American Horror Story: Spilt Milk

Posted on January 10, 2013

Okay, now what?

With two more hours of storytelling left to go, we’re puzzled as to what’s left to talk about. Sure, Jude’s fate is still up Pinin the air, as is Kit’s, but with Mary Eunice, Arden, and Thredson all dead, the story has seriously lost its steam. There are no antagonists left so we’re stuck with a bunch of very damaged protagonists wandering around the scenes in a daze. We can’t imagine the story’s going to merely fizzle out, but we have virtually no idea what’s about to happen. Of course, as we always say, that can only speak well of the show.

One good thing about clearing the board of all the bad guys is that it somehow wound up ratcheting up the tension. We held our breath constantly throughout this episode, waiting for something really, really bad to happen. Lana walking out the door of Briarcliff, Lana facing off against Thredson, Lana terminating her pregnancy; each of those scenes was shot as if something truly horrible was about to happen and in each case, nothing really did. Still we got that awesome “FUCK YEAH” moment when she got in the cab, showed Thredson the tape, and with a stone face, gave him a well-deserved finger.

This review seems even more disjointed than usual and the irony of it is, this episode was probably the least disjointed, most straightforward of the season. It’s the implications that have us befuddled rather than the episode itself. With the devil, the mutant zombies, the Nazi torturer and the serial killer all dispensed from the story we have only the aliens to consider (oh, how we loved writing that), and they’ve been almost completely absent from the story before now; a sideshow rather than a player. Obviously, they’re going to play into whatever the final fate of Kit and Grace is, but we fail to see how they relate to Jude and Lana. One thing’s for sure: we’re more convinced thanPin ever that Bloody Face, Jr. is not Lana and Thredson’s baby, but Kit and Grace’s. All that mama’s milk stuff tied in way too neatly and we couldn’t shake the feeling that the audience is being fed a bunch of red herrings.

Because think about it: Say BF, Jr. really is Lana’s baby. What story is left to tell, then? On the other hand, if he is Grace’s baby, then a whole slew of questions open up, not the least of which is why aliens created a serial killer.

Again, we just love the sentences we’re forced to write in discussing this show.

But we remember tossing out a bunch of theories last season only to have Murphy and Co. undermine them by giving the most obvious answers to any questions they posed, so we suppose we shouldn’t stand too firmly on our opinions. We’re on shaky ground, which we suppose is entirely the point with the show. It’s less of a horrPinor story this year and more of a simply disturbing one. But “American Simply Disturbing Story” would make a really dumb name for a show.

Honestly, reading over this review, you’d think we were drunk when we wrote it. Still, a decent hour of television, even if it left us more confused than ever. Most of the time, when a TV season reaches its conclusion, there’s a lot that needs to be tied up in the story. This time, the major question facing the audience is, What story is left to tell?

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