American Horror Story: Cult Episode 3 Review

I've really been enjoying this season of American Horror Story so far, and it's been a huge step up from the most recent seasons. Let's see if they can keep it up in this episode.

The episode begins with a woman who has a fear of being trapped, who seems to have been cured of her phobia. Dr. Vincent is convinced as well, and the woman and her boyfriend Mark leave Dr. Vincent's and go home. When at home, the woman hears a noise after Mark goes upstairs and she heads up to find him. When she get upstairs, she finds two coffins. Then, the killer clowns arrive, and shove both her and Mark into the coffins and secure them so they won't ever get out. I'm not really sure how to feel about this opening, as these are characters we've never seen before, which means we don't know what relevance this has to our main characters, but I'm sure there's an actual meaning that we'll discover soon enough.

At Ally's, Pedro's body is taken away as Ally watches on and cries. Ally asks Detective Samuels if she's in trouble, and he says that she isn't because of the Stand Your Ground law. She's obviously still shaken up, and upset by the fact that Oz witnessed the whole thing. The next day, the ladies are driving when they see a protest outside of the restaurant. Ally wants to hightail it out of there, but Ivy needs to go inside. Ally is left to drive home alone, and then Kai appears. He tells her how brave she is, and that he'll take care of the mob for her. Which is super f***ing creepy because I'm 100% convinced he's a psycho. Ally heads home, and almost immediately hears a knock at the door. It's the probably definitely crazy neighbors, and they're super mad about her killing Pedro. They want "racists" out of "their neighborhood", even though Ally was there first and also they don't own the entire neighborhood. Either way, it's creepy. Later on, when watching the news, the Mayfair-Richards ladies learn about the murder of the couple from earlier in the episode. Reporter Beverly Hope suspects that there could be a serial killer on the loose, but before they can really process this, they hear a loud truck coming down the street. The next day, Ivy comes downstairs to find Ally outside, staring at a bunch of dead birds, which were killed by the truck. The ladies report this, and the township says that there wasn't any truck sent out the night before. Then, Winter arrives and Ally's super mad at her for leaving. (HOW IS SHE NOT FIRED YET????) Winter says a guy was outside, and that she let him in. They come in to find a guy naked, and he says their ad wanted him to do that. Ivy's super mad and she threatens until he leaves. They find the ad, which was obviously set up by their neighbors because of the last line, which states that "Latin lovers need not apply." This is an interesting segment, but it was kinda all over the place. There was a lot of stuff going on, and I'm not really sure what to think of the whole chemical truck thing.

Dr. Vincent is reading the ad while he's on the phone with Ally, and we learn that the neighbors keep putting the ad up, even though it's been taken down numerous times. Dr. Vincent wants to see Ally, because he's worried about her phobias. She want to speak to the protesters, and he doesn't want her to. She arrives and the protesters storm her car, and then she sees Kai. All of the sudden, they all disappear. It's really creepy, but not unexpected considering that it's Kai. When the ladies get home, they find that psycho Meadow Oz a guinea pig (oh, this poor thing's gonna die, isn't it?). When Ally orders for him to be taken away (they're all allergic), he says he wishes he could say goodbye to her, instead of Mr. Guinea. Detective Samuels is at the Wilton's house, and then they get a call from Ally. Ally knows their game, and she's not having any of it. Meadow hangs up on her, and then Ally sees the truck again. She runs outside for some reason, and the truck almost hits her. At Kai's, Meadow is performing that weird ritual with Kai when she lies and he hits her. She gets up, and the two of them continue. She admits that she's afraid about not having kids and never feeling loved.

Ally and Ivy are at the restaurant with Oz, and Ally tells Oz that he can keep Mr. Guinea. They arrive home, and see one of the smiley faces on their door. When they get in, Oz runs in to tell the guinea pig he can keep him, and they see to poor thing in the microwave, and then it explodes. Which was a sh***y thing to do. Ally runs over to the Wilton house, bursts in, and sees them out back beekeeping. She punches Harrison, and screams at them about Mr. Guinea. She lets them have it, and then accuses them of painting the smiley face. They tell her that they've been marked by the killer, and she isn't buying it. She threatens to kill him (what all rational people do). Ally and Ivy start arguing about everything, and then Oz notices a smiley face on the Wilton's house. Ally refuses to tell them (oh, f*** them, she says), and Ivy and Oz go home. The truck comes back, and Ally runs over to the guy that gets out of the truck. She rips his mask off, and there's some smiley faced thing underneath. Then, Ally passes out. I don't know how to feel about this segment. The fight scene was epic, but I hated the scene before it, with the guinea pig. It was really unsettling and unnecessary and I hated it.

Harrison and Kai are performing the same ritual, and Harrison says that he wishes Kai were dead. At Ally and Ivy's, Detective Samuels is there and he thinks Ally is going crazy. Samuels tells them that the smiley face is genuine, and that he's concerned. The ladies hear Oz upstairs, and they run up. On Oz's computer, they see the video of Ally and Winter in the bathroom, which obviously infuriates Ivy. Ivy announces that she'll be leaving, with Oz, and then they hear sirens. Harrison is being arrested, and he lashes out at Ally. During the commotion caused by Harrison, Oz goes missing. They find him in the Wilton house, and discover the bloody scene leading up the staircase to a smiley face.

This was a decent episode, but it was definitely my least favorite of the season. While I hated everything that had to do with Mr. Guinea, that wasn't my only problem with the episode. I'm not too crazy about everyone turning on Ally, especially Ivy. The reveal of the Winter incident was upsetting,  because it wasn't completely Ally's fault that it happened and Ivy wouldn't even listen to her. The episode-opening murder also wasn't a great way to kick the episode off, because all I could think of was the shooting from the last episode and I didn't really care about the couple's death when that was weighing on my mind.
Score: 8/10
Grade: B

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