American Horror Story: Hotel (2015)
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American Horror Story: Hotel Review
Hotel is the fifth season of American Horror Story. It is a solid, but weaker season more in line with the first one in terms of quality, and far from its three predecessors.
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“If you want to feel the magic of cause and effect,
you have to have a purpose“
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This season is along with the previous one the gayest of all the AHS seasons. It features many LGBT characters, from bisexual women and men to a transgender woman, and that gave it a lot of edge, but more on that later in the character section.
I also liked how sexual it is and perverse. Many of its scenes are very hot thanks to very sexy actresses and actors chosen for the parts. The entire season is very sexy, very polished technically and simply cool and modern. But in terms of storytelling and not just style, it really stumbled.
I am of course talking about its messy nature once again, but this time around it’s even worse as it disposes of some characters way too early either by killing them or throwing them out of the focus. It was great for instance that they connected it to ‘Coven’ through Queenie, but why they killed her instantly was beyond me. The entire second half of the show focused suddenly on different characters and not the established ones and it was a very odd transition.
Lady Gaga as The Countess is a complicated case. I do not find her Golden Globe win really deserving, but it’s the Golden Globes so who cares. She is aesthetically pleasing and the camera really loves her, but in terms of the acting ability, she really started off weak with some very subpar dialogue delivery. However, later on she became much better to the point that she sold even some of her difficult emotional scenes.
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She here proved to have a lot of potential which is why she got ‘A Star Is Born’ gig. The character herself is a cool, hot bisexual vampire with a particularly strong backstory spanning decades. I did love her character relationships with everyone else, but she is a weaker replacement for Jessica Lange.
Sarah Poulson is entirely wasted on this season which was ridiculous, and her final part in a couple of final episodes came too late in the game to make a significant impact. Evan Peters has never been better than in the role of James March as he killed it with his amazing accent of the thirties Hollywood elite.
John Lowe is not only boring, but also a stupid character who makes no sense whatsoever in his shifts. He and his wife are pointless and they took away way too much screen time for other much better characters. As for Ramona, the show managed to waste Angela Bassett as well which was super annoying, though the lesbian romance between her and Gaga was cool.
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Kathy Bates as Iris is also a bit wasted, but she still got many great scenes in some episodes and she was genuinely amusing and well developed. Finn Wittrock is very strong both as Tristan and as Rudolph Valentino. Cheyenne Jackson as hot Will Drake is also fine. Denis O’Hare steals the show acting-wise with one powerhouse performance. He once again entirely transformed into this different role for him and he’s great at it. The character’s journey is sweet and emotional, but the portrayal of a transgender woman as bald and ugly was problematic.
Overall, I liked this season just fine. It’s technically strong, it’s very entertaining almost throughout and it features many memorable characters and some great acting here and there, but it’s messy in pacing and structure per usual, and it simply lacked stronger focus in terms of characters and narrative.
Worst Episodes: The Ten Commandments Killer and Battle Royale.
Best Episodes: Flicker and She Gets Revenge.
