AHS 1984 - Rest in Pieces/Final Girl ****

The era of the 80s slasher was given a fair treatment, I do believe. The tropes are here and the supernatural twist was a cool accompaniment that provides the season with some room to breathe and invent. Going forward and backward in time also gave way to stronger storytelling and the roots of why the camp might be this way, trapping victims there, and how it prevents one certain character—the son of the infamous Mr. Jingles—from having to endure its confines, allows for alternative points of view and context. There were plenty of fads invoked, those of that time stuck in that loop of Redwood wilderness despite how time passed them by, fashions and music interspersed to make our submersion into the 80s more intimate and connected. And the violence of the slasher genre wasn’t left out, neither was the sexual frankness. And the profanity, FX didn’t put any restraints on Murphy and Falchuk. There’s no reason, I can think of, that this season doesn’t have legs and reach new audiences into the future. I wonder how well this will do when it reaches Netflix eventually, too. It is VERY binge-encouraging. I watched four episodes this Friday. The Rabe inclusion at the end, as “Friday the 13^th” got some serious rub considering the close relation to Pamela Voorhees and her little boy who was killed in the lake due to inattentive counselors, didn’t feel tacked on but quite a relevant and ultimately significant engine in the vehicle of the overall arc that produced both Margaret and Mr. Jingles. That even she could find her way out of the darkness by season end wasn’t exactly what I was expecting. And I liked that about this season. Expecting the unexpected. There is pretty much a little bit of everything for any slasher fan, and the ghosts angle at Camp Redwood provided better ways to alternate and evolve characters that otherwise would just be stereotypes. Both episodes: 4/5

*There is a diner conversation between Brooke and Donna about being the final survivor, the "final girl". It is a bit overt and features heavily in dialogue so maybe that might be less desirable or accepted warmly by slasher fans because a lot of PG-13 slashers have incorporated that into the lexicon. Brooke had been in prison for five years and missed out on a lot so I liked how she felt robbed and wanted to get even for all that taken from her. That always made for good drama I found quite palatable as a revenge genre fan.