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American Horror Story: Coven - Final Chapter, “The Seven Wonders” - Early Review

29 Jan 2014

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If I live to see the seven wonders,
I’ll make a path to the rainbows end,
I’ll never live to match the beauty again…

If you thought the Coven finale could kick off with something other than Stevie Nicks twirling through the academy belting out her Fleetwood Mac hit “Seven Wonders”, you surely do not know Ryan Murphy. As the white witch makes her second (and last) appearance on the show before the opening credits roll, we glimpse each of the remaining witches hoping to be named the next Supreme. Tonight's episode, appropriately titled “The Seven Wonders”, is a strong finish to an uneven but always entertaining season. While some stories wrapped up last week (don’t expect Kathy Bates or Angela Bassett to pop up tonight) there is still a lot to get through in this finale, and with Douglas Petrie helming the script and Alfonso Gomez-Rejon directing, we’re certainly in good hands. The reveal of the next Supreme comes not without a price, as some witches fall trying to prove themselves - nor is it simply the end of the story. Murphy & Petrie crafted an ending that should please most fans of the season, tying together what they could and still throwing in a few surprises. Here’s your early look at the final chapter of American Horror Story: Coven.

As Zoe, Queenie, Misty and Madison prepare to attempt the seven wonders, each deals differently with the compounding fears and pressures. While at first it seems the tests may take an entire episode to cover, I was surprised at how quickly we began to run through them - and how early the first witch died as a result of failure to achieve a task. Fans of certain characters may be shocked how quickly their bet for Supreme falls out of the race. While the reveal of who is indeed Fiona’s successor may not come as a complete surprise, it really is done well. As many characters felt under-used throughout the season, I’m glad to report that in the finale at least a batch of them were able to get proper send-offs with storylines that seemed to come full circle. Cordelia, in particular, was a character I always wished we had gotten more of, and in the after-math of her mother's betrayal and death as well has her quest to find the coven’s next leader, Sarah Paulson is really given time to shine tonight.

Still, I can’t say I love how many questions are left unanswered or how many quick-fixes are laid down to cover up plot-holes or dropped stories. Spalding is seen ever-so-briefly in the finale, no mention of the baby he is keeping in the attic or what will become of him now that the new Supreme has been named. He literally just shows up to dispose of a body (hint: it’s a witch!). Ditto for Kyle, the man/monster/watchdog/sextoy who finishes out the season how he spent every episode past #3 - completely useless. Yes, technically he moves the plot along at one point tonight, but his story is given pretty much no closure and the stuff with Zoe and Madison continues to unfold aimlessly. Like Misty Day, I wish Kyle had been examined deeper - to me they were two characters with exciting inceptions but poor execution. Still, at least as Misty tries to prove herself as the next Supreme, we have enough background to want to cheer for her. Kyle exists within the universe with no purpose other than to drive Madison to the occasional hissy-fit (she certainly is not lacking in those tonight).


The cast here remains the most exciting part of this series, particularly for those of us who have followed the anthology throughout each of its incarnations. To me, Coven does not even hold a candle to Murder House or Asylum in terms of writing and realization, but the cast is always one of the best and most enjoyable on TV. I will admit to writing Gabourey Sidibe off as a one-trick pony after her Oscar-nominated turn in “Precious”, but her work throughout the season - despite never really being put in the spotlight - certainly disproved me. Jessica Lange indeed makes a brief but incredibly memorable appearance in the finale. Does that mean she’s alive? Not necessarily. Telling you how it unfolds would take the fun out of it. Rest assured, though - dead or alive, Lange knocks it out of the park. Frances Conroy is also given several great moments as Myrtle Snow, though some may find her wrap-up a tad ridiculous. At least she’s given an integral part tonight rather than simple comic relief. Fans of her work should be pleased to see her part escalated beyond the wacky house-guest.

Overall, Coven wraps up just about as well as you could hope it would. There is enough uneasiness, scares and surprises to keep the entire hour moving at a brisk pace and the emotional weight is certainly turned up a notch as the witches near the end of their story. If the previous 12 episodes had followed a more cohesive path, much of tonight’s pay-off would have felt even better. Tonight's episode (in certain parts) gets a bit heavy-handed again with the witches-as-minorities metaphor. We’ve gotten it all along. No need to shove it down our throats now. Asylum always comes to mind as a mini-series that perfectly wrapped up its many arcs without over-explaining it all. “The Seven Wonders” still does an admirable job, especially considering the sometimes rocky path to its finale. I cannot say thank you enough to all the readers who followed my previews all season - thanks for always checking back! Be sure to leave some final thoughts in the comments, let us know what you’re excited for, who you THINK the Supreme is, and check back after the episodes airs to let us what you think of the finale.


Final Thoughts:
- The last scene (and some of the lead-up) reminded me a lot of the “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” series finale. Particularly the final shot.
- Had the season had a tighter reign on the stories and characters earlier in the year, these great last few episodes would have been even more brilliant.
- No clue what’s coming up next season. I kept my eye open for clues and I’ve got… nothing. One of the “personal hells” explored tonight takes place in a High School though. Hint?

Stuff You’ll Love:
- Stevie Nicks. Just because.
- The Magic! We finally really see what all of these witches are capable of tonight. From trips to hell to a quicky-off-the-rails game of tag, the witchcraft takes center stage.
- The crowning of the next Supreme. We’ve waited all season and the reveal should please most fans. The aftermath also allows for a proper full-circle ending to the Coven arc.
- The wrap-up. Aside from a few plotlines which I mostly lost hope for a few weeks back, the important stuff is all given a satisfying ending. There’s a character or two that I wish would have made it to the finish, but this is American Horror Story. I’d be more disappointed if no one died.

American Horror Story: Coven airs its final episode, “The Seven Wonders”, tonight on FX. Follow me on Twitter for continued updates on all my other SpoilerTV work. Enjoy the show!

39 comments:

  1. Thanks Max, glad you enjoyed it.


    Here's hoping for a great Season 4 with some of the same cast

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  2. I cant tell yopu how much i am exited for this, AHS has ebcome one of my favorites series every season they do a great job like you said this may not be the best season but surely was entertained to watch... I like you i can never see the clues no mater how many tiems i watch the episode never seemed to find them!

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  3. Thanks for the preview.
    I'm really sad it's ending, I really loved most of the season.

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  4. "Sarah Paulson is really given time to shine tonight. "
    Yes yes yes!
    Thanks for the early review as always!
    Hope to see you next year!

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  5. I just feel like character arcs were almost non-existent this year. Everything was so inconsistent. The terror was gone. There was barely anyone to root for, and when you'd start to get invested in a character, they'd disappear for two weeks or be completely pushed aside. Stories morphed week to week. There were so many plots that came up then disappeared or just weren't explained. With Asylum I felt every character had relevance to a central story, one that wasn't so heavy-handed and preachy either, mind you. I just found it so much more compelling and because of that, even in all the darkness, even funnier. (I prefer dark humor to the cheese parts of Coven indulged).

    But as I've said, the joy of an anthology series is that different things will please different people. I found the writing for the most part to be downright terrible this season (even stuff tonight made me laugh out loud, AKA Zoe's version of hell & Cordelia speaking to the press). Still enjoyable. High hopes for S4.

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  6. Thanks for the great preview!

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  7. So if the ending is reminiscent of Buffy, I'm guessing it turns out they all have the power to be supremes or something?

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  8. That or they blow up the coven house or the entire city!!! :P

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  9. So Fiona is probably dead....that makes me sad... :(

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  10. That was actually a guess I had... but not quite. There's only one supreme, but you'll see what I mean once you watch.

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  11. My pleasure, thank you for reading & commenting!

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  12. So Fiona is probably dead...that makes me sad :( Great preview!

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  13. Just tell me who is the SUPREME,plz!

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  14. If you've seen season 1, for example, The Harmon family were all characters you could root for (perhaps not Ben). As they slowly convinced Vivian that she was insane, you empathized and it made the situation horrifying because, despite the supernatural, it felt real. The story was so well layered and built towards one moment - the birth of her child and each of the ghosts intentions to take it, then how that played out. This season just felt aimless to me and most of the characters hollow.

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  15. Oh, I really don't have this point of view of season 1, I found it very disappointing compared with Asylum which, to me, is the best season so far ^^

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  16. Well, I've got mixed feelings between season 1 and 3 because I love Witches and don't like Ghosts because I'm a bit paranoiac but to me, AHS = scary and S3 is not scary at all, if it were I think it would've been my second choice in choosing which season I liked most. S2 being the first choice of course!

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  17. Started with Zoe. I still say Zoe is or should be the next Supreme. Didn't Cordelia live an entire life without doing the seven wonders. Four girls do the trial.

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  18. mmmm how can there be a crowning if some/most/all witches die? :O "I’d be more disappointed if no one died."

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  19. I think that the one who dies is Zoe, if you see the promo Spalding is shown looking at her or her body like he is going to dipose it

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  20. Patience... good Lord.

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  21. Awesome! Pretty much what i expected anyway, but nonetheless, still absolutely fabulous!!! I am goin to be going thru some serious withdrawal for the next couple weeks, ugh!!!

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  22. Noneofyourbusiness30 January 2014 at 02:01

    Since next season is set in 1950, I think Harrison Renard's reference to "sometimes I feel like I'm trying to rid the State Department of Communists" in "Protect the Coven" might have been a clue.

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  23. I thought he was looking at Misty's body...

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  24. Cordelia or Misty for Supreme!

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  25. Very good catch, potentially. When I watch the finale back tonight I'm gonna keep an eye open for clues

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  26. i don't think there is a chance for Cordelia , remember that the next Supreme must be healthy and she insn't because she has problems to conceive a child

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  27. DAMN! Should've bet you on that. My bad

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  28. The season finale was no less then amazing. Loved every aspect of the story line.Particularly the end with Fiona living out her live long days in the cabin in the woods, with a man she doesn't want to settle down with. Amazing ending.

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  29. Ironically enough S1 is my least favorite...And for now S3 is my favorite (but that'll probably wear off)...But I just looove this deep disturbed psychological vibe that S2 had...I WAS AFRAID TO WATCH AT SOME POINTS last year. So there's that.
    Throwing my hat into the ring. (I love all the season though.)

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  30. I have a question (I am studying English Philology and we have only discussed the local color this week) : Was Ryan Murphy somehow influenced by The Yellow Wallpaper? It only just hit me. Now come to think of it Vivian's story is a lot like the one presented by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, I mean the protagonist's wife was her doctor after all...and we all know Ben was a shrink.

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  31. It turned out to be Madison!

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  32. " just feel like character arcs were almost non-existent this year. Everything was so inconsistent. The terror was gone. There was barely anyone to root for, and when you'd start to get invested in a character, they'd disappear for two weeks or be completely pushed aside. Stories morphed week to week. There were so many plots that came up then disappeared or just weren't explained. With Asylum I felt every character had relevance to a central story, one that wasn't so heavy-handed and preachy either, mind you. I just found it so much more compelling and because of that, even in all the darkness, even funnier. (I prefer darker humor to the cheese that Coven often indulged)."


    Argumentatively, and I haven't seen Asylum to make the great comparison, but it could be a motif in that "witchcraft" story is meant to be fluent, lyrical, abstract, unpredictable, and yet transforming. It's mythical and yet urban legend-ish. There was a fantastic sense of genre blending too! I liked not knowing what was going to pan out, how not everything was explained, and how you never knew what the truth of the matter was. It made it dreamy and mysterious, which psychologically is scary, just not in a traditional horror in your face way, but a haunting way.

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  33. Psychologically season 2 is terrifying. Both season 1 & 2 had questions unanswered and mythology left unexplained, but of course that's par for any series... the major problem for me this year was lack of terror and lack of characters to follow. The writing for the characters in season 2 was incredible, you felt their journey every step of the way, you were sad for them, terrified of what was happening to them - it's hard to explain since you haven't seen it, but what I loved was that they mixed top-notch cable drama with real, genuine terror. I haven't seen that on TV in a long time, if ever. This season, personally, felt like Ryan Murphy took a bunch of cool ideas + actors he wanted to work with and jumbled it all together. So the results were mixed. The lighter tone and mix of almost soapy storylines just didn't work for me overall. Enjoyable, but not something I'll watch again. I've already revisited both Murder House & Asylum since they aired.

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  34. the hair looks like zoe's

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  35. Asylum is also my favorite BY FAR of the 3. Season 3 doesn't come close to the first 2 for me.

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  36. I certainly wouldn't want characters to be perfect. I like characters that are flawed but that you can relate to or understand. These characters were mostly all just stereotypes without any real fleshing out. They bent with the plot. I thought Kyle could have been SO interesting.. and we literally know nothing of Zoe's past except for her random evil vag... aside from Fiona everyone felt thrown together for me, and even she was very back-and-forth and sort of random at times.

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  37. I only saw the first six episodes. I didn't like it (it takes a lot for me to abandon ship).

    I understand what you're saying and I agree it's hard to root for any one characters for a long period of time, but to me, that's what I relate to best, the idea that none of them are "perfect" or completely good and that they are all motivated by very different things. I think the Fleetwood Mac aspect is like you said, expresses a kind of "non-containment", -a drifter-gypsy element (a glimpse into the history of something intangible), but I can't say it's aimless until I see the finale. I think the characters are mostly "shallow" or vein, but that's what I think makes the story compelling or interesting is their obvious flaws and the comedic irony that comes with that, because depending on how it ends, makes a statement about those things...chosen, or survival of the fittest, or a time for everything, or does it "all come down to you?"

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  38. I liked it but it didn't blow me away like I hoped it would. (although I LOVED the beginning with Stevie)
    Kinda disagree about Kyle but can't go into detail too much here.


    Anyway this season was way better than S2 even though it felt a bit messed up at some points. As you said it's always been entertaining no matter how stupid it was and I hope S4 can achieve the same.

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