Themes in American Horror Story: Asylum - Part I

American Horror Story: Asylum

A Critical Analysis of Significant Themes - Part I

When I first saw American Horror Story: Murder House, it was through Netflix. At the time, I didn't have cable (and I still don't) so I was unable to watch the FX series when it originally aired. After reading a concise synopsis of the show on Netflix instant, I decided to give it a chance. It seemed like something I would enjoy watching--ghosts, vengeful spirits, supernatural monsters! 

I expected a sub-par plot and decent acting and lots of sex...it is FX, after all. What I did not expect were the amazing performances by Jessica Lange and Evan Peters as Constance Langdon and Tate Langdon, respectively. In addition, although the plot was a bit convoluted and rushed in some episodes, overall it was thoroughly engaging.

The writing was just spectacular.

After watching the first season, I was both excited for and wary of the upcoming second season. I love the supernatural--demons, angels, monsters, ghosts, etc.,--but I don't care for aliens. In fact, the alien aspect of Asylum is what stopped me from watching if for so many months, over a year after the original air date. However, when it became available on Netflix as well as Amazon Prime, I decided to give it shot.

Best decision ever.

The plot not only exceeded my expectations but the character development and--oh, my goodness--the writing was just...there are no words, really...

I enjoyed every minute of Asylum. Yet, an English and WGS major, I couldn't help but notice the recurring subtle wit, historical factors, and themes within each scene. It was like visual literature--I couldn't get enough of it! With most tv series, the plot seems to dominate with character development and screen writing taking a back seat. This was not the case with Asylum.

Most of the people I have spoken to tend to favor Murder House over Asylum, stating that the latter did not satisfy their need for horror or supernatural elements as the former season did. However, once I begin pointing out all of the subtle themes that Asylum brings to the table--Science vs God, Nature vs. Nurture, Corrupt Ambition, Political Hierarchy, Female Oppression, etc.--the wheels begin to turn, forcing them to watch both season once more. After watching both seasons or just a few episodes from each, 80% of those I have spoken to have changed their tune with Asylum now their favorite season of American Horror Story. 

Down below is the first part of my four-part analysis of different themes within Asylum :

Themes

• The Demonization of Female Sexuality
• Nearly all of the female characters Asylum are victimized by society's views on female sexuality. Take Lana Winters, for example, who, after having been raped by and escaping from Oliver Thredson, is blamed for her own attack by an unstable man who commits suicide as well as the Devil through Sister Mary Eunice. Additionally, there is Grace who is committed to Briarcliff after killing her father who molested her years, and, after having sex with Kit Walker, she is ordered to be sterilized by Sister Jude. Here is a list of strong female characters who have been condemned because of their sexuality:

• Sister Jude (Judy Martin)

• Played by Jessica Lange, Judy Martin was a troubled woman who later became a nun. Presented to the audience in flashbacks, Judy was abandoned by her fiance after she contracted syphilis from him, leaving her unable to bear children. Despite the fact that Judy was willing to forgive him out of love, her betrothed insisted that she was lying to him and ended their relationship right before their wedding day. 
• Since then, Judy's life took on a downward spiral. There are several instances in which Judy frequently imbibes hard liquor until she becomes intoxicated, smokes, and attempts to seduce younger men in her older years which results in several drunken one night stands. 
• These scenes, however, are presented in such a way where the root of Judy's tragic descent is not revealed until much later. The viewer, having understood Jude to be a very strict and somewhat cruel character, is initially prompted to feel disgust at her hypocrisy and current condescending attitude. 
• In one scene, Judy pleads for a young man to take her home--presumably to his place for intimate relations, but the young man says that he can't because "the baby is asleep". 
• At this point, Jude has a sort of realization, confronted by her own neediness that had been born out of pain. 
• After a hit and run, Jude, racked with guilt and shame with her own life style, becomes a nun. However, the sexual oppression that comes along with such a life style makes Jude miserable--even if it does change her life for the better. As a nun, Jude enjoys a certain freedom and power, ruling Briarcliff with an iron fist. Nevertheless, she is constantly challenged by her male peers due to her sex. 

• She often wears a red slip/camisole under her habit and fantasizes about the Monsignor. 
• In a way, Jude's shame at her own sexual freedom--as dictated by society--moves her to suppress it in a guise of holy chastity; thus, she admires Sister Mary Eunice (pre-Satan possession) a great deal and loathes Shelly, who may remind Jude of her own past. 
• It is only when Jude, having been freed from both the Church and Briarcliff, takes up residence with Kit that she finally finds peace and happiness.
• Shelley

• The vilification of female sexuality is seen most explicitly with Shelley. Having found pleasure in masturbation around age five, Shelly's parents are horrified. They force her to wear mittens to bed so that she will not be tempted into touching herself. However, Shelley eventually runs away.
• After being stripped of her freedom and forced into the oppressive role of the domestic housewife (during the 1960s), Shelley's husband becomes abusive and neglectful. She resents the fact that her husband, a compulsive cheater, receives no societal reprimand for his behavior. At one point in the show, she argues with Arden, who deems her a slut, that men like sex but nobody ever calls a man a whore.
• When her husband catches her in bed with two men during fleet week, he has her admitted to Briarcliff under the diagnosis of nymphomaniac.
• In order to survive in Briarcliff, Shelley uses her notoriety in terms of sexual favors to manipulate the prison guards, specifically Carl.
• Dr. Arden, frustrated by Sister Mary Eunice's corruption, attempts to rape Shelley, taunting her that rape does not apply to whores.
• She is later mutilated by Arden in addition to having her legs amputated after she laughs at his micropenis when during her attempted rape.
• This scene is especially tragic since Shelley, in unimaginable pain, had become a sympathetic character, enduring Arden's abuse as a result of helping Lana, Kit, and Grace's attempted escape.
• Sister Mary Eunice

• Extremely innocent and a people-pleaser, Sister Mary Eunice took her vows after she was humiliated by a group of peers who tricked her into coming to a pool party completely nude. 
• Dr. Arden, a Nazi war criminal, fell in love with her due to her innocence, her life. However, after the Devil possesses Mary Eunice, Arden becomes repulsed by her. 
• Although he still loves Mary Eunice (apparent by his immolation) and becomes aware of her possession later on, his attraction for her seems to die when she rapes the Monsignor, shattering the illusion of virginity and chastity with which he had come to associate her. Hence, we have Freud's Madonna-whore complex**. 
• Lana Winters

• An independent and ambitious journalist, Lana Winters is also revealed to be a homosexual early on in the show. Her aggressive, determined, and tough personality which broke away from the social norm for women, along with her taboo sexuality, eventually lead to her unjust imprisonment at Briarcliff. 
• Because of her homosexuality, seen as both a perversion and an illness, Dr. Thredson consistently attempts to "cure" Lana, seeming to genuinely like her. He prompts her to associate the female body with disgust, and he urges her to masturbate (in front of him) to the sight of a deaf-mute's penis. 
• Later on, when Thredson is revealed to be Bloody Face, he humiliates and brutally rapes her. 
• Though there were several factors behind the rape, I believe that one of these factors stemmed from Thredson's need to make Lana the perfect maternal, heterosexual female.

• Nature vs. Nurture
• Subtly woven into the plot of Asylum is the question of whether people are who they are due to  innate biological/genetic factors or if society plays a large role in the construction of personal identity. 
• Oliver Thredson

• Having grown up in the system or foster care, Oliver grew up with a lack of maternal warmth, something he sorely resented throughout his life.
• While pursuing his psychology degree, Thredson realized his need for skin to skin contact, for mothering, when he first saw a female cadaver whom he realized would be about his mother's age. 
• After embracing the dead body, Thredson begins to murder women, using his surgical expertise in skinning them. 
• Appointed by the courts to evaluate Kit Walker, Oliver deceives him into confessing to the crimes in which Thredson committed. 
• Taking note of Lana's tenacious attitude and possible ability for maternal warmth--observed when he heard her say that Bloody Face was some woman's baby, not just a monster--he abducts her from Briarcliff under the guise of helping her. 
• When Lana realizes that Oliver is Bloody Face, he has her shackled in his basement, torturing her with the prospect of death, until she begins to feed into Oliver's delusions, giving him the (false) motherly love and attention he so desperately craves. 
• After several acts of sexual abuse and assault, Oliver's realization that Lana will never return his love because of her homosexuality, attempts to murder her. 
• Able to escape, however, Lana later learns that she is pregnant with Thredson's child and instantly despises the life growing inside of her, fearful that the child will not only grow up to learn that his father was a serial killer but that her child might also be predisposed to murderous tendencies due to his parentage.
• Johnny Morgan / Johnny Thredson

• As much as Lana desired to have an abortion when learning of her pregnancy, she was unable to do so for personal reasons. Therefore, upon giving birth, she gave Johnny away for adoption but lead the world to believe that her son had died in childbirth. 
• Like Thredson, Johnny yearned for his birth mother all of his life. What's more, in his early childhood, Johnny would kill and skin cats, horrifying his foster parents which would result in his constant moving from house to house and suggesting a strong relationship to his father through biological factors. 
• Presented to the viewer as a drug-addicted, alcoholic, violent ex-prisoner, (unlike his charming sociopath father), Johnny is also shown wanting "mother's milk" just like his father, going so far as to hire a hooker who recently gave birth whereas Thredson imitated this act on Lana while he kept her prisoner.
• He eventually confronts Lana with the intent to kill her evident. Yet, when Lana manipulates Johnny's emotions (just like she did with Oliver), he lets his guard down and she is able to retrieve his gun.
•  Taking responsibility for her role in Johnny's violent past and murderous deeds, she kills him as she did his father, refusing to allow him a chance to redeem himself in fear that he might revert to his murderous ways.
• Although nature vs. nature is present in Oliver's case, I think it is much more striking in Johnny's, having been brought up to believe that he was a product of evil while living a harsh reality in the foster care system. 

The themes in Part II will discuss the concepts of:

• Nature vs. God
• Religion and the Supernatural
• Corrupt Ambition

**In American Horror Story: Asylum, set in a mental asylum during the 1960s, a time when the field of psychoanalysis was in chaos, the repressed character Dr. Arthur Arden, as portrayed by James Cromwell, is fixated with a seemingly innocent and virtuous nun. When she later sexually propositions him, he bitterly defaces and then destroys a statue of the Virgin Mary (aka the Madonna), screaming "Whore!" at it accusingly. Earlier in the series, Arden had shown to subscribe to Freudian theory regarding feminine sexuality. (See "Madonna-Whore complex" wikipedia references)