I can’t believe that we are so close to being halfway through this season’s “American Horror Story: 1984”! Despite many differing opinions regarding how awesome this season is, I’m 100% loving it. Believe me, this episode did not disappoint! Also, it answered so many questions. Especially questions like “Where will this go from here?” Well, we are definitely headed off the map, into places dark and disturbing…as we always do with AHS.
I wasn’t expecting anything that happened in this episode, to be honest. This is Friday the 13th, on methamphetamines. Seriously, I had zero foresight with this one. You’ve done it again, AHS! I applaud you. This is why I’m such a nerd for “American Horror Story.” It never goes where I think it will, ever. I’ve not once been able to predict this show. For that, I love it.
The kill count is at an all-time time high. Everyone is dead except for a few random characters. Some character’s fate isn’t known at all. Craziness is ensuing. Let’s examine this 99th episode of “American Horror Story: 1984, ‘Red Dawn.’ Fasten your seatbelt! I’m going to roll through this.
Rita/Donna Chambers comes in hot with yet another alter ego, this one as “Dee Dee”. We start the episode with a flashback to 1980, where we see a longer-haired Rita sitting in a car, watching a house closely. A (fabulous!) Pinto rolls up, and a man gets out, followed by a giggling woman. I’m thinking, “Ah, Rita is spying on her man.” Well, I was all wrong. The man is her father, not her man. She follows the couple into the house, after breaking in with a credit card. What she finds inside isn’t infidelity; no, instead what she finds is a woman tied to the bed, bloodied, cut up, dead. Her father is a killer. He confronts her, calling her “Dee Dee”, and tells her his gruesome story of a life driven by the overwhelming and all-consuming need to kill, which he has given into his whole life.
Overwhelmed, she begs to help him as she is, after all, a psychologist. He declines; instead, he fatally stabs himself in front of his daughter, after he has told her that he’s been a monster his whole life and that she has the darkness inside her, too. Now we know why “Rita/Donna Chambers/Dee Dee” is obsessed with learning about serial killers. This is the opening scene before the infamous introduction, which this season is totally radical. I’m loving it so much.
Let’s take a moment to respect the introduction. Every time, AHS, every time! This season has a catchy pop song that feels/sounds very 1980’s, with montages of hair-sprayed and makeup wearing people doing aerobics and other”80’s” things. Interwoven are horrific scenes of violence and other disturbing images. It’s the theme song, though, that I’ve fallen for: a little bit Jason, a little bit Freddy, a little bit Michael Myers. There are booming synthesizers, and a spooky beat, rocking in the background. I love it! It’s going to stick with me, I know that.
Back to business. As the last episode “Slashdance” ended, we watched as a murdered Richard Ramirez was surrounded by ominous satanic chanting, and then occult-like things started happening to his body. Rita was watching it all in horror. As we start ‘Red Dawn’, Rita and Richard are standing face to face, Rita demanding answers. “What the fuck are you?” She screams at him.
Ramirez is calm and cool, laughing even. “I was reborn, Dee Dee,” he answers, and proceeds to explain that Satan himself had brought him back, after “showing him everything”. Since he’s called her by the same nickname that her father used to call her, Rita is overcome, and Ramirez continues on, telling her that “The Darkness resides in everyone.” Delusional at this point, Rita’s father appears behind her, murmuring that she is following in his footsteps; Ramirez is saying that everything happening here at the camp is her fault, particularly because she is the one who brought Mr. Jingles here. Rita seems distraught. She questions reality, vision whirling.
Flash to a flaming vehicle, and a crispy Xavier dancing around it crazily, begging the others (Montana, Brooke, Chet, and Margaret) to help him create a fire that can be seen so they can be rescued. Xavier is the only one who thinks it’s a good idea to burn the entire camp down, but no one else agrees. Xavier completely freaks out. “I have breathed the fire of a thousand white-hot suns!!” He rages, his blistered skin waving as he throws his tantrum. Finally, Margaret whacks him in the back of the head with the gun. Sweet Margaret, asking God to forgive her as she does so. Montana wants to bail, but everyone agrees that the woods are a maze (of course they are!) filled with darkness, and, even booby traps. They are happy to have a gun handy, although Margaret “used all the bullets trying to save Trevor from Mr. Jingles!” in perfect character as the sweet, pious woman she’s pretending to be. (I was impressed!) Margaret then tells the others that she’d seen a couple camping across the lake, that they should take a boat to get to them. Chet is volunteered by the others. “You’re very brave,” devious Margaret gushes to Chet, and they take off, Chet going reluctantly.
Back at the infirmary, the hiker is still passed out, Xavier has a haunting bad dream about Bertie, and Brooke and Montana are pondering their circumstances. Montana slowly grabs an ax to hit Brooke with. Brooke is looking out the window and sees Ray, whips around sees the ax in Montana’s hand and says “Yeah! Keep that close! We may need it!” She had no clue that Montana was about to use it on her. Brooke heads off to get Ray, who is confused. Brooke wonders if he hit his head. At that moment, keys are heard jingling. Everyone takes off.
Margaret and Chet are rowing away through darkness, knifing through the lake in a speedy little rowboat. Chet is very gentlemanly, but Margaret is having none of it. “Confess your sins!” she shouts at a very confused Chet, badgering him with names and calling him a fake. He retorts, “You got anything to confess?” This gives Margaret the perfect opportunity to say that yes, in fact, she does! She admits that there isn’t anyone across the lake, she just needed to get him alone to kill him. With that, she takes an oar and clubs him, and although Chet puts up a good fight, Margaret ends up slicing his ear as a trophy. Poor Chet.
Meanwhile, Ray and Brooke are in the cafeteria, talking. They each open up about their pasts; Brooke admitting what happened at her wedding, Ray explaining that he wants to be a doctor like Quincy (remember that show?). This leads them to the inevitable pivoting point of every 80’s slasher flick where the virgin becomes a virgin no more. Brooke admits to Ray that he’s her first, and he seems surprised. They bond. They go to the fridge after, for something to eat. Opening the refrigerator door, they find ahead inside. Ray’s head. Freak out!
During this romance, Xavier and Montana are still holed up. Rita runs in. She admits that it was she who brought Mr. Jingles here. Xavier completely loses his shit. “You ruined this face! It’s your fault my future is in radio!” Freaking out, he attacks. He tries to kill Rita, who escapes into the woods, Xavier hot on her tail.
Brooke books it back to Montana, who whacks her in the head. “20 minutes till sunrise” in slasher font flashes on the screen, letting us know that the night is almost over. Brooke comes to, and Montana freaks out, screaming about Brooke’s facade: “I see what you really are! Where’s my sympathy?” Brooke has no idea what’s happening. Finally, in the midst of being choked out by Montana, Brooke realizes that Sam, her best man, is Montana’s brother, and Montana blames her for his death. They fight brutally, Montana screaming that Brooke is to blame. Again, Brooke is fantastic at fighting off her attacker- the girl’s got skills! This time she grabs a giant ‘ghetto-blaster’ and cracks Montana in the head with it. She runs off.
Elsewhere in the camp, Rita is in a cabin hiding from Xavier. Jingles is there. “You never should have brought me here,” he says dismally. Rita agrees, saying that she only wanted to find out if her father was truly the man she loved or was he always a monster all along? Finally, the root of Rita’s obsession is confessed. Jingles have a confession too- he’s not really Mr. Jingles. Margaret is. He explains everything to Rita about being set up by Margaret “She made everyone believe I did it,” he mournfully admits, saying that he’s never killed anyone outside the war. Rita begs him to kill her, but he refuses, telling her that she has to live with what she’s done. “There’s only one kill left,” he mutters. “You have to live with what you’ve done.” I’m almost feeling sorry for Mr. Jingles now!
Flashover to a wild-eyed Montana, who wants her pound of flesh, chasing Brooke through the woods. Brooke is hiding but Montana finds her. Their fighting ensues. Brooke finally breaks away again, this time with a knife.
Margaret is walking through the woods. Mr. Jingles appears, throwing the keys at her feet. “You’re Mr. Jingles,” he tells her, “These belong to you.” Suddenly he is shot by an arrow. Xavier has appeared, and he’s out for blood. Since they are in the archery field, Xavier has plenty of arrows, good aim, and Mr. Jingles is soon full of them. He lay dying. Xavier does a fantastic victory dance, asking Margaret if she is okay. “Never better,” Margaret replies, then kills him and takes his ear.
Jingles awaken to the echoing laughter of Richard Ramirez, and he looks up to find Ramirez asking if he accepts Satan as his Lord and master. Jingles looks confused.
Enter a bus full of happy, singing children, entering into Camp Redwood. (What sort of alternative dimension we in here? Obviously one where it’s okay to send your kids off to camp where a previous massacre happened!) They roll up right as Brooke comes flying into the camp, Montana on her heels. They fight, and finally, Brooke is standing Montana over and over again. The children watch in horror, then start screaming… Brooke just stands there, almost dumbfounded, her romper and jacket covered in blood. She’s still holding a knife.
Finally, police are on the scene. Montana is zipped into a black body bag. Brooke is led to the back of a cop car. At this moment, Margaret runs into Camp but before presenting herself, she stabs her own leg, stifling her own cries. She then limps towards an officer, “Thank God you’re here!” she’s blubbering, the victim part perfected already; she easily fools the police gathered there.
“Do you know this woman?” the policeman asks Margaret of Brooke, who is in the back of a police cruiser. “Yes!” She cries dramatically. “Yes, that’s one of my counselors! She went crazy and attacked us all!” CSI swarms the camp. Brooke cries in her prison.
An officer walks up to another, carrying a paper bag. The other cop peers in, wrinkling his nose in disgust. He tells the officer to bag it separately, as there had been a body found near a motorcycle crash near the entrance, that had no head.
At this point, a battered-looking Ray walks up and EMTs swarm him. They give him assistance, loading him onto a stretcher and into the back of the ambulance. He’s reassured that he’ll be fine. This scene is prolific! As the ambulance drives away, under the “Camp Redwood” sign, we see the vehicle continue down the road. The camera pans back. Ray is sitting there, staring up at the sign. “I just wanted to home,” he sobs. Suddenly Jonas, the hitchhiker, is there.
“You are home,” Jonas tells Ray, who eyes him like he’s crazy.
The final moments of this episode are what surprised me the very most. We see a police officer loading something into the trunk of his very ’80’s style cop car. Suddenly the car takes off. Just as suddenly, Montana is there. She shoots the officer.
Ray and Jonas are watching. “Why?” They ask her. She shrugs it off, calls them boring. She laughs. “You’re doing this purgatory thing all wrong! We can be gods here…” With that, she sashays past the two dumbfounded other counselors. Pan away…
Now we’re careening down the road in the cop car. Richard Ramirez is driving, Mr. Jingles is shotgun. They both start to laugh, quietly at first, then maniacally. The vintage cop car speeds down the road… leading us to next week’s 100th episode! Stay tuned and please join me in finding out what happens at Camp Redwood next week, where it seems that the land is now haunted by the spirits of the dead counselors! Plus, Ramirez and Jingles have now joined forces, so there’s no telling what happens next.
See you tonight to celebrate “American Horror Story’s 100th episode, and for even more details, check out this Think Story video.
Written by Mandie Stevens
