Always leave them wanting more: American Horror Story Freakshow

Mysteries and fan theories still arise around American Horror Story fifth season. Jessica Lange might not come back and Ryan Murphy claims that all the seasons are connected: is the audience far from being shocked? Freakshow ended abruptly a week ago with ‘Curtain Call’ while the audience kept scratching their head thinking ‘what the hell just happened?’  

Freakshow season’s premiere was the most watched telecast in FX’s history; until its ratings were reduced by half with the finale as has happened for almost every other season. Do not get me wrong, numbers are not all-knowing; Freakshow was definitely better than the repetitive and naïve Coven, but it is still far from being perfect.

Freakshow’s theme is very similar to all the others, AMS’ obsession with the outcasts and how they are persecuted by a hypocrite society is well known now. Fortunately, this new season manages to stress this theme out and include a new variant: it is all about the audience and the way in which we consume celebrities and crave fame. Despite some very strong points though, Freakshow confuses character development for self-explanatory backstories. Backstories that seem inventive, horrible and well directed the first time round, but become annoyingly slow paced and repetitive like in Edward Mordrake’s (Wes Bentley) Halloween episodes.

By the end of the show almost all the freaks are dead and the audience does not seem to care much about this. One of the reasons is that most of the  characters in Freakshow are puppets turned into plot devices: Paul (Met Fraser) who suddenly steps out of his supporting character shadow to investigate Elsa (Jessica Lange), only to disappear again by the end of the episode, Maggie (Emma Roberts) who suddenly has a change of heart and reveals all of Stanley’s (Denis O’Hare) killings just because of her relationship problems with Jimmy (Evan Peters) or even Chester (Neil Patrick Harris) that is introduced as a complex new villain only two episodes from the season finale. If there are any interesting characters they either take way too much time to overcome their clichéd personalities (Dell, Michael Chiklis), or they seem to run out of creative and crazy things to do to keep us (and themselves) entertained (just like Dandy (Finn Wittrock) before his ‘Curtain Call’’s killings). Now whether you want to argue that Elsa Mars is interesting consider that thorough the four seasons Jessica Lange plays basically always the same character despite the fact that her performance is always remarkable and engaging.

AMS’ does not only have flaws, I have to admit that its stylistic choices, its knowledge of history and cinematic conventions still surprise and intrigue me every time. The show switches of narrator several times, uses dream sequences to trick the audience and his expectations but especially manages to construct every single frame in ways that are confusing, disgusting and beautiful at the same time.

The two last episodes are a great example of this. All the secrets are revealed in a very casual way and everything falls down like a card pyramid. The audience is then repeatedly confused, shocked and disappointed by a series of cold blooded killings.

AMS’ does not only have flaws, I have to admit that its stylistic choices, its knowledge of history and cinematic conventions still surprise and intrigue me every time.

As we follow Dandy into his deranged and slow paced school murder mode, the audience cannot but feel cheated when they realize that there is no emotional response on their part towards the deaths of all the characters. The same feeling grows stronger during Dandy’s drowning, while the three remaining freaks are looking at him. First nothing, then the audience’s mind is flooded by hundreds of questions: was is it the theatrical death he deserved? Why do I not feel any sense of closure?

American Horror Story is still an ongoing work, it is getting better but it is also being dragged down by its obsession for details. For now this show is essentially the only decent televisual representation of pure horror the fans can get. AMS allows characters like Twisty the Clown (John Carrol Lynch), who became a horror cult figure, and actors like Finn Wittrock, to shine with incredible performances in just a couple of episodes. Because you can stop watching AMS but never stop talking about it. While I write this review other articles are already being written about the links between all the seasons and about fans searching passionately for other hidden clues, as Murphy suggested we should do.

At the moment there is a rumour involving the appearance of several Top Hats in Freakshow. Some suggest that this means that the next season might deal with a military operation called ‘Top Hat’ that took place in 1953 concerning radiological testing on human beings. The cues are very easy and fun to find in the show but the one you really have to pay attention to was given by Massimo (Danny Huston) in the season finale when he claimed that he had been working in the contruction of fake buildings in Nevada which were being used by the government for nuclear testing.

If you think that once the words ‘season finale’ are on everybody’s lips it means ‘the end’ you are probably wrong. American Horror Story producers have also launched a companion called American Crime Story that will premiere in 2016. The  first season will be subtitled The People vs O.J. Simpson and there are some names on the cast list that could interest us: Sarah Paulson, John Travolta and David Schwimmer.