American Horror Story: Hotel premiered earlier this week, and it came with a rather hefty amount of skepticism (from me, anyway). Ryan Murphy is known for starting his seasons off strongly, only for them to go into a tailspin around the midway point of the season. In the case of American Horror Story, he started off the series strongly with Murder House, achieved some of his best work with Asylum, hit rock bottom with Coven and slowly began to dig himself out of the hole he made with Freakshow, which was an improvement over Coven, but only slightly. Not many people seem to share this viewpoint. In fact, Coven seems to be many people’s favorite season of American Horror Story, whereas Asylum (and occasionally Freakshow) is thought to be the worst season. I’m not one to use profanity in my posts, but there’s only one way for me to say this: I fucking hate Coven. Asylum is the best season and Coven is the worst, and I’m here to tell you why.

Asylum

Strong Villains

Bloody Face, Dr. Arden and the possessed Sister Mary Eunice are all more than just your standard two-dimensional villains. They all get enough screen time to make you care about them (even if that caring means wanting to see them die horrible deaths). They each had unique M.O.s and made strong, lasting impressions. A horror movie (or show) is only as good as its villain, and Asylum delivered.

Developed Characters

This is sort of an extension of my first point, but the characters in Asylum were not caricatures. These were real people with developed plot lines (well, except for Chloë Sevigny’s character, who got shafted). Lange may get all the accolades (and Sister Jude has a great arc in the season as well), but Paulson’s Lana Winters was the centerpiece of the season, and she nailed the performance in every scene. From her incarceration to her aversion therapy to her cathartic murder of her son, Lana is the best character to come out of any season of AHS.

Strong, Cohesive Narrative

Asylum had the most cohesive narrative throughout the entirety of its 13 episodes. For juggling so many things (possession, aliens, a serial killer, Nazi mutation experiments, asylum inmates, among other things), Asylum holds itself together remarkably well. The Anne Frank Halloween episodes are two of the strongest episodes the series has ever done, and they fit into the plot of the story. Nearly every plot line seemed relevant to the season as a whole, which cannot be said of any of the other seasons.

The Conclusion is (Mostly) Satisfying

American Horror Story has had a problem sticking the landing each and every season. This is no exception for Asylum, but it is undoubtedly the strongest finale of the bunch. Many weren’t fans of the flash-forward storytelling device used for the final episode, but Asylum was always about Lana and her journey toward peace. The show needed to jump forward to give her that peace. Kit ends up taking in Sister Jude and taking care of her until she dies, and he is abducted by aliens after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Lana kills Dr. Thredson (aka Bloody Face), Alma is admitted to Briarcliff. It all sounds sloppy, but the execution is nearly flawless.

It‘s Actually Horrific

A show called American Horror Story needs to have some actual horror, and Asyludelivers it in spades. From the human experimentations done by James Cromwell’s Dr. Arden, to the possession of Sister Mary Eunice (Lily Rabe), Asylum pulled no punches. The only real moment of levity was the musical number in episode 10, but even that had a dark background to it. Asylum was a bleak, unforgiving season, that turned off many viewers (and is the main reason why Murphy turned to camp in Coven). This always confused me, because it seems as if people who are watching American Horror Story don’t want to see any actual horror.

Coven

As for Coven, aka the season that pandered to the gays, there have been plenty of articles written about the mess of a season it was. These are just some of my biggest issues with it:

UPDATE: After reading some of the comments I feel the need to explain the above statement. When I say “pandering to the gays,” that is not an insult to gay people (of which I am one), but rather an insult to Coven and the team behind it. As I watched Coven, it seemed like Murphy’s thought process was “let’s fill the show with bitchy queens and sassy one-liners” in lieu of a coherent plot, as if that is going to make the show for us and forgive it its shortcomings. I felt insulted by the fact that the creative team behind the show thought that that is all I wanted to see. I felt pandered to, and to be pandered to is insulting. That was my reasoning behind that statement. 

No Direction

If you go back and watch all 13 episodes of Coven, there doesn’t seem to be any consistency with the narrative. It really feels like the writers made it up as they went along. A simple outline of the season would have gone a long way in ensuring Coven’s cohesiveness. Alas, it’s clear no outline was made.

Inconsistent Characters

This is probably my biggest issue with Coven. None of the characters in the season felt like real characters because they  did things their character would never do. Kathy Bates’ Madame LaLaurie began a redemptive arc with Gabourey Sidibe’s Queenie and just….stopped. Don’t forget about the fact that Jessica Lange’s Fiona was a murderer and no one seemed to care. Cordelia’s forgiveness of Fiona in the finale didn’t feel like something Cordelia would actually do. Queenie leaving the girls at Miss Robichaux’s for Marie Laveau’s voodoo team also didn’t make much sense. The show seemed to imply that it was just a race thing, but there was not enough screen time devoted to Queenie’s scenes with Laveau to make her betrayal convincing. Emma Roberts’ Madison Montgomery and Sarah Paulson’s Cordelia were probably the only consistently written character throughout the entire season.

It Was Overstuffed Yet Storylines Were Left Hanging

What were the repercussions of Queenie having sex with a minotour? What happened to Madame LaLaurie’s redemption arc (as mentioned above)? People always complain about Asylum having one too many plot lines (though I’ll admit that the aliens were superfluous), but Coven is the real culprit here. What was the point of bringing in Patti Lupone’s character and her son? Why was Stevie Nicks even there (other than fan service)? The witch hunters were brought in and dispatched rather quickly. Cordelia didn’t seem to care much about the fact that her husband was a witch hunter. And remember when Zoe and Kyle skipped town, only to just come back in the beginning of the next episode for no particular reason? It’s all pretty sloppy screenwriting.

No Stakes

Just when you thought Coven was pulling the rug out from under you by killing a main character off early in the season (Evan Peters, Emma Roberts), they were resurrected. Death was never a permanent fixture in Coven, which made it really hard to care or worry about any of the characters. If you can’t care about the characters (praising their bitchiness and wittiness doesn’t count as caring about them), then there is nothing but a hollow shell of a show. Also, the endgame being the reveal of the new Supreme was not compelling at all. If that was the whole purpose of the season, it’s boring

Unearned Endings

The biggest offender of this is arguably Lily Rabe’s Misty Day. Her fate in the finale “The Seven Wonders,” where she is trapped in Hell for all eternity to dissect frogs, doesn’t hold much weight for us as viewers. Sure, she was one of the most likable characters of the season, but we really didn’t know anything about her other than that she really liked Stevie Nicks. Having her own personal Hell be dissecting frogs felt too predictable and like an easy narrative out. The endgame for the season was always going to be to have Cordelia be the new Supreme, so they just needed a way to dispatch Misty. Her fate would have been better suited to Roberts’ Madison Montgomery, who gets an “easy” death via strangulation by Peters’ character. No character had more of an unearned ending than Fiona though. She was a despicable, selfish human being and a murderer, but the show gave her a redemptive arc (in the last episode). We shouldn’t want to see this woman gain her daughter’s sympathy. Coven was trying to subvert expectations, and I get that, but it came off as cheap and unearned.

What do you think? Am I being too hard on Coven (or too forgiving of Asylum)? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below or Tweet me.