This article contains spoilers for “Presence” and Mike Flanagan’s “The Haunting of Hill House.”

Breaking through to the other side and witnessing things from a ghostly plane isn’t new for the horror genre. Films like “Haunter,” “The Others,” and “The Sixth Sense,” to name a few, have all provided viewers a glimpse into the afterlife. Director Steven Soderbergh’s new horror film “Presence” (check out our review here) offers a different kind of supernatural experience, as we view the entire story from a first-person paranormal perspective, featuring a ghost that only reveals itself after a death in the final act.

Early in “Presence,” a medium visiting the house explains that the afterlife doesn’t follow the same rules of time as ours, and the spirit is unaware of who they are or when they exist. This sets up the twist that the ghost is, in fact, Tyler Payne (Eddy Maday), the oldest child of the family who falls to his death while protecting his sister, seemingly sending himself back to before his demise to haunt the family until that moment. It’s a daring twist and one best not to dwell on too much.

That said, even with its strengths, it’s hard to watch “Presence” without recalling the specter known as the Bent-Neck Lady in “The Haunting of Hill House,” which employs similar rules much more effectively. This is largely due to the ghosts in question and their relationships with the living who are being scared out of their minds.

Fans of Mike Flanagan (or Flanafans) will surely remember the moment they discovered that the Bent-Neck Lady, who had been haunting Nell Crain (Victoria Pedretti) her entire life in “The Haunting of Hill House,” was, in fact, Eleanor “Nell” Crain herself. Dangling through the decades, the iconic ghost of one of Flanagan’s best shows threw a wild time loop into his adaptation of the classic horror story and it worked brilliantly, adding to the tragedy of Nell’s life, which carried on to death. In the case of “Presence,” however, the twist feels unearned, primarily because the character who becomes a ghost is portrayed as a jerk from the beginning.

Tyler is the beloved, arrogant son who is elevated solely by his mother’s obsession with his success. Had even a slight emotional connection been rebuilt between himself and his grieving yet overlooked sister, Chloe (Callina Liang), the twist of him turning into the ghost haunting his family would have resonated. Hints of a caring big brother who was even minimally invested in his entire family could have made the storyline credible. Instead, it’s a rushed reveal that comes across as merely tying up the film’s loose ends. Perhaps if Chloe had fallen to her death, taking her attacker with her to become the spirit, it would have been a more fitting conclusion than the one we received, primarily because there is no actual resolution for the family that truly deserved one.

The Payne family is damaged even before they set foot in their newly haunted home. Not only is Chris (Chris Sullivan) considering divorcing his shady business-dealing wife, but Rebekah (Lucy Liu) is not just picking a favorite child in Tyler but having a borderline icky paternal relationship with him. That leaves Chloe as undoubtedly the film’s main focus — a ghost in her own home, protected by her father but given nearly no affection by her mother.

None of this is even remotely resolved by the time the credits roll, even after the spirit has literally shaken the house awake when Tyler expresses his denial of his sister’s experience. Had there been a single scene where they made amends, or where Liu’s cold mother warmed a little to her daughter before the unexpected passing of her son, the gut punch it hopes to land would’ve left a mark. One that echoed the emotional notes of Nell’s revelation in “The Haunting of Hill House” when she finally realized that the thing that had been haunting her throughout her life was a deathly vision of her doom. During a Beyond Fest screening attended by /Film’s BJ Colangelo, Flanagan also confirmed that the Australian ghost film “Lake Mungo” was a huge inspiration for “The Haunting of Hill House,” and the film’s biggest scare was a direct influence on Nell’s terror.

Ultimately, “Presence,” leaning in on the premise of a watcher keeping its distance until absolutely necessary, needed a human touch to stick its landing. Instead, all it makes us want to do is head back to Hill House or make a trip to Lake Mungo and see how a really terrifying time twist is done.