"American Horror Story" Recap 1.06: Blood, Swine, and Tears

Sufferin' sweetbreads - as though murders, miscarriages, and affairs weren't enough, this week American Horror Story hit us with suicide, an extremely disturbing school shooting, and evil pig-men. It was like watching FOX News! Okay, okay - maybe it wasn't that scary...

Ding-dong. Constance (Jessica Lange) answers the door of the Murder House to find the only thing worse than Mormon missionaries on her doorstep: a SWAT team looking for Tate. It's 1994, and Tate just shot up Westfield High.

And they're going to make us watch it.

Sheesh.

Evan Peters as Tate

At the library, the group of students we met last week as ghosts barricade themselves in with a teacher when they hear shots in the hallway. Okay, I have to give a nod to Violet's ironic accuracy in dubbing the ghost kids "the Dead Breakfast Club", considering that they all died in the library. Judd Nelson Type says he saw the guy shoot some kid right next to him and he didn't know who the killer was. The shots get closer and the kids scatter, hiding anywhere they can. The teacher jumps up to block the door and is shot three times through it. The gunman enters - we don't see his face, but we know that it's Tate (Evan Peters).

I really don't think I can recap this in detail - it's actually too effed up. So I'll abbreviate by noting that Tate whistles the Twisted Nerve theme and methodically kills the goth girl, the stoner guy, and the computer nerd (who tries to call for help). The jock (Brando Eaton, who's doing double-time this week both here and on Dexter) tries to confront the shooter and is blown onto a library table. The cheerleader pees herself. Tate - we see his face now - overturns the table and she begs, "Why? Why?" before he unloads his shotgun.

We return to Murder House, where the SWAT team bursts into Tate's room (which is now Violet's). Tate sits on the bed, his face blank. They train their laser sights on his chest and he slowly pantomimes putting a gun to his own head and pulling the trigger. 

Opening credits. I think I need to bathe. Or cry. Or drink. Or all three at once. (What, I'm a multitasker!)

Violet (Taissa Farmiga) is in her room researching the Westfield massacre on the Internets. She finds profiles of all the kids she met the previous night, and then finds the mother lode: A notice of the death of the school shooter, Tate Langdon. She freaks, running through the house screaming for her mom, probably upset that her Sadie Hawkins date TOTALLY flaked on her.

Instead, she finds Constance sitting in the kitchen. Violet asks if she hurt her mother, and Connie replies, "Of course not - she's probably at the store, buying some frozen fare to reheat for your dinner." She asks Violet if she knows out about Tate. Violet tells her to get out, but Connie tells her that "this house will make you a believer." She adds that they were living in the Harmon house when Tate "lost his way", and that she believes that the house drove him to it. She tells Violet that she wants her to meet someone.

Next door, Connie introduces Violet to Billie Dean Howard, who is played by the fabulous out actress Sarah Paulson. She's a medium and she tells Violet that now that she's been "chosen", there's nothing she can do about it. Violet quips, "a Craigslist psychic with a Hollywood agent - who'd have thought." Billie corrects her - medium, not psychic. She tells her that when she was 25 her dead housekeeper appeared to her, naked and bloody, after her husband killed her with an ice pick. Connie deadpans, "It's hard to keep good help..." Yes, Connie - especially if you SHOOT THEM IN THE FACE.