This past week, a second installment of American Horror Stories was announced. American Horror Stories is a spinoff/companion piece to Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story. I am a big fan of AHS and have been watching it since the beginning, so I was excited when it was announced back in 2020 and airing Summer 2021. It was a nice detour from the main story, yet is still set in the same universe. I did enjoy every episode, some more than others. My favorites were Ba’al and Feral. Each episode features an hour long mini story, with an overarching Murder House wrap around story. 

This installment does a lot of things right. First and foremost, I really enjoyed Cody Fern and Billie Lourd in their episodes as well as their respective roles in both 1984 and Apocalypse. I also liked how self-contained the stories all are, as an hour is just enough time to set up the story and see how the events play out. In addition to this, there are a lot of cool concepts and one off ideas in this series that are explored. 

With all that being said, some things need to change this season. Firstly, I would like to leave the Murder House behind. Besides wanting to see Tate and Violet again, it ended after season one and the Harmons’ main story. Then, we see it brought back again and revisited throughout subsequent seasons, and again in Series. With the timeline shift and future slated seasons, there is not much more for this house and its inhabitants. 

Next, the ideas need to be fleshed out in a more cohesive way. There is that big timeline shift, so this would be the perfect time to explore the ideas Stories provides while revisiting other locations and set up the future while building stories in the present.