American Horror Story Going Too Far? Not For What You’d Think.
If you’ve been lucky enough to catch American Horror Story, you know it’s, for lack of a more eloquent term, pretty fucked up. Right from the premiere…actually right from the INTRO to the premiere, there is a bloody attack shown on-screen, clearly leading to a death (but if you ask me, those creepy ginger twins deserved it)….
This week was no exception.
SPOILERS after the jump if you haven’t seen the show. Skip this if you plan to!
This week’s episode that aired on the 9th (I’m a bit late, sorry), showed us, as if we didn’t already figure it out, that Tate is really, REALLY dead, and that he shot up his high school Columbine style.
Tonight I found this article, titled, “‘American Horror Story’ Goes Too Far”, by Richard Lawson. Of course, I assumed it was about one, if not all, of the following disturbing things that have occured on the show thus far:
- Children being murdered by a ghost/monster/whatever’s in the basement.
- Creepy terrifying dead old-timey babies in photos in the intro (this is the worst thing, ugh, I can’t watch the intro theme).
- Illegal basement abortions.
- Frankenbaby (If you know, you know).
- Dylan Macdermott’s character jerking off in front of a window and crying.
- Ghost in a gimp suit.
- People getting shot/stabbed/raped/burned/bashed with shovels/buried/drowned/axed/cutting themselves/etc.
Was last night’s opening scary? Of course. It was tense and awful. But it wasn’t the right kind of scary for this dopey show. The chief (if perhaps initially unintentional on the creators’ part) product of this show should be laughter. Maybe not during the immediate viewing, but certainly in the relieved, adrenalin-filled moments following. Like, look at these ridiculous folks getting scared at a haunted house. No doubt they were genuinely frightened when those photos snapped, but more than likely most of them were laughing only a few minutes, or seconds, later. That’s the kind of silly, ultimately empty scare that American Horror Story is best at. A school shooting is not that. That’s far too real, far too much of a downer for a dumb Wednesday night.
Really? Comparing the show to a haunted house balloon-pop scare? I begin to wonder if the author is actually aware of what “Horror” means…because it certainly doesn’t mean fluffy happy kittens and NOT gruesomely murdering people and burying them in the backyard and putting up a cute little gazebo. I mean…
AHS isn’t a documentary. It’s not a news biopic. It’s not a coming-of-age tale on the Life channel.
It’s a TV program (of the horror genre, my goodness) about a house that pretty much fucks everyone who lives within it and drives them to a grisly end. If one of the ends happened to be being shot to death after killing a bunch of kids in your high school, there’s been kids murdered on the show in much more horrible ways. What do you expect?
Of all the things AHS has shown, preaching about the show going too far because of a scene of a school shooting is way too “BUT MY AMERICAAAA!” and should be saved for a livejournal, not a popular publication. Most of the commenters on the article seem to agree.
How on earth could this show be labeled as a comedy? I admit I laughed when Ben noticed Two-Face!Russell Edgington was watching him wank it from the backyard, but claiming that this show should be anything but horror is rather ignorant. Seems he is a bit overworked over something he deems “campy”.
Columbine was something that actually happened, yes. Bad things happen in real life. Real life is also glamorized on television, namely the more exciting (re: bad and scary) party. EVERY OTHER THING on this show (bring on the horrible bloody murders and crazy people and eating brains!) is apparently okay, but a school shooting? Too much.
Sigh.
Confronting real-life issues? Pfft. Not on MY television!
American Horror Story, FUCK YEAH.
A “dopey Wednesday show”, this certainly is not. It’s well-written, witty, spooky, and fun. (Besides, Tate doesn’t remember anything anyway, IT WAS THE HOUSE’S FAULT! Not the media and that damn rock music!)
*side note – I’m totally not anti-American. I’m not even anti-Richard Lawson. He wrote a little blurb about The Vampire Diaries which was pretty much spot-on (oh god I love that show)…but I guess it IS impossible to hate TVD….dammit, Richard, why must you conflict me so?
Spot on. When I read his article, I was baffled as to how THAT came across as crossing the line, out of everything on that show. If it’s supposed to be comical, was Jessica Lange’s treatment of her down syndrome daughter amusing? Is it funny to kill a pregnant woman and bury her in the backyard? There are definitely moments that are supposed to make you laugh (Eric Stonestreet’s unfortunate demise comes to mind) and moments that are unintentionally funny. I think if any of the murders cross the line, they all do. That’s horror.