‘American Horror Stories’ delivers five uniquely alarming tales of terror that tackle liminal spaces, clones, Leprechauns, and more.
“You know, we invented hell.”
There was a lot of promise in American Horror Stories — an episodic anthology horror series — when it was first announced as a companion piece to American Horror Story proper. American Horror Stories’ first season was a lackluster effort that oddly felt compelled to needlessly connect its stories to American Horror Story. The second season worked out many of these kinks and, while still imperfect, there are some genuine gems in the mix, like the Twilight Zone-aping “Facelift.” The third season was an even greater improvement that arguably didn’t have any duds in the mix (although the AI assistant, “Daphne,” is a little derivative). More importantly, American Horror Stories seemed to finally find the right rhythm and creative team to do this series justice. Additionally, Season 3 eclipsed the modern seasons of American Horror Story and felt like the purest version of what Ryan Murphy should be doing with the horror genre. Not only do the new season’s remaining five episodes build upon this success, but they’re some of the best episodes that the anthology horror series have ever done – and the perfect Halloween binge.
Both American Horror Story series’ have tackled nearly every horror subgenre and trope imaginable at this point, but this batch of American Horror Stories episodes boldly tackles the more recent fascination of liminal space horror — specifically the Backrooms phenomenon that gained life on 4chan and was popularized by YouTuber Kane Parsons’ short films. Parsons is tapped to direct a feature film adaptation of the Backrooms for A24, but it’s exciting to see American Horror Stories beat them to the punch and provide its own eerie take on this surreal, hostile purgatory.
“Backrooms” is a tragic tale of obsession that’s directed by David Gelb, who isn’t a complete newcomer to horror — he helmed 2011’s polarizing The Lazarus Effect — but his primary mode is as a documentary filmmaker, with food as his area of expertise. This makes Gelb a particularly unique choice for American Horror Stories, but his skills as a documentarian help give “Backrooms” some extra bite. The strong episode is really able to lean into the cinéma vérité faux-reality angle that’s essential for this type of story. It’s a gambit that really pays off and it’s satisfying that one of the first mainstream celebrations and adaptations of “Backrooms horror” is such a success, rather than soullessly chasing a viral trend.
This collection of episodes continues the theme of missing people, fractured families, and slipping sense of self with “X,” “The Thing Under the Bed,” and “Clone.” Matt Spicer directs “X,” a striking black-and-white installment about a medical conspiracy and a nurse’s efforts to locate a dangerous patient who has disappeared, only for the situation to become considerably more supernatural. Spicer is another new voice for the American Horror Stories family, having previously worked on poppy titles with dark edges, like Dollface, On Becoming A God in Central Florida, and Ingrid Goes West. Spicer thrives in this environment and proves that he has very natural impulses as a horror director. There are several sequences from the episode that feel like they’re straight from a George A. Romero film.
“Clone” is the type of story that feels two steps removed for Black Mirror and feels the weakest out of these five new entries. The Max Winkler-directed installment has the regular American Horror Story collaborator explore the potential in a tech billionaire who creates a robotic clone who is supposed to fill in for him after he’s unable to perform his duties after a harrowing accident. What begins as a privileged life hack soon gradually becomes a prolonged fight for survival as the robotic counterpart pleads for autonomy and supremacy. There are shades of M3GAN, AfrAId, and the many other tech-based horror films that have been churned out over the past few years. “Clone” finds strength in its central questions of identity and how it’s more in line with a horror-centric version of Multiplicity than it is a riff on Ex Machina.
Much like how “X” and “Clone” deconstruct familiar ideas, “The Thing Under the Bed” and “Leprechaun” subvert fairly standard storytelling tropes that zig just when you expect them to zag. “The Thing Under the Bed” begins as a melancholy bedtime story that continues to peel back its layers and turn into a nightmare that proves that monsters are lurking in far more places than just under the bed. “Leprechaun” might be the most unhinged and surprising entry of the lot. A by-the-book bank heist becomes infinitely more complicated when the titular creature gets unleashed. There’s a lot of seasonal horror that American Horror Story and American Horror Stories has failed to tackle and this is honestly one of the most creative takes on a Leprechaun story that either series could approach, while not unnecessarily being tethered to St. Patrick’s Day.
“Leprechaun” along with “Backrooms” are both written by Joe Baken (the latter of which is co-written with Jon Rabin Baitz). Baken and Baitz are the co-creators and co-writers for Ryan Murphy’s Grotesquerie (as well as Dr. Odyssey), but Baken also penned the two strongest episodes from the first-half of American Horror Stories’ third season, “Bestie” and “Tapeworm.” Baken’s scripts continue to shine and it’ll be a shame if this is American Horror Stories’ end because he’s someone who genuinely understands the right tone and energy for a pulpy horror anthology series that’s still deeply disturbing.
It also doesn’t hurt that these episodes also continue American Horror Stories’ tradition of absolutely stacked casts. Some of the guest stars from these five episodes include Michael Imperioli, Henry Winkler, Victor Garber, June Squibb, Debby Ryan, and Jeff Hiller. Everyone is clearly having a lot of fun here, but Winkler, Garber, and Hiller all give particularly memorable and heightened performances that understand the assignment. Imperioli, while not as exaggerated, gives a rich, pained performance that becomes the necessary emotional anchor to “Backrooms.” If nothing else, American Horror Stories delivers constant delights with its guest stars, even if the horror and storytelling from these episodes fall flat for some audiences.
American Horror Stories Season 3: Part 2 is a surprise highlight of the Halloween season that’s dense in both tricks and treats. It’s everything that horror fans want from an anthology series that’s completely lacking in the standard Murphy smarm and excess that’s prone to dragging his series down. These five episodes are filled with haunting visuals, rewarding surprises, and crushing conclusions that will make audiences want to repeatedly return to these twisted tales.
All three seasons of ‘American Horror Stories’ are available to stream on Hulu.
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