American Horror Story: Double Feature: Red Tide Premiere Recap & Review//October 333rd, 2021

 Now that the very interesting, different, often confusing season of American Horror Stories has come to an end, it’s time for this year’s actual AHS season, Double Feature, to take the floor. 

I will admit, after finding about half of the episodes of “Stories” to be subpar, I was very worried about what the actual season would look like. Between the rushed changes that seemed to have to be made because of the pandemic, and the ambitious concept of a two-in-one season (Freaky formatting is never the AHS universe’s friend as far as I’m concerned.),  I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t expecting the worst, or at the very least, the painfully mediocre.

I am happy to report, though, that I was pleasantly surprised, and found the first two episodes of this season to be a true return to form for my favorite show. 

The first story we’ll be experiencing this season is called Red Tide. It is set in the very eerie, mysterious seaside town of Provincetown, Massachusetts, at the very tip of Cape Cod.

Our story begins with the Gardner family, husband Harry, pregnant wife, Lyme disease enthusiast, and perpetual annoyance Doris, and young daughter Alma (who at one point sounds like she’s being addressed as “Almondine”...Did anyone else hear this?) on the drive to start their new life in P-Town, where writer Harry is hoping to find some inspiration for a television pilot, and “interior designer” (I’m using quotes here because I’m really not sure this is her actual job and not just an Instagram hobby.) Doris is being paid to redesign the house they’ll be staying in. Alma is counting out loud, and when asked what it is that she’s counting, her answer is “roadkill”. No sooner are we introduced to this strange hobby of Alma’s, when Harry suddenly has to slam on his brakes due to a dead deer in the middle of the road. He gets out to investigate it, and Doris expresses, for the first out of approximately seven billion times in the first episode, an intense fear of Lyme disease. Lyme disease is the least of this family’s problems, though, as it’s very clear that this deer was not hit by a car or bitten by a tick. Its throat has obviously been ripped out. 

They continue on, though, because what family in a horror story ever heeds very obvious warnings, and something offscreen carries the mutilated deer away.

They get to the very creepy house, which Alma comments “looks haunted”, and try to settle in. Harry goes to the local market and ends up meeting local homeless, probably strung out nutjob “Tuberculosis Karen”, who makes one of the best entrances ever in AHS history, telling Harry to get the fuck out of this town in the most colorful of ways. (The grocery store owner’s declaration of “You’re not allowed to die in here!” when she starts hacking up a storm is already one of my favorite AHS quotes ever.)

Back at home, we learn that Alma is a gifted young violinist, who wants to play first chair in the philharmonic by the time she’s eighteen. Her excessive playing, though, proves to be a distraction for Harry’s writing, so Doris offers to take her on a walk. They end up walking through a cemetery (which seems out of character considering how boring and terrified of everything Doris is) and while Doris is explaining the importance of tucking your pants into your socks to protect against Lyme disease, and reminding Alma of her friend’s mother who does in fact have Lyme disease, they wind up getting chased by a pale, bald, vampiric looking man, who may or may not have Lyme disease. He chases them all the way home (Don’t know if leading someone who is pursuing you in such a way to your home is the best idea but it’s not as if Doris would have the imagination to lead him somewhere else. To be fair, she also doesn’t know the area yet but Doris’ lack of imagination is my favorite thing to pick on this season so far, so...)  and seems to be trying to break in, so the Gardners alert the police, and local Chief Burleson seems unfazed, writing this creature off as simply being a drug addict. (Doris still blames Lyme disease.) She swears that the Gardners will be safe in Provincetown, and whether that lie is intentional or ignorant remains to be seen, but there it is. A group of these creatures appears outside Alma’s window later that evening, but of course Harry doesn’t see them. He does, however, find a bunch of creepy pale dude corpses on the beach during a run the next morning.

Despite all of this, Harry wants nothing more than to get out and celebrate life, so he books a reservation, at the only restaurant he could find in town, for himself and Doris. Doris bails at the last second due to pregnancy complications, but insists Harry go on ahead without her while she stays at home and googles Lyme disease.

 Harry has a much more eventful evening, meeting colorful folks like flamboyant sex worker Mickey, having another run-in with Tuberculosis Karen, and, most notably, meeting two incredibly accomplished writers, Tony winner Austin Sommers and novelist Sarah Cunningham, better known as Belle Noir. After a truly amazing rendition of Islands In The Stream (shoutout to Lyme disease at 1:19), they invite Harry to join them for a drink, during which they tell him he will soon never have to worry about writer’s block again. Harry is unbothered by how eccentric these two are (but I suppose all writers are at least a little eccentric) and just seems genuinely happy that they consider him to be on par with them. 

Back at home, though, one of the pale creatures is waiting for him, and this time he doesn’t hesitate to kill it then and there. This, of course, prompts Doris to demand they leave town immediately lest they suffer a fate worse than Lyme disease. There’s also a weird side thing involving Karen bringing a baby to Belle, in a very Bram Stoker’s Dracula-esque scene. This also feels like a bit of a throwback to Marie Laveau’s deal with Papa Legba in Coven, but Belle’s plans for the baby, and the perks for Karen besides a tiny bag of drugs and I guess protection from the pale creatures, remains to be seen. Perhaps baby blood protects against Lyme disease. PS, where does this seemingly homeless chick charge the phone that Belle has apparently given her?

Before leaving town, Harry visits with Austin, who offers him some black pills that are “guaranteed” to cure his writer’s block. He’s hesitant at first but pops one after a conversation with his agent, Ursula. (And I make a mental note to apologize to the person I said was full of shit when they said that would be a character’s name this season.) The Gardner family is literally in the car, packed up and ready to leave P-Town, when the pills hit and inspiration strikes Harry like never before. He tears the car apart to get his computer and insists they stay at least long enough for him to write everything that’s just come to him, while Doris complains nonstop.

Harry writes like a machine, not stopping to eat or sleep, and when Alma calls him out for taking a pill (also wanting something like it for herself because she thinks it will work like Adderall and help her focus on perfecting the song she’s learning on the violin), Harry tells her off, and we realize the side effects are really taking shape here. Things escalate when Doris forces him to eat a turkey sandwich, and he immediately spits it out as if it’s the worst thing he’s ever tasted. (Maybe the turkey had Lyme disease.) We then spiral into things like drinking blended meat and sucking blood out of a wound on Doris’ finger. Harry returns to Belle and Austin to ask WTF is going on, and they explain that the pill, which Austin refers to as “The Muse”, has one unfortunate side effect: It drains certain minerals from one’s body, causing the need to feed on fresh blood. There’s also a weird catch that if the person who takes the pill doesn’t actually have any talent, they turn into one of the pale creatures, however, if you are talented and then stop taking them, you’ll never be able to successfully pursue your talent again. Harry is reluctant to continue taking the pills after realizing they’re basically vampire tablets, but reconsiders after his agent tells him he got a deal with Netflix and Joaquin Phoenix is apparently so excited by what he’s written that he’s willing to act in the series for free. Even Doris can’t deny that this is big news, and uses this moment to finally express an emotion beyond Very Concerned About Lyme Disease. So, it’s hunting time for Harry, and Belle and Austin are more than happy to teach him the ropes. 

Elsewhere, Mickey has taken in TB Karen. His place isn’t much, but it’s better than the streets in this cold climate, and honestly, he seems like a pretty decent guy. The two discuss many things, but the conversation finally turns to the little black pills, which Mickey just happens to have stolen from Belle during their last rendezvous. Mickey wants to take them, but Karen maintains that she doesn’t want to be like Belle and the others, even after Mickey produces some old paintings of Karen’s that prove that the woman really does have talent. (Belle is probably my favorite new character due to the fact that Frances Conroy has always and will always be my ultimate AHS fave, but my heart truly breaks for Karen and I think she’s going to be the one to destroy me emotionally.) Mickey eventually takes the pill while Karen declines, and I suppose we’ll see how that works out next episode. I hope Mickey is as talented as he thinks he is, because, like I said, he’s a good dude. He deserves better than to become one of the pale zombies.

Belle and Austin have one more recommendation for Harry: Go and see a dentist who can fix his teeth so that they’re more conducive to his new lifestyle. There we meet Lark, a tattoo artist fueled by the Muse pills who studied dentistry to appease her parents and eventually came up with a way to file teeth in such a way that everyone on the pill can live their best seaside vampire life. Harry is now officially ready and raring to go.

Also ready and raring to go is Alma, who steals a pill in order to perfect her violin playing. Somewhere in her Muse-induced haze, she absolutely owns her snooze fest basic bitch of a mother (I’m sorry, I love Lily Rabe but Doris is the most annoying, blah character on this show since Shelby Miller.) by telling her she will never understand greatness like she and her father do, and calling her a perfectly ordinary woman. Doris is, of course, offended, but can she really be that offended that her daughter thinks comparing different shades of white all day long, working to erase the character from the house they’re living in, is boring? I’m calling it now, Doris is going to end up taking a pill and will become one of the pale zombies.

Anyway, our episode ends with Doris threatening to leave Harry with Alma in tow, but instead she finds Alma in the cemetery, sucking the blood from a dead animal. Is she on the road to becoming like her father, or is she about to become one of the pale zombies? Or maybe it’s just Lyme disease? I guess we’ll find out!

All in all, I think this season is off to a very solid start. Maybe I’m just exhausted from the rollercoaster that Stories turned out to be, but I truly see something special forming in this season that I haven’t seen in years. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate every season in its own way, but I’d be lying if I said I haven’t felt like the show has been missing something since Hotel ended. Roanoke’s strange formatting overshadowed what could’ve been a great story, Cult, while well-written for the most part, was a bit too reality based for my personal taste, Apocalypse was super fun but clearly a fan service season, and 1984 was, for the most part, so ridiculously self aware that it read more like a parody than an actual season, save for the scenes involving Benjamin Richter’s backstory. It’s so good to see AHS doing what it does best again, creating an eerie atmosphere with a great cast of interesting, unusual characters, while telling us a horror story not quite like anything else out there. I have to say, I’m already a bit disappointed that the Red Tide story won’t make up the entire season, but I’m hoping part two of Double Feature, an alien-centric story called Death Valley, will be just as good.

Here’s to a perfect return to form, and another wonderful season of AHS after two long years without it.

Stay spooky, my friends. And for goodness sake, try not to catch Lyme disease.