — The Haunting of Hill House S1E6 (2018) — Signature Episode

• Runtime: ~58 min
• Director: Mike Flanagan
• Technique: Long takes, hidden cuts, storm-mirrored timelines
• Impact: Benchmark for prestige-horror craft
• IMDb User Score: ~9+/10

A funeral home becomes a time machine as childhood and adult selves collide mid-tempest. The choreography dazzles, but the engine is mourning; form serves feeling. It distills why Mike Flanagan linger: the ghosts are metaphors, and the metaphors are merciful.

17) The Haunting Anthology (2018–2020) — Franchise Entry

• Works: Hill House (2018), Bly Manor (2020)
• Role: Creator/Showrunner (directed all of Hill House)
• Signature: Repertory cast, literary remixes
• Tone: Gothic intimacy over gore
• Avg. IMDb: ~8.0/10

A repertory troupe migrates across eras and texts while Flanagan refines a house style: eulogies as set pieces, scores as stained glass, production design as memory palace. A franchise that proves brand without sameness—central to understanding Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

18) Director’s Cut — Doctor Sleep (2020) — Feature Cut

• Runtime: 180 min
• Format: Home release (extended)
• Additions: Chapter structure, character beats
• Effect: Novelistic clarity
• Reputation: Fan-preferred cut

Not just longer—better. The chaptering sharpens arcs for Dan, Abra, and the True Knot, and the Overlook return lands as therapy, not only nostalgia. A lesson in editorial authorship that echoes across Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

19) Collaboration with The Newton Brothers — Scores (2013–Present)

• Notable: Oculus, Hush, Gerald’s Game, Doctor Sleep, Midnight Mass, Usher
• Role: Composers shaping sonic identity
• Signature: Lyrical dread, choral laments
• Function: Thematic glue across projects
• Recognition: Fan-favorite OSTs

Organs and choirs crack like old pews; strings hum like air in a crypt. Their music makes elegy the baseline so scares punctuate rather than dominate. Once you hear it, you’ll spot it across Mike Flanagan.

20) Kate Siegel x Mike Flanagan — The Muse/Partner Thread

• Shared Works: Hush, Hill House, Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, Usher
• Roles: Co-writer (Hush), actor, recurring lead
• Signature: Resilient, articulate survivors
• Arc: From voiceless final girl to confessional powerhouse
• Why it matters: Continuity of theme and tone

Siegel personifies Flanagan’s fascination with articulate resilience. Whether speaking through silence in Hush or dismantling dogma in Midnight Mass, she grounds metaphysics in bruised humanity—central to how Mike Flanagan find their pulse.

21) The Dark Tower (TBA) — TV Series (In Development)

• Status: In development
• Source: Stephen King saga
• Role: Creator/Showrunner (planned)
• Tone: Epic dark fantasy, mythic quest
• IMDb: —

King’s multiverse of grief, gunslingers, and fate aligns with Flanagan’s moral preoccupations. If realized, expect stoic heroism braided with compassionate horror—an expansion of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows into cosmic scope.

22) Something Is Killing the Children (TBA) — TV Series (In Development)

• Status: In development
• Source: James Tynion IV & Werther Dell’Edera
• Role: Adaptation/showrunning involvement reported
• Tone: Monster-hunting, trauma allegory
• IMDb: —

Children see monsters adults refuse to acknowledge—an almost on-the-nose fit for Flanagan’s theme of institutional blindness. Could synthesize creature thrills with town-portrait empathy typical of Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

23) The Season of Passage (TBA) — Feature Film (In Development)

• Status: Announced
• Source: Christopher Pike novel
• Role: Writer/Director
• Tone: Cosmic/medical horror
• IMDb: —

Mars dust, folklore rot, scientific hubris—planetary stakes without abandoning intimacy. A space-age cousin to the theological autopsy of Midnight Mass, still aligned with the compassion that defines Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

24) Revival (TBA) — Feature Film (Development History)

• Status: Previously in development
• Source: Stephen King
• Role: Writer/Director attachment reported
• Tone: Faith, electricity, cosmic dread
• IMDb: —

Even as a “what-if,” the pairing maps cleanly onto Flanagan’s sandbox: belief as accelerant, science as séance. It illustrates his gravitational pull toward stories where spirituality meets experiment—prime territory for Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

25) The Mike Flanagan Players — Repertory Ensemble (Ongoing)

• Core: Carla Gugino, Kate Siegel, Henry Thomas, Rahul Kohli, Samantha Sloyan, Annabeth Gish, T’Nia Miller, Bruce Greenwood, Zach Gilford
• Function: Continuity of tone & trust
• Signature: Characters who speak like essays and feel like people
• Span: From Absentia to Usher
• IMDb: —

More than casting comfort food, this troupe is a creative covenant. Familiar faces let Flanagan skip rapport and dive straight into nuance, yielding performances with moral weight. In an industry obsessed with “universes,” he’s built something more intimate: a moral ecosystem—home base for Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows.

Conclusion: Why Mike Flanagan Movies and TV Shows Endure

Mike Flanagan endure because they treat horror as a compassionate translator for emotions we often suppress—grief, guilt, love, and redemption. From small-scale indies like Absentia to sprawling Netflix epics such as The Haunting of Hill House and The Fall of the House of Usher, Flanagan consistently proves that horror is more than a scare—it is a mirror to the human condition. His trademark style—long monologues, layered sound design, and meticulous editing—invites audiences to reflect on their own fears and hopes.

What separates Mike Flanagan from standard horror fare is their relentless empathy. Ghosts represent unresolved trauma, vampires become metaphors for blind faith, and cursed objects reveal the fragility of memory. The scares may jolt us, but it is the characters’ struggles for forgiveness and love that linger. This balance between dread and compassion is why critics at IndieWire describe him as one of the defining voices of modern horror storytelling, while publications like Variety highlight his ability to transform genre television into award-worthy prestige drama.

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