Who's Going to Kill Bette & Dot on 'Freak Show'?

With the death of Ma Petite on AHS: Freak Show came one resounding thought: If Ryan Murphy is willing to take Jyoti Amge off our screens, is his capacity for wreaking havoc on Freak Show fans limitless? The answer is probably yes, and AHS has been trying to kill Bette and Dot Tattler all season. They're a perplexing duo. They're not exactly likable — Bette's head is permanently in a cloud made up of cotton candy and helium, and Dot... well, Dot seems a little evil. She usually comes back around to not murdering her sister, but she sure thinks about it a lot.

Apparently, it's a popular daydream though, so Dot can hardly be blamed. Elsa has done everything short of cold-blooded murder to get rid of her biggest competition, and Stanley's eyeballs basically become big, animated dollar signs every time he thinks of Bette and Dot's heads in a jar of formaldehyde. In fact, Dandy, Jupiter's resident psychopath, is just about the only villain who didn't want to kill the Freak Show headliners. And then they went and betrayed him in the name of not being human pets.

So, with the events of the last few episodes, and the reveal that the since deceased Ethel has the twins hidden away somewhere "safe," the question becomes less, "Will the twins make it out of this season alive," and more, "Who's going to do the job?"

Dandy

Dandy killed his mom, y'all. Not only does he have a special obsession with Bette and Dot, but he's also been jilted by them. He knows that Dot was always just using him to get his money for a separating operation, and Bette left him because her sister said so. Now that he's surely turned on him, and they're out there somewhere, unprotected by the Freak Show, the Tattler twins would be a quick little murder trophy for Dandy and his new bathing habits: the power of innocence and intelligence, all wrapped into one set of vital organs.

Stanley

While just as merciless, Stanley has the exact opposite motivation to murder from Dandy: money, and money alone. The twins would collect the ultimate paycheck at the American Morbidity Museum, and Stanley knows it. They resisted his fail-proof cupcake plan, and Ma Petite has held him over for an episode, but it's only a matter of time (and by the looks of the previews, that time is next week) before Stanley zeroes back in on Bette and Dot, and their individual but similar desires to be a star.

Elsa

The main question with Else is quickly becoming, "Will she destroy herself before she destroys everyone else?" If the answer is "yes," then Bette and Dot can sleep easy (in a locked room that only they have the key to, with Amazon Eve standing guard). If the answer is "no," then Elsa is going to kill those twins. There is no greater reminder of her failure to become a star, than two fresh-faced beauties who everyone wants more than her in every way. Hopefully by this point, even Bette is a touch wary of Elsa.

Bette/Dot

And, of course, Bette and Dot's greatest strength, and greatest weakness, is each other. We've seen Dot dream about ridding herself of her sister plenty of times, and in fact, she's already tried it once. If they can get themselves to an operating table, I have no doubt that one body is walking in, and one body is walking out. Bette has "sacrificial innocent" written all over her, and with all of the crazies listed above who are willing to create that sacrifice, Bette might have to decide if she's going down with her sister, or taking her out herself.

Images: Michele K. Short/FX; giphy (3); lovethelange/Tumblr