It’s an age–old story—in its past couple seasons, the TV show you once loved seems to have lost its magic. What was once fresh and exciting has become a chore to watch, and you begin to wonder if you should even bother when the new season’s premiere rolls around. This attitude is ubiquitous when it comes to fans of the FX series American Horror Story. A preference for more recent iterations of the offbeat show is practically unheard of. So, upon hearing that this year’s American Horror Story: Apocalypse would reintroduce the characters and thematic elements of the show’s earlier installments, a little bud of hope sprung in me. Unfortunately, the premiere episode left me with little reassurance.
There are two main things that separate the early seasons of AHS with the more recent ones. The first is the cast. The show’s first season, American Horror Story: Murderhouse, featured standout performances from Jessica Lange, Connie Britton and Evan Peters. These performances were the driving forces of the show’s richness, and added to the overall depth of production that made AHS such a high quality work of television. Secondly, the early seasons of the show had markedly superior and more layered narrative structures, inviting greater suspense and a more immersive horror experience.
These two elements were degraded in tandem over the last few seasons. Beloved actors left the show and were replaced by inferior performers. The stories lost their novelty, and the show’s horror elements began to seem lazy and gratuitous. These criticisms were only reaffirmed by the opening sequence of season eight’s premiere episode. We begin with a sprinkling of familiar faces, comedic relief characters from last season reimagined for the present situation. It’s the end of the world and a wealthy few are poised to escape the nuclear winter. This introductory sequence is almost unwatchably campy—reminiscent of Scream Queens, a darkly “comedic” (and unsuccessful) spin–off series by the creators of AHS. Camp and horror can work together, but the low quality of the acting in this opening sequence is distracting. Not off to a good start.
Throughout the hour–long episode, there are some hits and a number of misses. After the opening credits, we are taken to the aftermath of the apocalypse—the few who remain are struggling to survive in a Brave New World–esque bunker divided by class and labeled by color. The survivors are lead by two deceptive, sadistic women (played by Sarah Paulson and Kathy Bates, two favored, staple actresses in the series).The production design and costuming are lush, but the storytelling is spotty. In fact, so little is happening in this bunker that we flash forward eighteen months in the first episode. It isn’t until the very end that anything remotely exciting happens, and that’s when the first crossover element presents itself.
Though the premiere episode of Apocalypse is aimed more at exposition than storytelling, it does end on a note that encourages long time fans of the show to stay on their toes. A return of season one’s antichrist, Michael Langdon, is sure to pull up some literal demons from the past. Furthermore, we are shown in trailers for episode two that the witches of season three will also participate in this post–apocalyptic horror story. What was messy, ineffectively campy, and a bit disappointing in episode one has potential for revival, so long as it can lift up its key players, take the exposition down a notch, and incorporate the shocking horror elements in a way that enriches the narrative instead of undercutting it. American Horror Story: Apocalypse has a lot to prove.
