When AMC’s The Walking Dead hit it big last year, we knew that TV studios and management companies would be capitalizing on the trend and pushing as many of their horror TV projects they have to the top of the greenlight list. The true test, however, is whether any of those shows would turn out to be decent.
Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story has proven that fact with only a handful of episodes, and FX has taken notice as well. The cable network has just announced a second season for the show. THR has the official word from the network.
“It’s one thing to have the ambition and guts to reinvent a genre in a way that makes it captivatingly fresh for a broad audience — it’s something else entirely to have the craft to back that ambition up,” said FX president and GM Jon Landgraf. “Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk have hit the trifecta withNip/Tuck, Glee and now American Horror Story, which will be scaring FX’s viewers to death for many years to come.”
After a 14 percent dip during its second episode, the story about a family that moves into a haunted abode where they’re tortured by spirits of the estate’s former residents in a metaphor for marriage and infidelity, rebounded with its third and fourth airings, which both set series highs in topped the premiere in the advertiser-coveted adults 18-49 demo as well as adults 18-34.
With this, you can expect to see more thrills and jump cuts. The one question remains: how can you take a haunted, creepy horror story and extend it a whole extra year? We’ll find out soon enough.
