wlj

Hey guys, i know i am late to the game. i just watched the first season on Netflix this week.



my question is, is the Asylum season worth even starting? Does it stay scary or just fall apart after a few episodes?

writer106

I enjoyed Asylum for the most part. There was one storyline that in that season that was bad and poorly written. Jessica Lange and Sarah Paulson gave good performances in that season.

starseed1981

Asylum is the best season they've had imho.

stopgap

All the seasons seem to tail off toward the end. I really like the concept of season one but like you said. Asylum, yes. That was probably the better Stories of the show. I didn't even finish the last one with the circus.

Luds

Yep, Asylum by far the best season.

Goat3001

I personally thought the first season was the best. Good, self contained story. Maybe a little predictable and not exactly scary, but enjoyable throughout.

I thought Asylum was pretty good and definitely worth watching but personally I felt it was too busy for its own good. Too much going on and too many subplots. Overall though I liked it a lot.

Coven started off pretty good (IIRC) and then completely fell apart as the season went on. It was bad enough that I didn't even bother to watch Freak Show.

I'm intrigued by "Hotel" because it seems they're trying to go back to their Murder House roots with it.

Jadzia

I also thought season 1 fell off a cliff, story-wise. Asylum was much better maintaining the crazy momentum throughout the entire season. It's my favorite season.

Coven also fell into the season 1 trap - it started off strong then fell apart.

The Freak Show one was pretty much bad the entire season.

wlj

OK, i will move forward to Asylum. Thanks for the input

Koby

I thought Asylum was the weakest season among a weak series. I've completed the first 4 seasons, but I'm undecided if I should bother with season 5 as everything has been pretty lackluster and seems to just fall apart about midway into each season.

PhantomStranger

Asylum falls apart after seven or eight episodes, much like season one did. It's a pattern that American Horror Story has repeated nearly every season of its existence. Asylum has some interesting stuff going on but we soon get a kitchen sink approach from the writers, including musical sequences.

Autotelik

Asylum is my favorite season, but the ending sucked.

LiquidSky

I've enjoyed all the seasons. To me, Asylum is definitely the most disturbing.

Josh-da-man

I finally figured out how American Horror Story works.

Each season is like one of those themed horror anthologies that were popular in the 90s. Each season has a "theme" -- haunted house, spooky asylum, witches, freak show -- and a handful of individual stories that could work on their own that are then mashed up into a single season-long story. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it's unfocused and random.

Just to use "Freakshow" as an example because it is the frehest one in my mind... Twisty the clown is its own short story. The Maggie and Stanley are their own short story. Elsa Mars and her backstory is her own short story. Dandy is his own short story. The twins are their own short story. Etc, etc. Each of these arcs could exist on their own as a part of a themed anthology, but they're all woven into a single narrative. Each season is sort of like a cross between The Twilight Zone and Robert Altman's Short Cuts.

Troy Stiffler

Yup'. I think that's obvious. One setting. Lots of characters.

Tragedy is, the "best" elements come and go so fast. The Nazi doctor. Danny Huston and Kathy Bates. Twisty and ‎Edward Mordrake.

Season 1 held together the best. Season 2 was unexpected. I didn't finish Season 3 and 4. Optimistic that Season 4 will be good.

Nausicaa

Asylum is far and away the best season, and while it's very darkly comic (laugh out loud hilarious at many times), it is also very disturbing. To me, it was a lot more "scary" than season 1 because ghosts aren't real. The asylum setting involves a lot more very real human on human cruelty that is pretty horrifying at times. I just found the whole setting and story much more interesting.

Now season 3, I wouldn't bother watching.

jacob_b

Like everyone else said, the shows problem is it starts off good, but has too much going on and just falls off tracks. It hooks the first couple of episodes but by the middle you kind of forget about it and then just binge to catch up and afterwards you wonder why you wasted the time as the ending just sucks and never lives up to the start. Great season ideas, just nothing to keep you going.

Eddie W

I think part of their problem is the seasons are too long. It needs to start in October in end before the Christmas break. I bailed on the last season but remember noticing it Feburary or so & thinking "holy crap, this shit is still on??"

DJariya

1/21/15 (We.) 10:00 PM FX (#413) Curtain Call
1/14/15 (We.) 10:00 PM FX (#412) Show Stoppers
1/7/15 (We.) 10:00 PM FX (#411) Magical Thinking
12/17/14 (We.) 10:00 PM FX (#410) Orphans

Each season was always 13 episodes. Last season took a few weeks off and then resumed in January after the holidays and new year.

jacob_b

And almost every TV series is doing that because of the holidays. Kind of sucks, but I understand holidays are with the families and holiday specials.

windom

The first season was only 12 episodes and finished before Christmas.

DJariya

They were supposed to film 13, but Ryan Murphy was double dipping with Glee and didn't have enough time to produce a 13th episode, so they ended the season of episode 12 and if you recall it was an extended episode.

jacob_b

I wonder what will happen since him and Emma Roberts are tied up in that shitty Scream Queens show...

Nth Power

I really liked Season 1.
Asylum was pretty good except for the one storyline which was pretty dumb.
I didn't even finish Freak Show. I think I made it through ten episodes. It started out OK, but it got worse as it went on.

windom

He's also doing American Crime Story with Sarah Paulson right now.

Rob V

This. However, Twisty and Dandy were the best characters, IMO.