FX Network
Fear is a powerful emotion. The media has tapped into this by using the “if it bleeds it leads” explanation for you nightly newscasts. Horror movies tap into our fears of various things to help sell tickets. And probably quite by coincidence, this week brings us a movie and a TV show that will certainly not play well with those who suffer from coulrophobia – the fear of clowns. The movie adaption of Stephen King’s It opens in theaters Friday, and FX debuts the latest season of American Horror Story with the subtitle “Cult”. And while it’s been very well known for a while that our current political climate plays a large part in the season’s plotline, oh there are clowns too from the already established Twisty the Clown (from “Freak Show”) to people in clown masks looking like they just stepped out of one of The Purge movies.
In the first episode, “Election Night,” the action begins appropriately as the 2016 election results are announced. In one household, we’re introduced to the blue-haired Kai Anderson (Evan Peters), a devout Trump fan thrilled that his candidate has won to make American great again. In another household, we meet Ally (Sarah Paulson) and Ivy (Alison Pill) and their son Oz (Cooper Dodson). Along with their neighbors, they take in the results with Ally particularly affected by Hillary Clinton’s loss, practically coming unglued at the prospect of a Trump presidency.
After the opening titles, we’re suddenly watching a young couple trying to engage in a bit of a snogging session when good old Twisty the Clown shows up and kills them. Psyche! It’s just a visualization of Oz’s comic book which trigger’s Ally’s coulrophobia when he shows it to her. Things only get worse for Ally as she believes she’s being stalked by people wearing clown masks in the local grocery store. Even the coral in her therapist’s office sets her off – even though it’s been there for months – because of the holes in it (yes, trypophobia is a real thing). The election has triggered all of Ally’s phobias to the point she is barely functioning and her marriage and family ar being tested to the max.
Meanwhile, Kai attempts to get the town council to not vote on police protection for the local Jewish center because he believes everyone should live in fear so that then the government can step in and offer them protection. The shoot him down and he mutters under his breath that there’s nothing more dangerous than a humiliated man … something the council president and his wife learn later. Kai also has a “chance” encounter with Ally and Ivy which begins with the women having a latte tossed at them. What’s not really clear at this point is how Kai knows the women.
Kai’s roommate Winter Anderson (Billie Lourd), also a Clinton supporter who worked on her campaign, is upset by the results but her relationship with Kai begins to make us wonder exactly what kind of a hold he has over her, and possibly the others we’ve seen in the clown masks terrorizing Ally, even though no one else has ever claimed to see them. But after the election, the nanny for Oz just vanished (either fled the country or was deported, no one knows) so Winter shows up with a perfect resumé and gets the job. But she doesn’t seem to be such a good influence on Oz, allowing him to watch actual death videos online and when he claims to have seen an ice cream truck full of clowns go into the neighbors’ home and murder them, Ally is none to pleased. But when there are no signs of clowns and the police determine the deaths to be a murder/suicide, we all have to wonder if everyone is becoming unhinged or if there is something more sinister at work here.
And of course there is more than meets the eye because the show is called “Cult” and Kai is obviously a, for now, small time cult leader directing Winter through her interview with Ally and Ivy, and most likely using her to indoctrinate Oz into their group. It’s probably not a far stretch to say that the other clowns we’ve seen are also part of his cult. But what is Kai’s mission? He seems to not like lesbians, and he baited a group of Mexicans into giving him a good beating, complete with the video evidence which omitted him throwing a condom full of urine at them first. And what of the grocery store cashier (played by Chaz Bono with a missing forearm)? He told the police he only saw Ally freaking out in the store but no clowns.
The question now is where is all this going? The show isn’t very shy about blaming all of this on Trump, so it will be interesting to see how people will react (like when Kai grinds up a bag of cheese doodles and spreads them on his face to resemble who he may consider his own cult leader. Will there be furious tweeting at 3 AM Wednesday denouncing the show? Ryan Murphy and company have to walk a very fine line here but perhaps the election and the aftermath is just the jumping off point for what is to come. What we do know is that there will not be any real supernatural elements to this season, and that Peters will be playing various real life cult leaders throughout the season indicating there will be some time jumps but how these segments fit into the main narrative remains to be seen.
Season 7 of American Horror Story, with its grounded in reality storytelling, may end up being the most terrifying season of them all.
What do you think of the season premiere? Too political? Too scary? Too close to reality? Sound off in the comments below!
Share this post
