Creepy new images, promos, and details on FX’s American Horror Story season 2

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

(MINOR SPOILERS follow) For those who tuned in to the first season of FX’s American Horror Story the appeal of the second season is likely through the roof.  The show averaged 4.4 million viewers and garnered 17 Emmy nominations, which is pretty great for a first season.  I watched the first episode out of curiosity and was glued to the bitter end.  Scary, sexy, shocking, and outright engaging, the show was unlike anything I’d seen on TV before.  Now, with the second season, entitled American Horror Story: Asylum, we are in for more scares, more sex, more shock, and, in a very cool move, more of the same stars, only in very different roles.  Showrunners Ryan Murphy (Glee) and Brad Falchuk have pushed the limits of cable with the series and promise more of the same for its second turn.

In the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly, the cast and crew talked about the upcoming season, what to expect, and just how crazy and horrific it’ll be. “To me, last year was a family drama.  This is our version of a workplace drama,” said Falchuk. 

This season takes place at Briarcliff Manor in western Massachusetts, which serves as a mental asylum for a wide array of personalities who may or may not be crazy, including a nymphomaniac, an alien abductee, a lesbian journalist, and a degenerate bully, amongst others. “I was really interested in the idea of people being punished because they’re different…It’s about the oppressed.  More than that, this season is really about asking the question of who is crazy and who is sane,” said Murphy.  “When I read [the scripts] I was like, ‘This is nuts.’  Then we did the table read, and we read it aloud, there was something more grounded about it.  But it’s provocative, and that makes it fun to watch,” said Chloe Sevigny, who plays the nymphomaniac inmate.

The story will jump between modern day and 1964, as newlyweds Leo (Maroon 5’s Adam Levine) and Teresa (Jenna Dewan Tatum) stumble onto an “abandoned” Briarcliff, where the nightmare begins.  it’s there that they meet a character named Bloody Face, a serial killer who wears a mask of his victim’s flesh, along with a black nightie and opera-length gloves.  “I don’t think people tune in to the show because they want MY DINNER WITH ANDRE.  I think they want to be scared.  I’m just writing what I would like to see.  I’m scared of aliens and I’m scared fo Nazis and I’m scared of nuns.  So it’s the perfect stew of horror and fear,” said Murphy. 

Jessica Lange delivered an amazing performance last season and to have her back for another is enough to draw me in, especially as a psychotic nun.  However, there are other returning castmembers, including Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, and STAR TREK’s Zachary Quinto. “I think Ryan’s doing something with American Horror Story that hasn’t been done on television recently, which is create a repertory company of actors.  To have that opportunity to come back and play characters that are totally different is so appealing to me,” said Quinto.  Notable newcomers this season include James Cromwell as a torturous doctor and Joseph Fiennes as a Monsignor to the facility.

“I think this season is going to be the scariest thing anybody has seen on television,” said FX President John Landgraf.  That’s a tall order, but if it’s anything like season one, I think we’ll all have yet another show to be hooked on, which may well serve to bring the TV horror genre back to life.

FX’s American Horror Story: Asylum commits you on October 17th, 2012.