The Part Of American Horror Stories' Ba'al That Makes Absolutely No Sense To Fans
"American Horror Stories" continues to chug along with another one-off terror tale. The latest installment — a Billie Lourd-starring episode entitled "Ba'al" — operates in that "Rosemary's Baby" space in which the horror stems from motherhood. In short, "Ba'al" is a story of Liv Whitley (Lourd), a woman who will do anything to become a mother — including using a demonic-looking idol unexpectedly gifted to her by Bernadette (Virginia Gardner) at the fertility clinic.
As you might expect, things go awry very quickly, but maybe not in the way you might predict. Yes, Liv begins seeing and hearing a demonic figure as both her husband Matt (Ronen Rubinestein) and therapist Dr. Berger (Vanessa Williams) insist there's nothing to fear. But the (first) twist is that none of what Liv is experiencing is real. Matt is an actor who is secretly having an affair with Bernadette, and, together with their other friends in the industry, they hatch a plan to drive Liv crazy and take all her money. The demonic Ba'al totem is fake, one of the actors dresses as a demon, another uses a fog machine, and they even go so far as to drug Liv. At one point Matt even gets Liv to stab him so she'll be institutionalized.
There's a lot about Matt and his friend's plan which feels a bit overwrought, but there's one specific aspect that has fans of "American Horror Stories" scratching their heads.
Why make a plan involving a baby at all?
There are effectively two competing motivations in "Ba'al": Liv's desire to have a baby and Matt's desire to take Liv for everything she's worth. In the end, it's pretty clear who is the victor, but, even after the first twist, it kind of feels like Liv technically got her way. Even though Liv is in an institution with no immediate means of escape and Matt and his friends appear to be rich, there's one obvious problem — with Liv out of the picture, Matt still has to take care of this child he never wanted. "American Horror Stories" fans are more than a bit curious why Matt and Liv wind up having a baby — they're also wondering why Matt's scheme ever involved pretending to want a child in the first place.
"He didn't want to have the baby, so why go through that whole scheme?" Reddit user andychicago asked. "That makes no sense. All he had to say was that they cooked up the plan after she wouldn't drop the baby thing."
Within the narrative, we are told that Liv is desperate for a child, and, as far as Matt goes, he does apparently take steroids hoping that will prevent him from being fertile. That being said, it feels as though the four rounds of in vitro fertilization the pair attempt would have either still worked or, at the very least, the doctors would have caught on that there was a chemical element to Matt's infertility. Whether or not one unwanted child is a worthwhile price to pay for what appears to be limited wealth could be an episode of "American Horror Stories" in an of itself. In the meantime, if you want to find out where "Ba'al" goes after its first twist, the episode is streaming now on Hulu.