American Horror Story: Freak Show Recap “Blood Bath”: The Show Must Go On

In the latest American Horror Story: Freak Show recap, Ethel tries to stop Elsa with disastrous results and Dandy finally deals with his mother before taking a nice, long bath….

By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer

The body count on American Horror Story: Freak Show was eventually going to get higher and with an episode titled ‘Blood Bath’ it seemed like a good time to lose a few cast members. Admittedly, this season has been a puzzle to figure out with a minimum amount of edge pieces to help put it together. There’s psychopath Dandy, who started out as a child killing cats and disappearing the gardener’s son. He’s now developing into his own special brand of serial killer.

Then there’s the freak show where the plot points have bounced around so much it’s hard to keep track of what the central theme of this season is supposed to be. Is it about Stanley’s morbid desire to collect the hides of every freak within a hundred miles? Is it about Elsa’s unshakable will to one day become a star no matter how many people she has to kill to be the only one in the spotlight? It’s definitely not about a killer clown anymore, that much we know for sure!

One high note this week — at least there wasn’t an unnecessary musical number!

With that said, let’s get into the recap for the latest episode of American Horror Story: Freak Show

I’ve Got My Eye on You

The episode opens this week during a frantic search for Ma Petit, who has gone missing. Of course they have no clue she’s currently swimming in formaldehyde several states away while rich people pay cash to stand next to her little lifeless corpse, but that’s neither here nor there. Dell finds her bloody dress, ripped to shreds and an easy excuse that she must have been carried off in the night by a coyote. She was the smallest woman in the world after all.

Everyone at the freak show is devastated, but Elsa is just inconsolable. She weeps for her fallen friend, turning on the water works and shrieks of painful torment. Maybe Elsa is laying it on a little thick, but she really did seem to care for Ma Petit so it was probably all genuine remorse for losing her tiny friend. Meanwhile, Ethel is about three fingers deep into a bottle of whiskey and she’s had enough of the fake grief.

She confronts Elsa and out and out accuses her of foul play to get rid of Ma Petit. Ethel reveals that she heard the conversation between Elsa and Stanley when he proposed a mercy killing for the twins and the freak show leader didn’t exactly shoot down the idea. She believes Elsa will get rid of anyone threatening to take her spotlight. So now Ethel is just doing what she thinks is right. Elsa was like a mother to everyone in this freak show and that’s how she got everyone to go along with her plans because she played on the maternal need all of them felt for her. To turn her back on them for a chance at Hollywood was the final straw.

Elsa tries to leave at one point and Ethel puts a bullet in her leg. Only problem — Elsa doesn’t flinch.

Finally, Elsa comes clean about why she fits in so well at this freak show. Back when she was an unwilling participant in the snuff film, her legs were so badly damaged that the soldier who finally rescued her had no choice but to take her to see Danny Huston. Yes, the Axeman is back except this time he’s a renowned Italian surgeon named Massimo, who gained his reputation during World War II for fixing soldier who lost limbs thanks to grenades going off around them. With the war over, Massimo’s skill set wasn’t needed as much but now with Elsa barely clinging onto life and her legs even less so, he jumped back into action.

He fixed Elsa’s legs and then built her two custom replacements out of wood that she now straps on everyday to hide her condition from everyone in the freak show. It’s clear Massimo had a thing for Elsa so he’ll probably pop up again before the season is over.

Elsa ends her story with a tear in her eye, but as much as she hoped this would sway Ethel’s decision to do away with her, she wasn’t all that moved by the tale of woe. So Elsa offers to have one final Schnapps with her friend before saying goodbye forever. Ethel agrees, but fails to see the throwing knife by the liquor stand. A quick turn and a throw and Elsa puts her blade right into Ethel’s eye. The bearded lady is no more.

Of course Ethel can’t be found dead in Elsa’s tent with a knife in her face, so she calls upon Stanley to help her dispose of the body. Instead, Stanley concocts a plan where he straps Ethel into a car, ties a chain around her throat, puts a rock down on the gas pedal and let’s physics do the rest for him. A screaming witness in the form of his partner Maggie, who ‘saw’ the whole thing happened plus a decapitated Ethel with her face bashed in leaves no questions asked. Ethel’s terminal illness only compounds suspicion that this was suicide and with that the case is closed! You have to wonder, did Stanley then claim the head to turn over to the museum?

Funeral for a Friend

Ethel’s passing rocks the entire freak show, especially her son Jimmy who is really struggling with his mom’s passing. He can’t believe she’d take her own life the way she did. At her funeral, the entire camp gathers minus Elsa to mourn her memory and help bury her in the ground. Elsa’s MIA because she’s down in MIA at a health and wellness facility looking for the next star of the show. She finds it in the form of a New York socialized named Barbara, who also just so happens to be quite obese. Barbara’s mother wanted her to be a social climber, but the embarrassment about her weight got so bad that at one point she started telling people her daughter was knocked up as opposed to just saying she was fat.

Barbara never wanted to go back to that life. She just wanted some really good potpie. Then again, who doesn’t want really good potpie? So Elsa scoops her up and takes Barbara back to the freak show. It’s clear this was a distraction to not think about the awful thing she just did to poor Ethel but her excuse is ‘the show must go on!’.

The funeral ends with Jimmy telling his mother that she was somebody in this life because the only thing people aspire to be told is ‘you weren’t nothing’. He drowns himself in a bottle of whiskey and a few more beers while the women of the freak show gain strength around their fallen sister.

Desiree leads the charge — Ethel never needed a man to make it in this world, why should they need men to help them cut through the maze that’s called life? Her anger and ire only grows when she sees poor Penny standing there, head shaved, tattoos all over her face and a split tongue courtesy of an evil and abusive father. It’s time for that bastard to pay.

So the new women’s power movement head over to Penny’s old house, kidnap her father and bring him back to the trailer for a little tar and feather action. He begs for his daughter’s forgiveness, but he’s really just asking to be spared. No such luck. They pour the hot, molten tar all over him as he screams in agony and then they douse him with feathers while laughing away at his torment. Of course in the distance, Maggie hears the commotion and she decides to intervene. Why exactly? Who the fuck knows.

Either way, Maggie convinces Penny to stop before she kills him because that’s something she’ll have stained on her soul forever and there’s no coming back from it. Penny finally gives in and tells her father that he’ll get to go home tonight, but gives him a harsh reminder that they can find him at any time and finish the job they started tonight.

While all of this is going on, Jimmy is pounding booze because whenever he’s upset that’s what he does. He’s been drunk for about 50-percent of this show so far. Elsa tries to shake him up and stop him from destroying himself the way his mother did with her drinking, but he’s not having it. She offers him up the big pillowy bosoms that Barbara possesses as a substitute place for his tears to land without his mother around. He scoffs at her idea and runs away.

The next morning, Jimmy’s still sauced to the gills and when Maggie tries to convince him to stop or to run away with her (again), and he’s heard enough. She doesn’t understand what this is like and she just needs to go away. Maggie turns and bolts and in the end Jimmy lays his head down on Barbara’s big boobs and goes a big rubbery one while he weeps into her new dress.

Fine and Dandy

Over at the Mott household, Gloria has sought the advice of a trained professional when it comes to dealing with her psychopathic son whose teen angst bullshit now has a body count. The doctor thinks he should be locked away, but she just couldn’t bare that. Instead she gets him to go see the doctor under the pretense that he’s being tested for his genius IQ. Well right away, Dandy’s not a genius, but he is smart enough to see through his mother’s clever rouse. Instead he messes with the doctor by describing horrific death scenes when looking at Rorschach cards and then tells a story about a pygmy tribe that would eat the leaders from other tribes they conquer. The belief was eating the flesh of a leader would pass his or her abilities onto the people who took part in the cannibalistic dinner. The doctor (whose voice seems almost familiar and they never show his face so that’s something to keep an eye on) is a little nervous now that Dandy is talking about killing folks and eating their flesh.

He leaves and goes home where he erupts on his mother. She already failed him once today when she refused to get rid of Dora’s daughter Regina, who came calling looking for her mother. If Regina keeps looking and actually finds her mother, Dandy will go to the electric chair and Gloria will be sitting right on his lap when they pull the switch. Hey Regina, go dig in the rose garden, dear, you’re mother is somewhere under there.

At this point, Dandy’s had it with his mother. Her own father went flat broke in the Great Depression so to keep her wealthy aspirations alive, Gloria married her second cousin because he still had a boat load of money. She ended up having Dandy as a result and now 20 years later here they are still together. He’s damaged and she’s possessive. Gloria confesses given the already strange relationship she has with her son, that he really was the only love of her life and she can’t go on without him.

So when Dandy points a gun at his own head and threatens to pull the trigger, Gloria begs him to stop. So he does. Dandy shoots her instead.

Moments later, Dandy’s disrobing and climbing into a bathtub filled to the brim with blood. Maybe it’s therapeutic on the skin, but more likely Dandy’s just trying to soak in the last remnants of his mother before going on his next murder spree across Florida.

Make sure to come back next week for another new episode of American Horror Story: Freak Show starting at 10pm ET on FX and a recap following here shortly after the show airs.