Elizabeth's Headstone In The Woman In The House Across The Street From The Girl In The Window Could Mean More Than You Think
If the title didn't tip viewers off to the parody at work in Netflix's "The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window," the comedy-thriller reveals its absurd hand in Episode 2 with the flashback to how Anna's (Kristen Bell) nine-year-old daughter died — she was killed and eaten upon attending an interview with a cannibalistic serial killer for Take Your Daughter to Work Day. Her dad, Douglas (Michael Ealy), is a forensic psychiatrist who specializes in serial killers, of course.
It's certainly heartbreaking to see what Anna is going through — her three-year grieving process has devolved into downing enough bottles of wine and pills to induce hallucinations — but the circumstances of Elizabeth's (Appy Pratt) death are written to be as tragic as possible, pushing the incident into the realm of hilariously implausible. Some think this is the series going too far, but the dark comedy takes that and runs with it, turning even poor little Elizabeth's headstone into a recurring gag.
There are many visual gags sprinkled throughout the series, like Anna's trio of books on how to be an artist, or the unending supply of casserole dishes, but the headstone seems to have more going on than simple amusement.
The epitaph changes each time we see it
Each time we see the headstone, it sports a different epitaph engraved below Elizabeth's name. In Episode 1, the phrase — "If love could save you, you would have lived forever" — is normal enough, showing how much Anna and Douglas loved their daughter. At this point, the series has yet to delve into its true absurdity. Sure, Anna's rain phobia is a little offbeat, but she's clearly struggling to deal with her trauma.
However, Episode 2 gives us the deets on Elizabeth's untimely demise and Anna delivers an overly long monologue beside the grave, which now reads: "In Heaven you can dance like no one's watching." It's cheesy, but still a mostly realistic epitaph. At this point, the change could be interpreted as a joke or it could be leaning into making the audience question if what we're seeing is actually happening or simply in Anna's mind, as she's revealed to be an unreliable narrator.
It isn't until Episode 6 that we see the headstone again. Now, the headstone fully embraces comedy with the nonsensical phrase, "There's no "I" in Heaven," which has never been written on anyone's grave. Viewers loved the weird twist on the classic but tired "no I in team" saying: Twitter user @lydie_glass picked it out as the "best sight gag" in the series, while user @Adzkirkbride tweeted, "the changing gravestone is making me LOSE it." But for the viewers who didn't realize "The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window" is a parody, the changing epitaphs were either confusing or frightening. For user @LisaLeboho, it enhanced the psychological thrill of the series: "The tombstone kept changing and each time I felt like I was going crazy." In the end, neither the audience nor Anna was going crazy.