There was never a curse in What Remains of Edith Finch. (Analysis)

When I started this video I was kind of thinking this was all a reach, until you mentioned how siblings can help end generational trauma and I remembered that each generation of Finches all had only one person who survived to have kids after all their siblings died or went missing…

Milton is the kid who went no contact

I find it interesting how we see glimpses of Edie in Edith, even how she memorialises her family members in her book similarly to how Edie did, by drawing them in ways connected to their deaths and making that their whole personality (although I can also see how the devs probably just did that to players would have an easier time remembering who was who in the family tree).

I agree that the family basically ended up creating their own curse, a self fulfilling prophecy driven by a life of recklessness. When I experienced this game first as a teenager I didn’t notice just how much of the environment is so so dangerous in this game I was just focused on the storytelling, so I understand the children’s perspectives more now as an adult.

Also, even if Edith’s son is the end of the cycle, the fact he has a broken arm is a sign that the same recklessness has also passed down to him.

I always wondered why I loved this game so much, I think it's because I wanted someone, Anyone, to celebrate me like Edie seemed to do. I'm older now, and her behaviour is disturbing, but younger me was unironically considering a grand Finch-style shebang at one point, wondering if I'd ever be revered the same way

so basically Edie is the reail villain of the game.

WROEF? is one of the most depressing games i've ever played.

I actually think the trippy scene of the starving child may have been delirium from a combination of starvation and the holy berries she ate. They didn't usually cause hallucinations on their own but just a few can be fatal to a young child, and combined with the other toxic substance she consumed in toothpaste and gone off rat food could have combined to quite the delirious state.

I just played this game as I wanted to experience it before being spoiled by this video and I just cried after I finished it, it was such a sad game and so many of the deaths could’ve been easily prevented especially if the family was less neglectful or took mental illness seriously. I was also sad that Edith died at the end and was hoping she’d be able to break the generational trauma or “curse”.

Love this analysis. You need to stop warming folk though about "this is just my thoughts" "i might be wrong" "i over analyse things" this is YOUR analysis bro, own it

“Every Finch is buried in the library”
Some have fantastical stories about how they died, some horrible, and in Milton’s case, his fate is unknown. But he found out the stories, snuck into the rooms through the passages, connected the dots and may have found out the truth. There’s no story pertaining to Milton, but if every Finch is buried in the library with a story. What if Milton is LITERALLY buried in the library and they never found him because it was sealed away. Maybe he found out the truth connecting all of these stories and found out the cause of some of them: Edie. And when she figured out that he knew, she had to silence him, maybe burying him under the floorboards of the library or burning the corpse and hiding it in a book shaped box. HE MIGHT LITERALLY BE BURIED IN THE LIBRARY

Edit: Another haunting thing to consider regarding Sam? Both he and Calvin, despite living decades apart, both fell to their deaths.

I feel like you bringing up Sam's compliance in response to the trauma he experienced throughout his life also shows itself in how he reacts to Gregory's death and the subsequent divorce. Even though Kay made far more mistakes in that moment (leaving a 1-year old unsupervised in the bath and whatnot), Sam places the blame firmly on himself. That combined with his fixation on being strong enough to survive as shown in his hunting reel makes me wonder if he's choosing to blame himself over what he perceived to be a single moment of showing weakness leading to yet another death in the family.

I think by the end of the game, the “curse” is broken by Milton and Edith.

Milton is the easy one as he left without forgetting and it’s clear he still cares given that he came back and I think he almost did the same as Edith but stopped midway through hence why his art stops appearing.

But I think Edith fully break the “curse” by continuing and writing all of the stories even if they aren’t real, because in the end the journal makes exploring the whole house pointless when the stories are there within literally hands reach of her kid.

I think this is represented by her kid only opening the journal thing once and closing it once, alongside the fact we never see them enter the house just to the cemetery but also because of the cast which for bones is like the bare minimum of proper healing.

The flowers on Edith’s grave apparently are quite toxic but I think this represents sacrifice as she knew the whole house was essentially toxic to be at especially since she is pregnant but she took the risk and essentially poisoned herself and I think it was the stress of her life, going back to the house and childbirth that ultimately killed but it paid off in the end.

I thought Molly's whole bit was caused by eating poison berries/leaves, which produced hallucinations and then killed her

I know it's probably wrong to try and solve the deaths, but I think all of Edie's children died from falling. Molly, I think, climbed out the window while hallucinating from the various poisons, or even just to escape her locked room. Walter, who after living in his bunker for decades, was blinded by the sun and walked off the cliff.

Lewis: As he bowed down to accept the crown, he bowed down into the fish slicer ...

Молли умерла не от отравления. Необязательно есть морковь и ягоды, вы можете пропустить эти шаги и сразу залезть на дерево. Если вы откажетесь от моркови и ягод, у Молли тоже начнутся галлюцинации. И в конце своего путешествия она вернулась в постель и написала в блокноте, что умерла в тот момент. Это исключает возможность выпадения из окна.
Я объясняю:
Молли была больна! Скорее всего, у нее был паразитизм, в ее организме были паразиты и глисты. Она регулярно ела еду хомяка, а в кадре показывают экскременты в клетке. Родители были небрежны по отношению к детям и не лечили заболевание.
Молли была голодна и не могла насытиться. Она кормила и себя, и паразита.
Последнему животному она превратилась в червяка и сказала::
"Мы оба знаем, что я вкусная".
Вероятно, у нее были предсмертные галлюцинации и умерла от паразитов.

Уолтер, человек который просидел в бункере 30 лет. Его не мог сбить поезд, потому что в кадре показывали , что железная дорога была разрушена еще на обрыве дороги. У Олтера был сердечный приступ. От 30 лет ел только персики, находился без солнечного света и рассказывал про Землетрясение. Которое никто не слышал кроме него. Скорее всего это были проблемы со здоровьем из-за плохого образа жизни.
Когда он взял кувалду и в 53 пошел сносить стену, его сердце не выдержало и он погиб от сердечного приступа, когда вышел к солнцу.

Rick definitely did exist and he was present when Barbara died because the comic book mentions that the police blamed him for the murder. It could be a lie but the appeal of the comic book (to the original readers) is that it's a gory and fictionalized account of a real story; blatantly lying about something that the reader could have easily checked or would have probably already known would have spoilt everything.

I’m pretty sure the holly berries are real, and she has a poison induced hallucination, combined with the toothpaste and moldy carrot

I’m realizing I’m definitely not the first to comment this, love the video, the analysis is very well thought out

The Calla Lillies are a traditional funeral flower, so I believe they are meant to signify that Edith has passed.

Moral of the story, send ur grandparents into retirement homes.

do you think the use of going through the doggy door itself is symbolic? i understand the house being locked because its abandoned but going through the doggy door as a child when the family was still living in there seems strange. maybe its a continuation of the series of locked doors through the house?

ive experienced smnth similar with my family but alot less 'fantasica'l in a sense. my grandma brought the idea of a bad luck curse in my family, an excuse for whenever smnth went bad or missing. it was an excuse for them keeping bad people around them, ignoring issues in the family of lyingl. my grandma blamed her loosing money that she hid in her bedroom on this when it reality her daughter had stolen it. i remember believing it as a kid because it would happen over and over again where my grandma would suddenly loose an item she had left it.

pretty sure i stopped believing when i was 10 and lost a gold jewellery box my other grandma had given me before she passed only to find it broken in pieces in my grandmas.drawer and have her admit to me it was because my cousin was angry it was mine and not his.

i was obsessed with this game when kt was popular but couldnt rlly grasp the concept fully so im so happy that i found this video ❤️❤️ keep up the good work

i think molly most likely died from eating an odd concoction of things, and possibly real holly berries. she talks about how the monster will get her in her sleep. its most likely the combination would of given her a sense of dread and unfortunately shed pass during her sleep, when her heart would naturally be slower anyways

as for the other family members- i think that barb most likely slipped on a roller skate or something as she was shown to not be the best balance wise. if walter did maybe push one out as a prank to make her trip, the guilt, and edies fantasies could of messed with a developing childs mind. in walters death you can see rickys supposed crutch in the tunnels, but with the time gap it very much could be calvins. as for walters death, im not 100% sure what did happen due to the fact he was down there for ages. something could of spooked him like the sun, or he could of tripped on the tracks and fell, or simply just thrown himself into the water. but his note he left sounded very hopeful, and not like a permanent goodbye more like a see you in a while kinda way. sam seemed like it was somehow both connected to him being so preventative and just outside of the curse to me. he got so good at surviving that he got a little bit of an ego, and just simply missed a step. gwen or guss i forgot his name definitely seems like a hurricane accident. i think kay was probably an alcoholic while going through a rough patch with sam, and knocked the tap. i noticed with sam, dawn and edith that their deaths were much more realistic, as they didnt play into edies storys. for lewis i think the drugs, sober, morbid job, edies ways and the death of his father and basically the rest of his family took a tole on him, leading to psychosis and if edie knew the extent of his issues and turned it into a story i think it would probably by far one of the most fantastical ones. i think milton, with dawn being grounded, but also being one of the younger ones by that point probably ran a way. he was being painted as a prodigy of art similar to barb and thus ran away before he could die in a way that would make edie conjur up a story, hence the whole he was swallowed by the house. i also find it interesting how the chimney was specifically built from the orginal houses bricks. the chimney is the heart of the house in a way, so in a way the orginal houses was still there. i think edie just had bad coping mechanisms from the time period, whatever happened in the orginal house, and guilt of being a bad parent. with all the whimsy her father and husband both had i can definitely see how her brain would jump to some conclusions to make her feel better. ARG SORRY

Lewis’s death absolutely messed me up while playing this. It’s one of the most memorable and sad events I’ve ever played in any game. I still think about how it affects me, and how depression and daydreaming can take someone out of reality and that succumbing to the fantasy into finality was far better than actually living life. He was and felt alone, and he needed more help and intervention than anyone was willing to give him until it was too late.

You make a lot of interesting points about the metaphors that may have been used throughout the story, but I think your depiction of Edie almost entirely lacks nuance. I don't believe Edie is a psycho killer who thrives on fame, or at least that's not entirely what she is. I don't think she is a mastermind scheming people's deaths. I think Edith's monologue after Walter's scene and during her walk to the grave yard holds a lot of weight for what the story actually is about. I don't think most abusive people do the terrible things they do with a scheming intention. We as humans have to be able to justify ourselves and our actions are good. I don't think Edie is painting Edith's memorial because she plans to kill her, but rather because she assumes she will die soon. This is honestly the scarier viewpoint in my opinion. Both Dawn and Edie are wrong in their approach. Dawn approaches the "curse" with complete fear, locking away the bad things to pretend they don't happen. If you interpret the flip book Milton left behind to be from before he went missing, it may imply that he went missing on purpose in some way. This would mean both of Dawn's children (aside from Edith) died intentionally in some form, proving her method ineffective. Meanwhile, Edie fully embraces and almost idolizes the curse, making it her god that governs everything. Her children died in more neglectful and accidental (but more brutal) ways. Edie's way of coping with the death of her family is to believe in a curse, to make the stories fantastical because then she doesn't have to deal with the trauma. Dawn is the representation of the family trauma that is "we don't talk about it, we don't think about it, don't ask questions." whereas Edie is a direct contributor who cannot come to terms with the fact she contributed to deaths of people in the family. If it is a curse, then it isn't her fault.

Neither method is good. We don't move past generational trauma without addressing it but we can't let that trauma control our lives or use it as an excuse for actions. I think this is shown through several deaths being completely unrelated to Edie at all. Sam is the one that comes to mind. I think this illustrates that the point of the story isn't the "Edie was the villain all along" story line that is easy to jump through. The true villain is the trauma, and several outside and inside influences are pawns to that evil.

I notice that Sam's poem for Calvin is very simple, with a clear pattern and a clear idea at the top. To me that looks less like spontaneous writing and more like induced writing; an adult telling a kid to write something. I wonder if Edie pushed Sam to write something for Calvin's memorial. Contrast Dawn's poem for Gus; it more feels apologetic. Putting it onto a kite spool is almost assuredly Edie's idea, but the poem itself feels honest, more like something someone would write while grieving. You can say that it's an age difference, and it might be, but I find the contrast interesting.

A lot of theories around the game seem to sort of villainise Edie which I don’t entirely agree with 100%. We are using modern terms like ‘generational trauma’ to define an older character. Edie would never have seen what she was doing to be harmful, she very well may have been superstitious and believed in a curse (that we all know she was perpetuating). I have met people who memorialise the dead and people who exaggerate the lives and actions of dead from when they were alive. Edie could if just been exaggerating her family’s deaths to try and make sure they will be remembered a memorialised because she too lived in fear of the family curse. She wrote as a warning and a reminder to be careful all without knowing it was her writing that was destroying everything around her. Sometimes the past just needs to stay the past.

with the way that edith talks about edie and dawn throughout the game i think that it makes the player thing that dawn was a strict overprotecting mother while edie was ediths way out from it and how to have fun but in reality edie was manipulating her making her think thats what dawn was like when she just wanted to save her kids from edie

I’m pretty sure that’s why Edie had the grave prepared while she was still alive and indicated in her will where she wanted to be buried. It fits considering her habit of preparing for people’s deaths while they’re still alive. Why not her own?

Edit: I think also the reason you’re on a conveyor belt at the end of Lewis’ story is that it’s hinting at what’s about to happen to him. Like all the other fish on the cannery conveyor belt.

Edit 2: actually if you think about it. It makes sense no one died for a while after Barbara’s death. Edie got so much attention from the former’s child star’s “gruesome” death that likely would have satisfied her addiction for some years.

Edit 3: Edith died through childbirth, most likely.

Molly died of poisoning tho?

It really touched me when you talked about sibling relationships being a key to counter generational trauma. I'm like that with my brother, they tried to pit us against each other but now we're finding stength together and they can't do anything about it

If Barbara just died because she fell off the second story, why did Walter hide? Walter talks about a monster, the monster most likely being Edie. I don't think it was Rick because why should Walter be in fear of him? Edie was always in the house, on the other hand

Is this the game where the baby drowns in a bathtub or something?

One thing i noticed is after you mentioned the boyfriend Rick has the same injuries as Calvin, is that neither Calvin nor Sam is ever mentioned even though they should have been alive and, theoretically, in the house, but are never mentioned or shown. It's almost like the comic was written so far after Barbara and Calvin's deaths that his existence is irrelevant in the fantastical death of Barbara. I think it also shows that Edie's neglect or even abuse became worse based on how her children questioned or defied her expectations and desires. This might just be grand ammounts of speculation, but it popped into my head.

It never occcured to me that Lewis' death was anything other than self-inflicted, but it definitely makes sense as a possibility. My first impression of that part of the game was definitely not accidental, and it hit so hard I had to take a break. Too much experience with depression, and familiarity with wanting an escape from a miserable life :/

I do think that Milton did escape and I think the unfinished swan told his story after how he found love and lost his love only to later find out that he had a son, realizing this he wrote a book that was the unfinished swan to sort of call out to his family that he was still alive in fact I believe both games actually take place within the same year (the year Ediths son is returning to his mom's grave).

I enjoy this analysis because it holds the story under a more rational light, but ultimately, I think there's far too much coincidence to dismiss the curse as imagination. I mean EVERY single member of the family perishes prematurely except for Edie, who was the curse's most devout believer. I'm not convinced you can chalk all of it up to carelessness; even Sven and Edith's father are lost in bizarre accidents.

The most obvious evidence that something supernatural is involved is Milton. An 11 year old boy disappears without a trace. Nothing in the story hints that he was planning to leave, or that he disagreed with his family's reality. Besides, I can't imagine he would be fine leaving his mother thinking that she'd lost a child. Even ignoring how his flipbook is supported by the events in the Unfinished Swan, the reality is he couldn't have simply disappeared into thin air, even if he wanted to. We saw those fliers, they were definitely looking.

Edie is for sure obsessed with the curse, her lost family, and attention, but I think that is the result of the curse, not the cause of it.

I know this is a very late comment, but I just want to say that I love your analysis. I love this game, and there is just so much nuance to a lot of the story. I remember watching a video by Joseph Anderson, and I agree that Edie is to put it lightly, a pretty sh*t person. There is something I do want to say about the Barbara comic book and how, minor spoilers if you have not watched Joseph Anderson's video, but I do think that Edie did have a hand in the creation of the comic because of the detail with the key in the music box. It was information even Edith didn't know until Dawn told her about it and we all can agree Edie know the most about the house than anyone else.
Anyway what I want to say is that the comic book's depiction of Walter, as a young child, hiding fearfully under the bed has always irked me. It felt like the narrator of the comic is berating a young Walter for being a coward or something. With the possibility that Edie is involved in the comic and passive aggressively insulting her then 9 to 10 year old son for being scared disgusts me.
Sorry for the long tangent.
If you read this whole comment, tell me want you think.
Thank you.

The story of Lewis has always resonated with me incredibly deeply. I remember from my first memories choosing the decision he made. To live in vivid fantasy rather then the horrible reality. Spending my life in an imagined better one. Honestly, I'm pretty sure his story is one of the reasons I stopped

I like your interpretation of Barbara's death; it's one of the more unique ones out there. Her whole section reminds me of Tales from the Crypt or 1000 Ways to Die. Those shows usually make up stories of people's deaths, but on occasions when they do showcase a real story, they highly exaggerate it for the sake of entertainment.
honestly that news broadcast could have been a horror themed radio drama that gave walter a nightmare.
it also makes sense for gramma eidie to use the comic to memorialize barb rather than a newspaper article, her dying to an unfortunate fall isn't NEARLY as sensational as her being eaten by monsters. after all, eidie did like to go around and say her husband died because of a dragon attack, rather than just say he died falling while building a dragon shaped slide.

also replaying the game made me realize something sad, it wasn't the tent that crushed gus, it was the totem pole. in gus's story if you look closely, before the tent flies off you can see it slam into the pole and the pole starts to topple over. it's also foreshadowed in the part were you're walking on the beach, and you walk past the pole it's laying exactly where gus was standing

actually calvin died after barbara.

also it’s pretty telling how reckless edith was climbing and squeezing throughout all the property just to get to these stories only to end up giving birth prematurely and ultimately dying during childbirth.

The fact that
What Remains Of Edith Finch
Is more so about Edith Sr (Edie) than Edith jr(who u play as)

Calvin's section legit made me nervous the entire time, especially when he was upside down. I was expecting him to fall, as there's no centrifugal force to keep the chain from collapsing as he comes to a stop.

I disagree that the only way to fix things was to let the memories of the passed family members die. It is one way, sure, but I think that Edith had an intent in mind other than just continuing to spread the family's traumas. I think that Edith wanted to change the way the family was remembered, breaking away from Edie's toxic storytelling and obsession with the curse and moving instead to a healthier kind of rememberance which acknowledges that the people who passed were people and not just stories. She wanted her child to know and acknowledge their stories, yes, but she wanted this to happen as a step towards moving on. Rather than forgetting the past, Edith wanted her child to recontextualize their deaths in their mind not as the result of a curse but as unfortunate happenings to accept, learn from, and finally acknowledge in a way that will allow them to fade from memory with grace not as stories, but as people, remembered as such.
It's true that Edith could have broken the cycle by leaving it all behind to be forgotten, but that feels like a less cathartic way to end the trauma. Forgetting could have led to the same mistakes being made as Edith's child would never have learned from the past family's mistakes, and it would have allowed the child to continue to believe that the Finch family is cursed. Instead, Edith gave her child the possibility of retrospection- the chance to look back, realize what actually went wrong, and do better, allowing for an ending where the "curse" is broken and the family can be remembered with love as they should have been the whole time.

TLDR I think Edith did the right thing explaining what happened to her kid in a way that lets those members of the family who died to the house to be recontextualized and remembered not as victims of a "curse" but as unlucky souls who should be remembered with love, and I believe that this may be the best way for what remains of the Finch family to move on gracefully.

The youngest children's deaths make me so sad. The different deaths are wild, but I didn't even think it was about trauma.

The murder “eating his family” can be heard as “Edi-ing his family”, to hint that the whole murder story was a fantastical telling of events.

Watching a walkthrough , as I dont have the game with me, my friend has my system atm, but with Lewis, when the character Lewis enters the door, and is in the Cannery, like it would be when playing one of the real Finch's, but passing Lewis at the machine and back into the game, the game remains 1st person, as Lewis took full identity of his character, as the narration states, that the character was the real Lewis. just a thought that came to me when watching it,

What is this, clarification city!? READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING PLEASE :)
- I KNOW that Calla Lillies are traditional funeral flowers, what I meant in the video is that they likely have a DEEPER MEANING than just that. Its likely that they are meant to show *rebirth*, which would make a lot of sense considering how Edith rebirths the curse through her book.

- I KNOW ABOUT THE UNFINISHED SWAN PLEASE DON'T SPOIL IT ANY MORE THAN YOU ALREADY HAVE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

- The reason I believe Edie stopped bringing walter food was because in the final part of his section, his routine of eating peaches for every meal is interrupted because he doesn't have any in front of him. Combined with this, he says that "he's going to enjoy every minute of it (freedom), especially the food." Implying he didn't have access to much food or at least good food.

- Its clear to me now that there is an idea that Edith's child actually did the right thing and laid the stories to rest as they can be seen leaving the journal and the flowers at Edith's grave. A surprisingly good ending to the story.

I will likely add to this in the future if more common notes come up in the comments, for now, a big thanks for the support on this video! I really thought it would do poorly due to being almost 8 years old now, but yall proved that wrong. Idk what game I plan to tackle next, but I have some obligations with the main game I do on my channel, Risk of Rain 2, to do first. I think I'm going to do something smaller scale just for a breather, but i'll def be doing more analyses in the future. Love you all to bits! <3