This week on the season finale of American Horror Story: Coven a Stevie Nicks video starts playing, with her singing some song called Seven Wonders. This serves as the backdrop as we see Queenie, Madison, Misty, and Zoe preparing for the test of the seven wonders.

Myrtle and Cordelia oversee the tests. Cordelia explains that this may be the first time the seven wonders are used to name the new Supreme, not to confirm the incoming one. Fiona was supposed to find her replacement, but instead tried to kill anyone she thought might be the new Supreme.

The tests begin, and all four pass the first two. Misty is unable to return from Hell during the third test, and dies. This leaves Madison, Zoe, and Queenie.  During the transmutation test, the three play a game of tag, finally having fun for the first time in forever. Cordelia warns them to be careful, and lo and behold, Zoe somehow ends up spiked on top of the fence.

Zoe is near death, and Queenie tries to bring her back to life, but is unable. I guess this means Queenie is out of the running for Supreme. Cordelia tries to guilt Madison into doing it, but Madison gives them an ultimatum – make her the Supreme or she’ll leave. Zoe is dead, and Madison doesn’t care. They all knew the risks going in.

Fiona delivers a quite uninspired eulogy for Nan, and Cordelia talks with Myrtle about again trying to get rid of Fiona.  Queenie arrives with Delphine, who has been put back together.  Everyone is surprised to see the both of them, as Queenie was believed to have died during the attack at the beauty parlor, and Marie had told Queenie to burn Delphine’s head.

Hank’s father has had his men arrange it so that it is never known that Hank was the shooter at the salon.  He also wants to buy the coven off so that his company can recover.  He vows to kill the witches after he gets what he wants.

The first part of this episode is a narrative by Delphine, which ends with her having a black handyman tied up in the attic room.  She first discovered the joy of killing slaves when she first arrived in New Orleans.  She has felt unfulfilled as of late, and figures that killing again will bring her vitality back.

Zoe uses her magic to find out that Fiona and Marie killed Nan in the tub.  Madison has become jealous that Zoe fell in love with Kyle, and tries to hurt Zoe by seducing Kyle in front of her.  Kyle refuses and says he loves Zoe.  Madison is furious, and vows to take Kyle apart, since she was the one who put him together in the first place.

Back in 1833, Madame LaLaurie scares away a potential boyfriend of her daughter. Her three daughters conspire to kill her. Somehow she hears of their plan, and has them brought down to her torture basement. She killed her own daughters, and now they are part of the zombie troupe attacking the house.

Luke goes outside, thinking the zombies are kids playing a prank. Meanwhile, Marie Laveau is levitating in her spell room. A random kid that is actually dressed like a zombie is killed by the real zombies. Luke gets axed in the back, and Nan runs outside to help him. They can’t make it back inside so they hide in a car.

Of course it doesn’t last long, and the zombies attack the car. Zoe distracts the zombies with some pots and pans, and now the zombies are after her. She hides in a crypt and sees something that draws her attention. It turns out it’s a chainsaw, and Zoe goes crazy cutting zombies to pieces, allowing Nan and Luke to escape inside.

Inside, Madame LaLaurie tries to connect with one of her zombie daughters. She seems receptive at first, but then starts choking LaLaurie. The zombie ends up in Queenie’s room. Queenie tries to defeat the zombie by hurting herself and projecting it on the zombie. Finally Madame LaLaurie kills her zombie daughter, and Queenie consoles her.

In 1961 New Orleans, a black boy is chased down by some angry white local men and hung in the woods. His mother works in Marie Laveau’s hair salon. As revenge, Laveau casts a spell, reanimating the dead, and releasing them on the murderers.

Spalding is shown having a creepy tea party in his room with a bunch of dolls when he hears some screaming. This is when he comes upon Fiona killing Madison. Fiona tells him it is her duty to stay vital, and that Spalding seems so much more wise without his tongue.

Fiona hears a crash and rushes outside to find Queenie bleeding and near death. The minotaur (I’ve been incorrectly calling him a mantaur – sorry folks, too much wrestling as kid) is still in the greenhouse. We’ll find out later that Fiona beheaded the minotaur, and sends the head to Marie Laveau.

Fiona wakes up Cordelia so they can help Queenie. They are too busy arguing about Marie Laveau, and Queenie passes out. Fiona breathes some breath into her, and Queenie regains consciousness. Fiona won’t let Cordelia call 911, telling her she needs to handle everything internally. They wouldn’t want a visit from The Council.

Zoe is still at Kyle’s house, trying to figure out what to do with him. She feels terrible about what he’s become. She makes him some food, and most likely laced it with rat poison. But when she comes back, Kyle is gone. On Halloween.

Fiona has a flashback to 1971. She is the Supreme apparent to the current Supreme, Anna-Lee. Anna-Lee feels that Fiona is too young and cocky to take the throne, and if she had her way, Fiona would never become the Supreme. Anna-Lee slaps Fiona, and Fiona slices her throat, killing her. A servant witnesses the murder, and as we come back to current time, he still works there. But Fiona implies that she cut out his tongue.

Zoe goes to see Kyle’s mom, who confesses to her that she was about to hang herself when Zoe called. Zoe tells her she will see Kyle again, and leaves, intent of bringing Kyle back to his mother.

Zoe returns to Misty and Kyle to see how is coming along. His wounds have healed a great deal, and it is clear that Misty has grown attached to Kyle. When Zoe says she wants to take him to his mother, Misty gets angry, saying Kyle is not ready. But Kyle clings to Zoe, so she takes him away. Misty is crying one second, and dancing to Stevie Nicks the next.

While he’s obviously more of a household name for creating and running 3 years of Fox’s hit high school musical series Glee, before that Ryan Murphy was known as the man who created Nip/Tuck. That series, obviously very different than Glee, was his real masterpiece, bringing 100 episodes of drama, horror, and intrigue.

Now that things look to be settling down for his series on Fox, their raunchier network sister station, FX, has picked up 13 episodes of Murphy and his co-creator Brad Falchuk’s American Horror Story. THR has the scoop on the premise and who we can expect to see on the show:

From 20th Television, the mysterious drama revolves around Ben and Vivien Harmon (The Practice’s Dylan McDermott, Friday Night Lights’ Connie Britton) who move their family from Boston to a haunted San Francisco home in an attempt to rebuild their family after a miscarriage and affair.

Murphy is said to be revising the initial script to increase the role of the nosy neighbor once Jessica Lange (Grey Gardens) signed on to the project in April. Denis O’Hare (True Blood) co-stars as Larry the Burn Guy, a former resident of the haunted estate; with Frances Conroy (Six Feet Under) and Alexandra Breckenridge (Life Unexpected) both playing Moira O’Hara, a housekeeper who has worked at the home for years and appears as a young woman to Ben and an older woman to Vivien.

If you’ve been following the marketing for Stone, you are no doubt poised to see a psychological thriller, of sorts. Unfortunately, Stone plays more like a  psychodrama than a psychological thriller.  The movie does a bang-up  job of establishing that something very, very  bad is going to happen.

Through music, imagery and a frightening  flashback we are conditioned to believe that there will be a showdown between good and evil.  I found myself on the edge of my seat, waiting for the proverbial shoe to drop, but it never does.

A strangely meandering story just sort of sputters out, and the film ends abruptly, prompting a “huh, you mean that was it?” It’s a pity, because there was a lot of potential in the movie.

Robert De Niro stars as Jack Mabry, a parole officer who works in a prison, reviewing cases to determine which inmates are qualified for a parole hearing.  He pores over the minutiae of each case, studies the files and conducts in-depth interviews with the potential parolees.  He is about to retire from his position when he is given one last case to review.

Edward Norton plays Gerald Creeson, who goes by the moniker “Stone.”  He is Jack’s last case. He has served ten years for arson, and he is starting to lose his mind within the confines of prison.  He is desperate to get out.  His sex-kitten wife Lucetta (Milla Jovovich) is also eager to have him back in her bed, and she is more than willing to use her sexuality to influence Jack’s decision.

By Shannon Hood and Jane Almirall

Each day we will provide you with capsule reviews and impressions of the films we see at Fantastic Fest, along with any activities or interviews we attend.  Complete reviews and interviews can be found on the site in upcoming weeks.

Day one of fantastic fest we hit the ground running and went straight from the airport to pick up our press badges.  We managed to cram in three screenings for the day, starting at 4pm.  Not too shabby.

Screening: Stone. Directed by John Curran and starring Edward Norton, Robert De Niro, Frances Conroy, and Milla Jovovich.  Summary: A convicted arsonist (Norton) looks to manipulate a parole officer (De Niro) into a plan to secure his parole by placing his beautiful wife (Jovovich)  in the lawman’s path.

Jane’s thoughts:  This was an unusual experience for me.  I was half expecting this to play out like a thriller-but instead I watched a slow (but evenly paced) meditative, existential character study.

The performances were great, but I can’t say I enjoyed the film (to its credit,we discussed it a great deal afterwards.)

The characters in Stone never quite feel like actual people, rather they represent certain characteristics of humanity.  Their stories slowly unfold to reveal that in the end, we are back at the beginning and haven’t moved an inch.

This is a recap for Happy Town, episode 2, “I Came to Haplin for the Water,” and it will have spoilers in order to discuss plot points. If you did not see the pilot for Happy Town last week, you can watch it on the official ABC website.

Now that I have seen the first two episodes of Happy Town, here are a few of my initial thoughts on the series. I enjoyed the second half of both episodes quite a bit more than the first. I have found it difficult to initially get into the show, but by the end of each episode I have been completely engrossed.

I enjoy quirky, but I do not enjoy goofy, and some of the characters are quickly veering into annoying territory (I’m looking at you, Stiviletto brothers.) I feel like some of these characters are coming across as being badly acted, and it seems to take down the quality of the show a notch. There are still plenty of talented actors on the show, and that might be why some of the weaker ones stand out.

I do think the show suffers in the writing department. I didn’t notice it so much the first episode, when I was trying to keep all the characters and plot-lines straight, but in the second episode I noticed sloppy dialogue and meandering scenes that easily could have been tightened up.