WARNING! Spoilers for Ratched ahead.
Netflix’s latest original series Ratched features a title sequence with a red string that reveals the inner workings of Mildred Ratched and represents the major themes of season 1. Ryan Murphy is known for crafting opening credits that tell a wealth of information on the entire series and hide the ending through cryptic imagery. Ratched is not exception; here’s the opening sequence and the red string’s significance explained.
Ratched tells the story of Ken Kesey’s Nurse Mildred Ratched from the 1962 novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. It serves as a prequel to showcase how she grew into the evil and ominous figure that she is in the original source. Sarah Paulson portrays Mildred Ratched as she attempts to save her brother Edmund Tolleson (Finn Wittrock) from the death penalty. As she dons her sea blue nurse’s garb and iconic red lipstick, she saunters through the hospital and manipulates everyone around her. While the title sequence may appear to be an unassuming opener that shows Mildred navigating the halls of Lucia State Hospital, it actually represents her past while also revealing the importance of her surroundings.
Ryan Murphy’s title sequence for American Horror Story: Coven became famous for its hidden reveal of who the supreme truly was when Sarah Paulson’s name flashed on screen with Santa Muerte, implying she’d master the seven wonders. Every detail of his opening sequences unveil something important about the story. Here’s Ratched’s title sequence explained.
Ratched: What The Title Sequence Reveals About The Plot
As the title sequence shows Mildred pulling a red string from the ocean and walking through the halls of Lucia State Hospital, there are brief flashes of drowning, patients, crow’s eyes, and overturned furniture. Her surroundings are meant to indicate where she will end up. Specifically, when the furniture is in disarray, it is meant to represent that her entire world will be flipped on its head. Two major instances uphold the ideology of internal chaos: Mildred’s discovery of her sexuality and the fact that she must take down Edmund before he kills her, as was revealed by the end of season 1. As she follows the red string, it becomes tangled and her appearance begins to change. This is meant to indicate her rise towards villainy as well as how well she hides her true self from others.
What Does The Red String Mean?
While the red string continues to become tangled in furniture and other people, it reveals that Mildred is entangled with others in ways that she did not expect. When it first appears, it is in reference to Greek mythology. The red string represents The Fates, who choose an individual’s destiny. It begins with Clotho, who creates the string that represents the beginning of life while Lachesis decides the length. Atropos controls when someone dies by cutting the thread. While this is only one meaning, it also represents Mildred’s past, present, and future with Edmund and at Lucia State Hospital. Her past has anchored her to Edmund through guilt while the present becomes tangled in the truth of their relationship.
Mildred must take the future into her own hands and cut the thread that ties her to her brother. When the siblings finally face off, it could indicate that the string is severed, but her new life as the villain she is known as in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest begins. A more literal meaning for the red string links to episode 6, “Got No Strings”, where she attends a puppet show with Gwendolyn and recalls her traumatic past in the foster care system. With this application, the string adapts a more literal meaning; when Mildred cuts the red string, she is free of her bondage and childhood trauma by taking her life into her own hands.
Ryan Murphy is quickly becoming the master of crafting a title sequence with an abundance of symbolism and hidden reveals to the series’ plot. The red string is the dominating factor in the opening credits that tells everything that the audience will need to know for the character’s future. Ratched season 2 could potentially even feature a new opening sequence with more hidden reveals than season 1.
