Reviews
[TV Review] ‘Scream’ Season 2 Finale: “When a Stranger Calls”
“Hello Kieran. Who told you you could wear my mask?”
– Brandon James
After all that, it was Kieran. He was Piper’s accomplice in the first season and he was the sole killer this season. About 90% of you in the comments were right. I chose not to believe it because it seemed too obvious (especially when MTV releases images like this one ahead of the finale’s release), but I was wrong. While the end result may have been a bit predictable, the episode as a whole was much better than most of the episodes in the latter half of the season and was on par with last year’s finale.
It would be easy to say that Kieran’s reveal was disappointing, but the truth is that Scream made it so that any character could have reasonably been the killer (with the exception of maybe Brooke and/or Noah). Because of this, the reveal was bound to be disappointing no matter what. Think about it: had Gustavo, Eli, Emma, Audrey, Aunt Tina, Ms. Lang, Acosta, or even Maggie been the killer, would anyone be saying “I didn’t see that coming.”? Okay maybe Maggie would have been a surprise, but the point is that even though Kieran’s reveal could be seen as predictable it would have been equally as predictable had it been any other character. That is the problem inherent to the whodunit sub-genre though. When you think about it, it actually is sort of clever because it almost makes you want to go back and watch Amadeus Serrafini’s scenes from the first season to see how he behaves around all of the other characters (especially his dad). Maybe that’s why Kieran has always been so dull and lifeless for the past two seasons. He was trying to stay under the radar. As bland as Serrafini has been for these two seasons, he did a commendable job channeling his inner Skeet Ulrich for his unmasking.
Whether or not the explanation holds up is up to the viewer. We are meant to believe that Kieran and Piper dating before he came to town and that Eli (RIP) knew he was crazy the whole time (maybe not a killer, but certainly crazy). There are plenty of questions one may have about it. For example, why didn’t Eli ever tell Emma about all of the shit that Kieran pulled back home? We he worried that she wouldn’t believe him? At the very least it would have planted the seed in her head that would force her to start looking into him, but that’s neither here nor there at this point.
The most exciting prospect of Kieran being the killer isn’t what takes place in “When a Stranger Calls”, but rather what it means for the show going forward (if it goes forward). Having Emma spare his life and send him to prison is one of the boldest (and smartest) moves the series has ever done. First, it adds an extra dimension that Kieran that the character so desperately needed. Since he’s still alive, Serrafini will finally get the opportunity to show off the acting chops that Scream‘s writers have prevented him from showing in the past. Second, it actually makes you root for Emma. Sidney Prescott killed (or had a hand in killing) every single Ghost Face that came after her. She never spared one. It’s not that she should have, but having Scream: The Series’s final girl make a different decision with her Ghost Face is the most compelling thing Emma has ever done. Her journey has been a rocky one this season and her sparing Kieran was her way of showing she was moving on.
There was so much that happened before the reveal though, as we got a major set piece in the middle of the episode The entire sequence inside the movie theater was Scream at its best. We saw its five main characters working together, barricading themselves in the theater in order to catch the killer, not realizing it was one of their own. Of course, it would have helped matters if they didn’t keep splitting up like the Scooby Gang (Seriously, have they never seen a horror movie? Noah should know better.), but it was a great scene nonetheless full of suspense and (here’s the key here) fun. Too often Scream takes itself so seriously that it’s a breath of fresh air when it just has fun with its premise. Scream‘s main weakness is that it falls too often on the melodramatic side of the dramatic spectrum, but it takes itself far too seriously for that to work. If it were a better show this would be alright, but the fact of the matter is that Scream is a teen soap opera. It doesn’t need to be brooding. It needs to be entertaining. This entire sequence was golden. It even nailed the suspense and shock of the situation. I can’t be the only one who gasped out loud when Brooke got stabbed, right?
We also got some actual emotion from Santiago Segura’s Gustavo. ‘Stavo (yes, I’ll finally start calling him that), has been nothing more than a red herring all season. It was painfully obvious that he was never going to be the killer because there were too many signs saying that he was the killer. Watching him break down while Brooke was in surgery was something that needed to happen to his character, especially if he is going to be sticking around next season, especially since it looks like Acosta adopted Brooke.
“When a Stranger Calls” is not a perfect episode of television. No one would accuse any episode of Scream of being perfect, but it is Scream at its best so far. The initial reveal of Kieran may be disappointing at first, and that is understandable. I took a few days to let it sit with me before I wrote this review. I watched the episode again to let it sink in. If anything, this episode shows such promise for where the writers could take Season 3 (if we get one) with the return of Brandon James. Let’s just hope they don’t botch that plot development liked the botched Audrey’s this season. Bring on Season 3! #RenewMTVScream
Random Notes
- My interview with Amadeus Serafini (Kieran) will be posted tomorrow morning. Be sure to check back for it!
- Tons of references to the Scream films tonight. A few of my favorites:
- Kieran being the killer is an homage to Billy being the killer in Scream (Kieran’s hair even looked like Billy’s hair).
- “Piper taught me that killing people is way more fun than therapy” is mighty similar to this line from Bitch # 1 in Scream.
- The car crash in the beginning featured a shot of the cop car scraping a barrier just like the cop car in Scream 2 scraped another car.
- Kieran’s line “He was obsessed with that girl and now he’s obsessed with you!” is highly reminiscent of this Parker Posey line in Scream 3.
- The entire bit with Brooke not letting Gustavo into the theater mirrored the scene where Kirby wouldn’t let Charlie in the house in Scream 4. It even borrowed some dialogue and blocking from that scene.
- I may be one or two off, but I believe the body count this season was 7 (Jake, Eddie the hotel clerk, Branson, Zoe, Mayor Maddox, the cop driving Audrey and Emma, and Eli).
- If that cop would have just driven straight into the killer all of their problems would have been solved. That would have been a nice twist, wouldn’t it?
- Is it just me, or does it sound like the killer has some nasal congestion issues sometimes?
- Ms. Lang was pretty pointless, wasn’t she? Maybe she’ll stick around next season and give us Scream’s version of Scream 2‘s post-fame Gale Weathers. We did see her writing her book, after all.
- Noah is a boxers guy. Who knew?
- “Mmmmm if it isn’t daddy’s little girl.”
- “You know half of those are fake, right?” “Yeah, well, the other half are real.”
- “Hey, I heard Brooke’s hurt. She okay?” – SOUND MORE DISTRESSED WHEN YOU ASK SOMETHING LIKE THAT STAVO.
- Emma is a terrible shot. Kieran’s body practically took up the entire stairway and she didn’t hit him once.
- Plenty of plot holes in the Kieran reveal, but I want to know why he didn’t just shoot Audrey. He had multiple opportunities to after his cover was blown.
- Here is a summary of all of my episode grades for Season 2 of Scream. Perhaps I was too forgiving of all of its flaws (and there are many), but at the end of the day I do enjoy the series for what it is. It averages out to a 3.25/5, so I’ll round it up to a 3.5.
- That’s it for Season 2 of Scream everyone! It’s been a rocky road, but I’ve had a lot of fun with this season. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my reviews as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them.
Reviews
“AHS: Delicate” Review – “Little Gold Man” Mixes Oscar Fever & Baby Fever into the Perfect Product
‘AHS: Delicate’ enters early labor with a fun, frenzied episode that finds the perfect tone and goes for broke as its water breaks.
“I’ll figure it out. Women always do.”
American Horror Story is no stranger to remixing real-life history with ludicrous, heightened Murphy-isms, whether it’s AHS: 1984’s incorporation of Richard Ramirez, AHS: Cult’s use of Valerie Solanas, or AHS: Coven’s prominent role for the Axeman of New Orleans. Accordingly, it’s very much par for the course for AHS: Delicate to riff on other pop culture touchstones and infinitely warp them to its wicked whims. That being said, it takes real guts to do a postmodern feminist version of Rosemary’s Baby and then actually put Mia Farrow – while she’s filming Rosemary’s Baby, no less – into the narrative. This is the type of gonzo bullshit that I want out of American Horror Story! Sharon Tate even shows up for a minute because why the hell not? Make no mistake, this is completely absurd, but the right kind of campy absurdity that’s consistently been in American Horror Story’s wheelhouse since its inception. It’s a wild introduction that sets up an Oscar-centric AHS: Delicate episode for success. “Little Gold Man” is a chaotic episode that’s worth its weight in gold and starts to bring this contentious season home.
It’d be one thing if “Little Gold Man” just featured a brief detour to 1967 so that this season of pregnancy horror could cross off Rosemary’s Baby from its checklist. AHS: Delicate gets more ambitious with its revisionist history and goes so far as to say that Mia Farrow and Anna Victoria Alcott are similarly plagued. “Little Gold Man” intentionally gives Frank Sinatra dialogue that’s basically verbatim from Dex Harding Sr., which indicates that this demonic curse has been ruffling Hollywood’s feathers for the better part of a century. Anna Victoria Alcott’s Oscar-nominated feature film, The Auteur, is evidently no different than Rosemary’s Baby. It’s merely Satanic forces’ latest attempt to cultivate the “perfect product.” “Little Gold Man” even implies that the only reason that Mia Farrow didn’t go on to make waves at the 1969 Academy Awards and ends up with her twisted lot in life is because she couldn’t properly commit to Siobhan’s scheme, unlike Anna.
This is easily one of American Horror Story’s more ridiculous cold opens, but there’s a lot of love for the horror genre and Hollywood that pumps through its veins. If Hollywood needs to be a part of AHS: Delicate’s story then this is actually the perfect connective tissue. On that note, Claire DeJean plays Sharon Tate in “Little Gold Man” and does fine work with the brief scene. However, it would have been a nice, subtle nod of continuity if AHS: Delicate brought back Rachel Roberts who previously portrayed Tate in AHS: Cult. “Little Gold Man” still makes its point and to echo a famous line from Jennifer Lynch’s father’s television masterpiece: “It is happening again.”
“Little Gold Man” is rich in sequences where Anna just rides the waves of success and enjoys her blossoming fame. She feels empowered and begins to finally take control of her life, rather than let it push her around and get under her skin like a gestating fetus. Anna’s success coincides with a colossal exposition dump from Tavi Gevinson’s Cora, a character who’s been absent for so long that we were all seemingly meant to forget that she was ever someone who was supposed to be significant. Cora has apparently been the one pulling many of Anna’s strings all along as she goes Single White Female, rather than Anna having a case of Repulsion. It’s an explanation that oddly works and feeds into the episode’s more general message of dreams becoming nightmares. Cora continuing to stay aligned with Dr. Hill because she has student loans is also somehow, tragically the perfect explanation for her abhorrent behavior. It’s not the most outlandish series of events in an episode that also briefly gives Anna alligator legs and makes Emma Roberts and Kim Kardashian kiss.
“Little Gold Man” often feels like it hits the fast-forward button as it delivers more answers, much in the same vein as last week’s “Ava Hestia.” These episodes are two sides of the same coin and it’s surely no coincidence that they’re both directed by Jennifer Lynch. This season has benefitted from being entirely written by Halley Feiffer – a first for the series – but it’s unfortunate that Lynch couldn’t direct every episode of AHS: Delicate instead of just four out of nine entries. That’s not to say that a version of this season that was unilaterally directed by Lynch would have been without its issues. However, it’s likely that there’d be a better sense of synergy across the season with fewer redundancies. She’s responsible for the best episodes of AHS: Delicate and it’s a disappointment that she won’t be the one who closes the season out in next week’s finale.
To this point, “Little Gold Man” utilizes immaculate pacing that helps this episode breeze by. Anna’s Oscar nomination and the awards ceremony are in the same episode, whereas it feels like “Part 1” of the season would have spaced these events out over four or five episodes. This frenzied tempo works in “Little Gold Man’s” favor as AHS: Delicate speed-runs to its finish instead of getting lost in laborious plotting and unnecessary storytelling. This is how the entire season should have been. Although it’s also worth pointing out that this is by far the shortest episode of American Horror Story to date at only 34 minutes. It’s a shame that the season’s strongest entries have also been the ones with the least amount of content. There could have been a whole other act to “Little Gold Man,” or at the least, a substantially longer cold open that got more out of its Mia Farrow mayhem.
“Little Gold Man” is an American Horror Story episode that does everything right, but is still forced to contend with three-quarters of a subpar season. “Part 2” of AHS: Delicate actually helps the season’s first five episodes shine brighter in retrospect and this will definitely be a season that benefits from one long binge that doesn’t have a six-month break in the middle. Unfortunately, anyone who’s already watched it once will likely not feel compelled to experience these labor pains a second time over. With one episode to go and Anna’s potential demon offspring ready to greet the world, AHS: Delicate is poised to deliver one hell of a finale.
Although, to paraphrase Frank Sinatra, “How do you expect to be a good conclusion if this is what you’re chasing?”
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