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Let’s Talk About ‘The Future Perfect’:
- President Eisenhower is dying, but he reveals to Mamie that there are another group of Reptilian aliens on Earth as well.
- Nixon made it to the Oval Office, but the Vietnam War is killing his presidency. Valiant Thor assures him the war is just a distraction.
- Nixon asks G. Gordon Liddy to bug Thor’s office at the Watergate.
- The true identity of Deep Throat is revealed.
- As pressure from the war and Watergate increase, Nixon refuses to resign but the aliens have a way to persuade him.
- Mamie Eisenhower decides it’s time for her to make an exit from this world, and then live forever at Area 51.
- Cal’s birthing experience went horribly wrong, setting off alarms at the facility.
- Jamie and Kendall think maybe the boys tried to escape, but Calico tells them that’s not possible.
- Two new babies are born, but only one is perfection and only one mother survives … sort of.
- News of the successful hybrid birth has Mamie and Calico worried for their own futures.
- Thor reveals to Mamie the truth of their hybrid birth experiment.
We’re at the end of the second half of this season’s American Horror Story and I think this ‘Double Feature’ concept, plus the debut of the stand-alone American Horror Stories, has been a breath of fresh air for the writing team, allowing them to tell shorter stories with less padding than they’d have to do with a normal 10-13 episode season. I’ve enjoyed both ‘Red Tide’ and ‘Death Valley’ but I think ‘Death Valley’ had a little more of a satisfying ending that was a definite nod to the types of endings The Twilight Zone used to give us, not wrapping everything up into a neat package. I know AHS usually has difficulty sticking that landing, but I think ‘Death Valley’ was the more successful of the two parts.
What I loved about ‘Death Valley’ was how it played with real events and people from the past. We’ve already seen the Eisenhowers and Richard Nixon, and this week they added Henry Kissinger and G. Gordon Liddy to the mix, as well as the Vietnam War and Watergate. In 1969, Eisenhower is dying, but watching the news of the war and wondering which was worse — making a deal with the aliens or paving the way for Nixon’s presidency. He also notices Henry Kissinger’s eyes during a televised speech, telling Mamie they look reptilian sometimes. Mamie pooh-poohs the idea but Ike tells her that there is a second alien race on the planet, and Thor’s people had abducted one and disposed of the body so no one would find out. But Mamie thinks it’s just another wild story and wants to focus on bringing back another holiday that people have forgotten: Evacuation Day (yep, it’s a real thing observed in Massachusetts on March 17).
But as Ike’s condition deteriorates, Thor arrives and offers him the chance to live forever if he agrees to go to Area 51. Ike says he died the day he signed that treaty and he doesn’t trust them, but Thor assures him that no matter how he feels they still hold him in the highest regard. Ike says he’s old, not stupid and that Thor and Mamie deserve each other. He dies and Mamie gives him a tender kiss on the forehead … and then tells Thor that is not happening to her. She doesn’t care where he takes her, but she’s not ending up bedridden for the remainder of her life.
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In 1972, Nixon is president but it’s all unraveling because of the Vietnam War. Henry Kissinger and Thor are in the Oval Office, and Kissinger wants to know how much longer it’s going to take for them to create their perfect hybrid. Thor assures them they are on track to birth the first on in … 2021. Nixon flips out because Thor told him the war was just a distraction to get the American public to look the other way while they keep doing what they’re doing, but Nixon knows the war won’t last another fifty years. Thor says of course it won’t, but they have a whole list of distractions prepared, and he subtly threatens Nixon that distractions come in many forms.
Not happy about that threat, Nixon summons G. Gordon Liddy to the Oval and tells him to break into Thor’s office at the Watergate and bug the place. Nixon is convinced the aliens want to kill him now because they think he’s falling apart. They wanted him to be the ringleader of the circus when the tent caught fire, but he’s not burning up with those clowns. Liddy says he won’t let him down, and Nixon says he’d be the first. But someone knows all about Watergate, and they set up a meeting with a reporter in a parking garage (in reality the reporter was Bob Woodward but he’s not mentioned by name here, probably because he’s still alive). The informant says to just call them Deep Throat and the identity is revealed … it’s Mamie Eisenhower!
As Watergate unfolds publicly, Mamie is upset that no one is talking about Evacuation Day, and wonders if it just wouldn’t be simpler for Thor to have Nixon killed. Kissinger tells Nixon that he should resign but Nixon refuses. He’d rather be put on trial than let the aliens win, but suddenly the Oval Office is bathed in a bright, white light and Nixon finds himself naked ands face down on an operating table in a black room with a couple of gray aliens. He begs them to not do what they’re about to do … and we all know what is about to happen. Next thing you know, Nixon is on TV delivering his resignation speech. Mamie says she doesn’t want to know what Thor did to him, and he says you’d be surprised what a little routine medical examination can make people do. She says at least Nixon’s resignation speech is graceful, and Thor said it should be because he wrote it. Speaking of graceful exits, Mamie says it’s almost time for hers. She might have a couple more years to make Evacuation Day happen but when she’s ready to die, she wants to make sure she lives forever. Thor makes that promise.
In 1979, Mamie listens to the news on the radio of her death while she’s in a limo on the way to Area 51. She wonders why people favor the desert, and Thor tells her his people traveled to Earth because the desert resembles their planet, barren, empty, full of death. Welcome to your new home. Mamie is then dressed in a chiffon gown and strolling through empty white hallways. She arrives in the cafeteria and meets Calico, who tells Mamie she’s a huge fan and likes birthdays. And they’ll be spending quite a few of them together so they might as well be friends. Mamie asks Calico if she likes fudge, and Calico replies, ‘More than life itself.’
In the present, alarms are going off in Area 51 and the military police are searching everyone’s rooms, including Kendall and Jamie’s room and Mamie’s (the first time we see her in color, wearing the same gown that we now see is her favorite color — pink). Mamie uses her position of authority and asks what’s going on. The officer tells her there’s been an ‘unauthorized death’ and she assumes someone has been murdered. But he won’t tell her any more. The police enter the soundstage and find the dead bodies of both Cal and Troy. Looking up, the squid-baby drops from the rafters onto an officer’s face. The rest turn and shoot both of them. The Hybrid woman arrives, sees the carnage and says it was a little excessive. The leader of the group says that thing was eating Ronny. The Hybrid asks who Ronny is, and the cop says the one with his face eaten off. She said they could kill Ronny but not the child. She is amazed by the baby though because this is an anomaly they haven’t seen in two cycles and they must learn why the subject has regressed. The cop says it’s always darkest before the dawn, an Earth saying the Hybrid is not familiar with. He then asks why the B-Team is there, and she tells him they’ve been promoted. B-Team opens fire on A-Team.
With everyone gathered in the cafeteria for assessment, supplements and refreshments, the girls wonder if they boys tried to escape. Calico assures them that they are trapped like rats. The last attempted escape was in ’92 … no ’82. Jamie thinks that maybe they’re hiding on the soundstage … and they find all of the dead bodies littering the moon set. That triggers labor in both Kendall and Jamie, and Jamie says there’s no hope but the Hybrid arrives and says she’s wrong, hope is close. She puts them to sleep and says … ‘it’s always darkest before the dawn.’
Both girls wake up in the delivery room. Jamie gives birth first and the babie is the closest they’ve come yet to perfection. But still not good enough so the baby is killed … and so is Jamie. Kendall is next and … perfection. They have succeeded and can now call Earth their home. Kendall says it’s only a matter of time before things change. The aliens will get complacent and lazy, telling her ‘heavy is the head that wears the crown’. The Hybrid says Kendall won’t have to worry about that and then slits her throat with a laser. Except she just completely decapitated her. All they need now is the vessel to birth more babies, and her body is the perfect breeding machine. They attach a large metallic sphere to Kendall’s body where her head used to be, and her body twitches back to life.
Calico helps Mamie celebrate her birthday with an actual cupcake — not an easy thing to get these days — but Mamie says birthdays now give her the blues because she’s not getting any older. She starts to list off all of her accomplishments, but Calico reminds her she’s heard them all so many times now that they are part of her DNA. Maybe it’s time they make some new memories. While they chat, some others in the room are celebrating and Calico asks what’s going on. They tell them the first successful hybrid was born and now everything is about to change. That seems to worry both women.
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Mamie demands some answers from Thor and he admits that sixty years of hard work has paid off. They are going to clone Kendall’s body so they can produce as many hybrids as quickly as possible to populate the world. Umm, the world is already populated, she reminds him. She thought the plan was for them to not go extinct, to live side-by-side, but he tells her their best chance for survival is to live on this world … without humans. Mamie is appalled but Thor asks her if she had a prize rose garden and the gardener came in and killed all the roses, what would she do? She says she’d fire him. He tells her Earth is the garden, humanity is teh gardener, we’re firing you. But not her, there will be a few who’ve helped their cause who will be spared. She says she feels like a traitor, but Thor tells her history is written by the victors and she will be remembered as one of the good ones who saw the limitations of her own kind. Ike too. She says he wouldn’t want that, he was right and he tried to warn her. Thor says nothing would have changed even if she did believe him. She reveals that she knows of the existence of another alien race, the Reptilians (she doesn’t know that Ike was right about Kissinger being one). Thor admits that is true, but while they can’t share the planet with the humans, they can share it with the Reptilians. They may be cold-blooded and hideous but they have qualities Thor’s people admire and technology they need. We see a quick flashback as Thor and Kissinger sign their own treaty.
It’s time for Mamie to see exactly what she helped create, but the guards won’t let her in the infirmary. The Hybrid emerges and allows her to pass, finally revealing her name to be Theta. Mamie says she should at least get to see what she helped accomplish since her husband did not, and Theta agrees. Mamie is stunned by the baby, saying she didn’t expect it to be so beautiful. Theta says that’s a mother talking, and Mamie is as much a mother to the child as the one who bore it. Mamie sees the body of Kendall and Theta tells her to think of it as a machine now. Mamie says people are not machines, but Theta asks her who runs the world now, people or machines? Which would last longer if the other suddenly disappeared? Mamie says if Theta really admired her husband then she’d know he would have never sanctioned the end of the human race. Theta seems surprised to hear this news, that the aliens are planning to kill the entire human race and take the planet for themselves.
Mamie delivers the news to Calico that the aliens have their prize calf now, no need for the rest of the herd. Calico says that perhaps Mamie will have a new story to tell after all. Mamie says what if this one has a twist they didn’t see coming? What if they fought back? Calico says they don’t stand a chance, but Mamie tells her all they have to worry about are the hybrid and the body that produced it. If it took them sixty years to get to this point, destroying those might get them another sixty. Calico says they’d never get close enough, but Mamie assures her they’ll have help on the inside.
They both head back to the delivery room and Theta shows them a new baby is already growing in the body, and within the week they should have the entire process down to an hour. But are they ready to take the next step? Mamie says they have to do what needs to be done. Calico is hesitant because it’s just a baby. Mamie angrily asks her if she had the chance to go back in time to kill Hitler, would she not do it because he’s just a baby? She tells Calico that an immoral act becomes moral when it’s done in the service of humanity. Calico asks why she gets to make all these decision and the reply is, ‘Because I’m Mamie fucking Eisenhower!’ And then she takes a scalpel to kill the first hybrid, but Theta raises her hand and stops Mamie in her tracks, freezing her in position, mocking her for trying to appeal to Theta’s humanity. She will not help those who have destroyed the planet and its natural resources, and even if they wanted to live with the humans it would be impossible because humans are too selfish to share. She says humans won’t even open their door to their own kind in their moment of need, so why would they welcome the aliens? Her people will restore balance and create a new world. Humanity has its chance. Mamie tries to call out to Calico, but Theta tells her Mamie made her choice, now it’s Calico’s turn. The children need a mother to nurture them, and after all the losses she suffered over the years — okay, plot hole, if Calico has never had a successful birth why did they keep her around to try again when they killed Jamie after one try? — this is her reward. Mamie asks for help again but Calico says Theta is right about people. She’s seen them at their worst and at their best, but it’s time to step aside and give someone else a chance. Theta says, ‘Goodbye, Mrs. Eisenhower,’ and with a flick of her wrist Mamie’s head explodes. Theta tells Calico to assist her with the next birth. This is the first time Calico has seen a birth from that side, and another perfect specimen is delivered. Theta gives the baby to Calico and as she looks at it, the baby gives her a little smile. The end.
And the end of a very fun season. It was great to see Sarah Paulson, Frances Conroy, Evan Peters, Finn Wittrock and Lily Rabe back in ‘Red Tide’, and even more fun to have Paulson, Leslie Grossman and Angelica Ross appear in both features. And, again, Macaulay Culkin was just spectacular in ‘Red Tide’. I hope they can bring him back for another season. All around, I think they did the series proud with its tenth season, so it will be interesting to see what the series looks like moving forward. Will they continue with some of the mainstays? Will they shake things up and start with a whole new cast? Will Kathy Bates ever return?? All of that will, of course, remain a mystery but I take my hat off to everyone involved for a very fun Season 10.
What did you think of the finale? Sound off in the comments below!
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