Great Again (American Horror Story)

"Great Again"
American Horror Story episode
Episode no.	Season 7 Episode 11
Directed by	Jennifer Lynch
Written by	Tim Minear
Production code	7ATS11
Original air date	November 14, 2017 (2017-11-14)
Running time	45 minutes
Guest appearances
Adina Porter as Template:AHSCharacter Annie Ilonzeh as Erika Dennis Cockrum as Herbert Jackson Cameron Cowperthwaite as Speedwagon Cooper Dodson as Oz Mayfair-Richards Liz Jenkins as Gloria Whitmore

"Great Again" is the eleventh episode and season finale of the seventh season of the anthology television series American Horror Story. It aired on November 14, 2017, on the cable network FX. The episode was written by Tim Minear, and directed by Jennifer Lynch.

Plot

A SWAT team storms the Anderson basement on the night that the cult intends to massacre one-hundred pregnant women. Months later, Beverly pays Ally a visit at the Butchery. Ally divulges to Beverly that the FBI approached her to become an informant while she was in the psychiatric hospital. Beverly becomes a key advisor to Ally’s Michigan Senate campaign. Kai escapes from a maximum security prison with the help of a guard named Gloria and infiltrates a televised political debate between Ally and her opponent. After spewing a misogynistic tirade, Kai points a gun to Ally’s head. He discovers that the gun is unloaded after pulling the trigger. Gloria had spoken with Ally earlier and agreed to sabotage Kai. Beverly shoots him in the head. Ally obtains the vast majority of the female vote and becomes a senator. One night thereafter, Ally tucks Oz into bed, dons an emerald SCUM cloak, and departs to attend a meeting with a group of “empowered women who want to change the system”.

Reception

"Great Again" was watched by 1.97 million people during its original broadcast, and gained a 1.0 ratings share among adults aged 18–49.

The episode received mostly positive reviews from critics. On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, "Great Again" holds a 71% approval rating, based on 14 reviews with an average rating of 7.36 out of 17.

Tony Sokol of Den of Geek gave the episode a 4 out of 5, saying "[the episode] is as subtly effective as the season has been peripherally horrific. Real life settings, secret organizations, crypto-SuperPACs and brown shirted thugs pick at the scabs of deep-seated conspiratorial paranoia. Politicians are every bit as scary as sad clowns and serial killers, and they have the power to affect more lives. That's pretty frightening, and fear is trust. But the season ends on a reassuring note for horror fans as we see Ally fitting herself in the cloak of the cult she now leads."

Kat Rosenfield from Entertainment Weekly gave the episode a A. She particularly enjoyed the last confrontation between Ally and Kai, saying it was what "we need and deserve". She also praised Kai's death scene, commenting that it was about "as satisfying an act of vengeance as we’ve gotten on this series, ever." Finally, even if she mentioned that the end would have been fine without it, she appreciated the final twist of the episode. Vulture's Brian Moylan gave the episode a 4 out of 5, with a positive review, commenting "This rather strong season was different, and so it necessitated a different kind of ending. It’s less of a frightfest than it is a fantasy." Despite thinking that the shape of the episode was "strangely convoluted", he particularly enjoyed Paulson's performance and so the character of Ally, her development and her dynamic with Adina Porter's Beverly.

Matt Fowler of IGN gave the episode a 5.8 out of 10, with a mixed to negative review. He said "Cult continued with Kai's boring endgame misogyny, that only really started for real last week, and turned everything into a screaming showdown between him and Ally as they verbally volleyed tired memes and platitudes, undercutting some of the more interesting ideas that the season began with. Revenge is always sweet, but Kai had to go nuts and lose a lot of his edge, becoming quite boring in the process, in order to lose all he'd built up."

External links

• "Great Again" at IMDb