#deadofsummertv

FALL TV SCHEDULE:

This Fall, I’ll be watching “American Horror Story,” “Scream Queens,” and “The Exorcist.” I’m a huge fan of AHS, and such a great season (Hotel), I’m really looking forward to watching AHS with a critique lens. Likewise, I absolutely loved “Scream Queens,” and I’m so excited to meet some new characters plus see some favorites again (Hester, FTW). Finally, “The Exorcist” has produced some intense trailers and I feel like it’s my duty to take a peek at the new series.

The following review will be a little different in that I’ve provided a list of my exact thoughts while watching the episode, with a small paragraph below of my overall impression of the series. I’ve switched it up for this episode for the following reasons (1) I’m losing steam hence my 2-week hiatus to follow this posting, (2) I’ll be doing my Scream Queens reviews in this fashion!

Since I’ll be covering 3 different shows while attending grad school and working full-time, I won’t be able to be as detailed and critical as I’d like to be. So, while I’m going to give a critical response to all AHS episodes (*subject to change due to unforeseen circumstances) and a critical response to “The Exorcist” pilot and the season as a whole once it’s done, I’ll be posting my reactions to “Scream Queens” similar to my response to “She Talks to Angels.” And here we go…

Did Jessie, Garrett, and Alex not hear Amy axe Deborah and that girl?

Holyoke hid his soul in Jessie. And here I thought it’d be Joel!

I love that the final showdown is between Amy and Jessie (her nemesis turned friend) and Amy’s two boytoys.

Cricket and Joel are zombies now. I don’t know how to feel about this.

Did we just forget about Blair and Drew?

Garrett’s dream of his dead father brings about this inspirational quote: “nothing happens by accident.” Hmm, that seems like it’ll be important.

Deb is strung up like Christmas décor.

Amy straight up jumped through the window! Hilarious!

Anton, this is the moment you decide to speak up?

Come on Garrett, I thought you were going to be the hero.

That 80s drama music really swells with the kiss.

A Blair look-back scene, reminding us that Blair never got his own episode.

This episode’s soundtrack brought to you by the Talking Heads feat. Blotter

Alex’s flashback is to give him a moment of redemption. Oh gosh, now I know that he’s going to die. Redemption + Peripheral Character + (Sexiness)  = Death

Blotter’s headless and armless body walking around is awesome!

And Alex’s redemption came in sticking back while Jessie ran off, but did he really need to go without a fight? :(

Jessie’s attitude at the beginning of the season completely makes sense now, and I absolutely love her for it.

The bathroom scene is horrifying; I really don’t know what I would do if I was in Jessie’s situation.

Elizabeth Lail’s impression of Uma Thurman’s Poison Ivy is fabulous; I don’t know if it fits Evil Amy’s character though.

Is Garrett actually dead and tricking Jessie? And why did Blair and Drew walk in casually like they didn’t need an explanation of what-the-heck is going on?

The ring of pure water is so “Supernatural;” I love it!

I guess Garrett is actually fine, even though he was all melodramatic over the piece of glass earlier.

The final confrontation is all “Night of the Living Dead” with Joel and Cricket banging on the doors.

Lucky we got the video camera left on by accid….oh no, it was all fate. Cheesy, but it works.

Deborah was about to join the fun. Why didn’t she chase after them before? I’m imagining dead Deb struggling to unhook herself from the wall.

Yes Jessie, you do you girl!

Amy’s blood runs from her and into the water bottle, and it seems that Holyoke’s soul then leaves Jessie and goes back into the lake.

One question I do have is why they were able to exorcise the demon so easily at the end, when they had tried earlier with Amy and couldn’t manage. Unless of course, it’s because Amy was holding Malphus in. Duh.

I don’t know how to feel about everyone walking into the lake like that.

Ha! I knew Garrett was dead! Did he die on the bench where they carved “Townie + Braces?” ‘Cause that would be cute.

Jessie is kissing a ghost, guys.

And now it’s really over; although, I have to admit Jessie could have handled this without Drew and Blair.

I’m so glad Jessie was still able to go to school.

Waiting for that cliffhanger ending like…

Aww, Blair and Drew are Happily Ever After in Seattle, and they’re seeing Bowie!

Why is that pic of the group missing Amy? Did they really leave her out of everything during the early days of camp? Lol

And done. Glad we don’t get that cliffhanger ending like “Scream: The TV Series” Season One, just that “For Sale” sign swinging.

The finale ended as the series began: as an 80’s campy horror film would, although the pilot did a better job of not just capturing the essence of the 80’s Scream but also in capturing the audience. This final episode was basically the Final-Girl-last-30 minutes-of-a-horror-movie cheese expanded into a 45-minute episode of television. But although I snapped at the television screen through this and the penultimate episode, I really enjoyed the series as a whole. We’re seeing more and more 80’s nostalgia movies and shows, just look at “Stranger Things,” and “Dead of Summer” shows that it can be a really fun setting! However, having “Stranger Things” as a comparison illuminates the ability to do the 80s better. But still, DOS has been able to create amazing characters with rich backstories, menacing plot twists that surprised us all in the end, and gruesome homicides exciting to watch! All in all, I’d say DOS has been a terrific show.

Episode’s Rating:

30 minutes into the episode, I was ready to give “Home Sweet Home” a measly 1 Scream, but those last 10 minutes now have me debating a much higher rating.

I’ll begin with the bad. The majority of the episode focuses on the exorcism of Malphus from Amy, but in that span of time, we move through so many twists that the point of the exorcism becomes confusing. For example, Holyoke begins the exorcism using the pure Camp Stillwater drink, but then moves to play the hymn to call on the Spirit of Light. When Holyoke is disintegrated by Malphus or whomever was called by the tampered piano, the group decide to go through the exorcism without Holyoke. This all ends when the demon jumps from Amy to Deb to Jessie and back to Amy again (we find out later), and when Jessie is locked into the pure water bath.

All of the twists were just really hard to follow, but their meaning also faltered. Why does Alex throw Jessie into the water and drown her purposefully. After Jessie is saved by Amy, Alex remarks that only some pure could survive the water. Did Alex mean to imply that Jessie was not pure? And furthermore, if that was true, why didn’t they just try to baptize Amy in the first place?

I really enjoyed learning more about Amy’s backstory, though I wondered why we weren’t getting a Blair or Jessie backstory. Guess we have to wait for Season 2 for that. Although her backstory was fascinating, I suppose I need to take some time to clarify what it all means. Amy’s refusal to follow orders in order to free the mouse seemed like it was a moment of naiveté; a re-statement of Amy’s purity. Likewise, her ironic gullibility in getting stuck in the garage while her family died seemed to go along with that portrayal of Amy’s innocence. However, after finding out what we know now, I wonder if we’re supposed to believe that Amy put the mouse in the sink and if she set off the Carbon Monoxide.

But the real highlight of the episode comes in those last few minutes where we find out that pure Amy is actually a total psycho and she actually killed Margot. And psychotic Amy is who Malphus really wanted as the vessel. Elizabeth Lail has never been a Zelda, but she really shone bright in this segment, from the faux crying after Margot dies to the Patrick-Bateman-inspired axe murder.

The flip was such a superb undermining of character and plot that really got my attention. Unfortunately, the majority of the episode suffered, which couldn’t allow me to bring my rating too far up.

 Minor Pros and Cons (+/-):

+ Alex, Garrett and Jessie working together was great!

+ At first I thought that when the firefighter opened up the garage door that Amy’s parents had been worried and called her in missing. Their deaths were a complete surprise.

+ The use of the lake water as purification in the exorcism. Very cool and original!

+ And most of all, Amy’s psycho reveal at the end, but especially that awesome axe murder scene.

+ Not really a positive (or a negative), but I love that Amy got a slip about what Deborah did while she was the camp. Deb is dead now, so will we find out how Deb contributed to this evil? 

 - We really didn’t need that girl who figured out that Amy was bad to show up in the first seconds of the episode and only appear again in the last five to die. Deb had figured it all out with the map and knife in Amy’s trunk. It was as if they just wanted an extra body.

- Although the montage of Amy’s murders were fun, I don’t think it was necessary and it might have actually just insulted the audience a bit—showing that the writers didn’t think the viewers would get that Amy was the one killing all along.

- How did Amy learn all of that black magic so quickly thought? The groundskeeper is killed right away.

Highlight of the Episode: