Written by Manny Coto
Directed by Max Winkler
Bryce: "Open the door, Jaslyn."
Last week threw in a connection to Coven and this week, well an actor from that season who also appeared in Hotel has appeared in this one, also with an actor from the latter season. Saying that, this episode is a reference free zone from the parent series.
Gabourey Sidibe and Max Greenfield find themselves playing married couple, Jaslyn and Bryce Taylor who have moved into a nice neighbourhood with a nonexistent crime rate. Now this should be a good thing but Jaslyn's a rather jumpy person so she took it upon herself to get a door security system named Aura to reassure her, much to the annoyance of her control freak husband.
With Bryce being annoyed and dismissive of Jaslyn's need for Aura, the matter finds herself being stalked by a face from the past. For a good portion of the episode we're lead to believe that Dale Hendricks (Joel Swetow) a former janitor had bad intentions towards Jaslyn but when the latter opened the door to him, things took a rather surprising turn for the episode.
Having Dale atoning for his stalkerish behaviour of the past was a nice surprise along with Jaclyn apologising for her previous mistreatment of him during her high school years. Of course it was then made abundantly clear that Dale was a ghost and making amends with Jaslyn was his way of crossing over and he did that in a style that felt reminiscent of how Thanos vaporised people.
Of course with the Aura device also bring revealed to show ghosts, it turned out that Jaslyn wasn't the only one with a past. Bryce who spent most of the episode dismissing Jaslyn was revealed to have a pregnant former lover named Mary Jeane, whom he looked after she was hit by a truck. Also Bryce found himself being killed by Mary Jeane, so he got his just desserts.
Bryce's comeuppance would've been a perfect to have ended the episode but we got a minor time jump, a new location for Jaslyn and another installation of Aura. Now Jaslyn has an abusive dead husband haunting her until she can find a way to get rid of him.
- This was meant to be the third episode of the season but for some reason, some of the episodes have been shuffled.
- Seeing as a certain video sharing app cannot be named, Jaslyn had to watch Aura prank videos on TechVid instead.
- Dale looked like one of the Pales from the previous season of American Horror Story.
- Chronology: I'm assuming 2022 with a three month time jump and flashbacks to twenty years prior where it was revealed that Jaslyn's parents were murdered in a home invasion.
Aura was a fine enough second episode with solid performances from both Sidibe and Greenfied and while it's nice when this show does do stories not tied to anything we've previously seen, the questionable ending does mar this one a bit. It's not bad but it's an average one at best.
Rating: 6 out of 10
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