Fake news ’til you make news: AHS: Cult episode 6 recap

As we hit the season’s midpoint, American Horror Story: Cult serves up explosive reveals, terrifying twists, and tons of deceptively fake news.

We open this week’s episode of American Horror Story: Cult with a terrifying reminder of the horror of this world with a political rally that has ended in bloodshed. Kai is giving a speech, as he’s still campaigning for city council (in case you forgot like I did). We hear gunshots in the background, and Harrison takes off running, but Ivy is frozen in terror. Cops swarm the rally, begging for the perpetrator to drop the gun. People are all over the ground in varied states of being wounded, and when the camera finally pans to the shooter, it’s none other than a frazzled looking Ally. Kai lays on the stage, seemingly dead.

We have a mini flashback to last week’s episode, when Meadow begged Ally to help save her from the cult and outed its members to her (namely, her wife Ivy). Only this time, we watch the aftermath of that revelation. Ally seems done being afraid and starts getting angry. She takes a call from Dr. Vincent. Ally admits she can’t trust Ivy or anyone anymore. She assures the doctor that she’s not crazy, again, and explains that she’s definitely being targeted and thinks Ivy might be in on it. Dr. Vincent reminds her to play it safe because lawyers might use this against her in her custody battle. She says she’ll just go to sleep, but uh-oh oops instead she grabs a knife and sneaks across the street.

She snoops and fiddles with entrances until she makes her way into the neighbors’ house, where she hears Harrison and Detective Samuels. She crawls over to some pants on the ground and grabs a set of keys, unlocks the garage, and frees Meadow from the literal ties that bind her. Unfortunately, Meadow accidentally causes a stir and the men hear them. Harrison tries to stop the women from leaving, but Ally pepper sprays him. Meadow steals her own car, and they head to the vacant restaurant.

Ally suggests they hide out there until they figure out a new plan; Meadow wants to leave the country. Ally refuses to leave without Oz. She then demands that Meadow tell her what’s going on with the so-called cult. She tells Meadow to convince her, and Meadow reminds her that they’ve been getting into her house pretty easily. Meadow tells Ally that Ivy had gotten into the cult to make her wife crazy, perhaps because she’d voted for Jill Stein. Apparently, the whole point of this cult is to prepare for the takeover, which is horrifying and vague.

Ally still doesn’t believe or fully understand, so Meadow lays out the way Kai works. She starts by explaining that you can’t just join the cult — Kai must choose you. Then, we flashback to December 2016, where Meadow’s voiceover admits she’s in love with Kai. In the flashback, Kai tells Meadow that she’s better than anyone, and she says that he’d made her feel like she was the only person in the world.

Admittedly, Kai targeted Meadow because of her desperate desire to have it all, and he made her feel invincible despite her failures in life. After a few scenes of very scary “bliss” between Kai and Meadow, which include carrying out terrible crimes together, we watch as Meadow overhears Kai telling Ivy the exact same romantic, sweet-talky thing he’d told her to get her to trust him and join the cult. Meadow tries to leave, but not before going on a rant to the rest of the cult about how what they’re doing is absolutely nuts and can’t possibly lead to world domination. Kai tells Harrison that he needs to call the cops, because “something terrible has happened to your wife.”

It’s then that Harrison ties Meadow up. After Kai tells her she’s worthless, Harrison and Detective Samuels dump her into the shallow backyard grave that Ally had found her in. Back in the present, Meadow assures Ally that since the cops are in on the cult and won’t offer any help, the only way to stop Kai is to kill him.

At a council meeting in April, we see Kai preaching to the people that change needs to come at the local level. He also tries to instill fear in them by bringing up the murders, but a citizen, Sally (Mare Winningham!), calls him out with facts! She admits that the crimes he’d reminded the crowd of (the murder of the former councilman, the coffin murders, etc.) need to be dealt with, but everything’s generally okay in the world. She accuses him of simply trying to get them on his side by making them scared. She then announces that she’s going to declare a write-in candidacy and challenge him. Before she leaves, she tells him that “a young man’s certainty is also his burden — I’m gonna relieve you of both” and he stares at her threateningly.

In another flashback to the day after the election, Ivy is panicking to Winter about the man, Gary, who’d they’d tied up to prevent from voting. Winter brings her to Kai, who asks to be left alone with Ivy. He puts his pinky up and Ivy, who used to be sane and regular, refuses. But Kai scares her into sitting with him, reminding her that she could be arrested any minute because of what she did to Gary. She finally takes his stupid pinky.

After some intimidation, Ivy admits that her greatest fear is sleeping next to her wife. Kai asks when she began to despise her, and Ivy tells the story of Oz’s birth. She talks about her jealousy of Ally having been able to carry Oz because she could not. Ivy admits that since he’d been born, she’d felt like Ally was trying to keep him as her own. Kai asks Ivy if she’d be interested in his “young, hot sister,” and Ivy says only if she’d also be able to keep her son, who is the only reason she’d been staying in her marriage. Kai asks her if she’s ever considered murdering Ally, and then suggests that instead, they make sure no lawyer would ever consider giving Ally custody of their child.

In the present, Ally shows up at Dr. Vincent’s with Meadow, hoping that she’ll spill all the details of the cult to him and he’ll document it, giving solid proof for a lawyer that she’s not just crazy. She leaves in a frenzy, and Meadow and Dr. Vincent kinda just look at each other and I want to barf.

On the other side of town, Ally shows up at Sally’s house and gets her to let her in basically by explaining she owns the best restaurant in town. Ally quickly and manically (is there any other way at this point?) tells her everything about the cult. She breaks down the crimes, the trucks, etc., and cites Meadow as a source to corroborate her story since she’d escaped the cult.

Sally doesn’t believe her at first, but soon starts to roll a joint and speak super brilliantly about how the patriarchy is all to blame for Kai’s behavior. She admits that Kai needs to be humiliated in order to be stopped, and tells Ally that she’ll work with her to beat Kai. Ally wants to take her to see Meadow, and as they discuss it, the clowns break into the house. Sally tells Ally to stay calm. Ally fails at this, so Sally grabs a gun. She dares the clowns to make a move on her so she can make an example of them.

They quickly attack her, and Kai skulks in. She reminds him that killing her won’t stop progress, but he goes on to berate her for being an intellectual. He then hacks her Facebook to write a political status that doubles as a suicide note. She tells him that no one will believe it, and he says “Of course they will — it’s on Facebook,” at which point my heart fell out of my body.

Kai shoots Sally, and Ally, elsewhere in the house, screams out in terror. A clown sneaks around looking for her, but she stays hidden in the bathroom until it finally enters. Ally looks her up and down and, though she has a scary elephant-with-teeth mask on, she still recognizes the clown as Ivy. Ivy closes the door and leaves with the cult.

Ally returns to Dr. Vincent’s to tell him what had just happened and to ensure him that Ivy is involved. He tells Ally that he’d let Meadow leave, because Kai called Meadow, and she told Dr. Vincent that she’s not in trouble. In the present again, Dr. Vincent really doesn’t believe Ally, and he again suggests that she check herself in to a place that can help her. Instead, she curses him out and leaves.

We’re back to our opening scene, and Kai is ranting at the crowd. Ally makes her way through the and spots Meadow, who is holding a gun. Meadow shoots several members of the crowd, and Ally begs her to stop. As she gets off the ground to finally wrestle the gun out of Meadow’s hands, Meadow shoots herself in the mouth, and Ally is left standing alone, holding the gun herself. The cops show up.

We get another flashback to Kai and Meadow in the closet right after she’d been tied up by Harrison, cutting her free and praising her for being the only person in the world who understands him. He tells her that she’s the only one who can help elevate him to the next level — which involves her shooting him so he goes to the hospital and is then brought back to life. He then instructs her to go to Ally and to admit everything so that the truth can hide in plain sight.

We’re back at the scene of the crime. Meadow lays dead, Ally is taken away in handcuffs, Ivy looks distraught and horrified, and Kai, on a gurney, gives a gross monster’s smile.

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This episode was super intense, incredibly relevant, unbelievably chock-full of revelations, and something I need to watch over and over but don’t ever want to have to endure again. Tune in next week, where Ally’s fate will be revealed and I will hopefully be okay with it.