American Horror Story

A decent pilot.   Enough there to get me to tune in next week.   The only thing about it is that it tries so hard to be scary.   Still the batshit insanity of the show buys alot of goodwill.   Also, Ryan Murphy has to commended for giving work to mentally challenged actors.   Good for him.

ETA:  Also, I love that Jessica Lang (still looking good) is in pure "slumming" mode here.   She's alot of fun to watch here.

I'm in.  It's unhinged and bananas and capable of going waaaay off the rails at any minute, but it probably won't be boring.   I can already tell that Jessica Lange is going to be a hoot in this.

Seriously creepy opening credits with all those grim baby photos.   Jesus.  

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arjen Rudd 

In the first episode, there are two Dylan McDermott ass shots, one while he stands in front of a window masturbating. Jessica Lange plays the next door neighbor, a Tennessee Williams-y fading southern belle who shows up periodically with her retarded daughter, makes an insane speech, and steals things. Connie Britton fucks a ghost in dominatrix gear. She thinks it's her husband, but she knows the dominatrix costume belonged to the gay couple that killed each other in the haunted house before they moved in . There's a caveman imp that lives in the basement and bites anyone who goes down there. There's a peeping tom burn victim, an apparently dead maid that appears to some people as a sexy whore and to others as the mom from Six Feet Under, and there's lots of jars filled with dead baby body parts. And that actually doesn't even begin to cover the crazy here.

And they still want to live there? Are these people retarded?

Well there wouldn't be a series if the leads were smart.   The creepiest part to me was the lady getting it on with The Gimp.   Call it my PTSD from Pulp Fiction.    Also, can this be considered gay friendly horror?  Like Glee, it feels like a show tailored for gay people (not that there's anything wrong with that)

Quote:

Originally Posted by dynamotv 

Well there wouldn't be a series if the leads were smart.   The creepiest part to me was the lady getting it on with The Gimp.   Call it my PTSD from Pulp Fiction.    Also, can this be considered gay friendly horror?  Like Glee, it feels like a show tailored for gay people (not that there's anything wrong with that)

If you're gay for Dylan McDermott, perhaps.  

OK, answer me this guys. Because I haven't watched this and I want to know if I must.

You have ladies fucking ghosts in gimp suits and men masturbating to ghosts and crying. OK?

How is this not the best show ever?

Judging by this thread, I have made a huge mistake ignoring this show.

The pilot was one of the most exhausting hours of bullshit I've ever watched. Ridiculous, terrible, and I'll almost certainly watch the next episode.

Okay, you guys are just making this stuff up now.

A lot of this sounds batshit crazy fun on paper but watching the pilot it just comes off as bad. It's like an unfocused mess of cliches and ideas from a million other movies and tv shows all crammed together into generic mush. Some bits are a little wild in the context of basic cable but I was still bored and irritated by it. And it can't manage the mix of tones it aspires to have. It's very campy, some of which is obviously deliberate, bordering on a genre spoof, but it obviously wants you to take some of it seriously and be scared by it, which, no. I'll cut it a little bit of slack because shows usually take time to find their footing, but otherwise it's an insult to horror fans and fans of good tv alike.

I can't help but admire bold craziness such as this. Hell, I'm in for the whole season. The language and the ass shots and the over all kinky tone felt very close to an HBO or Showtime series.  

I think the freakiest thing for me is the fact that Dylan McDermit walks around in the all together on a regular basis.   Me and my wife came to the same conclusion that the teenage daughter is all fucked up due to having to see her dad's junk on a regular basis.  

I did love the Frances Conroy/Jessica Lange showdown:  "Don't make me kill you . . . AGAIN!"  

Oh, first casualty will undoubtedly be the family dog.  

I  can see the dog lasting longer than most of the cast.

Over/under on burn victim peeping tom brain cancer guy?  I'm giving him until the fourth ep.  Any takers?

Any show that has Jessica Lange whining about "the mongoloid" daughter is aces.  And Desperate Housewives doesn't have the fucking BALLS to have whore maid masturbating in front of a naked McDermott who goes and and wanks it himself, and then do a callback scene later in the show.

This thing is going to go nuclear when it implodes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dynamotv 

I think the freakiest thing for me is the fact that Dylan McDermit walks around in the all together on a regular basis.   Me and my wife came to the same conclusion that the teenage daughter is all fucked up due to having to see her dad's junk on a regular basis.  

Well, he was sleepwalking, which likely just started when they moved into the house.

Before that reveal, I was also wondering, "As a psychiatrist, is he just experimenting on his daughter?"

As far as scarring her, I doubt anything could top her walking in on him about to get it on with the mom from Six Feet Under. That would ruin me.

Long before Glee, and before Nip/Tuck went laughably off the rails, Murphy ran the 1st season of Nip/Tuck, which was one of the best 1st seasons of any show ever. I'm in.

I really think that this show's opening titles should begin with:

FROM THE CREATORS OF

GLEE

(estranged couple make peace with angry make-up sex)

(cut away to a sexy fire)

"We're going to be happy here."

(cuts to commercial)

HAHAHAHAHAHAH

The daughter reminds me of Vera Farmiga. 

This show is so damned goofy.  It's hilarious.

During the burnt guy's story, I started thinking, "They're really going for a Bernard Herrmann-type score."  Then I realized... "Oh, they're actually using a cue from Vertigo."

Quote:

Originally Posted by mcnooj82 

The daughter reminds me of Vera Farmiga. 

Taissa Farmiga reminds you of Vera Farmiga... hmm... :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Farsight 

 

Taissa Farmiga reminds you of Vera Farmiga... hmm... :)

Evil twin? Identical cousin? Perhaps a child given up for adoption and blithly forgotten about until an opportune moment?  

Quote:

Originally Posted by Farsight 

 

Taissa Farmiga reminds you of Vera Farmiga... hmm... :)

It's like they could be sisters or something.

I'll tune in for the young maid ghost and Willow.

I got halfway through the show and had to turn it off, it was so bad.  Yeah, its got a lot of goofy concepts that are brilliant when broken off by themselves.  But put together,this show is a mess.  I like how the wife catches her husband cheating, cuts him with a knife, then suddenly they're off buying a new house together like nothing happened.  

Bad show.  Bad, bad show.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Farsight 

 

Taissa Farmiga reminds you of Vera Farmiga... hmm... :)

WHAAAAAAAA!?!?!  I had no idea what the actor's name was.  That's hilarious.  Wow... a 21 year gap between sisters.  That's pretty crazy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Simon West will kill Again 

 

Bad show.  Bad, bad show.

Yes.  But I'm a faithful True Blood viewer.  This is quite the step up.  Minus the boobs.  So far.  

I got hopes for the horny maid during sweeps....
 

The only nudity allowed on FX is man-butt. Sorry.

And woman butt!  Gina Torres at the very least on The Shield!

Anyway, this is sitting on the DVR.  After Sepinwall's scathing summation, I really want to give it a shot, if only so I can say, "Yeah, fuck this show."

Well, it's definitely not boring. Like it or hate it, it should keep you interested for the full 60 minutes.

I tentatively disagree. The WTFness seemed so forced and desperate that it mostly fell flat and thus left me bored. But after thinking about it more and discussing it with some friends I'll admit I came into this with a pretty prejudiced perspective, so I'm going to give another episode or two a shot and see if I can at least appreciate it in an over the top so bad it's good trainwreck sort of way.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Simon West will kill Again 

But put together,this show is a mess.  I like how the wife catches her husband cheating, cuts him with a knife, then suddenly they're off buying a new house together like nothing happened. 

I'm not sure if its because you didn't watch it all but that was probably the most straightforward bit of the story. He had an affair and she caught him in the act, timejump, they move into the new house as part of their attempt to keep their marriage together.

And, yeah, I kind of loved it. Completely ridiculous and almost certainly unable to maintain itself for very long, I thought it was a fresh breath of crazy, over the top air. She slept with the gimp-ghost for Pete's sake, but the real amazing thing is that she thought she was sleeping with her husband who was wearing the murder-suicide gay couple's gimp suit. And that is magic.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arjen Rudd 

Everyone should watch this. If you're with me in the sad crew that watched things like Harper's Island, you'll love it.

Have not watched this show yet, have only seen the ads so far. On the surface it does feel like it could be this years Harper's/Happy Town/Persons Unknown. But it can't join those hallowed ranks until it fits the pattern of:

1) big ads push

2) show gets the WORST RATINGS EVER

3) show is moved from respectable weekday slot to after the midnight Two and Half Men repeat on Saturday

4) they don't even bother to air the last few episodes, instead you have to go online to see them

5) 3 people at CHUD continue to post about it in a sad ghost town of a thread

Since it's a cable show and not network, I don't see much of this happening. Sorry FX, just doesn't feel the same without it.

This show is so fucking bad.  Like...it's so weird JUST TO BE WEIRD.  It feels like all these ideas were in a bucket and they drew 'em out, "Creepy girl."  And then they drew out a modifier "Creepy RETARDED girl.  Woo, good one!"  "Old woman maid."  "Old woman maid who is ALSO A YOUNG HOT MAID.  Fucking rad!"  "Wait...AND ALSO MASTURBATES!"  "AND THEN HE MASTURBATES!!!"  "AND CRYS!!!"  "AND THERE'S A BURN FACE WATCHING!!!!!!!!!!!  I just came, did you?"

So, yeah, I'm totally gonna watch the next episode.  I need to see the next car in this train wreck.

I watched Nip/Tuck from its awesome beginning season to it's terrible final ones and have never had even the slightest urge to watch Glee, but the posts in this thread have convinced me that I have to give this show a look.

Thanks.

Second ep wasn't as batshit as the first, but it had its moments.  Jessica Lange and her character are gonna be the VIP of this show.  Making ipicac brownies to fuck with the neighbor daughter (and having her creepy daughter spit in the batter...sweeet), throwing the daughter in "the bad girl closet" full of mirrors while trying to seduce a young stud, and that bit at the end.  Just...very fine.  Her and her cursed womb.

No man-butt tonight.  My wife is bummed.

So the crazy young guy is apparently Lange's son... and she wanted to poison their daughter that he likes... hmm.

Plus, the house has basically done his bidding twice already.

Kate Mara usually plays such a doe-eyed good girl, fun to see her as an obviously crazy person. And hilarious that McDermott's psychiatrist is unable to see it.

I'm having a good time.

On any more rational show, the suspension of disbelief for that family to stay another single minute in that house would be too great.  This show is so bazoo that you just sort of throw your hands up and say, "Okay, then!"  

It was fun seeing Peter Parker's cute Russian neighbor looking all sinister.  

I kind of hope we never get any explanations for what's happening.   It's already reaching LOST Season 6 levels of convolution on just Episode 2. 

This show..wow...Biggest WTF.. I'm going to keep watching.

This show fits Ryan Murphys all over the place style.

Definitely getting a Jacob/Man in Black vibe from Lange and Frances Conroy.   

I love how seriously the show takes itself, it's campy but not in a "look at how campy we're being!" kind of way.

I think it's exactly in a "look how campy we're being" way. That's one of the most annoying things about it. It may play it relatively straight but it's still dripping with winking self-awareness.

I disagree about the winking self awareness. Grindhouse had winking self awareness, but there's no meta commentary here.  The show has zero sense of humor, which is what makes it so funny. I think Jessica Lange is the only one who knows what kind of show she's in.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ratty 

Definitely getting a Jacob/Man in Black vibe from Lange and Frances Conroy.   

Really?  Seems more like Lange may be slightly evil buy Conroy is more a victim and not being let go by the house/Lange.

If the opening sequence had been set in the 90's, the girls would've been walking downstairs wearing flannel shirts talking about how they were going to the Pearl Jam concert while Smells Like Teen Spirit played in the background.

I find this show to be utterly tasteless and offensive. Locking the girl with Downs Syndrome in the torture-closet-of-mirrors was a bridge too far. 

I guess I admire the excess. It's completely ridiculous. The editing, the camera moves, it's all designed to disorient I suppose. It's really the anti-Shining. I think it's utterly unsustainable. How can this go on for more than a season? Or a few episodes? It's truly the most flamboyant and indulgent television series I've ever seen. 

A shrink who leaves his Blackberry in plain sight while with a client. Holy shit. What am I supposed to do with that? I did like how he ditched the girl in the midst of her abortion. Got a LOL out of me. So, I don't know.