AHS Hotel Episode 1: Checking In

Two words. Lady. Gaga. I've always been a pretty big fan of Mother Monster, but after one episode of American Horror Story: Hotel, I was online looking to order Kermit sweaters and meat purses. Maybe I'm exaggerating...or maybe I was born this way... 

All of that aside, welcome back loyal American Horror Story fans! I have truly high hopes for this season after Freak Show's disappointing second half, and I'm curious to see how the returning actors fare with the new blood (so to speak). Absent this year is Jessica Lange, who probably could have racked up another Emmy with an additional season or two. Returning powerhouses like Kathy Bates, Angela Bassett, and Sarah Paulson should be able to fill in some of that void though. In addition to the crazy good female stars, tonight's 90 minute premiere handed us drugs, murder, rape, sex, and sushi. Here's how it all went down. 

Somethin' About This Place

The Hotel Cortez in Los Angeles is not fancy...at least not from the outside. At first glance the inside looks like Disney's Tower of Terror. At second glance, this place could be The Overlook Hotel's twin. The building is a dead zone for cell service and there is no wifi. This is already horrifying. 

Two young Swedish ladies find themselves with a pre-paid reservation they have to stick with. Seems they didn't realize that the Hotel Cortez was so far away from Universal Studios and they are eager to get to the Jurassic Park ride. I don't blame them. It's a pretty awesome ride. Kathy Bates' hotel manager character, Iris, quickly shatters any possibility for these girls to get a refund in order to stay closer to the touristy things they want to do. She leads them to their room which has no refrigerator and a dead animal smell. Soon To Be Dead Girl #1 calls down to the front desk and demands another room. Iris pretty much tells her to screw off and hangs up on her. Soon To Be Dead Girl #2 begins to examine the bed to locate the source of the smell. Wouldn't you know it? Something has been sewn inside the mattress. Something that looks like one of Dr. Arden's experiments from Asylum. Annnnd let the opening credits begin! 

Iris assures the girls that they will not be charged for the room (I should hope not). She sends them to room 64 to wait for the police to arrive. "This one, we never rent out." Makes sense - soon after taking a nap, Dead Girl Walking #1 finds, well, Dead Girl No Longer Walking on the bathroom floor being eaten by creepy blond children. I think I'd rather stay in the room with the science experiment in the mattress. 

A tweaked out diva-dude checks into the hotel that same day and after he bitches about the nightly rate, Iris hands him the key to room 64. He has no luggage but did bring along a heroin kit. He shoots up almost immediately (natch) and begins to hallucinate...or does he? He either has a twisted imagination or he's getting raped by a rubbery man wearing a spiral bladed strap on.  Seems to be the latter. The cherry on top here is Sarah Paulson strolling in and whispering "Tell me you love me" while the guy screams in agony because again, he's getting his ass ripped to shreds by a human drill. "Say 'I love you Sally' and it will all go away." He says it...then dies. 

Brush The Dangerous

Wes Bentley returns to play John Lowe, a police detective in the midst of trying to catch a serial killer. Said killer calls John's cell phone in a very "let's play a game" voice to say that he is located at the Hotel Cortez in room 64 and he fully plans to kill again. 

Eat your heart out, Cleopatra.

John arrives at the hotel and asks to examine room 64. Iris enlists the help of Denis O'Hare, who this season is playing a character called Liz Taylor. Yup. His style says it all. Anywho, Liz takes the detective to the room in question.  John enters with his serious face primed and gun in hand...only to find the room empty. No half eaten Swedish girls. No butt ripped junkie. For whatever reason, John then lays down on the bed and starts to snooze. He opens his eyes and sees one of the creepy kids. He says "Holden?" and chases him to an empty hallway. 

John has a wife (Chloe Sevigny) and daughter waiting for him at home. The wife is a doctor, however, and peaces out right after he arrives. Daddy-daughter night consists of sushi where the little Scarlet tells John that she had another dream about "him" last night. Him, meaning Holden? She says she can't quite remember what he looked like when she's awake and asks her father if he remembers. He does and she suggests they put the pictures back up in the house again.

Their dinner is cut short when his wife, Alex, sends him an emergency text with an address. When John and Scarlet arrive at the address, another police car is there already. John shouts "watch my daughter!" to the officer and takes off into the house. The officer hears a noise in the bushes nearby though and leaves the kid alone in the car while he pursues it. Super. As John makes his way through the house with his serious face and gun raised, he received a call from Alex's cell...only the creepy voice from earlier is on the other end of the phone. "I told you I would do it again." John's daughter has now followed him into the house. She screams as she enters at a room where two dudes are suspended with their intestines hanging out like they had just been through a meat grinder.

**We flash back to a happier time in 2010 where the family of four (Holden included) is having a blast at a carnival. John takes Holden to the carousel and turns away briefly when his cell phone vibrates. When he looks back at the horse his son had been on, it's empty.***  

We are back in present day. Alex is fine and she and John are at home wondering who the serial killer is and how he got Alex's phone. John is going to move out for a while and leave his family in police protection until he finds the man behind the murders. Alex is way more agreeable to this than I had anticipated. Though she says "I don't blame you for Holden," she tells John that Holden looked so much like him that it's hard to face him sometimes. Ouch.  Where does a good detective go when he can't stay at home? Why the Hotel Cortez, of course, where he hallucinated earlier. Reservation for 1 please - room 64.

Bad Romance

A neon sign that reads "why are we not having sex right now?" hangs on a wall. Enter Lady Gaga...or The Countess...or Elizabeth. She and her longtime lover, Donovan (Matt Bomer) are a totally normal couple. I mean, they take strolls, they attend public outdoor movies, and they initiate foursomes right there in the lawn. Okay, so they're not mainstream. But during a screening of Nosferatu the duo pick up another couple and take them back to the Hotel Cortez. A foursome ensues (how does FX get away with this stuff?) and then, like any normal couple would, Elizabeth and Donovan slash open the throats of their partners and drink their blood. There's kinky...and then there's crazy. I can't imagine what the cleanup is like.

So it turns out the Swedish girls aren't quite dead. Yet. Iris has them in some sort of neon lit cages and she's hell bent on clearing their systems of all of the drugs and alcohol she found in their room. She makes some sort of shake in a blender consisting of things like chicken liver and oysters that apparently contain a lot of nutrients. I learn something new every day. Iris begins to put a hose with this shit in Dead Girl Walking #1's mouth and then in walks Sally without her murderous monster. These women have some history. Iris calls Sally "the beginning and the end of all my suffering." She hands the vitamin shake (we'll call it that) off to Sally and tells her to take over if she thinks she can do it better. "Otherwise you'll have to explain to her why they still taste like shit." Is Gaga still thirsty?

Sally explains that the room they are in used to house marionette shows. She wants the girls to entertain her. Sally opens one cage and tells the girl to run. She leaves her friend behind without a second thought and almost makes it out of the house. Too bad Elizabeth is there to slit her throat.

While Elizabeth is certainly the mistress (and Countess) of the Hotel Cortez, someone else has their eye on it. Cheyenne Jackson plays Will Drake, a rich dude from the fashion industry in New York who intends to buy the hotel and move to Los Angeles with his son, Lachlan. Apparently he has designed dresses for Michelle Obama. Not touching that one, The sale, however, is news to Iris and Liz Taylor and they look very uneasy as Will and his realtor begin their walk-through. The realtor, by the way is Marcy...who was the realtor in Season 1. Her last sale didn't work out too well for the Harmons, so I can only imagine how screwed Will is at this point. 

They begin in the penthouse where a very naked Donovan flips out. Elizabeth compliments the hell out of Will's fashion designs and encourages him to maintain the "character" of the hotel. While Donovan dresses and begrudgingly takes Will on a tour of the hotel's artwork, Elizabeth takes Lachlan to a secret room filled with candy and video games. The creepy blond kids are there...and among them is Holden.

Control Your Poison, Babe
Donovan bitterly struts around the lobby and Iris approaches him. We learn that she is his mother, so I have to wonder how awkward it is for her to know he's banging such a crazy bitch...or that he drinks people's blood...or that he kills people. Regardless, she has not left the hotel in 20 years because she "needs to see him every day." Weird.

***We flash back to 1994 where Donovan is involved with Sally, who is a heroin addict and dealer. Donovan follows her into room 64 at the Hotel Cortez to shoot up and Iris follows him. After nearly banging down the door, Iris pushes past Sally when she opens it. Donovan is out cold and things aren't looking good for him. Sally leaves, stumbling down the hallway with zero remorse about the dude she just shared a needle with. For whatever reason, she lingers near a tall open window. Will she jump? Nope. Doesn't have to. Iris pushes her out and she goes splat on the concrete below. When she returns to room 64, Elizabeth is there and she's alllll about Donovan. ***

Sooo, is this going to be like the Murder House where if you die there, you're stuck there? Sally is obviously a ghost and while Iris looked younger in the 20 year flashback, Donovan looks exactly the same. Did he OD? Is he dead too? Gaga? The creepy blond kids? We have a long season ahead of us but I love the snippets of stories we got tonight and I'm excited to see how it all plays out in the coming weeks. I'm SO happy this show is back!