TV Review: American Horror Story My Roanoke Nightmare (Season 6, Episode 6)

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

EPISODE: CHAPTER 6

THE SCOOP: With season 1 of My Roanoke Nightmare in the books, producers rush the second season into production. What could go wrong?

WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW. IF YOU'VE NOT SEEN THIS EPISODE, STOP READING HERE!

THE SKINNY: Jack Motherf*ckin' Twist! Didn't see that one coming, did ya?! Indeed, after six solid weeks of American Horror Story doing a bang-up job of reinventing itself with My Roanoke Nightmare, the slick subterfuge and sly surprises keep on coming. Season 6, Chapter 6 (directed by Angela Bassett) got going with the smooth talking Sidney (Cheyenne Jackson), hot Hollywood producer who just made My Roanoke Nightmare a hit TV show for his network execs. Naturally, they want a follow up, and his pitch for Season 2 of the hit program is Return to Roanoke. That is, to reunite all involved from the first season – the real life Millers, Lee and Flora and the ones portrayed on TV – place them back inside the haunted Roanoke abode for 3 days during a blood moon and film that shite 24/7, Big Brother style. The execs balk at first, but money talks, and since the show was indeed a massive coup, the show goes on. The things, the real Matt and Shelby have since separated, on the count of her infidelity with the actor who portrayed Matt on the show, Dominic Banks (also played by Cuba Gooding). Shelby agrees to return to the house for season 2, even if Matt isn't willing.

Sidney's production has the house rigged and booby-trapped to appear haunted. His real motivation is not to make a horror show, he says, but to induce a confession out of Lee for murdering her husband Mason. Lee also returns, despite being sued for custody of Flora by Mason's mother. The actress who played her, Monet Tumusiime (Bassett), an alcoholic, needs heavy insurance to be brought back. Sidney also recruits Agnes Mary Winstead, the actress who played the Butcher (again by Kathy Bates), who after playing the part, went on a psychotic rampage along the Hollywood walk of fame. She was committed for six months in a mental hospital, claims she much better now, but when Sidney informs her she's too unhinged to appear in season 2, she lashes out, speaks threateningly in tongues and sets-up as a formidable foe moving forward. But then, who left a ring of pig-fetuses near the house if it wasn't Agnes or the Polk hillbillies? Could everything we've been seeing so far already be part of season 2? Cameras are seen rolling after-all? And did that crew member who lethally turned a chainsaw on himself during production really do so on accident? 

Whatever the case, heinous haunting continues at Roanoke. Producer Diana Cross knows as much, films herself expressing the sentiment while riding out of town for help, but of course she's run into by Pig-Man. Her car is flipped, her skull crushed, and her footage found 3 months post-production. We then get a glimpse at the actors who played Shelby, Audrey Tindall (Paulson) and Edward, Rory Monahan (Peters), now hitched together in the English countryside (Paulson with a British accents is pretty delicious). They too get the call-back and return to Roanoke at once. Filming has begun. Agnes shows up with her cleaver in tow, frightens the guests and disappears. More alarming to Shelby is the fact Matt appears, with Lee. Awkward for real. Even more awkward when Dominic too comes a-knockin'. Matt warns a few of the actors that a Blood Moon is nigh, and we're given a disclaimer that says all but one cast member were mysteriously killed during the next three days!

How about that goddamn show-stopper though huh? Oh hell yes! The Pig-Man ogles Audrey fresh out of the shower, and as soon as Rory goes upstairs to suss the situation alone, stupidly so, the poor hapless bastard is gored and throated by those two ghostly female med-students who slash his neck and stab the dude many times over in the torso, requisite grue pouring out. They smear the word MURDER in his blood on a mirror to indicate Rory was the first of many to come. Matt records this on his phone, alerts the others, and the show leaves our asses hanging until next week.

And honestly, I can't wait. Major ups to Angela Bassett for turning in quite possibly the best episode of My Roaonoke Nightmare yet, which in itself has been one of the freshest and script-flipping seasons yet. Never mind meta, this is like some meta-cubed, through-the-looking-glass shite. We've seen AHS carve new territory with the anthological model and by redeploying actors in different roles from season to season. But here, we get that very shift mid-season, as half of the cast are revealed to be someone entirely different altogether…in show and out (if that makes sense). The difference being, they're all confined to the same ill-fated location and forced to cohabitate with each other. It's pretty damn brilliant, and measuring by how fast the episode flew by, highly entertaining throughout. It's quite heartening to see producers of the show challenge themselves, challenge the model of the show, rework it, breathe new life (and death) into it, and continue to give a very good stable of actors enough ante-upping material to want to come back for more. My Roanoke Nightmare has been so damn good so far that I almost, almost forgive (but not forget) the now-not-so-glaring absence of Jessica Lange. If she suddenly returns, I'll keel over quicker than Rory's gory corpse!

KILL OF THE WEEK: Oh most definitely Rory's vicious demise at the hands of those two med-student ghosts. Dude got ripped, torn, tattered and shattered!

BLOOD & GORE:

• A ring of pig fetuses caked in grue
• Random crew dude chainsaws himself in background, minimal gore
• Rory gets his throat slashed, stabbed in torso twice, blood spills profusely

WTF CHARACTER MOMENT: Aside from Rory going upstairs alone, why Matt agreed to do the show knowing full well better than anyone that shite was about to get worse than before seems rather shady. Did he want to see Shelby die? Was he so distraught he actually had designs on killing her? Or Dominic for that matter? We shall see!

MOST BIZARRE SCENE: I believe the terms used were "fetal pigs." Yeah, gory unborn baby hogs shown in close-up is pretty damn bizarre!