The angel of death is beautiful and sympathetic this episode.

WHAT a show it was this week. "Dark Cousin" was immediately one of my favorite ever episodes of AHS the second that guest-star Frances Conroy appeared onscreen as a goth geisha and unfurled her feathered wings. YES.

It looks like after giving viewers a bit of history, American Horror Story: Asylum is getting back on track with the stories at hand.

"Dark Cousin" was an odd episode of American Horror Story: Asylum - and not in the normal American Horror Story freaky, scary or horrific way. It felt like a transitional hour that moved characters from one place to another.

Well, I guess it can't be rainbows and colostrum every week. This episode skipped a lot of the usual camp fun in favor of some goth shenanigans and serious carnage.

"Dark Cousin" had some pretty interesting connective tissue, but it faltered under some wicked moments of lunacy.

"Dark Cousin" never once made explicit reference to the sociopolitical strife of mid-sixties America... Still, the history was there in the subtext, and its concerns were dramatized.

Asylum appears to be setting up for a huge conflict between the forces of good and evil. Flawed good and evil, but evil anyway.

I may be crazy, but tonight's episode of American Horror Story: Asylum might just be the best yet. It was pulpy, it was soapy, it was creepy and gory; everything you want this show to be!

An episode that's a little all over the place but at least seems intent on moving forward, instead of confirming stuff we already know (as last episode did).