Recapping AHS: Baby, I Was Born This Way

Oh my God, you guys. I've been a little worried that this show wasn't going to live up to the thoroughly ridiculous crazy from last year. So far, we just haven’t seen anything that over the top, you know? Yeah, not after this episode. To begin - A thoroughly modern phone rings and 911 answers a call from a man’s voice saying that the police are needed at Briarcliff and that he has taken care of “the impostors . Modern day cops arrive at the Briarcliff ruins to find the bodies of the three teenagers dressed as Bloody Face suspended in the air.

"So wat's up?" "Nuthin. Just hangin out."

Act I! In 1964, a woman brings her young daughter to the asylum after it appears that the little girl, Jenny, murdered her friend and then dispassionately blamed a man with a beard and a brown jacket in a totally unconvincing way. Lana awakes in a comfortable bed and someone cooking in the distance. As she comes to, she realizes she’s still in Thredson’s torture chamber, although at least the bed is real. Thredson is making her tomato soup and sandwiches because that’s what polite killers do for their victims. Thredson says the sandwiches are the “perfect mommy snack”, but that he never had a mother because he was abandoned as a child and then grew up in an orphanage. Thredson always knew he was different, but it wasn't until Medical school that he really understood about himself when he encountered a female cadaver, which he came to believe was a sort of surrogate for his real mother. He felt compelled to be close to the cadaver, finding her body in a gross anatomy class and eventually stripping down and laying next to her and OH HOLY GOD WE JUST WENT RIGHT INTO NECROPHILIA WITH A CORPSE THAT HE WANTS TO BE HIS MOTHER OH MY GOD!!! He says the experience was only marred by how cold and stiff the cadaver’s skin was, even after he removed it. Thus, he decided to start off with fresher bodies and began murdering the women that he has now framed Kit for. 

Forever unclean...

Meanwhile, Mr. Goodman calls Sister Jude to say that he’s made a breakthrough and even though Anne wasn't really Anne Frank, her information was accurate and Arden is, in fact, Hans Gruber. Goodman asks Jude for Arden’s fingerprint. In a local hospital, Monsignor has agreed to deliver Last Rights for a Jane Doe who is extremely defiled and suffering from TB in addition to many other diseases. No surprise, the Jane Doe is Shelly looking not long for the world.

Act II! Flashback to 1962 as Monsignor meets Arden for the first time when Briarcliff was still a sanitarium. Arden is the supervising physician. Monsignor delivers Last Rights for the few remaining patients as they die and then assists Arden in disposing of the bodies in the crematorium. With Briarcliff is shutting down, Arden fears his research developing a drug that would boost the immune system will be over. Back in 1964, Monsignor watches helplessly as Shelly appears to finally die before confronting Arden directly in his office, saying Jude was right about him and that he is a monster. Arden sees the inmates as evolutionary failures, including one whom who has caught masturbating while spying on Sister Eunice as she undresses in her room and is now his latest test subject. By infecting them with both TB and Syphilis, Arden believes that they are now “more than human” and that the research will get American through an inevitable Russian nuclear attack. Monsignor is all, hells no, I’m reporting you, but Arden says that doing that will expose him too. Wonder what that’s about? Arden says Monsignor can avoid anything by getting rid of Jude. In the kitchen, Eunice is cutting vegetables with Jenny. Eunice eggs Jenny on, saying that the friend she murdered was totes asking for it and Jenny shouldn't apologize for anything. Eunice reveals her own tortured past trying to be friends with a bunch of Mean Girls who tricked her into disrobing at a pool party in front of a cute boy. Jenny is skeptical, but Eunice confesses that she’s actually the devil, so take that, little psychopathic kid. And BTW, God is totally false, you know that right? This scene is kind of amazing and I totally want to see more of Demon Eunice and the child murderer.

Maybe a cooking show?

Upstairs, Monsignor tells Jude to pack her bags – he’s arranged for her to be transferred to a girls’ home in Pittsburgh. Jude knows Arden is behind this and that he’s turned Monsignor against her.

Act III! Jude packs her bags as Eunice informs her that Jenny’s mother has come back to pick her up. Jude tearfully tells her that she’s leaving Briarcliff, but she’s not going to leave Eunice at the mercy of Arden. In his house, Thredson takes a call from Kit from the prison who wants to know what the hell is up with that taped confession? Thredson is all hey man, sucks to be you. Lana takes advantage of the distraction to try to saw through the chains holding her leg to the bed, but Thredson comes back to the torture room before she can get free. When he sees what she’s done he says that she is just like all the others and not Mommy at all. He ties her arms to the bed and dons the Bloody Face mask. In her room, Eunice has put on Jude’s red slip and dances around her room provocatively while singing along to “You Don’t Own Me” at the crucifix on her wall. Seriously, am I the only one who really digs this demon’s sense of humor? A phone rings – it’s Goodman looking for Sister Jude. Jude brings some cognac to Arden in his lab, offering him a toast to his success at getting her kicked out. Jude says she’s always been a good sport and offers a glass, which Arden eventually accepts, leaving a nice convenient fingerprint. In his hotel room, Goodman answers a knock at the door – it’s Sister Eunice.

Act IV! Jude arrives at Goodman’s hotel room to a phone ringing and the door open. She answers the phone, but no one responds on the other end of the line. It’s then that she notices a VERY bloody Goodman lying in the bathroom with a shard of mirror sticking out of his neck. Goodman manages to get out that a nun did this. Eunice, meanwhile, is confronting Arden with Goodman’s evidence, but tells him she’s taken care of it, although she has hidden some evidence herself in case he tries to double-cross her. Arden insists that he isn't a monster, he’s a visionary and the Nazi hunters are just "money-grubbing Jews", which kinda damages his case. Eunice tells him he just needs to trust her “with your entire soul” and everything will work out. Meanwhile, Jenny is up to her old tricks, having murdered her entire family and again dispassionately giving the story about the man with a beard and a brown coat being the culprit. Back in his torture room, Thredon starts to cut off Lana’s clothes while still wearing the mask. He admits that he’s been watching Lana for some time now, going back to when Lana first took an interest as Kit was initially brought in by the police. Lana, sensing her only option, tells him that she understands and that she doesn't want him to feel guilty because a mother’s love is unconditional. She calls him her baby and Thredson tearfully removes the mask before cuddling up to her like an infant and starting to nurse from her breast. In the modern day, cops pull down the three bodies and report that the call came from Leo’s phone. They find Leo, sans arm, in the next room. Suddenly, a phone rings. It’s in another room, being held by Leo’s arm. The detectives answer it and hear the man’s voice, who says he only killed the impostors  Cut to another torture room and another Bloody Face, standing over Teresa who is strapped to a table.

Next week – Sister Eunice gets wicked and apparently there’s an angel? Sure. Why not.