After the strong start to the series, the second episode of American Horror Story: Roanoke continues with disturbing scenes, questions of sanity and reality, and the turbulent relationships between our 3 main characters. Although there are some exciting scenes where we find out more about the previous inhabitants of the house, it has some moments that get a little repetitive and so doesn’t quite live up to the first.
Shelby (SARAH PAULSON), having fled her house, becomes lost in the woods and stumbles upon Thomasin White (KATHY BATES) performing a ritualistic, human sacrifice in a disturbing scene. If you watch closely, we catch a glimpse of LADY GAGA’s character, though we don’t know too much about her yet. The sacrifice and repeated use of pigs harks back to series 1, where one of Dr Harmon’s patients is terrified of the mythical ‘Piggy Man’ coming to kill him, so perhaps we’ll learn more connections between all the series as the sixth plays out.
As the episode continues, there’s a stark contrast between moments of normality – Shelby and Matt together in the hospital following her ordeal, and Lee and her husband playing hide and seek with their daughter – and the almost hallucinogenic, murderous scenes, adding to the tension nicely. However as the episode progresses there becomes an issue in the inconsistency with the characters’ outlook on their situation; one moment Shelby is desperate to leave, but after witnessing the horrific human sacrifice, rather than being convinced of the need to leave and never return, she becomes stubbornly certain it must be the locals. I’m not sure what person in their right mind would draw that conclusion based on what she saw, but then perhaps Shelby’s not in her right mind…
Lee’s tense relationship with her estranged husband Mason (CHARLES MALIK WHITFIELD) is put to the test when her daughter Flora starts repeating sinister messages from Priscilla – a ghostly child that only Flora can see. One of the weakest parts for me was the performance of Lee’s daughter Flora, who is certainly old enough to understand the concepts of danger, death and murder, and yet when she believes that someone in the house is trying to kill her family, she reacts with absolutely no emotion. Whether it was a case of intentional direction or just poor acting, I’m not sure. The child comes across as one of those psychopathic children from old horror movies, but if it is intentional, it’s not effective. Furthermore, the rest of the characters begin to react in a more stereotypical ‘bad horror’ movie way, and less like the realistic couple they came across as in episode 1. They constantly wander off into the woods at night, drawn in by strange noises. This happens 3 times in this episode, by which point, it’s pretty hard to feel scared or have sympathy for them when they’re just behaving irrationally.
There is some excitement to be had when Matt and Shelby discover a bunker on their property, and through Dr Elias Cunningham’s (DENNIS O’HARE) video diary, we learn about previous murderous inhabitants. There are mysterious phone calls, ghosts and scenes from the past appearing and playing out in front of our modern-day characters, which mix things up and make it fresher. The addition of Dr Cunningham’s character is a welcome one, and adds another level of intrigue to the story. However things are let down by poor, very over the-top acting from a pair of psychopathic nurses. Without giving away too many spoilers, their story seems a little lazy and without much depth, but does open up the idea that there’s something worse lurking around the property.
Something about this episode and the way we learn information, for example through Dr Cunningham’s videos and the peculiar acting, sparks a thought in me that perhaps it is all part of a bigger, intentional plan that will reveal itself later down the line. My feeling is that we are watching this multi-layered narrative as if it was a real documentary, and whereas normally we follow characters as events unfold, here we hear only Matt, Shelby and Lee’s version of events. Perhaps the more predictable parts and strange acting is a sign of our characters’ telling lies and manipulating the story to their own ends. The creators could be taking advantage of the viewer trusting the words of the Millers, and may turn the story on its head further down the line. On the other hand, it could just be bad acting…
As the episode closes, we are left on a cliffhanger when one of the characters disappears in seemingly sinister circumstances. Hopefully this will propel the plot forward once again, and after this episode perhaps the leads will have less time to get lost in the woods.
AMERICAN HORROR STORY: ROANOKE AIRS IN THE UK ON FRIDAYS AT 10PM
