‘American Horror Story: Freak Show’ episode 5 review: Matt Bomer, Michael Chiklis steal the show
With Twisty the clown off wandering the afterlife with Edward Mordrake, Dandy Mott has decided to fill his shows on “American Horror Story: Freak Show” and just like that the series moves us in a completely different direction. Will Dandy be continuing Twisty’s murdering rampage? Sure, but his motivation be completely different since Twisty killed due to his breakdown, failed career and failed suicide. Twisty ultimately wanted to be a clown again, and there was no way to make that happen outside of force. Dandy on the other hand is a psychotic who has wanted to kill, but didn’t really have it in him to go through with it until the death of Twisty. What kind of killer will Dandy be?
Lobster Boy’s love: Esmeralda knows that Stanley is planning to murder the freaks, so she tries to “read his hand” telling him that he needs to leave the show and go to New York City and start fresh. When he tries to kiss her, she flinches and he ends up in Desiree’s room. As they start to get romantic, Desiree starts bleeding and she’s rushed to the hospital.
Desiree’s shocker: At the hospital she learns that she was pregnant and miscarried – The doctor also tells her that even though when she was born the doctor told her mother that she was a boy, that she was always a full fledged woman and actually doesn’t have any male parts at all. Once she learns that with a little cosmetic surgery she can look like every other woman (and that Dell is Jimmy’s father) she leaves him for a normal life. Dell pays the doctor who offered to do the cosmetic surgery on Desiree a visit, breaking his hands and threatening his grandchildren’s lives if he does the surgery on her.
Dell’s secret: While his wife was going through a miscarriage, Dell is at a gay bar with a man named Andy that he claims he loves, but Andy is also a prostitute and it’s something that Dell can’t deal with. He wants to leave Desiree and be with Andy, and offers to get Andy his own place until he can be with him, but Andy knows that Dell will never get the nerve to leave.
Dandy’s been a bad boy: Dandy tries to pretend that the murder of the maid, Dora, was by a criminal that broke in, but his mother knows right away that it was him. His mother reveals that Dandy’s father had the same dark desires. When Dandy wanders into the same gay bar Dell was in and meets Andy, we suspect that things are not going to end well. Dandy brings him to Twisty’s bus of horrors and stabs Andy to death, leaving Dell without his wife and his lover.
Elsa’s full house: Elsa’s freak show finally has a full house and she is headlining the show… and it’s going badly. The audience turns on her as she sings and starts throwing things until she gets off the stage. The reaction from the audience makes her reconsider an offer given by Stanley to be on television instead of the silver screen, but he has instead taken an interest in Bette and Dot. Stanley offers them poisoned pink cupcakes (he wants their body’s for the museum of curiosities), but they decline. Elsa takes Bette and Dot for a drive and brings them to the Mott household.
We loved hearing Elsa’s speech on television being the death of art and how TV will never replace movies. And here we are… with television replacing movies. Episode grade: B
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