Thank you for your help, everyone! Below is my trailer breakdown. I've put it in spoiler tags as it is, frankly, massive; it ran to seven pages of notes even before I inserted the image code for over a hundred screenshots. Frankly, I'm not sure it'll even display. I hope this is of use.
This scene depicts a trolley departing from, or passing by, a mansion of suitable beauty that we can presume it to be the Baudelaire mansion. If this is the case, this scene would be set shortly before the start of the original
The Bad Beginning.
The Baudelaires – Violet (Malina Weissman), Klaus (Louis Hynes), and Sunny (unknown) – accompanied by Justice Strauss (Joan Cusack), on a trolley ride passing by what may be Briny Beach. The only point in TBB in which these four go on an outing together is for a shopping trip after the Baudelaires have moved in with Count Olaf, and there is no indication in the text that a trolley is taken or that Briny Beach is passed. Later shots suggest this is an original scene taking place before the start of TBB proper, the implications of which are discussed at that time.
These shots depict what was the Baudelaires’ original first meeting with Justice Strauss in the book; Mr. Poe’s car pulls up outside her small and charming house (note the V.F.D. insignia on the manhole cover in the street), and then she points out to the Baudelaires and Mr. Poe (K. Todd Freeman) the actual home of Count Olaf nearby. A miscellaneous bird similar to a Mountain Bluebird flies past.
This shot shows the Baudelaires’ arrival at Uncle Monty’s house. The house is somewhat smaller than in previous interpretations, but the fact that the Reptile Room is visible above and to the sides of the building suggests that in this version it is larger than the entire rest of the house.
These shots appear to show Violet and Klaus reading in a library while Sunny eats a carrot; it may be a generic establishing library, such as the Baudelaire one, but is likely Justice Strauss’s own library.
Here, the Baudelaires have arrived on Briny Beach for an outing; the beach isn’t obviously foggy, but is rather grey and depressing, in contrast to the Baudelaires, who are wearing brightly-coloured clothing as Klaus lays out a similarly colourful blanket.
The voiceover synchronises with the visuals as we see Lemony Snicket (Patrick Warburton) narrating aboard what appears to be the same trolley previously seen. The other passengers on the trolley don’t appear to perceive him, suggesting that he is playing a role similar to a Greek chorus, unseen and unheard by the rest of the world.
Violet skips a stone marked with a cross on the sea at Briny Beach. If Violet is marking her stones, this might allow one of them to be easily identified as the same stone when the children return to Briny Beach at the end of
The Grim Grotto.
The fire truck passing by, apparently seen by Klaus and Violet aboard the trolley, along with the presence of Lemony Snicket behind them and Briny Beach possibly still visible through the windows, suggests that this scene takes place before the Baudelaire fire. This appears to be from the same set of shots as those showing the Baudelaires on the trolley with Justice Strauss. If so, this would indicate that the TV show is deviating from the books in having the Baudelaires first meet Justice Strauss before the fire and at the very beginning of the story, rather than first meeting her near Olaf’s house after the fire and mistaking her for their new guardian. This change might further develop the relationship between Justice Strauss and the Baudelaires, her dearly wishing to adopt them and the children wishing the same – and also chronologically mirrors their parting at the very end of
The Penultimate Peril.
These two shots show Klaus, and then all three Baudelaires, visiting the burnt-out ruins of their home.
Mr. Poe’s voiceover follows through to the “perished” exchange from the books. Mr. Poe’s smile of approval at Klaus’s vocabulary is appropriately inappropriate.
Mr. Poe rings the doorbell of Count Olaf’s house as he waits with the children to place them in Olaf’s care. The steps and house appear dilapidated and unclean, and an eye-shaped oval is chalked around a peephole.
Count Olaf’s eye peers through the peephole, a moment not from the books but which echoes a similar event in the 2004 movie.
Count Olaf (Neil Patrick Harris) opens the door and greets the children with “Hello, hello, hello,” his first line in both TBB and (more or less) the movie. The V.F.D. insignia is visible in the frame of a window behind him.
Count Olaf shoves the Baudelaires through the front door and into his home; the pleasant street outside is briefly visible. The absence of Mr. Poe, Count Olaf’s brusqueness, and a slight difference in his costume suggests that this might not be a continuation of his introductory scene but may be an original scene set later in the story.
The Baudelaires and Count Olaf face each other from opposite ends of a long table, Olaf apparently in nightwear and sitting in a throne-like chair; a tray of cupcakes appears to be in front of Olaf, which suggests this is the beginning of a scene previously seen in publicity stills, in which he offers them to the Baudelaires – probably a reworking of a scene from the books in which he prepares them oatmeal with raspberries.
The Baudelaires sit together on a tiny, sagging, solitary bed in their bedroom in Count Olaf’s home, which has a poorly-curtained window. The room appears to be in the eaves of the house and the sloping walls are full of holes giving out into the open air. A ruined chair lies in the corner, along with much miscellaneous debris.
Count Olaf presents the Baudelaires with a list of chores, a task which he did not take care of in person in the books. A V.F.D. insignia, in glass, reversed, appears behind him – likely the reverse of the same window seen behind Olaf at the front door.
The Baudelaires perform various chores, including cleaning a filthy bathroom, attending to an unsafe and literally flaming stove (note another V.F.D. insignia in the rear window), and chopping wood outside, a task specifically noted in the books to be curiously pointless. Sunny sits in a wheelbarrow in front of a pyramid-like structure bearing the V.F.D. insignia.
A hidden V.F.D. insignia appears in the wood chippings.
Count Olaf peers through a spyglass – possibly a V.F.D. spyglass, a device originally introduced in the movie and which makes further appearances later in the trailer. The V.F.D. insignia appears in a sketch behind him.
The hook-handed man (Usman Ally) roughly escorts the Baudelaires upstairs – possibly after removing them from Justice Strauss’s library as in the book.
Violet uses an invention resembling a backpack to winch her up what appears to be a trailing length of fabric; this scene appears to take place outside Count Olaf’s house and may replace the grappling hook sequence from the original text.
Count Olaf’s car drives across the bridge to Aunt Josephine’s house by night. In the original books there was no bridge, although the house was no less precariously-positioned.
Apparently continuing from the previous scene, the car’s headlights sweep over the Baudelaires as they stand outside Josephine’s house.
Inside the car are Olaf’s troupe members, including the hook-handed man in the driver’s seat, the bald man (John DeSantis), and the two white-faced women (Jacqueline and Joyce Robbins) and the henchperson of indeterminate gender (Matty Cardarople) in the back seat. Whether it takes place during TWW or not, this scene is entirely original.
Count Olaf, Violet, and Klaus stand in Olaf’s yard and look upwards at Sunny, tied up, with tape over her mouth, and trapped in a cage hanging outside Olaf’s tower room.
Justice Strauss converses with Count Olaf at his door, another scene not obviously taken from the books. Olaf’s “The Baudelaire children will be destroyed!” voiceover is not necessarily from this scene.
The hook-handed man pushes the Baudelaires into their room, likely after removing them from Justice Strauss's library as Klaus visibly has a book under his shirt in one shot; separately, the hook-handed man padlocks a grating to the exterior of the tower, which with Violet seated behind him is likely after her attempt to rescue Sunny from the tower. The show’s pincer-like interpretation of his hooks is visible as he closes the grating. Another V.F.D. insignia is visible worked into the window behind the Baudelaires. (Thank you to
Strangely for additional observations.)
Beneath a similar window but in a different room, definitely at the top of the tower as it looks out past the previously-seen grating and onto Sunny’s cage, Count Olaf, apparently in nightwear again, departs from the tower room through a trapdoor. Combined with his remarks about the Baudelaire fortune shortly becoming his (illustrated by the hourglass), this may be an expansion of the sequence in the books in which the hook-handed man locks the Baudelaires in the tower and Violet and Klaus are subsequently collected by Olaf to appear in
The Marvelous Marriage.
The Baudelaires and Mr. Poe depart the Fickle Ferry and arrive on Damocles Dock. A nearby sign warns against feeding the Lachrymose Leeches.
Aunt Josephine (Alfre Woodard) welcomes the Baudelaires to her home; cracks run up the walls, and a telephone sits safely beneath a glass dome on a cake stand.
An unseen person, possibly Josephine, holds a photograph taken in the main street of Paltryville (according to a caption). At the front of the photograph is a row of people, who can be identified as, from left to right: Dr. Orwell (Catherine O’Hara); Uncle Monty (Aasif Mandvi); two unidentified couples (the left pair played by Will Arnett and Cobie Smulders), one of which is likely to be the Baudelaire parents whilst the other has been suggested to be possibly the Quagmire parents, Jacques and Kit Snicket, or even Jerome and Esmé Squalor; an unidentified man who may be the late Ike Anwhistle (played by series director Barry Sonnenfeld), alongside Aunt Josephine; and two further men not conclusively identified (the rightmost of which may be Lemony Snicket).
Aunt Josephine reminisces, from voiceover, about developing secret codes with the Baudelaire parents (the voiceover may be derived from two separate lines).
Klaus sits next to Uncle Monty in a movie theatre; Monty looks at the screen through a V.F.D. spyglass. The movie appears to be
Zombies in the Snow, primitively staged and presented in black and white, as expected; the subtitled line appears to have originally read "The sturdy oak barrier! They've broken through it! Gerta! Don't let them take the children!" (thank you,
jim). The spyglass apparently alters the movie’s subtitles to decipher a secret message, in this case “danGer”, “take the children!” This may replace the Sebald Code used in the movie’s dialogue as shown in
Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography.
Monty takes note of the decoded message in his lap; the fuller message is “HELLO MONTY. DANGER! TAKE THE CHILDREN,” with room enough on the notepaper for a further third or even fourth line of the message.
The Baudelaires, with Josephine standing behind them, enter a further room of Aunt Josephine’s house which may be her library and thus the Wide Window’s room; notably, a series of scrolls on one side of the door apparently hold maps labelled with the names of the real continents, while an alternative series of scrolls on the opposite side of the door are labelled “TOWN OF LAKE LACHRYMOSE,” “LAND OF DISTRICT,” and “CITY.”
Klaus opens a safe located under, possibly originally behind, a framed portrait in Josephine’s house. The figure in the portrait is unseen, but could conceivably be either the late Ike Anwhistle or Ivan Lachrymose, lake explorer. This sequence is entirely original.
A book entitled “The Incomplete History of Secret Organizations,” again original to the TV series, is removed from the safe.
An unseen person, possibly Snicket, removes another copy of the same book from a library shelf.
Violet and Klaus, eating a candlelit meal in Aunt Josephine’s house; the doll between them may be Pretty Penny.
Over several other maps and books, Klaus unfurls a map of a maze which is apparently situated in Uncle Monty’s garden; the centre of the maze is conspicuously shaped into the form of the V.F.D. insignia.
Automatic clamps fasten over the wrists and ankles of a Klaus, in overalls and without glasses; Dr. Orwell fits a metal cap onto his head. This scene undoubtedly takes place in Dr. Orwell’s office and precedes her hypnotism of Klaus.
At her request, Klaus shows Justice Strauss an object possibly retrieved from the Baudelaire ruins which appears to be a V.F.D. spyglass. As with anything involving V.F.D. spyglasses, this was not in the original books.
The camera pans to the V.F.D. insignia on Olaf’s ankle. For clarity, the insignia used in the television show is more rounded than that in the books, and with the initials designed to be slightly less obvious; it is also frequently depicted within an eye-shaped oval, with the inner insignia representing not only an eye and lashes in itself but the iris and pupil of the outer eye (while the inner eye itself sometimes also has a pupil).
The Baudelaires and Mr. Poe, on Olaf’s doorstep at their first meeting, apparently looking up from Olaf’s tattoo to his face. Olaf avoids their gaze.
The entire troupe, disguised, gasping at something happening to their right; the hook-handed man is wearing a suit and obviously fake hands and appears to be wearing a detective's badge (as observed by
Esmé's meme is meh), the bald man is a bewigged and moustached chauffeur, the henchperson of indeterminate gender is a nurse or stewardess, and the white-faced women are maids or cooks. The background suggests that this scene takes place in Uncle Monty’s house. In the books, only one of Olaf’s troupe members appeared in each of the books from TRR to TVV, but this scene alongside with the shots outside Josephine’s house and further shots taken from
The Miserable Mill this suggests that the show will include the entire troupe in every book.
Mr. Poe, in his office at Mulctuary Money Management, with files, a telephone, radio and typewriter on his desk, filing cabinets to either side, and an enormous safe door positioned behind him and protected by a number of windows and glass doors.
The cap of the V.F.D. spyglass.
A V.F.D. insignia inscribed in dust or sand; the insignia itself appears to be slightly raised and may be a design on a trapdoor or stone. It is unclear where this scene takes place.
A V.F.D. insignia drawn, apparently in chalk, on a brick wall which blocks the end of a tube-shaped brick passage which may be a sewer. It is unclear where this scene takes place, though it is probably in the city’s underground network of hidden tunnels and recalls the connection between those tunnels and the city’s waterways as described in
All The Wrong Questions.
A V.F.D. insignia incorporated into an elaborate, static golden framework, possibly part of a chair or similar. It is unclear where this scene takes place.
A tower incorporating numerous V.F.D. designs in its windows and railings. This does not match up to any previously-shown location, including Count Olaf’s tower, and as such it is unclear where this scene takes place – although the surrounding forest raises the possibility that it is part of Dr. Orwell’s office in Paltryville.
Aunt Josephine, Captain Sham, and the Baudelaires in Josephine’s house. Sham is introducing himself, suggesting that he makes his first appearance at her house rather than at the market in the town of Lake Lachrymose.
The Baudelaires, in clothes which have been suggested to be pyjamas, outside Monty’s house, beside a car; this may be the scene where Stephano first arrives at the house, or possibly later when Mr. Poe arrives just as Stephano is taking the children away.
Dr. Orwell patronises one or several of the Baudelaires (unseen).
Count Olaf, in what passes for well-dressed, possibly in Mulctuary Money Management; although this costume has been suggested to be his Detective Dupin disguise, it lines up with set photographs of Olaf stealing random items of clothing from passers-by to form a complete outfit.
The Baudelaires, wearing waterproofs, are driven through a forest in the back of a Lucky Smells pickup truck; possibly this is how they will travel to Paltryville in the show, rather than being taken by train.
Stephano storms through Monty’s maze.
Violet, in overalls and at Lucky Smells Lumbermill, apparently held captive by a similarly-dressed hook-handed man – another sign that troupe members will be appearing in books they did not originally appear in.
An especially well-dressed Shirley, responding. Her nametag reads “Shirley St. Ives,” while in the original TMM she was given no surname, while the UA assigned her the surname “T. Sinoit-Pecer” (“receptionist” reversed).
A ship by evening, probably the
Prospero, and Olaf boarding it; this scene probably occurs after the climax of TRR, and Olaf escaping on the ship is an original sequence which does not take place in the books.
Sunny throws playing cards with the V.F.D. insignia on the back; at this point she has been untied, but the tape has not been removed from her mouth, which along with the throwing of playing cards does not occur in the original text.
Olaf, dressed as a pharaoh, flanked by the white-faced women in similar Ancient Egyptian garb, with a backdrop depicting pyramids. This is presumably part of a play put on by Olaf and his troupe, possibly as part of
The Marvelous Marriage.
The mysterious woman emerging through the trapdoor – which bears a V.F.D. insignia on the underside and appears to be set on a ship or dockside – has no confirmed name at present (but is apparently played by Sara Canning); however, she is credibly speculated to be Jacquelyn, a character original to the Netflix series who is a member of V.F.D. investigating an unnamed pair of missing parents.
Sir (Don Johnson) welcomes the Baudelaires to Lucky Smells Lumbermill; Sir appears to be more active and genial than in the books, and notably has no cloud of cigar smoke permanently obscuring his face.
Snicket peers out from beneath a manhole cover.
An unknown man wearing an overcoat collapses, clutching a broken broom handle, and Count Olaf’s troupe (possibly wearing waterproofs) apparently lean over him, suggesting their complicity in his fate. Although this character and actor have not been identified, it is possible that he is Foreman Firstein, a character killed off-screen shortly before the beginning of TMM.
Charles (Rhys Darby) tied to a log, from the climax of TMM.
Sunny chews on a rope; this scene appears to take place in Lucky Smells Lumbermill and has been suggested to be part of a reworked climax to that book. In the original text, Sunny’s role in the climax was to use her teeth to engage in an improbable swordfight with Dr. Orwell; even if this scene does not occur in the TV series, Dr. Orwell is still shown to possess a cane, which in the original climax proved to be a swordstick.
Aunt Josephine’s house is torn apart during Hurricane Herman.
Klaus tumbles along the floor as the house tilts, and ends up hanging out the window; as in the movie, the destruction of Josephine’s house now appears to be a more dramatic action sequence.
The Baudelaires in the back of Uncle Monty’s car. He may be inviting them to join him on his Peruvian expedition, although in the original book he did this upon meeting them at the start of TRR.
This scene probably takes place in a cabin on the
Prospero, judging from the size of the room, maritime décor, and rear porthole. Olaf is in nightwear and is being confronted by Jacquelyn(?). He pulls out a dagger, she pulls out a cleaver, he pulls out a sword, and she pulls out what appears to be a harpoon gun. This scene does not appear in the original books. However, a harpoon gun does appear in
The Vile Village, and an identical weapon, possibly the same, is an important plot device in TPP and
The End. In the books, the harpoon gun was specifically loaded with four harpoons which fired in turn, but this version appears to carry only one harpoon at a time.
