Reviews
“AHS: Delicate” Review – “Opening Night” Delivers More of the Same for the Mid-Season Premiere
‘AHS: Delicate – Part Two’ returns with more of the same, yet Anna’s perturbing pregnancy finally starts to crown towards its creepy climax.
“Down will come baby, cradle and all…”
Part Two of American Horror Story: Delicate turns the clock back just over 35 years and begins with an unsettling vignette that chronicles how Emma Roberts’ Anna Victoria Alcott was brought into the world. This is actually an effective and telling prologue that functions as a strong distillation of the season. In fact, this would have been a better way to start off AHS: Delicate as a whole, rather than its second-half. It teases the many unknown and unintentional risks that are associated with pregnancy and childbirth, even when everything plays out normally and there’s no demon baby involved. American Horror Story addresses the twisted nature of “Rock-A-Bye-Baby” and the inherently creepy nature of lullabies. It’s a larger indictment of parenthood’s magical nature and the dark underbelly that’s beneath all the joy. It’s a fairly glib lesson for AHS: Delicate to impart so late in the game, but it still provides some helpful context for Anna.
Anna’s father proves to be a malignant letdown even before he opens his mouth to belittle his wife. He can barely pull his eyes away from Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and it seems that this self-improvement text has a better chance of imprinting on him than his actual daughter. “Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be,” is one of the many quick lessons that’s preached in this guidebook. It’s hard not to think of this simplistic shortcut throughout the duration of “Opening Night” as men continually fall short of their partner’s – and society’s – expectations. It’s a constructive pillar that helps “Opening Night” build a strong foundation, yet this season continues to erect a hollow monument – like ostentatious artwork at a gallery. “Opening Night” is not a bad episode of American Horror Story. It’s just more of the same as AHS: Delicate crawls to the finish line rather than confidently taking its first steps.
“Opening Night” continues to push the idea of how much mothers need to sacrifice for their children and the happiness and peace that they lose in order to help their offspring thrive. Anna is caught at the crossroads of this concept as her life continually unravels. Dex’s (Matt Czuchry) relationship with his own father is juxtaposed against Anna’s frayed relationship with her dad in order to highlight the stark differences between their families and upbringings. Dex’s father is far from an admirable figure, but he’s a parent who’s genuinely excited to solve his child’s problems rather than ignore them and deflect. Dex is largely a background presence in this episode. However, his struggle helps tie the shaggier elements of “Opening Night” together. The installment’s final act is easily its most compelling material. It matches the intensity of the episode’s prologue so that “Opening Night” can be bookended by parental trauma and sacrifice. The tragedy that Dex walks in on with his mother is genuinely moving and another effective way in which Dex’s life mirrors Anna’s, albeit in a bizarro manner.
Bradley Buecker directs a competent episode with “Opening Night,” yet it still has difficulty breaking free from this season’s repetitive habits – almost as if they’re inappropriate pregnancy cravings. Anna’s collection of disturbing dolls continues to grow like a morbid nursery of displacement. The same is true for AHS: Delicate’s obsession with cat chaos. “Opening Night” literally scratches the surface of something interesting with the rancid raccoon claw that claws out of Anna’s stomach. It’s the best part of the episode, but it’s still pretty standard pregnancy horror iconography. There are similar feelings of ambivalence that surround Michaela Jaé Rodriguez’s Nicolette, who’s evidently been watching over Anna since she was a baby like one of the nanny Disciples of the Watch from The Omen. It’s material that remains so one-note and she’s more of a chilling cipher than an actual character, which has been a consistent concession through this season. Anna finally starts to grow suspicious of Nicolette. However, it’s all just too little, too late.
Anna also appears to accidentally kill someone in a bathroom altercation…until she doesn’t, that is. The strongest element of “Opening Night” is just how fractured Anna’s mental state has become. She increasingly doesn’t know what she can trust as her fantasies blur together with reality. That being said, it’s long overdue for this season to step on the gas and finally take all of this to the next level. This material isn’t fundamentally flawed, but it’s just unfortunate that Roberts brings so little life to the Anna role. It remains one of her least interesting contributions in the entirety of American Horror Story. As much as Sarah Paulson has been overused in the anthology series, I’d be genuinely curious to see what she’d do with this variety of detached character. Roberts at least knows how to confidently chomp down on a bone. So there’s that.
On the other side of the spectrum, Kim Kardashian’s performance as Siobhan Corbyn is somehow AHS: Delicate’s saving grace. Kardashian unironically kills it and is clearly having a ball here. The campy Hollywood satire isn’t nearly as tight or insightful as it could be, but there’s still some fun commentary in “Opening Night” on the artificial nature of awards campaigning and how PR can masquerade as grief and empathy. Siobhan confidently pulls Anna’s strings and lures her into a false sense of empowerment by making sure that she ignores the men in her life. Siobhan can’t stand the idea of Anna quitting acting just because it would be unfair to “bring a baby into a world where none of us are safe.” (Pro Tip: don’t go down on your limo driver).
Siobhan laments that Anna turning her back on her “gift” wouldn’t just be a loss for her, but for all of motherhood. On that note, it’s absolutely no coincidence that this season doesn’t have Anna pining for an Emmy, but an Oscar – an award that’s a man. Everything that Anna has painstakingly worked towards is still ultimately in service of a man’s approval and the male gaze, even if Siobhan or any number of witches dress it up to be a different form of empowerment. After all, everyone just wants to float; whether it’s in a pool or away from life’s responsibilities and burdens.
To bring it all back to Covey’s self-help book, “Start with the end in mind,” is another mantra that’s preached in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. This text might be treated as toxic short-hand in “Opening Night,” but this is hopefully one lesson that’s worked its way into American Horror Story: Delicate. This season continues to bombard the audience with uncomfortable imagery and unreliable illusions as the same ideas circle round-and-round like blood down a bathtub drain. None of this means anything if it can’t stick the landing and provide satisfying closure to this morbid account of motherhood. Halley Feiffer knows where all of this is going and how Anna Victoria Alcott’s story will end. She just needs to let the audience in on the secret and follow through on its creepy contractions.
Death Down the Aisle begins with the tantalizing image of a bride, Malorie (Jess Brown), dressed in a wedding dress splattered with blood.
This is a brief (unnecessary) in media res opening before writer Audrey C. Marie jumps the action back to earlier in the day. It’s the day of the wedding, Malorie is preparing to wed Jon (David Alexander) and there’s a whirlwind introduction of wedding guests, many of whom are either family, work associates from Jon’s legal firm, or both.
Most of these relationships aren’t clear until after Jon’s death (this isn’t a spoiler; his death is heavily telegraphed by director Roxanne Boisvert). Only after the murder does it become clear that Death Down The Aisle is primarily interested in exploring red herrings, gossipy busy bodies, and characters making A LOT of phone calls.
Let’s rewind: Malorie is marrying Jon, an older man with an adult daughter, Bridget (Anna Kopacek), who looks nearly the same age as her. Jon works at Stone Legal Services with his brother Zach (Scott Gibson), as well as Malorie’s mother, Pamela (Jayne Heitmeyer) and Zach’s younger girlfriend, Amy (Gracie Callahan).
Each of these characters hand Jon a drink before the wedding begins – Zach – a Scotch, Amy – a coffee, and Pamela – an energy drink. There’s also a mysterious glass of champagne delivered to Malorie’s room that Jon drinks and Boisvert ensures that the audience keeps track of each of them by zooming in each time. This is why it’s no surprise when Jon keels over mid-ceremony, coughs up blood on Malorie’s dress, and immediately croaks.
Naturally it turns out that nearly everyone had a motive to see him dead. Pamela recently quit the firm because Jon wouldn’t confirm her salary; Zach was pushing for a merger with rival Miles (Colin Price) that Jon was unsure about, and the dead man fretted that Amy was a gold digger, so Jon wouldn’t support her promotion, either.
Adding to the too plentiful number of suspects is Malorie’s ex-husband Ryan (Frank Fiola), a recovering addict. Even Jon’s own daughter ends up on the list when it’s revealed that they were fighting in the weeks leading up to his death.
The only one who doesn’t have a motive to kill Jon is Malorie’s best friend Francesca (JaNae Armogan), who works at the wedding venue and thinks she saw something fishy. Naturally she’s killed off before the end of the first act.
What follows is a lot of conversation between characters about the firm, the merger, Malorie and Jon’s relationship, and how everyone is lying to everyone else. The problem is that 90% of these conversations happen via phone or text and few of them are interesting. Marie’s script fails to develop the characters beyond their motive, which means that the majority of the plot developments aren’t particularly engaging because the characters are so shallow.
With so many people and interweaving relationships involved, it’s hard to zero in and identify with anyone. Malorie is clearly meant to be the protagonist because, like most Lifetime films, she assumes the role of investigator, despite the presence of Detective Levine (Christian Paul) on the periphery.
But even she is kept at a distance from the audience. Because we only see a few moments of her relationship with Jon, secrets that the pair were keeping from friends and family don’t carry any emotional resonance when they come to light later in the film. One in particular seems to come out of left field and seemingly only exists to introduce another red herring in order to prolong the mystery for another 20 minutes.
Alas none of the characters get much to do, so none of the performances pop. Kopacek and Callahan look too similar and are styled identically, which sometimes makes it hard to distinguish one from the other. Further issues with casting is that the age disparity between Malorie & Jon and Zach & Amy is never mentioned (neither is Jon’s paternity of Bridget). This may be an ageist observation, but even the fact that Pamela never comments that her daughter was marrying her (Pamela’s) boss seems unusual, especially when Death Down the Aisle regularly suggests that one or more character is a gold digger.
Arguably the film’s biggest issue is that everything circles around the business dealings of the firm, none of which is engaging or interesting (hilariously it’s never even made clear what kind of law they practice!) Without more distinct characters, there’s very little to hang the narrative on.
Unfortunately after a solid opening, Death Down the Aisle gets stuck spinning its wheels, endlessly recycling its red herrings and interminable phone calls between characters. The suspect list is long, but the film’s energy lags through the saggy middle section and the climax can’t bring Death Down the Aisle back to life.
This one could have easily been called “Business Phone Calls”…and that’s not great.
Death Down the Aisle premiered on Lifetime Thursday, June 13.
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