The series centers on a prominent Boston family reeling in the wake of the chilling discovery that their recently deceased patriarch could have been a serial killer. Suspicion arises that one of them may have been his accomplice.
Madsen is riveting as the icy, outrageous Madeline, who is furious that bad-boy Garrett is home after promising never to come back. Most early clues point to him, but American Gothic wisely keeps serving up disturbing bits on all family members.
This is a fun little time-waster, with a solid enough cast and a nifty enough hook to keep one watching, at least for a relatively breezy self-contained thirteen episodes.
OK, so it seems deeply weird that the episode is interspersed with the Hawthorne's neighbor ringing the doorbell and seeking information on the missing Caramel's whereabouts. But it all makes hideous sense.
Everything in American Gothic is faux-weird and faux-creepy, which creates this looming sense that everyone is about to start laughing and admit that the show is a spoof. Spoiler alert: That doesn't happen.
If a quasi-suspenseful thriller filled with campy, soap opera theatrics is your cup of tea, then American Gothic may be entertaining enough (if not thoroughly engaging).
Then again, it's summer, and this is a scripted, first-run network TV series. That's something. And maybe everyone hasn't seen a dozen dramas with similar troubled-family plots, many (Netflix's "Bloodline," for instance) much craftier.
