{"id":347,"date":"2024-04-25T16:06:36","date_gmt":"2024-04-25T16:06:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/?p=347"},"modified":"2024-05-01T23:44:41","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T23:44:41","slug":"american-horror-story-delicate-ends-with-a-wtf-not-a-bang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/2024\/04\/25\/american-horror-story-delicate-ends-with-a-wtf-not-a-bang\/","title":{"rendered":"American Horror Story: Delicate ends with a WTF, not a bang"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n \"Kim
Image: FX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I am Boo-Boo the Fool<\/p>\n

Perhaps two good American Horror Story<\/em> seasons in a row was too much to ask for.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll be the first to put on my clown makeup<\/a> and call myself out for daring to wish for too much. But after the surprisingly poignant<\/a> <\/em>AHS: NYC<\/em><\/a> last season, I was full of hope. Early episodes of AHS: Delicate<\/em><\/a> had me bewitched by the more restrained psychological buildup. And I kept making excuses when the show failed to deliver, when it strung out the buildup for yet another episode. <\/p>\n

I forgot the first fundamental rule of being an AHS<\/em> fan: The show rarely, if ever, sticks the landing.<\/p>\n

[Ed. note:<\/strong> This post contains major spoilers for the end of American Horror Story: Delicate.<\/em>] <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Emma
\n Image: FX<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Delicate<\/em> followed Anna Alcott (Emma Roberts), an actress on the road to campaign for an Oscar who is also desperately trying to get pregnant. After finally conceiving, she starts to experience a lot of weirdness: dark figures following her around, dolls of herself with various injuries left around, and cravings for raw animal flesh, among other things. Throughout it all, her best friend and manager, Siobhan (Kim Kardashian), reassures her that everything will be totally fine and normal.<\/p>\n

But Siobhan is actually the mastermind behind everything Anna\u2019s been experiencing. \u2019Twas she who orchestrated (almost) every creepy event this season! <\/p>\n

Except\u2026 What the hell was she orchestrating?<\/p>\n

Yes, she\u2019s preyed on women who want it all for centuries, including familiar faces like her husband Dex\u2019s tech mogul friend Talia (Juliana Canfield) and Sonia (Annabelle Dexter-Jones), the artist he works with. They\u2019re all in this cult to birth creatures, which Siobhan claims will be a new race of superpowered beings that will take over the world and kill all men. This is all revealed in some weird luxury apartment where almost everything is painted bright red and all the cult members wear stupid costumes and fawn over Siobhan. <\/p>\n

And it would be 1% more forgivable if the costumes weren\u2019t so bad. Seriously, it\u2019s bugged me all season that the feathered headdresses look like something you can pick up at Party City for $25.99 (plus tax). <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Kim
\n Image: FX<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

It all seems like it\u2019s taking place in a liminal space, or Anna\u2019s own head, which contributes to another frustration of this season: We don\u2019t necessarily need an answer to whether or not certain events were in Anna\u2019s head or not, but so few of those moments had actual, tangible effects on her that it doesn\u2019t even matter. Siobhan planted her cultists in every aspect of Anna\u2019s life, from the nurse holding her when she was born to the ambulance driver whisking her away as she gave birth. Anna kept having increasingly disturbing visions, including her baby clawing out of her and strange scaly legs, that all immediately vanished once someone else was there to perceive them. And even if we don\u2019t get answers, we should at least have some<\/em> sense of what is going on.<\/p>\n

Take last season, for instance: We never learned who the strange leather-clad figure haunting the queer community of New York City was, even when he unmasked himself to one of the characters. But that was OK, because we got the general sense that he was a sort of harbinger of death, past trauma lurking around the corner and eventually dragging everyone with him. It was a metaphor, and a devastating one at that. <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Emma
\n Image: FX<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

In Delicate<\/em>, though, we learn too much and yet not enough. The show clearly has some stuff on its mind about beauty, aging, motherhood, and womanhood \u2014 but it all kind of fizzles together in the end without much of a metaphorical structure. Siobhan never reveals what or who she is. (Beyond, uh, secretly Dex\u2019s mother.) This would be fine, without her weird master plan to kill all men. It\u2019s too specifically detailed, especially when we have no idea what the hell her motives are. It ends up being a comic portrayal of extreme feminism, which sits weirdly considering everything else the season tried to do.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the way Siobhan is defeated, though, that turns everything from bad to laughably stupid. Dex\u2019s dead wife, Adelaide, who we learned a couple of episodes prior was a former member of the cult who defected and tried to live a normal life, suddenly appears next to Anna. She leads her in a cryptic chant invoking Hestia<\/a>, Greek goddess of the hearth, for some reason (even though it\u2019s never implied Siobhan is a figure from the Greek pantheon; if anything, there\u2019s hints she\u2019s Satan or Lilith or some other more biblical figure). All Anna does is repeat these words louder when Siobhan comes in, and then Siobhan withers away into dust.<\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Emma
\n Image: FX<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Ta-da! That\u2019s it!<\/p>\n

The cult is gone. Anna\u2019s baby is normal. The super-modern apartment is now white and not bright red. She has her Oscar, too. <\/p>\n

All that buildup (So. Much. Buildup.) and it\u2019s just some loud chanting that fixes everything. Sure! <\/p>\n

As far as AHS<\/em> seasons go, Delicate <\/em>was not the worst. The first half was intriguing, especially since it shied away from typical AHS<\/em> conventions<\/a>, thanks to a new showrunner at the helm. But the ending was perhaps one of the biggest letdowns this show has ever had, with one of the most baffling \u201cdefeats\u201d of a villain I\u2019ve ever seen. Not even Kim Kardashian\u2019s surprisingly good performance<\/a> could save her from ridiculous motives and that horrible costume. <\/p>\n

All episodes of<\/small> American Horror Story: Delicate<\/em><\/small> are streaming on Hulu now. <\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Image: FX I am Boo-Boo the Fool Perhaps two good American Horror Story seasons in a row was ...<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":349,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":355,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347\/revisions\/355"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dulcipass.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}