Prospero "Perry" Usher's (Sauriyan Sapkota) story arc resembles an 1842 short story by Poe, "The Masque of the Red Death." In the original story, Prince Prospero invites a group of noblemen to a masquerade ball in his castle while a plague called the Red Death is at its peak. However, the elite group are wiped out once a mysterious figure cloaked in red (the Red Death) enters the venue. In the Netflix series, the event that Perry invites his select few privileged guests to is a rave orgy at a condemned testing site for Fortunato. Much like the Red Death, the figure that appears in this iteration is Verna, who's there to give him a final warning that unfortunately goes unheeded.
As an added touch, the passages from "The Masque of the Red Death" are scrawled across the walls of the building, as shared by the production designer Laurin Kelsey on her Instagram.
