American Horror Story: Roanoke is the sixth season of the series and boy, do they shake things up for it. Mixing a paranormal documentary format with found footage, Roanoke takes on a form that requires its audience to keep up, throwing old, and new, characters in to the plot as it takes on a life of its own. Unlike it’s predecessors, Roanoke brings you in for the story, setting aside mock interviews with the cast of the fake show My Roanoke Nightmare through a series of dramatic reenactments and testimonials. The story is new, exciting, and fresh to the otherwise outdated presentation of previous seasons.
It also has Cuba Gooding Jr <3
Premiering September 14, 2016, American Horror Story Roanoke feels a bit like a fever dream to me. My life, at the time of the premiere, was a bit of a shit show. I watched it here and there while desperately trying to impress my ex-boyfriend as he desperately chased other women on Tinder while sleeping with me. I never took care of myself during this time, skipping work to watch Roanoke with him because I was fucking delusional, and I associate this season with a lot of that. Nestled perfectly between him, his friend, and a bottle of Rumpleminz, I thought “if I sit and watch six episodes I get to be next to him,” a small tradeoff for companionship. I exchanged my self worth for warmth and with it, lost my dignity for the year and a half we were together.
Can you tell I associate a LOT of trauma with AHS?
Let’s get it Popping baby.
“From the very first moment I felt… Danger there,” Sarah Paulson says as title cards like Viewer Discretion Advised, The Following Story May Be Inspired By True Events, and The Story May Contain Disturbing Images flash on screen. Spliced up by interviews, season six is setting us up mockumentary style, with Shelby (Lily Rabe) being the first to talk. She details a story about how her husband Matt and her are perfect. He’s a pharmaceutical salesman (enemy?) and she's a teacher (balance of the force) who met in a yoga class. They moved to Los Angeles, are starting a family, and go out to celebrate both the promotion and the pregnancy before Matt (Andre Holland) is punched in the face. “That was the worst night of our lives,” says Shelby about Matt getting knocked out in a “gang initiation process.”
What kind of frat are they pedaling over there at UCLA!!!!!
We cut between the retelling and the dramatic reenactment as Sarah Paulson sits in the waiting room to hear her husband’s conditions, posing as actress version of Shelby. Now, this is going to be really fucking confusing when regaling this so I’m going to do the best I can by instead, using the actresses names since they’re both Shelby (Nightmare Name BTW). His orbital socket is broken and he will need surgery, whatever the fuck that means. Through tears, she says she needs to see him because Matt (now Cuba Gooding Jr.) is in a coma. She sees him and kisses his mouth, great acting for our lesbian Sarah Paulson. His hand grips around hers and she smiles. She was right!! Her touch brought him back to life!!!!!! Unfortunately for her she starts DRIPPING blood down her leg and we realize Shelby lost the baby.
An eye for an eye, a life for a life.
Following this city life trauma they decide to move east to where Matt used to live. Ah yes, North Carolina, a place with some of the most gorgeous forests and the ocean and God Damnit I hate Chicago. They’re frolicking in the woods having fun and he says “we’re not city folks” and at this moment I decide to make it about how much I fucking hate Chicago. Everyone here is weird and it’s so segregated and it’s also ten degrees out now. I grew up in Iowa where Midwest winters are brutal so maybe I’m being a fucking baby but I’ve Had it with Winter. The midwest is so annoying and passive aggressive too that I’m just like: SAY what you think! If you don’t like me then DONT TALK TO ME.
I’m over it.
In the woods on their picnic they find this beautiful old farm house and decide to go inside and check it out. Three bedrooms, two stories, and a basement, built in 1782 this house is arguably in great shape. There’s a spiral staircase and chandelier in perfect condition and bidding starts at $21k. Excuse me, what? You’re telling me THIS house is $21k? Listen, I get the whole “people falling for the haunted house because it’s cheap and gorgeous and they think what’s the catch” trope but you can’t deny you’d do the same thing. This place has MASSIVE windows and a spiral staircase, I’d take my chances at getting haunted too!!! Hell, I grew up in a haunted house. Yeah, maybe this one is more intense with all its foreshadowing of blood and pig carcasses but it’s also HUGE!!!!! Everyone at some point in their life should own a haunted house because it builds character. I often try to buy a haunted doll to own but my girlfriend says No. Why, you ask? Because I can’t own a dog and I can’t own a fish. I can’t hug the fish and I’d kill the dog on accident. A doll is the PERFECT middle ground.
Below is the house in question and beneath that is a Haunted Doll I once considered bidding on:
And here’s Miss Meg who Plays Pranks:
What’s wrong with the property? Hurricanes! But Cuba Gooding doesn’t care!!!! He bids $25k! The other people who say “you don’t want this house” bid $26k. Well, sucks to be them because Cuba bids $40k, which is their entire savings essentially. This reeeally turns Shelby on because they end up with the house. The hicks who bid against them are not pleased about this but who cares!!!! It’s theirs!!! They’re starting over and moving on up and they’re pleased as punch. Yet, underneath it all, Sarah Paulson feels something… ominous. Sinister music rises and we see the back of someone watching them through the trees.
Color me concerned!
Matt is STOKED about this house and Shelby is indifferent, the bread and butter of a good horror story. Feel like the wife is always reluctant and the guy is always like “don’t you get it babe? We have an OPPORTUNITY HERE” and then halfway through the movie he realizes she was right. He’s speculating on this, was it because she lost the baby? Sure, he got the shit kicked out of him, but she lost a LIFE! They don’t talk about it though because they’re straight and the solution to their distance is a hot ass Fucking scene. In the middle of penetration they hear something outside followed by slamming. Big strong Cuba Gooding goes to investigate outside and sees their garbage overturned with blood smeared on it. Silence before a metal can is thrown at his head. This is the south so he’s nervous it’s a hate crime targeting them as an interracial couple. Could it be the hillbillies? Possibly.
Sucks to suck though because they poured ALL their money into this house.
We learn that Shelby is an essential oils type bitch! She’s essentialing some oils when it starts to hail TEETH!!!!! Who’s fucking teeth are these? Is this the plague? She runs back inside and when Matt shows up after running errands, she hugs him like she' never wants to let go. This straight moment is cute for a second before he starts gaslighting her on what she saw. Human Teeth? Really, my stupid, deranged wife? Thinks the Man. He nonchalantly sits down like the enemy he is and says it must be the weather.
There’s no time to take care of her though because he’s off to Raleigh!!!
It’s important to note this is a biiiig business trip for him. Seeing as he’s a traveling salesman, if he lands this account he’ll be able to stay put a little longer and not have to travel so much! Isn’t that exciting for the wife at home? She’ll be taken care of and will get the big house to herself and he’ll bring in the money so she neednt worry. She may needle at her knit work and essential her little oils to her hearts content without a care in the world. I love talking about this as if gender roles handed out by the patriarchy solely exist in cis relationships: the woman at home waiting for her breadwinning husband to return, but really I’m a hypocrite, considering I’m over here hovering around my girlfriends table demanding attention while she works her six figure job. Yes, I’m Baby and have no palpable skills to provide the corporate elite, but this defies every boundary and barrier set out by the cis-hets before us because it’s Gay.
Take that, libtards.
“Are you sure you’re going to be okay?” He says, patronizing. “I’m a big girl :)” She responds, condescendingly. This isn’t accurately portraying them but it’s how I want to portray them so There. In actuality, she’s looking forward to alone time because his hovering is making her feel suffocated. She does some yoga in front of the big windows saying this routine actually works really well for them. He leaves, she misses him, and then they have great sex. As she cuts cucumbers and pours herself a glass of wine the window pane begins brutally banging against the side of the house. Frightening! But she is not perturbed. She walks around the house romantically touching the walls when she sees two women in nurse outfits randomly walk across the hallway. Okay, hot? Where are these two sexy ladies headed, she wonders as she flips on the light to the study. The music is suspiciously quiet and I avoid looking at the television, anticipating a jump scare. She gets in to what looks like a hot tub outside except the whole fucking set up of it is suspicious and terrifying as hell.
Uh, lol, no fucking thank u!!!!
Predictably, some shit goes down. As she sits there bobbing around, a hand pushes her under the water. The hand is none other than Kathy Bates and by the time Matt arrives, the police are there. She claims she struggles against her attackers and Matt is annoyed with his tone of voice, which implies the attackers were dressed in costumes holding pitchforks. He implies it’s the hillbillies, who have been messing with them since they moved. The cop implies they get a gun which clearly isn’t going to help the situation but Whatever. This problems going no where so maybe he’ll show up after.
Her husbands not really helping with the situation at all, questioning if Shelby REALLY saw the things she saw. You’re just paranoid, babe, he says as she regales that she called the police then called you. The cops didn’t find any finger prints or torches by the hot tub, though, so she MUST be crazy!!!! This back and forth goes on for a bit until the audience gets that okay, the message they’re sending is that their relationship right now is kind of fragile. He believes her, he insists, but she feels hella guilty. She doesn’t want to live there and why should she? Some more fuck shit is about to happen and she KNOWS this!!!
Pigs are screaming throughout the night and Matt can’t sleep so he gets up to galavant around the house. On the doorstep is a slaughtered pig that he buries promptly as not to shock Shelby, seeing as he’s leaving for Raleigh AGAIN the next day. He’s really proud of himself though because he sets up cameras around the property and calls his sister Lee (Monet Tumusiime/Angela Bassett), who doesn’t like Shelby. Uh oh, tension! Lee judges Shelby’s Yoga, Gluten Allergy, and Two Years of College and I laugh really hard because I too am now judging Shelby’s Yoga, Gluten Allergy, and Two Years of College. No offense, but deceive your husband a LITTLE bit if these are your only traits.
At least leave the house for four hours a day to say you’re doing something worthwhile like Welding.
We get a little backstory between these two. Shelby got her degree in Criminal Psychology from UNC before she started taking pills following an injury on the job. Going to assume here that Lee is addicted to opioids and she got discharged because of it but for the time being, we’re shown an old memory she had on the job. They bust a junkie spot and she sees a baby in a crib, shot in the shoulder at the same time she’s about to pick it up. Slinging back pills with alcohol on the job, she explains how she started at two pills a day going up to two an hour. As a car speeds by her, she takes off after it, chasing a serial rapist through the streets. He crashes his car into a truck but has a gun. He holds up the gun to his head and shoots himself as another police officer goes through her car looking for something, who knows. Seeing the pills in her passenger seat, she’s immediately fired.
Her life goes downhill from here.
Her husband wants a divorce because she is slipping as a parent. She’s forgotten to pick up her daughter, she doesn’t touch him which, you know, gotta slip in the important things as you go I guess. She loses custody of her daughter to him and we’re all caught up on who Matt’s sister is as a person because now it is time for Sarah Paulson to make dinner. Sizzling up some steak slamming a glass of wine, she chops up some carrots and hears a thud somewhere off in the distance. Mistakingly leaving the knife behind as she goes to inspect, she walks down the hallway before coming back to the kitchen and realizing, you guessed it, the knife is gone. Fear in her eyes, she sees the knife has been wedged in to the steak she’s cooking. Lee enters the kitchen and Shelby yells at her, obviously thinking she’s the one who pulled this prank. Tension hangs in the air as they have a conversation about life. Lee watches her pour alcohol into her glass and is like look, can I be real with you? While I’m here could you please not drink. I’m hanging on to sobriety by my teeth here and Shelby is like sure cuz she knows Lee has a gun and no matter what, she’ll be protected by her sister in law.
As night falls, the pig noises start again. Lee wakes up distraught and goes to her window to see where the source is coming from. The door to her room opens and in rolls a wine bottle. Assuming Shelby was the one who did this, Lee storms downstairs to confront her. “Why would you do this?” She says wielding the wine. Shelby is confused because she didn’t finish the wine bottle and at the same time, Matt receives an automated alert of men skulking around the territory with pitchforks and a bloody knife. Panicking, he calls the police as the mob shows up in the middle of the night with torches. These two women are having it OUT though because they cannot hear their phones going off.
Jammies are on, fight is on, game time.
Some evil words are thrown around here by Sarah Paulson! She’s asking Lee where she was when Matt was in the hospital and off screen we hear a door creak open. “Someone’s in the house,” says Lee as she tells Shelby to be quiet. Hearing maniacal laughter from the basement, Lee and Shelby go downstairs to check it out. They see a television playing a home video of two kids investigating the area, where a naked woman wearing a pigs head appears before the tape cuts out. Unfortunately for them, all the lights turn off as the people with torches enter their house.
Talk about a situation! Fuck!
Stuck in the basement for a half hour, Shelby and Lee wait this period out until the noise evaporates. Just as quickly as they came, they are gone. Lee insists they go back upstairs and when they do, a ton of dolls made of twigs are strung from the ceiling a la’ Blair Witch style. The police chalk it up to vandalism and they’re all upset about it. Maybe with his sister there, he’ll finally start believing his wife and they do, seeing as they show him the video of Pig Head Woman. He still thinks it’s the rednecks but we’ve seen Blair Witch and this is clearly Witchcraft. Also Pig Women has titties, none of the hillbillies had nice titties or a tiny waist. He once again is saying they’re just trying to freak them out so they leave and Shelby is like well it’s working I want to leave!!!! Lee is in on this too like “in this house we don’t ACAB Shelby” and Shelby is like “the cops are clearly not going to do anything.” Great so both Lee and Matt are on the side of gaslight Shelby.
Not looking like a great outcome for little Ms. Cottagecore.
Shelby drives off because she’s had enough of this shit and I would too. “At the time it made all the sense in the world,” says Shelby, picking flight over fight. Her cell phone rings and she answers, immediately crashing her car in to something in the middle of the woods. I knew it was coming, so I didn’t look, but I rewound it to figure out what it was for ya’ll because I love you. Looks like it’s a bloody Kathy Bates! Boy did I hate that jump scare! Seemingly untouched, Shelby gets out to investigate yelling out to see if the person she hit is still there. Welp, she is, and she’s getting up now to walk out into the woods. Blessed with great gut instincts, Shelby runs out into the woods to tell her she needs to get her to a hospital before losing Kathy Bates and also losing sight of the road.
Well fuck now she’s stuck out here with no one to help her.
She runs in to a clearing where the little twig people are strung up from a tree. Terrified, she turns around to run away but trips over a branch. Feeling the Earth below her move, the trees sway comically side to side as if the ground is bread rising. She runs for a while and lands herself directly in the center of people with pitchforks. This fucking sucks for her but one of the people is Wes Bentley so like, it could get worse. The ghosts could be ugly. As the episode ends, we see a scalped corpse reaching up to her and hear Sarah Paulson screaming her head off.
Overall I’m giving this one a 9.5/10. There was no rape scene, a good group of central characters, and I feel like this season had hella promise when it premiered. It shook up the traditional AHS format we know and love and delivered us with a well paced supernatural story that didn’t give too much away at the top. This is the first season I genuinely want to watch all the way through. What happens! How does it end! Is it good?
I guess that’s between the people who watched, FX, and God because I have no time to watch an entire season of television. My email is gatesmeggie@gmail.com if you want to email me your thoughts or comment on what happens in it, though.