Thursday, October 15, 2015

American Horror Story 5x02 Chutes and Ladders

By s. Thursday, October 15, 2015

This week at the Hotel we got to truly suffer trough the introduction and the following scenes featuring Finn Wittrock's character, we got to learn a little bit about Countess Elizabeth and we got a truly awesome black and white flashback which was so incredibly brutal I'm almost sure it would not be allowed to air in color.

We opened with Sally being sadistic to that raped dude and sewing him into the mattress. Then one of the Swedish tourists died after vamp kid fed on her and Iris and Liz Taylor along with the maid got rid of her body. Iris comes over to Elizabeth's room because she wants to speak with Donovan but he hides from her. Elizabeth tells him she wants to go out but he wants to stay in and watch House of Cards. So Elizabeth goes out on her own.
Then we get a scene with cop's wife talking with mother of her patient who is 1. one of those morons who don't vaccinate kids 2. played by Madchen Amick from Twin Peaks. I'm not entirely sure what the purpose of this scene was or why did they bother to bring semi-famous Amick in for one scene so I'm assuming - and hoping - she comes back and there was some point here.

Then we are back to Wes Bentley being in hotel and seeing a bunch of creepy visions including a decomposing couple fucking in the shower, because why not. He then sees his kid and chases him all around the hotel. I'm not sure how any of this is supposed to be helping him find the killer, but let's just roll with it.
Sally and the detective talk a bit at the bar where it turns out he avoids drinking. He tells Sally how he lost his son. Then at work someone sends him a package involving some sort of statue cowered in blood. You would think this guy would be super cautious of creepy at that point but no - he gets back to hotel where for some reason the other cops bring his daughter Scarlett. There is about to be a fashion show and for some reason she is allowed to stay at the hotel.

Sally is not on the guest list and she freaks out, yelling that she lives there. Scarlett is hanging around with the fashion guy's son. Then we get to meet Naomi Campbell's character who is also involved in the fashion world. She raves about some model called Tristan to the detective. It turns out he is played by Wittrock and is currently snorting drugs in the dressing room.
During the show Tristan pulls a bunch of stunts and stops only when he sees Elizabeth who remarks he has a lot of rage. Then the fashion guy comes in screaming and Tristan who cuts his own cheek and says he is done with modeling. Meanwhile fashion guy's kid brings Scarlett to see the baby vamps sleeping in coffins. What the hell is wrong with these two kids?

Tristan raids Elizabeth's room looking for coke and Donovan catches him. Elizabeth orders him to let him go. Tristan escapes and gets into an elevator that takes him only to one of the floors. He starts walking around and goes inside the room where he meets Mr. March (Evan Peters). He shoots some hooker after offering Tristan to do it and Tristan runs away and he is pulled into the elevator by Elizabeth.
Scarlett takes the bus and goes to the hotel to talk to her abducted brother whom she recognized among the kids in the coffin. She takes a blurry picture of him with her. This is all very boring, I wish they just skipped these scenes. She then goes home and her parents freak out. I have to say that this entire subplot is clearly the weakest link this season - I couldn't care less about the detective, his wife or these two dumb kids.

Then it turns out Elizabeth turned out the pussy model into vampire or whatever it is they are and she gets to tell him few things about herself - she was born in 1904 and was turned by "the man even more beautiful than him (so basically, could be anyone) who is gone now". We also get a flashback to the 70s with Gaga riding on a white horse into a disco club. Because when Gaga wants to ride into a club on a freaking white horse while wearing a wig - 30 foot long wig no less - Ryan Murphy obliges.
Donovan finds them in bed and freaks out. In response Elizabeth tells him to pack his things and go. Bitch is insane.

The detective then goes back to the hotel and handcuffs Iris because he wants to know what is happening in the hotel. She tells him the story of how Mr. March built it. We get a very creepy, black and white flashback detailing how Mr. March designed the hotel to be elaborate torture chamber and used chutes to get rid of the bodies. Cause it turns out, in case the killing of the random hooker haven't clued you in enough, that he is batshit insane.
We also find out he had a wife who in the flashback is blonde (we only see the back of her head) and tells him she likes to watch his victims suffer. Iris then tells the detective that after Mr. March died his wife got all of his money. Could his wife be Elizabeth?

Anyways we also get to find out a bit about the maid who would show up whenever Mr. March killed someone and clean the sheets and bring new ones. Once the cops show up to arrest them she happily lets Mr. March shoot her and he then cuts his own throat and dies. The detective doesn't believe any of this but then changes his mind and at work tells the other cop how Mr. March was killing in relation to religion (given one of the flashbacks where he says he hates it, he probably used the murders to mock it) and now the Ten Commandments killer is continuing with his work.
Then we get to see Tristan murdering some dude while Gaga comes in and he drinks his blood and then they make out. So your usual Hotel thing by now.

This episode was not as good as the premiere - the detective's family story is taking way too much time. Finn Wittrock is also a weak link - he is such a self aware actor and he is just terrible in the role. He also looks kinda disgusting so Elizabeth's interest in him is puzzling to say the least. I get that Murphy has a huge boner for this guy and for Peters but at least Peters has talent.

There was this funny thing that happened last week when Murphy, while giving interview to EW (which he gives weekly) remarked how ridiculous he finds some opinions that he casts the guys in the show based on his own personal type. Guess whose bare asses we got to see this week? Peters and Wittrock. If the show wasn't shot in advance I'd assume Matt Bomer saying to Gaga "you have a type" was a reference to all of this.

Speaking of, Peters has officially stole Paulson's thunder with his performance. He has this accent going on and this way of playing the character that is the perfect blend of comical and deranged. His scenes were the definitive highlight of the episode, both in terms of acting and style - it looked amazing. And he has great chemistry with Mare Winningham who plays the maid. I know there is more of them coming up this season so this is great news.

Next week we are gonna meet a woman scorned by the Countess and she is gonna be played by the fabulous Angela Bassett. About damn time she shows up!


4 comments:

  1. Definitely not as great but I agree with you, Evan Peters is shining in this role! I didn't really like him after the first season in any of the roles I even saw glimpses of, but this one, oh man, I like him when he is creepy and a killer. Plus he looks kind of cool with that mustache thing ´, surprisingly cool.

    I think the kids plot is dragged as well, it's just, fine, we get it, move on kind of thing but at the same time, I'm interested to find out where they are planning to end up with it.

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    1. Yeah I hope the chill with that children plot a little bit, it's the weakest plot in the season already

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  2. I can definitely say this episode wasn't as good as the premiere, but slightly so. That whole Mr March flashback scene is the quintessential AHS sequence if there ever was one. Everything about it oozed terror and psychosis and was definitely my favourite scene so far in S5, just behind the introduction of Lady Gaga and Matt Bomer and the whole orgy scene.

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    1. Yeah it was a terrific scene! The cinematography in it was also fantastic, hope there's gonna be more of this in this season

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