The Event In AHS: Coven That Was Worse Than Shelley's Asylum Fate
This article mentions sexual assault.
In "American Horror Story: Asylum," Shelley (Chloë Sevigny) goes through a lot. Promiscuous but proud, she does out sexual favors to staff members working at Briarcliff Manor, either to barter her way to freedom or to make her life in the nightmarish mental asylum easier to bear. Shelley's husband wanted her to be a modest housewife while he rampantly cheated on her, resulting in her sexual rebellion, and thus he committed her to Briarcliff.
Life doesn't get easier for her at Briarcliff, however, as she became a target for Dr. Arden (James Cromwell), who deplores Shelley's behavior. When she tries to escape the asylum during a nor'easter, Dr. Arden captures her and tries to sexually assault her. When Shelley mocks his manhood, he knocks her out, then amputates her legs. Further experimentation results in her mutilation and mutation. To protect Dr. Arden and his campaign of human experimentation, Sister Mary Eunice (Lily Rabe) drags and dumps Shelley in an elementary school. She's then taken to a hospital where, determined to be terminally ill, the doctors call Monsignor Timothy (Joseph Fiennes) from Briarcliff to read her last rites. She begs him to end her life. He chokes her to death with a rosary, finally relieving her of her suffering.
"American Horror Story" fans are nothing if not a contentious bunch, and according to posts on the /r/AmericanHorrorStory subreddit, there's a character that some feel suffered even more than Shelley. This character may surprise you, since they landed something of a happy ending — well, as much as one gets in "AHS." Which character did they name?
If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).
Who had it worse: Shelley or Kyle?
Per a post by Reddit user u/Phoenix_Rayne, at least 11 members of the "AHS" subreddit feel that Kyle Spencer (Evan Peters) of "American Horror Story: Coven" had it worse than Shelley.
In the third season of "AHS," the telepathic, spoiled actress Madison Montgomery (Emma Roberts) kills Kyle and his frat brothers when she flips a party bus with her mind. It's an act of revenge upon Kyle's friends for sexually assaulting her. Later on, Madison and lovestruck fellow witch Zoe Benson (Taissa Farmiga), who had met Kyle at the frat party before his death, reassemble Kyle from parts that aren't his own, then use a spell to resurrect him. It doesn't go quite as planned, so the two witches recruit the help of Misty Day (Lily Rabe) to do damage control. Then, the Frankenstein's-monster-like Kyle spends all of "Coven" bouncing between the man-hungry Madison and the innocent Zoe.
That he doesn't have enough cognitive power at first to properly understand or marshal his own strength in a conductive way is just the tip of the iceberg for poor Kyle. Zoe takes him to visit his mother, who sexually assaults him; in retaliation, Kyle kills his mother.
At Miss Robichaux's Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies, the boarding school for witches where Zoe and Madison are living, things aren't much better for Kyle. As Redditor u/lucyvgu noted, "It was so disturbing to watch, especially since the brutality of what they did was never taken seriously and they started using Kyle for sex." User u/FunnyRevolutionary17 highlighted a particularly traumatizing event for Kyle: "That scene when Zoe has him chained up and we see him realises his body is made up of the body parts of his dead friends, is so sad. Evan did a great job showing how disturbing and distressing it is for Kyle."
"Is too much to ask for the poor guy to be able to go back to college?" wondered u/OedipusCapulet, who pointed out that story potential went to waste by dimming Kyle's intelligence post-resurrection.
Since many characters suffer brutally, your mileage may vary as to who's had it the worst during "American Horror Story," but Kyle and Shelley's tales definitely rank very high in the show's pantheon of suffering.
If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).