Summary
The Beauty settles into a self-indulgent rhythm of body-horror and scene-setting in “Beautiful Chimp Face”, but the overall story remains pretty compelling.
I know it has been a while since the dreaded Covid-19 pandemic gripped the world, but The Beauty clearly hasn’t forgotten the panic and paranoia we all felt over matters of contagion and containment. I think that’s what gives Episode 4 of Ryan Murphy’s demented series, distressingly titled “Beautiful Chimp Face”, a slightly eerie quality. In the third part of the three-part premiere, it was mentioned that an outbreak in New York had been contained, and Cooper spends a lot of time in full biochemical regalia, looming over people with his face – still slightly injured after that lengthy fight in Episode 2 – glowing slightly amber. Everyone might be infected.
This is when Cooper isn’t wistfully reminiscing about his relationship with Jordan, which doesn’t pay off until the very end of the episode, since she remains missing after she contracted the virus herself. It’s still pretty clear that their totally casual, no-strings-attached relationship was anything but, at least as far as Cooper is concerned, but how that might affect their relationship now that Jordan is essentially someone else remains to be seen. I do think we might be looking at Cooper being unable to resist infecting himself, though.
In the meantime, Cooper busies himself interviewing Ashley Sanders, a magazine staffer who was there when Harper blew up. And he loved Harper. He especially loved their intimate moments together, which, by his account, were borderline psychotic. That means – all together now – he’s also infected, and is summarily removed and tranquilised when he attempts to flee. Something to note: Being infected doesn’t just make the sufferer more beautiful, it also apparently makes them somewhat demonically good in bed, which is probably worth keeping in mind when considering whether Cooper will give in to any potential overtures from New-Jordan.
Then Cooper goes to see Manny, Harper’s friend, and thus begins one of the protracted sequences of violence and body horror that this show has loved since the opening scene of the premiere. As Manny is increasingly gripped by the infection, he manages to wrestle his way free with newfound super-strength, becoming more and more messily infected all the while. This doubles as something of a tour of the labs, where various surgeries are taking place, and bodies are being held in stasis tubes, all the better to harvest their spare parts. This is a government operation? The critiques aren’t exactly subtle.
This takes up a good chunk of The Beauty Episode 4, so you have to imagine it’s important beyond the fun novelty of Manny’s appearance rapidly changing, and eventually his naked super-hot new self wrestling with Evan Peters before he’s eventually taken down. It’s useful to clarify the effects and extent of the virus, I suppose, and it’s similarly important that we get a sense of what’s going on during these containment procedures, but the whole thing can’t help but feel just a teeny bit indulgent.
While all this occupies the bulk of “Beautiful Chimp Face”, we do check in with Jeremy and the Assassin, mostly just to remind us that they’re now working together as cool international assassins, but also to introduce the slightly bizarre concept of there being a way for the infected to have safe sex without passing on the virus. This is for Jeremy’s benefit, and makes me wonder if it’s a way to keep his appetites satiated without risking more problems by spreading the infection far and wide. But it also makes me wonder whether this is how The Assassin has been doing things the whole time, too.
There’s also a brief check-in with Forst, who is doing evil Big Pharma things by insisting that the beauty drug is expedited despite the risks in order to time its release with World Beauty Day. Again, the critiques in The Beauty are sledgehammer-subtle.
Most of this is functional, granted. The big moment comes at the very end when New Jordan turns up at Cooper’s door, but we’ll have to wait until the next episode to see how that goes. I’m going to hazard a guess that it won’t go especially well, but you never know. It can’t be worse than the nightmares Cooper was having, and if it distracts him from the death of his cat, Nine Lives, then fair’s fair. Why we needed that detail about the cat – other than to emphasise how he’s always on the move, I suppose – is another question entirely.
