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Well here we go again. It’s that time of year when friends fight over their love or disdain for the latest installment of American Horror Story, and this new season is already no different. After months of teasers, which have turned out to be misdirects from the true theme of the season (or are they?), it is inevitable that some people will be massively disappointed in the first episode. But what everyone seems to forget it that even though this is an established series, each season is different, each first episode has to start building a new mythology for what is to come. It’s not like we’re joining a continuing, serialized drama from last season’s cliffhanger. A new story needs a new foundation, and the premiere of season six has cleverly set up that foundation.
Now I’ve watched my fair share of those haunting docuseries on the Destination America channel which has real people tell their allegedly real stories of being terrorized by ghostly entities in their homes with scenes featuring actors reenacting those events (I even know some actors who have appeared in those reenactments). Such is the case — at least so far — with this season’s American Horror Story, which appears to be a show within the show with the title “My Roanoke Nightmare.” For anyone who follows American history or who enjoys tales of mystery and suspense, you know that the title refers to the mystery of the Roanoke colony whose resident seemingly vanished into thin air. The only clue to be found was the word “Croatoa” carved into a tree. The Croatoa were an indigenous tribe so many suspected they may have massacred the settlers, but with no evidence of bodies researchers today believe the colonists may have simply moved to a new location or assimilated themselves into the tribe. But this enduring mystery sets the stage for the season.
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The first episode was set perfectly like one of those haunting shows with interracial married couple Shelby (Lily Rabe) and Matt (André Holland) recounting the story of a brutal attack that nearly took the life of Matt (under a movie theater marquee featuring the title “Crimson Harvest” — possible foreshadowing?) with the resulting stress causing Shelby to miscarry. Seeking to leave city life, the two stumble upon a dilapidated mansion in the middle of nowhere apparently in the area of the Roanoke colony. At auction, the couple bid against the Polks, a scary family of stereotypical Deliverance-style rednecks (one played by Chaz Bono!) who seem to really want the property. But Matt bids $40,000 and wins the property, but has he just bought them a haunted house or just one that seems haunted due to the activities of the Polk family? Disembodied voices and a frightening attack at the hot tub leads Matt to call his sister Lee (Adina Porter) to stay with Shelby while he is away on business. The two women have a frosty relationship, but when Lee also experiences an attack, Shelby flees the property and encounters something in the nearby forest.
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And that’s basically the set up for the season. As this is a show within the show, everything we’ve seen thus far of the events described by Shelby, Matt and Lee have been reenactments with Sarah Paulson playing Lee, Cuba Gooding Jr. as Matt and Angela Bassett as Lee. We also got very brief glimpses of Kathy Bates and Wes Bentley as possible ghostly members of the Roanoke colony. But we’ve also seen some things that only lead to more questions: Did Shelby actually experience a hailstorm of human teeth? Who were the two women Shelby saw walking through her house and then disappeared? What is the significance of the Blair Witch-esque stick figures left hanging in the house, and again seen in the forest? What was that video that Shelby and Lee watched while locked in the basement with what appeared to be someone wearing a pig’s head (which possibly ties to the dead pig someone left on the doorstep earlier)? Are the Polks maybe descended from the Roanoke colonists? Why did the forest floor appear to be “breathing”? So many questions, and we’re just beginning. Probably the biggest one is will the rest of the season maintain this show-within-a-show structure?
The producers have also said this season will definitively connect all the previous seasons and the main story has connected directly to season one. In the eleventh episode, Sarah Paulson’s psychic Billie (whom we revisisted when she turned up at the Hotel Cortez) told the story of Roanoke and the ghostly colonists who were banished by the native elders in a ritual that ended with them shouting the word “Croatoa.” This is apparently the jumping off point for this season, so it will be interesting to see how it weaves in the other seasons.
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As for the structure of the episode, I’ve seen plenty of comments calling it “disjointed” and “boring,” but it was anything but. It followed exactly the structure of the shows it was imitating with the “real” people describing the events followed by the reenactment. There was no real jumping around in time (except for when Lee was introduced and we had to see a bit of her backstory) with all of the events laid out in a linear manner. There have been complaints about the house and the location as not looking anything like the terrain of the Carolinas — but remember, we’re seeing a reenactment. This is not the real house or the real location of the house … at least not as far as we know at this point (and these reenactments are much more elaborate than anything those actual shows could produce but we’ll let them slide on that). This is how a show like My Haunted House is structured, and they have done a fine job with this first episode. And it’s great to see them using Angela Bassett’s talents after virtually wasting her last season. I’m just curious to know if the rest of the season will follow this structure because if it does, we know Shelby, Matt and Lee survived whatever ordeal they’re describing.
Say what you will about the new season — and complaining about the first episode because it asks too many questions is just beyond silly — but I found the episode to be engaging, clever and a bit terrifying, and I can’t wait to see what they have up their sleeve in the weeks to come …
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