A Kardashian hasn’t given us this much glamor in the Hamptons since Kourtney and Khloé “took” the beaches of Long Island in the 2014 season of their eponymous spinoff show. (Some say if you wander the shores after dark, you can still hear Kourt’s vocal fry echoing in the wind.) In the third episode of American Horror Story: Delicate, Kim Kardashian’s character Siobhan Corbyn joins her friend and client Anna Victoria Alcott (Emma Roberts) in the Hamptons, trying to calm the troubled burgeoning ingenue after her miscarriage at the end of last week’s installment.
Now that Season 12 of AHS is three episodes in, it’s not hard to peg Kardashian as the single best part of Delicate—though the appearance of Ryan Murphy alum Michaela Jaé Rodriguez as the manager of the Hamptons estate is a welcome touch. Most of the cast members, Roberts included, are doing some of the most lackluster work of their careers thus far. And then there’s Kardashian, shining like a bright star every time she glides into a frame, ready to spout some twisted wisdom in a way so surprising that it’s no shock she went viral on social media several times over in last week for her delicious line deliveries.
This week in Siobhan’s World (which we’re all just living in): Anna’s on the mend, which means that she not only needs guidance, but nutrition. After half the episode is spent following Anna as she wanders the woods and skulks around her rented mansion, she finally calls Siobhan when she comes close to losing it entirely. Because Siobhan has to keep her client in fighting shape, she hops on the Jitney and arrives at Anna’s place in a flash, fresh produce in hand.
Siobhan greets Anna with an upbeat, “Hi, pretty!” Not exactly the kind of way that I’d greet my friend if I found them wandering around wearing Old Navy’s finest skinny-jean-and-peacoat couture circa 2012, but Siobhan’s got to lead with a gentle touch. Cut to the both of them in the kitchen, where Siobhan is chopping a cucumber for “the green goddess dressing that went viral on TikTok.” Kim’s contract must have demanded she get at least three meta references to herself or her family in each episode, because Siobhan cutting vegetables was no doubt a direct nod to Kendall Jenner’s ridiculous method for chopping a cucumber that caused a stir on one of the slowest news days of 2022. Sorry Kendall, but Kim not only had oodles more screen presence, she can slice veggies more convincingly too.
But as the scene continues, Kim gets a chance at being slightly more nuanced with her self-referential dialogue. “You have that hunted look, same thing I had after my miscarriage,” Siobhan tells Anna. “I’m honestly shocked I didn’t get 5150’d. I was this close to running down Fifth Avenue screaming, ‘Fuck the patriarchy!’”
Then, Siobhan explains the anatomical logistics of what can happen to a woman’s body after a miscarriage in more detail. “Your body’s flooded with chemicals just to get you pregnant and then flooded with more chemicals once you are pregnant,” she says. “Then suddenly you aren’t [pregnant] anymore, so the chemicals just drop off on top of all the grief. It’s exactly what happens after postpartum, except you don’t even get the fucking baby out of it.”
Given Kardashian’s own complicated and very public experiences with having healthy pregnancies, this scene genuinely feels like her speaking from the heart. It helps that she’s clearly been studying her the craft of acting, but there’s an earnestness to Kim here that not even a few intensives at Juilliard can buy.
Siobhan tells Anna that the best thing she can do right now is sweat her rage out. “Girl, eat this salad and we’re gonna go on a walk—chew fast bitch!” she says. While the two women stroll the sandy beach, Siobhan spills some news about another big career move that she’s scored for Anna. “I just booked you the cover of Vogue,” she says excitedly. When Anna tries to protest, telling Siobhan that she’s nobody and that, despite the success of her indie movie, the film still isn’t big enough for a Vogue cover, Siobhan gets a little testy. “If you were a nobody, people wouldn’t be breaking into your apartment... You’ve earned this, and even if you haven’t, I have.”
While there was plenty of satantic-adjacent hullabaloo surrounding Anna’s pregnancy during this episode—which we haven’t been able to verify is real or not—Siobhan’s line feels like the biggest indicator to what is going on here. Anna seems to be caught in a Rosemary’s Baby situation; in that film, Mia Farrow’s character didn’t realize that she was a pawn in the devil’s game all along, her pregnancy just a part of John Cassavetes’ character’s pact with a cult to achieve undying fame. It appears as though Anna is in a similar predicament, where something harrowing is happening to her body while she and her publicist skyrocket toward celebrity.
We’ll see whether or not those suspicions are well founded in the coming weeks, but in the meantime, we have a bit more sage Siobhan Sagacity (insert trademark abbreviation here) to chew on until the next episode. “Nobody’s ready for anything: motherhood, stardom, miscarriages.” she says to Anna on the beach. “We’re all just learning on the job. I’m going to need you to pull yourself out of your misery and into your ambition.” In other words? Get your fucking ass up and work!
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