Big Nurse gets her origin story in trailer for prequel series Ratched

Sarah Paulson plays Nurse Mildred Ratched in Netflix's prequel to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

Fans of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest-whether Ken Kesey's 1962 novel or the 1975 Oscar-winning film starring Jack Nicholson-know that the sadistic, tyrannical Nurse Ratched is a crucial antagonist driving the story of a rebellious inmate in a psychiatric hospital. Now she's getting her own back story in the form of a new prequel series, Ratched. Netflix dropped the first trailer for the series yesterday.

(Spoilers for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest book and film below.)

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is set in a psychiatric hospital in Salem, Oregon, where Randle Patrick McMurphy is sent after faking insanity to escape a prison farm sentence. Nurse Ratched (aka Big Nurse) rules the place with an iron hand, systematically abusing the inmates under her charge. She maintains order by withholding basic necessities, medications, or patient privileges, but McMurphy's rebellious nature challenges her authority, even in the face of shock therapy.

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