American Horror Stories S01 E04 – The Naughty List
Bro House, a group of four influencers/clout chasers/morons, are a very unlikeable crew. Their first instance of being absolute idiots is, upon spotting a man who is considering jumping off a bridge, film the event in the hope of hitting further streaming heights. Of course, it backfires horribly, resulting in loss of sponsors and viewership.
Attempts to realign their content and steady the subscriber ship fair equally unsuccessful, and distasteful, until the harassment of a shopping mall Santa’s grotto Christmas elf catches the attention of the Santa (a terrifying yet underused Danny Trejo). You see, it turns out that this Santa isn’t the one that was supposed to be working the grotto. He was in fact murdered and replaced by Trejo, who just happens to be the pagan Santa Claus, and really has no time to for dickheads….
Although the episode centres around four protagonists, The Naughty List makes it very difficult to make us sympathetic towards these really unlikeable protagonists. You’re left a little confused as you root for the murderous villain and not the main characters. But for horror fans the killer-hunts-and-murders-one-by-one sequence is fun, and pushes the boundaries for violence in a TV show. It is also nicely shot, reflecting the viewpoints from equally annoying influencers such as the Paul brothers and Jimmy Donaldson. Anyone got the number of a certain pagan Santa?