Who knew that an episode about dealing with heroin withdrawal could be heartwarming?
In its fifth episode, American Gothic finally shows the audience its heart. It may be a murder mystery where one of the main characters is probably a strangling psychopath who kills one-percenters, but it can hit the emotional beats all the same. Which makes the ending reveal (I can't really call it a twist, because who didn't see that one coming?) all the more horrible. This show is making us care about the characters, to the point where I don't want anyone in the Hawthorne family to be the killer. Can't it just be Mayor Conley? Please?
A programming note: for me, at least, the Republican National Convention ran long and the show came on at a strange time, so I wanted to first give everyone a basic summary of what happened for anyone who missed certain scenes:
We pick up where we left off, with Garrett maybe about to murder Christina, but he is stopped by the arrival of her nosy neighbor. Garrett freaks out at the interruption and breaks up with Christina.
Brady arrives at the loft just in time to stop Cam from shooting up. He warns Cam that he's the main suspect in the Silver Bells killing and drops him off at the Hawthorne house. Brady tells Tessa that he swiped Cam's syringe, but won't give it to the DNA lab unless she tells him it's ok. She tells him it's not ok. Brady leaves and Tessa, who's handled Cam's withdrawals before, calls Alison for reinforcements.
Meanwhile, Alison and Naomi are being blackmailed by a campaign staffer, Kimmie, who knows about their affair. Alison tells Naomi to take care of the problem and goes to help Cam. She arrives at the house at the same time as Garrett and the police. That's when all hell breaks lose.
Cam is having intense hallucinations during his withdrawal. He starts seeing his dead father, urging him to remember something about "the body". We are also treated to creepy images of Gunther as Cam's cartoon frog man and Jack reciting Holden Caulfield's favorite poem, Comin' Thro' the Rye with his toothy puppet. Cam can't tell reality from fantasy and hurts Tessa before being restrained.
Everyone is trying to get in touch with Madeline, who tells her children she's at the spa. In reality she's in Pennsylvania watching a waitress scam her customer out of ten bucks. Surprise! The waitress is her mother, a con artist and alcoholic who has been paid off to not be a nuisance to the family. She's the sender of the daisy postcard and tells Madeline that it's time for her to have a relationship with her grandchildren. Madeline gives her an ultimatum: visit her grandchildren or get paid double. Needless to say, Madeline drives away alone.
Garrett wants to help Cam through his withdrawal, but is frozen out by Alison, who still hasn't forgiven him for leaving without reason. When both Alison and Tessa are called away, he tries to help Cam by tying him to the sink and going to Christina for help. Christina gives him a prescription, but makes it clear she isn't happy with his freak-out the previous night.
The prescription makes it easier for Cam, but Alison is mad at Garrett about the whole "tying their brother to the sink" thing. Tessa gives Brady permission to test the syringe. Alison finds out that Naomi schemed to get the blackmailing staffer fired. Garrett finds Christina again and tells her he wants to be honest with her and show her something. Madeline comes back to help Cam, who seems to be in a better place but can't repress his memory anymore.
Cam remembers someone dragging a body down the staircase, and he finds a patched up baluster as proof that it wasn't just in his imagination. Just as Cam is facing the fact that someone close to him may be a murderer, Brady gives Tessa the bad news. Cam's DNA wasn't a match for the Silver Bells Killer, but it does prove that the DNA came from someone biologically related to him. Tessa is left in stunned silence.
The emotional crux of the episode is Madeline. Virginia Madsen is a wonderful actress and she's always played Madeline with the right mixture of motherly concern and maniacal manipulation, but the scene with her mother is a cut above the rest. You can tell as Madeline drives away, after having successfully bribed her mother into staying out of her life, that she's quietly devastated. This women is still hiding secrets, but this scene makes her motivations a little more transparent. Madeline had an absent mother, in spirit if not in fact, and she takes extreme control in her children's lives because she felt like that was what she was missing in her own. I think it's 100% clear that Madeline killed Mitchell to protect someone in the family, and while she is sad about, it's not a choice she would change.
Madeline's mother also sheds light on her relationship with Cam. She's not just trying to save her son from addiction, but trying to symbolically save her mother and give Jack a better childhood than the one she had. Her admission to Cam that her mother was (well is, it seems the children are under the impression that their grandmother is dead) an alcoholic genuinely surprises and touches him. For a moment, they understand each other. Madeline truly loves her son. Is it this particular love that led her to kill Mitchell? We don't know yet, but I can't wait to find out.
Meanwhile...this week in Brady: Brady is still, inexplicably, part of the Silver Bells task force. He seems to also have forgiven Tessa for her deception. No sign of Dana. She's probably off enjoying her boat.
Top Suspects of the Week:
The Hawthorne Women: Cam specifically hallucinates himself, his father, and Garrett, all dragging the body, which makes me think it's another red herring and it's his mother or one of his sisters.
Caleb: Madeline's mother mentions her past relationship with someone named Caleb. I'm sure that won't come back to haunt her in any way.
Mayor Conley: Please?
Caramel Watch: Absolutely no Caramel this week and no sign of his owner. This is unacceptable. We do have Gatsby, Christina's adorable dog, who may or may not (but probably didn't) save her from being killed by Garrett.
Let me know your own thoughts in the comments! Also, feel free to speculate as to what Caramel was up to this week instead of hanging around the Hawthorne family.
