American Horror Story: Don't be Afraid of the Dark
September 13, 2017 5:41 PM - Season 7, Episode 2 - Subscribe
Ally has an epiphany, and deals with her phobias by adopting a coping mechanism.
1)How is winter still hired.
2)What even is her character, where in the beginning she asked for a TW from CNN before announcing the election*, and now she's showing a 9 year old snuff videos.
*ohmygod the jokes about "the liberals" are so, so painful. "Not until Rachel Maddow calls it! She's the only one I trust" shouts the lesbian. 🙄🙄🙄
posted by FirstMateKate at 12:54 PM on September 14, 2017 [1 favorite]
2)What even is her character, where in the beginning she asked for a TW from CNN before announcing the election*, and now she's showing a 9 year old snuff videos.
*ohmygod the jokes about "the liberals" are so, so painful. "Not until Rachel Maddow calls it! She's the only one I trust" shouts the lesbian. 🙄🙄🙄
posted by FirstMateKate at 12:54 PM on September 14, 2017 [1 favorite]
I'm not 100% convinced that both Kai and Winter exist.
posted by a box and a stick and a string and a bear at 5:58 PM on September 14, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by a box and a stick and a string and a bear at 5:58 PM on September 14, 2017 [2 favorites]
I'm kind of astonished that something so openly anti-Trump -- like, where the villain is Donald Trump, and there's no question on the part of the show that you will accept the villain as Donald Trump -- is just, like, on normal TV. I presume no one has told him about it. An hour of TV with a continuous storyline seems like a lot for him to process.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:22 PM on September 14, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:22 PM on September 14, 2017 [1 favorite]
Despite that fact that she commits sexual assault in this episode, I really like Billie Lourd's performance. I'm realizing that there's a sort of unreliable narrator thread here so it's entirely possible that the bath scene never happened, or didn't happen the way it's portrayed, but maybe I'm overthinking it.
Knowing almost nothing else about AHS other than it is Ryan Murphy property, I am ok with the over-acting and silliness and jump scares. I agree with others that this didn't really need to be set in our timeline, it just as easily could have done this plot with President Drumpf or Smith or Johnson who was a Trump-like caricature.
Paulson's portrayal of a mentally ill person is sometimes completely on the nose and other times offensive. I like her enough to keep watching. Everyone else but Billie Lourd almost seem like they are in a different show, but again that may be a writing/directing choice considering the overall plot. I am looking forward to the stories coming together rather than following two or three threads at once, but maybe that's never going to happen until the very end.
Also - who sends a mentally unstable person to check on an alarm in the middle of the night? I guess the same person who sends a murder suspect to go check on a mentally unstable person in the middle of a blackout.
posted by obtuser at 8:06 AM on September 15, 2017
Knowing almost nothing else about AHS other than it is Ryan Murphy property, I am ok with the over-acting and silliness and jump scares. I agree with others that this didn't really need to be set in our timeline, it just as easily could have done this plot with President Drumpf or Smith or Johnson who was a Trump-like caricature.
Paulson's portrayal of a mentally ill person is sometimes completely on the nose and other times offensive. I like her enough to keep watching. Everyone else but Billie Lourd almost seem like they are in a different show, but again that may be a writing/directing choice considering the overall plot. I am looking forward to the stories coming together rather than following two or three threads at once, but maybe that's never going to happen until the very end.
Also - who sends a mentally unstable person to check on an alarm in the middle of the night? I guess the same person who sends a murder suspect to go check on a mentally unstable person in the middle of a blackout.
posted by obtuser at 8:06 AM on September 15, 2017
2)What even is her character, where in the beginning she asked for a TW from CNN before announcing the election*, and now she's showing a 9 year old snuff videos.
Her character is former-over-the-top-liberal-caricature turned devoted member of Kai's cult of fear-worshippers. (Much like the neighbors, though we don't really know how much of the info about themselves was purely made up. The Nicole Kidman fan-club thing got a genuine laugh from me when they called back to it during the "armory" scene though. I'll be shocked if that isn't also a setup for some kind of Eyes Wide Shut reference later on.) I, too, am really liking Billie Lourd's performance; she's doing a nice job managing all the layers of liberal caricature/fear-worshipping cultist/ordinary teenage babysitter and she makes some interesting choices about which one to play up when.
Also - who sends a mentally unstable person to check on an alarm in the middle of the night? I guess the same person who sends a murder suspect to go check on a mentally unstable person in the middle of a blackout.
Honestly, the only way I can explain about 80% of Ivy's behavior is if she is also already a cultist and they're just saving that up for a "big shocking twist" towards the end of the season. Or, you know, "none of it happened that way, Ally's just super-unreliably narrating" but that's pretty unsatisfying.
A lot of the jokes about "snowflake liberals" are just so far over the top they don't even land and are just cringeworthy instead, but I will admit I did like the sendup of saying "I just want to build bridges!" from your house with bars on the windows and doors - that's the closest to the mark of any kind of real-world liberal hypocrisy that I've seen them get so far.
posted by mstokes650 at 8:33 AM on September 15, 2017 [3 favorites]
Her character is former-over-the-top-liberal-caricature turned devoted member of Kai's cult of fear-worshippers. (Much like the neighbors, though we don't really know how much of the info about themselves was purely made up. The Nicole Kidman fan-club thing got a genuine laugh from me when they called back to it during the "armory" scene though. I'll be shocked if that isn't also a setup for some kind of Eyes Wide Shut reference later on.) I, too, am really liking Billie Lourd's performance; she's doing a nice job managing all the layers of liberal caricature/fear-worshipping cultist/ordinary teenage babysitter and she makes some interesting choices about which one to play up when.
Also - who sends a mentally unstable person to check on an alarm in the middle of the night? I guess the same person who sends a murder suspect to go check on a mentally unstable person in the middle of a blackout.
Honestly, the only way I can explain about 80% of Ivy's behavior is if she is also already a cultist and they're just saving that up for a "big shocking twist" towards the end of the season. Or, you know, "none of it happened that way, Ally's just super-unreliably narrating" but that's pretty unsatisfying.
A lot of the jokes about "snowflake liberals" are just so far over the top they don't even land and are just cringeworthy instead, but I will admit I did like the sendup of saying "I just want to build bridges!" from your house with bars on the windows and doors - that's the closest to the mark of any kind of real-world liberal hypocrisy that I've seen them get so far.
posted by mstokes650 at 8:33 AM on September 15, 2017 [3 favorites]
Honestly, the only way I can explain about 80% of Ivy's behavior is if she is also already a cultist and they're just saving that up for a "big shocking twist" towards the end of the season.
When Ally woke up next to the clown, I thought that had to be foreshadowing of Ivy being in the cult. She's been sleeping with the clown this whole time!
I was worried the Trump stuff would not work in this show, but actually I kind of get it in this episode. I adore Billy Eichner and Leslie Grossman. They're the perfect Stepford gun owners (with the added glorious Kidman reference!).
posted by bluefly at 1:57 PM on September 16, 2017 [1 favorite]
When Ally woke up next to the clown, I thought that had to be foreshadowing of Ivy being in the cult. She's been sleeping with the clown this whole time!
I was worried the Trump stuff would not work in this show, but actually I kind of get it in this episode. I adore Billy Eichner and Leslie Grossman. They're the perfect Stepford gun owners (with the added glorious Kidman reference!).
posted by bluefly at 1:57 PM on September 16, 2017 [1 favorite]
When Ally woke up next to the clown, I thought that had to be foreshadowing of Ivy being in the cult. She's been sleeping with the clown this whole time!
Ivy's definitely in the cult, right? That's how they managed to prank Ally with the food at the restaurant in episode one. All the clowns she's seeing are real; Ivy's just fucking with her by (for example) pretending to call the police and then reporting there was nothing on any of the security cameras at the stores. Because their whole thing is her fear.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 7:55 PM on September 17, 2017
Ivy's definitely in the cult, right? That's how they managed to prank Ally with the food at the restaurant in episode one. All the clowns she's seeing are real; Ivy's just fucking with her by (for example) pretending to call the police and then reporting there was nothing on any of the security cameras at the stores. Because their whole thing is her fear.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 7:55 PM on September 17, 2017
from your house with bars on the windows and doors - that's the closest to the mark of any kind of real-world liberal hypocrisy that I've seen them get so far.
Yes and no; this was an entirely asymmetrical confrontation.
Yes, it's super on the nose about wanting to build bridges. No, Kai is menacing her with veiled physical threats (and exploiting her anxiety/fears in a clearly sadistic manner) - in some jurisdictions, this is arguably criminal assault in some form.
Which, too, is also straight up pointing out the smarmy plausible deniability employed by a lot of monsters with certain privileges.
posted by porpoise at 7:45 PM on September 20, 2017
Yes and no; this was an entirely asymmetrical confrontation.
Yes, it's super on the nose about wanting to build bridges. No, Kai is menacing her with veiled physical threats (and exploiting her anxiety/fears in a clearly sadistic manner) - in some jurisdictions, this is arguably criminal assault in some form.
Which, too, is also straight up pointing out the smarmy plausible deniability employed by a lot of monsters with certain privileges.
posted by porpoise at 7:45 PM on September 20, 2017
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I'm DEEPLY disappointed that giant candle didn't melt down enough to release what I can only assume are well-trained murder bees.
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 11:51 AM on September 14, 2017 [4 favorites]