Round Two: Scream Queens

Scream Queens: Season 1, Episode 3 “Chainsaw” (C-)

I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I wanted to like this show, but I was willing to give it a chance since I do remember that Ryan Murphy and his creative partners can be bitingly clever when they want to. Unfortunately, this show is just too absurd without enough payoff, and I don’t feel like I need to see people getting their arms cut off on a weekly basis especially if everyone who’s still alive is going to react by acting even less intelligently. Almost everything involving the Kappa house is nauseating, and incorporating other characters, like the idiotic boys who make suggestions like that Chanel pray for her pledges to be murdered so that she can go back to being popular, isn’t helping at all. It’s hard to get a read on just about everyone, particularly Dean Munsch, whose decision to come live in the Kappa house for a week with her absurd noise machine playlist was forced at best. Her being a third wheel to Wes and Gigi on their date was actually more tolerable, though I do question Wes’ commitment to tracking his daughter’s every movement, opting to teach a class he knew nothing about and then fretting when he realized he didn’t know where she was. Chanel #3 confessing that her father is Charles Manson was weird but about par for the course on this show. It didn’t take long for Hester to get made over, and I’m sure that won’t last too long. The one tolerable part of this show, for whatever reason, is Niecy Nash, who to me is far more Emmy-worthy than she was on “Getting On,” in a role that embraces the preposterousness of this show. I don’t think I’ll be back for take three.