It is widely agreed that Ryan Murphy, the twisted-yet-completely-brilliant creator of the American Horror Story (AHS) series is a horror realm mastermind. He is the creative and directorial engine that captivated fans at the series' inception back in 2011 with The Murder House and has continued to keep all of us devoted fans intrigued, just begging for the next episode. Forewarning: the rest of this article contains spoilers about all seasons of AHS, including My Roanoke Nightmare.
However, we are now four episodes deep into AHS season six: My Roanoke Nightmare and fans are starting to become concerned that Murphy is substituting the "horror" aspect of AHS for just straight up gore. In 2011, The Murder House kept us guessing, our minds spinning deeper into insanity each episode, and by the finale, dedicated fans were all pretty much bonkers. Season two, Asylum, wasn't particularly my cup of tea, it disturbed me more than it entertained me, but nonetheless, I was hooked. Coven, season three, featured very little blood and guts (unless you count Kathy Bates' zombie daughters and Taissa Farmiga getting impaled on a fence, but hey, other than that, clean as a whistle.) and survived almost completely on the twists and turns of the story line.
However, season four, Freak Show, was when things began to get, well, a little freaky. Killer clowns stabbing people, failed attempts at suicide, rape, torture, laceration, and most importantly, Emma Roberts getting cut in half. There was a significant spike in the level of blood and guts in season four than there had been in almost all the other seasons, cumulatively, and things did not improve into season five either. AHS: Hotel acquired an inhuman level of hype due to the fact that Lady Gaga joined the cast. Gaga, although she is a stellar performer, spent most of her time on screen having sex, ripping people's throats out and rolling around in their blood. Typical. Hotel also featured a string of brutal, biblical murders, and characters with some mega abandonment issues. Overall, though, Hotel held its own and was a completely addictive experience, so addictive however, that when the AHS creators announced that the theme for season six would not be publicly released until the premiere, people armed themselves with torches and pitchforks (pun intended.)
My Roanoke Nightmare has definitely gone in a different direction altogether from the previous seasons. Murphy took the real-life story of the disappearing colony of Roanoke from 1590 and made it work for his show...or did he? Thus far this season, we have seen a mugging, a miscarriage, a man being roasted alive, throats getting slit, heads getting cleaved, ex-husbands being burned and crucified, teeth raining from the sky, senior citizens getting massacred, nurses having their arms ripped off and last but certainly not least, a disembowelment. This is only four episodes worth of gore, and although the concept has piqued my interest, I can't help but notice that the princess of AHS herself, Sarah Paulson, who usually plays some strong, take-no-shit character, has been running around distress-fully doing a whole lot of nothing.
Devoted AHS fans, myself included, have begun to hum with the nervous chatter of the phrase nobody wishes to speak: Is Murphy losing his touch? *gasps* AHS watchers are in agreement that there has certainly been more gore this season than there has been horror. People also feel that snails can move faster than the story line seems to be progressing. Although it has been a bit slow for me, I know that after episode six, the episode that is said to contain a seriously mind-numbing plot twist, the plot will be full-speed-ahead. So this is one issue I'm not particularly concerned with.
It remains to be seen whether this season of AHS will turn out to be more of an American Gore Story than a horror show, but either way, Murphy has an army of dedicated fans waiting with bated breath just to see what he'll do next. In the meantime, let's ask a more important question here: WHERE TF IS EVAN PETERS? Until next time, AHS watchers.
