FX
After the previous episode’s reveal that John Lowe was indeed the Ten Commandments Killer (which we correctly postulated), he was completely absent from this week’s episode. But for good reason as we got a lot of backstory and tightening of loose ends, particularly one that has been nagging at me now for weeks.
This week’s episode, “She Wants Revenge,” was certainly full of revenge storylines, and the “she” of the title could refer to any one of several characters – The Countess, Iris or Ramona. In fact, pretty much all of them had some kind of revenge story this week, and it will be interesting to see where next week’s episode “She Gets Revenge” goes from here.
The Countess has any number of people to exact revenge on, but in particular James March who locked up her one true love behind the wall of the hotel. Knowing that Valentino and his wife are now free, she’s been searching for their whereabouts, finally locating them at a seedy Hollywood motel. Valentino is stunned and very happy to find The Countess knocking at the door, but there’s one little problem with the future of their relationship – his wife. She may not be long for this world if The Countess has her way.
As for March, whose existence in the hotel is made bearable only by the monthly visits The Countess grants to him, well, those days are over after the revelation of his misdeeds with Rudy and Natacha. And with the newly discovered hallway now open, The Countess orders Will Drake’s construction crew to install an impenetrable door within the next 24 hours, basically creating a vault. But for what … or whom? March helpfully materializes to offer the foreman assistance on the installation. But with The Countess snubbing March and about to marry Will, the spurned lover may be the one looking for revenge.
We’ve gotten very little insight into Ramona’s character since she was introduced, and what we know certainly gives her enough ammo to seek revenge against The Countess. She killed Ramona’s man and then dumped her in favor of her next plaything. But what we learned this week was absolutely heartbreaking.
After 20 years, Ramona finally went to visit her parents. Her father, noticing her lack of aging, asked if she’d been doing the plastic surgery. Ramona laughed it off but didn’t reveal her truth. Unfortunately, her mother (Marla Gibbs in a way too brief cameo) was ill and her dad was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. Mom suddenly passes away, Dad gets progressively worse, and to top it off, his home is burglarized and he is abused by the robbers. Ramona can’t stand to see him in that condition so she does what any good daughter, who happens to be a vampire, would do — she gives him her blood to heal his wounds and hopefully his brain.
No such luck though. Cuts, bruises and broken bones will heal, but synapses will not so while her father was physically whole again, his Alzheimer’s was only halted, leaving him in a perpetual state of dementia without knowing what he’s become (and it’s interesting that they’ve never actually used the term “vampire” rather referring to the condition as a viral infection). With her heart broken, Ramona does the only thing she can — she kills her father. Apparently, the infected can drown … even though they’re technically already dead and not breathing? I’m a little confused on that point.
FX
But now we know Ramona has a whole lot of hate for The Countess and her partners in crime, Donovan and Iris, are on the verge of making her plan come to fruition. Or are they? Iris has really become her own woman since being turned, not putting up with the douchebags that check in to film porn movies, and hoping her newfound strength will win back the respect of her son. It doesn’t though, because he’s convinced The Countess truly loves him. She swore it after they made love, even though she’s planning to marry Drake one day and be a widow the next. His blind lust for her completely jeopardizes the plan when they turn the tables on Ramona, much to Iris’ chagrin. That vault The Countess wanted constructed ASAP? Well, that’s where she’s going to store Ramona.
But let’s not forget, March knows about the vault and some of The Countess’ other secrets, one of which he’s very happy to share with Will just moments after their nuptials. As The Countess leaves to get changed for the honeymoon in Paris, March asks Will to accompany him to a room upstairs. The room which happens to house Bartholomew, The Countess’ baby. Will, of course, had no idea she already had a child and was horrified when he saw … it. Unfortunatelt for him, his new wife was seething when she heard him say he’d never raise that child after she was prepared to raise his son as her own. Telling him she had planned to kill him in Paris, plans change and he ends up in the vault with Ramona.
FX
Begging for help, Ramona convinces Will that she’s as much a victim as he is and he releases her from her cage. In a panic when he realizes there is no way out and that the place is soundproof, he suddenly realizes that they’re going to starve to death. In what had to be one of the best lines of the episode, Ramona stated matter of factly, “I’m not,” then slit his throat and feasted on his blood (but is he dead? We did see Will in the previews for next week). But how will they get out of the vault? My guess is Donovan will do the deed after catching The Countess making a sly exit from Valentino’s motel room. This is one scorned lover that will most likely be her downfall by the time the season ends.
And that loose end that has been nagging at me? They finally addressed the horde of vampire … or infected children that have been on a killing spree in Los Angeles. We saw a TV news report of another dead body, completely drained of blood, and the possibility that a group of children may have witnessed the murder. Of course they witnessed it since they were the killers. Turns out they’re holed up in one of the kids’ home that Alex has tracked them to, finding a pile of dead adults in one of the rooms.
The kids, however, are not too smart, ordering pizza delivery and killing the driver. Alex tries to reason with them to come to the Hotel Cortez with her to be cared for because ordering a pizza gives the police an address, and when the driver fails to return, that’s the first place the police will come looking. The boy who Alex cured from measles is the very aggressive ring leader and he’s having none of it, despite some of the other children not wanting to kill any more people. He basically tells Alex to kiss his ass and the kids leave her there, telling her she’ll have to explain to the police why the place is full of dead bodies.
With only four episodes left in the season (and next week will be the last one before the holidays), I’m happy we’re finally seeing some of these plot strands being re-addressed and tidied up. I just hope that Ryan Murphy and his writers can pull everything together without making it all seem rushed as has so often happened in past seasons. For now, I am digging what they’re doing. After a very shaky start, for me this has been one of the best seasons overall. I know everyone misses Jessica Lange, but I’ve been super-impressed with Lady Gaga (who was just nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance) and I love that she never wears the same outfit from scene to scene. Please, powers that be, don’t let this season fall apart at the end!
By the way, does anyone know if they’ve added any prosthetics to Finn Wittrock’s face to play Valentino? I know he’s wearing brown contacts, but his nose looks different to me, so I was thinking that was probably a prosthetic. There’s just something subtle enough going on there to make him look just vaguely not like himself to confuse the viewers. If you know, or have any other comments about the episode, please share them below. We want to hear from you!
Share this post
