On Oct. 11, "American Horror Story: Delicate" continued with Episode Four, "Vanishing Twin." The episode was a victim to the directionless feel of "Delicate," but it was the best installment in the series so far.
"Vanishing Twin" opens with a scene set in 1555 at the mansion where Mary, Queen of Scots, has just given birth. The staff there hears her screaming and crying behind a closed door, and Mary refuses to let anyone in. When her sister, Elizabeth I, arrives, she goes in to see what the problem is. Mary is lying in a blood-soaked bed, clutching her newborn and sobbing.
As Elizabeth questions Mary about what happened and why she delivered the baby alone, two women in elegant black dresses – played by "American Horror Story" stars Billie Lourd and Leslie Grossman – appear in the bedroom. They take Mary's child, as she sold her firstborn to the Devil for a fruitful reign. The two women then curse Elizabeth to be barren when she refuses to make the sale.
Now, viewers may wonder, "What does this have to do with Anna and her miscarriage and the other main plotlines?" The answer is somewhat explained later in the episode, but I still didn't like how they added a fantasy horror element to an already crowded plot. However, I did appreciate the change of setting and the fun historical tie-ins that connect to what really happened.
The present-day leaves off where the last episode ended. Anna is still enchantedly staring at the dead raccoon in the yard and begins inexplicably bleeding from her mouth. Dex calls her back inside, breaking her trance, but she takes an extra minute to wrap the raccoon in a blanket gingerly. Anna lovingly carries the rotting, bleeding animal into the house. Nicolette confronts her and subsequently snaps at her. Anna then walks calmly to the basement and places the raccoon in a blanket-covered bassinet in an attempt to act as its mother.
This scene was one of my favorites in the season so far. For the first time in the last four episodes, I finally felt scared and very creeped out. Until this point, every scene meant to scare the audience fell flat. This scene, with Anna so obviously on the way to insanity after her miscarriage, actually gave watchers the chills, and you both sympathize with her situation and feel very grossed out.
She eventually abandons her baby for a meeting with Siobhan back in the city. As Siobhan is talking about Anna's need to save her image after the vomit incident from Episode Two, she introduces Anna to her crisis PR experts, the Ashleys. The Ashleys have the great idea to make Anna star in a feminist "reel" that will save her dwindling award hopes. While Anna initially seems skeptical, she ultimately trusts Siobhan and the Ashleys.
The "reel" is phenomenal. It's meant to be very on-the-nose but incredibly funny. It feels like a women's empowerment speech written by a man, which is exactly the vibe the writers were going for. "It's my body. I'll vomit if I need to," Anna said, directly into the camera, referencing her vomiting at the Gotham Awards, and that might be one of the funniest lines in the season so far.
The meeting is where the audience sees why the scene at the beginning is important. The Ashleys are played by Lourd and Grossman, implying that they are the same woman who cursed Elizabeth and stole Mary's child. Since they are now in control of Anna that obviously adds some serious tension to the future of her character.
While Anna is still in the city, she convinces Dex to take her to one more visit with Dr. Hill because she believes she's still pregnant. Even though you might think she isn't, since she just had a miscarriage, Hill's ultrasound reveals she is miraculously still pregnant. Hill claims it is likely "Vanishing Twin Syndrome," a medical condition where one embryo dies while another one survives.
The now much happier couple returns to their apartment in New York, and there they find that the doorman has let Dex's mother, Virginia, in. Her visit is completely unannounced, and Dex seems rather unhappy with the intrusion. Additionally, Virginia is only there to sue her ex-husband, Dex's dad. According to her therapist, he abused her with Satanic rituals and she repressed the memories in her subconscious.
At this point in the episode, it lost me. Why would they add another plot line into the show when we are almost halfway through? How does this connect to the already-packed plot? "Delicate" was starting to make some sense, but the creators slapped on a half-baked idea into the last half of the episode, which feels unnecessary from a viewer's perspective. The creators might be trying to suggest that Dex is satanically abusing Anna, and that's why she's still hearing the whispers from the basement of Thalia's house, but it feels like a silly idea and a little bit too obvious.
When Anna and Dex return to Thalia's house, Anna begins to get pregnancy cravings. She eats a pint of ice cream and a jar of pickles, which is decidedly gross. Yet, it gets even more disgusting.
Anna returns to the basement, following whispers and her cravings. She sees her raccoon that she picked up at the beginning of the episode, further into its state of decay. As she caresses its face, she tenderly picks it up from the bassinet and bites into it. The camera zooms in on her mouth as she continues to rip away at its flesh, and those are the last images left with the audience at the end of Episode Four.
This was a marker of significant improvement in this season. While there were some obvious setbacks, it is a step up from the previous episodes. I feel a lot less confused in a bad way and a lot more confused in a good way, which is how all "American Horror Story" seasons should be.
Rating: 3.5/5
