American Gothic: Difference between revisions

[[File:american_gothic_cole_9694.jpg|frame|That's Buck spelled with a "B."]]

 

 

Welcome to Trinity, South Carolina. A quaint, lovely town of picturesque houses, white picket fences, old-growth forest, and friendly next-door neighbors. Good People. There's only one slight problem with this beautiful idyllic town where everyone knows everybody (and their juiciest secrets for the gossip chain):

Its premier lawman, Sheriff Lucas Buck, is the Devil.

 

 

Opposing Buck is young Caleb Temple (played by Lucas Black), an orphan who [[Dead Person Conversation|talks regularly]] to his [[Spirit Advisor|dead sister Merlyn]] and who has powers of his own--and who may or may not be Buck's son. Buck wants Caleb to follow him; Merlyn wants Caleb to resist; and the rest of Trinity gets caught in the crossfire, so to speak. [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic]]?

 

 

Unsurprisingly, the show is darkly Gothic and twisted, displaying many horror, suspense, and mystery tropes--although there is a delicious amount of black comedy as well.

 

 

{{tropelist}}

* [[Achilles' Heel]] - Sheriff Lucas Buck's vulnerability is {{spoiler|his third eye--if stabbed there, he could be killed}}.

* [[Aesop]] - Rarely.

* [[Affably Evil]] - Buck didn't get a sterling reputation in Trinity for nothing.

* [[Arc Words]]/[[Catch Phrase]]: "Someone's at the door."

* [[Badass Longcoat]]: Guess who?

* [[Badass Long Hair]]

* [[Chickification]] - Sadly, this happened to [[Plucky Girl|Gail Emory]]. At the start of the show, while not exactly an [[Action Girl]], she was certainly a female [[Determinator]] who, as an [[Intrepid Reporter]], was determined to find out the truth of her parents' deaths and bring their murderer to justice. But as soon as she learned her parents were not {{spoiler|[[Broken Pedestal|the paragons of virtue she thought them to be]]}}, her [[Belated Backstory]] was dropped and she seemed to flounder about with nothing to do. By the end of the series, she's morphed almost completely into a [[Damsel in Distress]], having to rely on Buck himself for protection, and in her last scene is left in a hospital bed, crying piteously over the baby she's lost--even though she didn't want it in the first place, seeing as it was the son of Satan (as depicted graphically via ultrasound--or maybe not). At least some of this may be due to [[Executive Meddling]] in order to pair up the major male and female leads, or a result of the show being [[Screwed by the Network]] so that Shaun Cassidy had to wrap everything up far too quickly and nonsensically. But some surely isn't.

* [[Children Are Innocent]] - Played Straight and then disturbingly averted. [[Moral Event Horizon|Buck is proven to be absolutely evil]] by <s>murdering</s> [[Mercy Kill|mercy-killing]] Merlyn in the first episode, and most of the first half to three-quarters of the series is devoted to protecting the innocent Caleb from the sheriff's vile influence. But then, as Caleb [[Start of Darkness|gradually falls deeper and deeper under his father's thrall]], starts taking lessons from him, and even absorbs some of his powers, he becomes more disturbingly amoral, wicked, and heartless. By the end of the series, Caleb is practically a carbon copy of ''[[The Omen]]'' and it is {{spoiler|Buck}} who must actually {{spoiler|save Trinity from ''him''}}. All the more chilling because of how artfully it is done.

* [[Cool Big Sis]] - Or, in this case, cousin.

* [[Corrupt Hick]] - Buck.

* [[Villain with Good Publicity]] - Sheriff Lucas Buck. Men tip their hats and women hand him flowers, little old men and women thank him for the charity work that has enabled them to afford their medicines, children smile and wave, and so on. No one in Trinity could possibly believe good ol' boy Buck could have a mean bone in his body.

* [[Virginity Makes You Stupid]] - Disappointingly inverted: while this trope might be upsetting to feminists or anyone who believes in equality, the character arc Gail suffers from is just as misogynistic. At the start of the show, she is an [[Action Girl]], an [[Intrepid Reporter]], a [[Determinator]], a [[Mama Bear]], and a [[Cool Big Sis]]. But because she's [[Forbidden Fruit]], Sheriff Buck [[I Have You Now, My Pretty|pursues her relentlessly]]. And the minute he succeeds in bedding her, all of her previous characterization goes out the window and she becomes weak, ineffectual, dumb, and clueless--a real [[Damsel in Distress]]. Yes, ''having sex makes you stupid''.

** Dr. Crower ends up becoming one of these in "Doctor Death Takes a Holiday", and this is the ostensible justification for Buck [[Put on a Bus|sending him out of town to the loony bin]]. On the one hand, [[Room Full of Crazy|plastering the walls of your room with newspaper clippings, death threats, photos, and a big red gun-sight target]] would definitely suggest someone is a danger to himself and others. On the other hand, considering Buck is the Devil Incarnate, being an extremist, well-intentioned or not, [[I Did What I Had to Do|may be the only way]] ''[[I Did What I Had to Do|to]]'' [[I Did What I Had to Do|get rid of him]]. Which, [[Gambit Roulette|since the whole thing was orchestrated by Buck anyway]] to get rid of who he thought was his biggest obstacle to claiming Caleb, really underscores how in Trinity, [[Good Is Impotent]].

* [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic]]

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:The Nineties]]

[[Category:American Series]]

[[Category:Horror Series]]