American Horror Story: Spooky Little Girl

One thing we can’t figure out about this show (cue the peanut gallery: “ONE thing?!?”) is how the hell the creators think they can keep this going semi-indefinitely. Haunted house stories typically have endings and they’re typically reached within a few hours of the beginning of the story. Trying to tell a haunted house story over an entire television season doesn’t even seem to make much sense on the face of it, let alone trying to continue the story over several seasons. After all, how many times can the Harmons be faced with evil presences in their house before they snap out of it and say “Fuck escrow, I’m bailing?”

There were indications and rumors at the start of this series that the creators originally planned to move a new family into the house each season and spend the season following their story. They have since said that they abandoned this idea but we wonder if that’s true. How on earth can the story of the Harmon family continue past this season when so much has already happened to them? Vivian got raped, Ben assisted in the murder of his pregnant girlfriend and buried her in the backyard, Vivian got pregnant (twice!), shot Ben and got sent to an institution (because apparently, that’s how simple it is to get institutionalized in California; wave a gun around and mention a rape), Violet slit her wrists and probably died, then she had sex with the ghost that raped and impregnated her mom. We’re at EPISODE NINE, people.

It seems to us, especially after last night’s episode, that the only possible way to sustain the story is to just keep adding more ghosts to the house. We didn’t say such a plan was going to work in keeping the story interesting; just that this was one way to keep the story going. Of course, they could drive a clown car onto the lawn and force us to spend 40 minutes watching pratfalls and juggling as a way to stretch things out too. Both methods have largely the same chance of success, although the former has some real comedy teeth to it.

Imagine halfway through season 4 of American Horror Story, just after we meet the sexed-up ghosts of Lee Harvey Oswald, Susan Smith, and Nicole Brown Simpson, when the writers realize the unliving population of that house is now larger than that of the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area and the Harmons are forced to sell off all their furniture just to make room for the city of oversexed dead people living in the house, trying to fuck and kill them all. Maybe they could spend a season building an addition on the house to accommodate them – a nursery for dead babies might be nice – and then we can watch an endless line of workmen get seduced and then killed by Moira, Hayden, the White Dahlia, and whatever other pissed-off sexy female ghosts have accumulated in the house (like barnacles) by then. Then all the dead doctors in the house (for there will surely be dozens revealed by then) can all get together in the basement, stroke their chins thoughtfully, and then chop up the bodies for disposal. It’ll all be streamlined by then; people will walk in the front door, get seduced and killed by one of the horny females, dragged down to the basement, chopped up, and then carted out by one of the house’s many living allies (Burned Larry and Constance will have an entire secret society of helpers by this point). The whole thing could take no more than an hour and if the ghosts work very hard and take no breaks, they can manage to add about 20 or so new dead people to the house a day. Before long they’ll be holding elections. If they can manage to stop fucking and killing for long enough, that is.

It frightens us a little that the preceding paragraph may give Ryan Murphy ideas if he happens to read it.

We’d give you a recap of last night’s episode but there wasn’t much to recap. Hayden (who’s number one with a bullet on T Lo’s list of favorite ghosts) sexes up Constance’s boyfriend then kills him. Also, The White Dahlia shows up and tries to have sex with Ben by having faux-sex with Moira. Hayden keeps trying to break up Viv and Ben, Ben visits Viv and says awful things to her even though he’s the piece of shit who cheated on her, then Ben tells Hayden he doesn’t love her and accuses the guy from the security company of sleeping with his wife. Meanwhile, Constance is all atwitter over her demonic grandchild, plotting to somehow snatch it right out of Viv’s womb but then running into a roadblock because it turns out her little bundle of joy is destined to bring about the END OF THE WORLD! Seriously! There’s a pope and everything!

Thankfully, Ben starts to believe that maybe Vivian isn’t so crazy after all, which causes him to see Moira as an old lady, which in turn causes the little turtle head to permanently retreat into its shell (although this occurs off camera).

It’s kind of funny how we said there was nothing to recap and then listed a dozen completely insane plot developments. We’re getting a little spoiled here.

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