Phuel
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LOL
I think you did just answered your own question with your analysis of the performance.
Neo postmodernism is more of an off-the-cuff term that I don't mean with any seriousness. Just more along the lines of another postmodern style.
Have you seen Moulin Rouge? Post-Victorian Paris setting but the musical numbers were all pop songs from the 21st-century, reinvented. As Scott already mentioned, the type of guitar-riffing that was used is not a sound of the 1950s, in which this show is set in. That type of sound wasn't around until the mid-60s. But unlike Moulin Rouge, which was hyper-stylized from beginning to end, with sets pieces that resembled musical staging/ video sets, and even a highly stylized form of cinematography, with the modern musical numbers worked alongside the post-Victorian settings: It consistently maintained a rockstar-Victorian theatre for the MTV-generation look throughout the film. Freak Show just injected a bit of modernity with the (poorly-rendered) musical number into an otherwise 1950s set. It didn't work.
The eccentricity of the musical number from Freak Show looked like it was shoehorned into a very ordinary-looking show. Visually, it reminded me of the type of aesthetic favored by Smashing Pumpkins' Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness phase. I'd highly recommend you'd check the sound, as well as their visual style for that period of their career if you're not familiar with it. They were all so striking and fit the post-punk/baroque-rock of their sound so wonderfully. (Not to mention the deeply-saturated and overexposed photography of the Freak Show musical number had a very mid-90s vibe-- instantly reminds me of Hole's videos-- which were also very similar to Smashing Pumpkins' aesthetic.) Seems like Ryan can't help himself and must always ram in a musical number; I guess the context of this number isn't so horrible compared to the ones in Coven and Asylum-- it was just the execution that was very weak, to me.
Visually, I'd prefer the show's atmosphere to resemble more of the campaign's imagery and vibe if they wanted to be stylishly creepy: Go all the way with a Floria Sigismondi look and feel. Or just stick to a plain-jane look and have the disturbing elements of the story unfold to create atmosphere (Like Cannibal Holocaust). The way it is now, it just comes off either lazy, or the budget didn't allow it to go all the way.
Scott: Puddles the Clown (with his amazing voice) is more unpredictably unhinged, more creepy, than this one. This one is way too Clown-wannabe from Spawn (who, if you're not familiar with the Spawn comic, was based on, and is named Gacy. Creepy.)
