Well kids, we have reached the final episode of American Horror Story: Cult. When we last left our cast of questionable characters, Kai's cult was full steam ahead and one way or another there was going to be some sort of showdown. Kai vs Beverly? Kai vs Ally? Ally vs Beverly? I'll say that some of the events in this hour surprised me, some made me roll my eyes, and a few even caused me to cheer from my couch. Who emerged victorious when it was all said and done? Here's what went down in "Great Again."
Was It Something You Said?
The episode opens in 2018, where Kai is at a maximum security prison playing pinky power with a female guard and convincing her to show him her titties. Classy. Gloria and her titties have bought into the "divine ruler" bullshit, as have a ton of the inmates in this prison. Kai has built a new army of different ages and races, many of whom don't seem to realize exactly how expendable they are. More on that later, but how the hell did Kai get here?
We flash back now to 11 months earlier with Ally confronting the mole from the man army. He explains that he wears a recorder and is working with the police...but only because the police had been investigating Detective Jack. There were rumors that he was a crooked cop. How bout that? This guy was only supposed to expose that Jack was on the take, but low and behold he ended up as a mole in a cult! When Ally realizes the mole wears a recorder only and not a live wire, she kills him. She then breaks the news to Kai and he realizes Winter was innocent after all. No shit, Kai. You strangled her for absolutely no reason. He has an emotional breakdown (better him than Ally) and Ally comforts him, saying Winter's death doesn't have to be in vain. She tells Kai he can honor her by becoming the man she always believed he could be and I gag.
Kai goes into the living room of his house/headquarters where the man army is ready for their next round of instructions. The group has gathered to execute the "bigger and better than Manson" plan and each dude has a pre-made backpack of items to send them on a killing spree. The victims? One hundred pregnant women. See, the Manson Family killing one pregnant woman wasn't big enough. Kai wants his cult to slay 100 and explains exactly how the women should be stabbed in order to impale both mother and child. Really? Beverly stands in the kitchen shaking from head to toe. When Ally approaches, Beverly begs Ally to kill her. She tells Ally, "If Kai had told me to, I would have killed you...and gotten a cheeseburger right after." Ha! Please Ally, don't kill Beverly. She's too priceless and most of the comic relief disappeared with Meadow and Harrison. Ally asks her to just hold on for a little while longer, and I'm hoping this means Ally is about to do something useful.
Don't Leave Me Hanging
The "night of 100 Tates" arrives and Kai and the man army are ready to roll out. Ally starts to leave the house and tells an inquisitive member of the man army she's just going to get some snacks, which is the worst excuse ever. I'm surprised she isn't seized right then and there, but she walks out to a truck full of FBI agents and a raid begins. This had been building for a while - the FBI had their suspicions after Meadow's assassination attempt and they approached Ally to become their inside informant while she was in the psych ward. Neat. Through the haze of a smoke bomb we see some of the man army members killed by the FBI. Some kill themselves. Others are taken out by a now stoic Beverly and I cheer her on. Kai looks to be the last man alive and when he is ushered to the truck, he realizes Ally betrayed him and goes apeshit as he is driven away. Beverly is handcuffed as well and appears relieved as she makes her way out of the house.
Several months later we see Ally running a very thriving restaurant, as her popularity has rejuvenated interest in The Butchery. Ever the humble hostess, Ally declines taking photos with patrons who refer to her as "one of the most inspiring women of our time" because she's just trying to put everything behind her. Oh for god's sake. Haven't we heard this shit before? Why don't we just have her on the Lana Winters Show at this point like Lee Miller in Roanoke? Suddenly Beverly is there (how on earth is Beverly there?) and she tells Ally that Kai pled guilty to everything and isn't going to trial. Like the rest of us, Beverly doesn't understand how she wasn't arrested, and Ally says she told the FBI Beverly was a victim and did not have a direct role in any of the murders. And plus, as a black woman she didn't fit the profile. Beverly still looks confused and I don't blame her. She casually says the only murder Kai didn't claim was Ivy's. Ally maintains that Kai killed her wife in front of her and her last words were "I love you, I'm sorry." You've got to be fucking kidding me. Beverly maintains her "you're full of shit" look, but really Ivy is a passing thought at this point anyway since Ally has been banging the new chef, Erica, for 8 weeks now. The lovebirds invite Beverly to Oz's upcoming birthday party and she accepts.
Oz seems to have taken to Erika and she seems to be right at home with Oz and Ally. The birthday party is successful and it's nice to see that Oz still has friends after the crazy shit he and his moms went through. The phone is ringing off the hook these days and Erika screens the calls. At one point she mentions that Rachel Maddow's people called again, but Ally doesn't want to give any interviews about what happened. Too worried people will figure out you're a murdering liar, Ally? Erika encourages her to do the show since Maddow is "a legit feminist icon" and looks to Beverly to back her up. Beverly's response is, "If she turned down Lana Winters, why would she talk to Rachel fucking Maddow?" AMAZING! I was only (half) kidding earlier when I mentioned Stupid Lana. I get a really good laugh out of this. Ally says all she wants to do is be a soccer mom and a small business owner, and the conversation is interrupted by another phone call. Ally answers this one and it's a collect call from Kai. She accepts the charges and... wait. She accepts the charges?!? I'm at a loss. Ally wants to put it all behind her but sent him Oz's real paternity results. Why? Kai tells Ally that her status as the mother of his child was the only thing keeping her alive, but all bets are off now. She gloats that she's doing great and he'll spend the rest of his life in prison, and Kai threatens her some more and just about breaks the phone before he hangs up.
All This Time You Were Pretending
The next time we see Ally, she's announcing her candidacy to unseat Senator Jackson...exactly what Kai wanted to do in 2018. Oh. My. God. Kai is banging Gloria when he sees this on TV and he notices Beverly is right by Ally's side. I hope Gloria likes it rough, because that's totally what she's getting tonight.
Ally runs her campaign using her cult experience and trauma to gain support. One of her videos shows her kneeling at Ivy's grave. Anyone else notice the dates on the headstone say April 14th, 1984-2017? Was that special dinner also a birthday dinner or does Ally "just not recall" what day Ivy died? Anyway, Ally is trailing in the polls due to her lack of political experience, though she tries hard to spin that by saying she's a woman who will go to Capitol Hill and "take a sledgehammer to their antiquated system of oppression." She still goes into the debate against Senator Jackson with the odds against her. But wait... Beverly has news for Ally just before the debate starts. She says Kai was found dead in prison, his face mutilated beyond recognition. Riiiiiight. What Kai actually did was convince one of the inmates that kinda, sorta resembles him to get matching tattoos and pretend to be Kai while Kai makes his escape with Gloria's help. What dude doesn't know is Kai's plan was actually to stab him to death and make his face unrecognizable. He's coming for you, Ally.
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| I mean, really? |
Ally and Senator Jackson are trading insults on stage in front of a packed audience when Ally thinks she spots a familiar face in the audience. He approaches the mic in the aisle to ask a question and he introduces himself as Councilman Kai Anderson. Wowwww. The audience panics and Kai grabs a gun from Glora and climbs the stage. Senator Jackson steps in front of Ally and Kai hits him with the gun and knocks him to the ground. He tells Ally she's not a hero - she's a symbol he created. "You symbolize the hope that women will one day win an argument with their husbands...that they won't be cat called when they walk down the street...that their bosses won't talk about their tits anymore...that they'll make just as much money as the men make...that the fight is win-able! When I kill you, they'll see that there is no hope." Speaking of hope, where the hell is Beverly in all of this? Security guards? Anyone? Kai raises his gun to Ally's head and says women can't lead and women can't win. He pulls the trigger but the gun is not loaded. Kai turns to Gloria, who is now standing and smiling. She had been in cahoots with Ally for quite some time and the whole thing was strategically staged. Just as he and the rest of us realize he's been had, Ally addresses him. "There is something more dangerous in this world than a humiliated man - a nasty woman." Beverly steps up from behind then and blows Kai's brains out.
So Much For My Happy Ending
There's no big surprise when Ally wins the election and she puts Oz to bed that night with a huge smile on her face, telling him she is going to try to make the world better for him. He cuddles an elephant stuffed animal (reminiscent of Ivy's clown costume) and Ally hands him a Twisty toy to snuggle with and says she has to go to a meeting. When her son asks why she would need to go to a meeting at night she says she is meeting "some very special, very powerful friends who are going to help bring about that better world we were talking about...Women. A group of powerful, empowered women who want to change the system." Before Ally heads off to this meeting, we see her put on a black cloak. My first thought is: "Holy shit! Am I going to get Fiona Goode and Madam LaLaurie after all? Is this a Coven crossover?!?" But then I watch the scene again and realize this is a SCUM cloak and Ally is resuming the work of Valerie Solanas.
And with that, Season 7 of American Horror Story is over. I'll say that when Cult started I was very much into the killer clown posse, the weekly reveal of who the members where, how the members became Kai followers (that Emma Roberts pet adoption event scene is one of my absolute favorites), and why those members began to turn on one another. With a theme centered around cults, the man army made sense, as did the bedtime stories and test of true loyalty in the kool-aid episode. But Cult took a turn around the time of the "Valerie Solanas invented The Zodiac Killer" hour and the season struggled for me a little after that. The most loyal allies became dispensable, Ally went from basket case to wife-murderer in a snap, Kai killed his two siblings when his bond with them seemed unbreakable, and instead of mystery and suspense, we mostly got repetitive rhetoric and gore during the second half of the season. Don't get me wrong - I like a gruesome death as much as the next viewer (is it even okay to say that?) but how Kai went from saving the innocent captives in the Judgement House to unleashing a slaughter on so many innocent people is still a gray area for me. His motivation was...Trump? Babbitt? Manson? The captivating power of manwiches? An All-4-One messiah baby? I'm still not entirely clear on the point of it all...other than allowing Sarah Paulson to get the best of a serial killer once again. Maybe I just need to think on it more.
I will say though that the majority of the performances were fantastic. I feel like Evan Peters often takes a back seat to the women of AHS each season, but this was his year to shine, hands down. He was amazing. Billie Lourd, Alison Pill, Billy Eichner and Leslie Grossman were all great additions and I hope they return, especially if we are going to continue on without heavy hitters like Jessica Lange, Kathy Bates, Lily Rabe, Denis O'Hare, and Angela Bassett (though she did some directing this season). Not sure what American Horror Story holds in 2018, but here's hoping we get back to the supernatural or even extraterrestrial next year. Until then I will probably go back and watch Roanoke, Hotel, and Coven to remember the good ol' days.
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