Major spoiler alert for anyone who hasn't watched the latest episode of American Horror Story.
Another week, another episode of American Horror Story: Roanoke causing viewers to hoot and howl at their TVs with rampant confusion. This week brought the seventh installment of Season 6's ten episodes, and it went wild building up its body count as the found-footage half of the season continued on in full bloom. Last week's twist did not go as well for characters as it did for those watching, and the process of elimination makes it a lot easier to guess who that lone survivor will end up being. But let's discuss all these fresh corpses, shall we?
The first person to fall victim to this show's many threats was Cheyenne Jackson's self-absorbed and joy-free producer Sidney James. Well, technically it was his assistant, Chelsea Alden's Alissa, whose blood was first drawn. She, Sidney and the cameraman were all killed by a vengeful Agnes, determined to make her way onto the new show by any means necessary. (Her means, in this case, are entirely tied to being completely insane and of the belief that she's the real Butcher.) Even though Jackson just showed up last week, I won't really miss him at all, and his early death did add some texture to the episode, with Audrey and others initially thinking he was behind the ongoing horrors. But he was really just outside with his guts hanging out.
This episode also went a little further in building up the uncomfortable relationship between Shelby, Matt and Dominic. It all came to a head - a totally smooshified head - when Shelby discovered what she thought was Matt getting attacked by the ancient witch Scathach. Only that wasn't what was happening, and Matt revealed that the entire reason he came back to the house for the Three Days in Hell show was to reconnect with her, because he's in love. Well, he was in love, before an enraged and still injured Shelby totally gave The Walking Dead premiere a run for its money where skull-crushings are concerned.
Lee's big thrust in Chapter 7 was making it clear that she was also recording everything that happened to her during these three days, so that people would see the location's horrors are real and then stop assuming she's to blame for what happened to her husband and daughter. Sadly, Lee didn't even get to live to see if her name would ever be cleared, as that backwoods Mama Polk and her skeezy family took her, Audrey and Monet hostage. The latter two made it to the end credits, but the did so with parts of Lee in their digestive system, as the Polks tenderized poor Lee and (presumably) cooked her up for dinner. Not the most appetizing surprise, but an effective one nonetheless.
American Horror Story: Roanoke gave Kathy Bates one hell of a lunatic to play, and she somehow managed to extract a mild form of sympathy, at least when she wasn't straight up murdering people who didn't necessarily deserve it. Agnes got so injured during tonight's episode that I started to think she had some kind of immortal powers at play, but that was proven very wrong by the final moments, when both she and viewers got to lay eyes on the REAL Tomasyn "The Butcher" White, who had no need for Agnes' praise and affection. The legit Butcher put her hatchet straight down the middle of Agnes' face while it was still in its awestruck phase, so we can probably expect all of the show's future deaths to come at the hand of supernatural entities, such as that roaring version of Edward Phillippe Mott the ladies saw in that tunnel. That shit was spooky.
With lots of characters heading to their gore-soaked non-graves in the future, American Horror Story: Roanoke will air its final three episodes over the next three Wednesdays on FX. To see what you can watch in the meantime, check out our fall TV schedule.
