Written by Tim Minear
Directed by Liza Johnson
Ally: "That's not true, those numbers don't seem right to me. Where are you getting your information from?"
Kai: "Facebook!"
Ah yes, because the instant reactionary that is social media evidently is the best to make an argument for virtually anything. I'll give Ally points for calling out Kai on his readiness to believe random statistics from Facebook but everything else about the character is starting to grate on me a little.
I get that she's got fears (clowns, holes, bees etc) and that she's on the edge and while I definitely think Sarah Paulson is doing a commendable job nonetheless, unless something happens really fast, then Ally is going to further grate on me as a character. There's only so much the show can milk out of the character's growing paranoia and two episodes in, it's starting to feel like we're already at saturation point with her.
This week though when Ally wasn't freaking out about seeing clowns in bed with her, she also had the misfortune of finding her chef's dead body in the restaurant and ended the episode by accidentally shooting Pedro when the power went out and her new neighbour intensified the paranoia with his talk of terrorist threats.
Speaking of the new neighbours - this week we were introduced to married couple, Harrison and Meadow Wilton (Billy Eichner and Leslie Grossman) and already, I'm both fascinated and a little creeped out by them. Both besties - the gay beekeeper and his cancer surviving/pharmaceutical saleswoman wife certainly gave us a lot of information about themselves which managed to send Ally into something of a tizzy at times. Still though they did add a bit of colour to an episode that felt a bit beige at times.
Keeping with the inappropriate for a moment, I genuinely cannot decide what Winter's game actually is. While Kai used his 'beating' to garner some public support and a bid to run for city councilor, Winter seemed more intent on playing mind games with both Oz and Ally for her own amusement. She forced the former into the pinky thing that her and Kai have going on while trying to seduce the latter with a bubble bath. The only person she hasn't manipulated so far is Ivy but I'm sure that will happen soon enough.
As for the political commentary - eh, it was still OTT at times here. I think had this season aired earlier in the year, a lot of the themes (fear, immigrants, walls/bridges etc) would have been a lot more effective but despite some of the show's best intentions, a lot of it is simply not coming together as strongly as it should be.
- Harrison/Meadow aside we were also introduced to Adina Porter's reporter, Beverly Hope for a brief moment this week.
- Oz is short for Ozymandias, which seems appropriate for this season. We also got another Twisty cameo this week.
- Both Ivy and Rudy seemed like they could be planning another solution for Ally if they figure out that she isn't taking her medication.
- Chronology: From where the end of the previous episode left off.
Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark was solid enough but again, the show needs to move away from the election commentary because at the moment, it seems to be holding it back. It's time to really embrace the horror and go mad with the clowns and get the actual cult theme up and running instead of treading the post Trump political blues.
Rating: 7 out of 10
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