Summary
The Beauty turns things on their head in “Beautiful Jordan”, replacing one of the co-leads and giving us a glimpse of what seems to be our Big Bad.
In Episode 2, “Beautiful Jordan”, The Beauty gives us our first glimpse of the villain of the piece, played by Ashton Kutcher. It also turns into John Wick for a good chunk of the very clipped 25-minute runtime, which is an interesting stylistic choice. But it’s still very much along the same lines as the rather demented premiere – it even ends with a redo of Jeremy’s transformation scene, though with a focus on a different character. One of the main ones!
But we’re in Venice here, as predicted, since Jordan and Cooper were directed by their boss to another victim who had tested positive for the mysterious virus that killed Ruby in Paris and other victims in Berlin and London. Her fate is a little different, though. She’s still a mess, but she’s still recognisably a human being; it’s just that her front has been peeled apart, exposing all of her vital organs. Not quite combustion, but not exactly survivable either. On the wall, the Egyptian symbol of beauty is daubed in blood.
This victim wasn’t just a model, but also an influencer, and posted a warning video shortly before dying that is too vague for now to constitute a clue. “Don’t do it” is advice that could apply to all sorts of things in the beauty industry, after all, and it isn’t the kind of advice that people tend to follow. Just think of Jeremy.
As mentioned at the top, “Beautiful Jordan” does give us a bit of a clue as to who’s pulling the strings here – Ashton Kutcher’s Byron Forst, who seems to be in charge of what I can only assume is a pharmaceutical company responsible for the Beauty formula, which has been stolen, resulting in the rapidly spreading infection. Forst deals with his problem rather adroitly – he sends an assassin to kill the thief – but the formula is already out in the wild. As if to prove the point, Jordan and Cooper are called back to the U.S. after the editor-in-chief of Vogue explodes.
Jordan and Cooper have a weird relationship. They’re “best friends” who have been intimate out of what both pretend is mere convenience, but there’s clearly more of a connection there than either is willing to admit. Both are still also bound to a lifestyle of casual sex with no attachments, though, preventing them from exploring any more serious options. This proves to be more of a problem for Jordan, but we’ll get to that in a minute.
In the meantime, Cooper is attacked by two men on the way back to his hotel, though he fights them off in a single extended action sequence that constitutes a good chunk of The Beauty Episode 2. It’s an interesting choice to have Cooper be so physically capable – horror is typically about vulnerability – and for this fight to go on so long in such a brief episode. But it’s fun and surprisingly well-choreographed, so it’s hard to mind. Cooper is able to get away, but he’s clearly being targeted personally. Jordan is, too, just in a different way.
With Jordan, she’s approached by a man with whom she quickly decides to spend the night. He’s the gender-swapped equivalent of Claire from the premiere. Their evening of passion goes well enough, but Jordan jolts awake with the same sweaty symptoms we saw Jeremy experience. She collapses, writhes around, disappears into a chrysalis, and then emerges as someone else. But it’s a more telling scene, as Rebecca Hall already looked good. She wasn’t a basement-dwelling incel. But the thing about her boob job in the premiere was clearly a setup. She wasn’t satisfied with herself, and that’s seemingly all it takes.
With Jordan infected, it seems that Rebecca Hall is now gone. She has been replaced by Jessica Alexander, which, to be fair to Ryan Murphy, is a pretty bold decision given the very legitimate acting chops that Hall provided. It’s a nice reiteration of the show’s underlying thesis that it isn’t just people like Jeremy who’re susceptible to The Beauty.
