Ilaria Biano, PhD

Clive Barker once said, “There are apparently two books in every American household—one of them is the Bible, and the other one is probably by Stephen King,”[i] thus suggesting an inseparable connection between American culture, religion, and the horror genre. If one were to seek a champion of this cultural milieu within contemporary popular culture, that would likely be Ryan Murphy. American Horror Story (AHS), one of Murphy’s most successful works aired on FX since 2011, is a horror anthology series. Over the years, AHS has presented stories rooted in classic horror tropes and, specifically, the American gothic genre: from haunted houses to asylums, from serial killers to witchcraft to vampires. The narrative is intentionally referential, a pastiche that draws from real events, horror classics, pop culture, history, and American folklore, thus reflecting Murphy’s signature style.

Ryan Murphy style revolves around three main axes. First, a constant cultural reference to Americanness, not as a celebration thereof, but rather as an object of social criticism and satire. Murphy places at the heart of his work not only fears, but myths, imagination, and emblematic episodes of American history, exorcising or deconstructing them. A second aspect of Murphy’s work lies in its postmodern character, expressed through genre pastiche, pop culture references, irony, and intertextuality. Finally, Murphy’s aesthetics revolve around camp, which was defined by Susan Sontag in 1964 as a way of viewing the world as an aesthetic phenomenon containing a great element of artifice. Over time, camp aesthetics have taken on more markedly political content as a cultural critique of dominant ideologies and “a mode of artistic expression that promotes queer visibility and denotes its struggle for representation.”[ii]

These three dimensions serve a distinctly political discourse in Murphy’s work, a progressive and liberal agenda closely tied to criticism of US society. Each of Murphy’s works shapes these aspects based on the different genres the author engages with, from horror to drama, musical to comedy, alternate history to crime. The horror genre, however, presents characteristics and variations that align particularly well with Ryan Murphy’s aesthetic and language, especially American Gothic.

If Gothic tends to cast a shadow while simultaneously exploiting societal taboos, American Gothic, emerging originally from a young society, stands as a counterpart to the American myth of hope and harmony, a critique of the national myth, bringing to the surface through a counter-narrative and in the form of the uncanny, the disturbing. While AHS fully expresses all this, its Gothic is also distinctly Murphy-esque, embracing tendencies already inherent in certain areas of horror television like irony and postmodernism.  Within the context of the horror genre on TV, AHS also signifies a significant innovation. The series appropriates conventional genre elements (the anthology format itself was present in horror television in previous decades, but on an episodic basis) while subverting them and pushing the boundaries of provocation and innovation.  As noted by Jowett, horror on TV seems more inclined to push the pedal of irony, not so much to make the product more acceptable, but to have more narrative opportunities to pursue. The relationship between horror and irony is often established through the register of intertextuality and postmodern language. Authors like Lake Crane, Hills, and Pinedo refer to postmodern horror in reference to texts that, on one hand, are “characterized by transgressions of previous generic rules, but [that] also reference them to make it translation clear,”[iii] and on the other, “[drift] back and forth between scares and laughs without warning.”[iv] AHS unquestionably fits within this genre, and all the unique elements of the show seamlessly come together in its portrayal of demons.

American Demons

The demonic figures depicted in AHS, while building on conventional archetypes, are constructed by adapting these original references, along with classical tropes of the horror genre, to the needs of the style and poetics of a highly recognizable author like Ryan Murphy. The representation of demons from the Christian tradition takes entirely original paths, elaborating a postmodern anti-pantheon deeply rooted in the specifically American imagination, folklore, and gothic tradition.

At first glance, Murphy’s demons possess almost conventional characteristics: they are pure evil but also embody the ills of society. They act against their victims in a very physical manner, committing disturbing acts of physical and often sexual violence. Rubber Man appears in the first season, Murder House, wearing a black latex suit and engaging in a series of attacks on various residents of the house. It reappears in the seventh season, Apocalypse. The status and identity of Rubber Man are never fully explained. In the first season, in most instances, it is one of the ghosts inhabiting the house who wears the suit (purchased by a previous owner). The actions it carries out are extremely violent and often arbitrary. One of the most significant acts is the violence against the homeowner, Vivien, resulting in the birth of a child—the child of a union between a human and a spirit, who is considered the Antichrist. When Rubber Man reappears in Apocalypse, a crossover season between seasons 1 and 3, determining its identity becomes even more complex. The most plausible interpretation suggests that the demonic essence resides in the suit itself, which has autonomous life or influences its wearer. In this sense, it could also be a form of possession—the demon acts through the garment and the one who wears it.

Cases of possession are not particularly frequent in AHS. The most relevant occurs in the second season Asylum. During an exorcism performed on a patient, the demon leaves the patient’s body and enters the body of a young nun, Sister Mary Eunice, whom we had previously known as particularly devoted, fearful, and shy. From that moment, Mary Eunice operates within the psychiatric hospital, carrying out the will of the force that possesses her, acting dissolutely, and even committing sexual violence against the Monsignor who runs the institution. An iconic sequence occurs in her cell, where Mary Eunice, dressed in a red slip, drinks wine and sings towards the crucifix on the wall, You don’t own me, by Lesley Gore.

Another demon to consider is the Addiction Demon, which appears in the fifth season, Hotel. The central scene of the first episode features a demon in human form, its body covered in scar tissue, seemingly engaging in a sexual assault against a man who came to Hotel Cortez to use drugs. This scene is rather long and explicit, which has attracted criticism to the series. On the other hand, when the scene ends, an overhead shot of the man lying on the bed, seemingly unaffected, adds a layer of complexity to the entire scene. It is peculiar that this demon is referred to as the Addiction Demon and that it acts subtly, without a real certainty that it has acted, yet inflicting cruel suffering on those it affects.

Finally, the figure of Papa Legba is interesting—a crossroad demon, an intermediary between the worlds of the living and the dead. He appears in the third season, Coven, in which two different congregations of witches are pitted against each other. Papa Legba belongs to the voodoo imagination, and both groups turn to him to seek favors. AHS’s Papa Legba is actually a combination of two figures from the Haitian voodoo tradition: the spirit of the same name that acts as an intermediary between the world of spirits and that of humans—with traditionally different iconography—and Baron Samedi, whose representation is adopted and who presides over the realm of the dead, occasionally granting humans powers.

It is worth mentioning one more example: the Antichrist. Born, as mentioned, from the union of a human being with a supernatural creature, the Antichrist is given the name Michael and an angelic appearance (but also resembling the average American teenager in the collective imagination). Yet, Michael is also the name of the Archangel destined to lead God’s angels against Lucifer and sound the trumpet to announce the final judgment. This inevitably introduces ambiguity into the character of Michael, as well as establishing an interactive and playful relationship with the series’ fandom. He is first raised by his grandmother at Murder House. Later, he is approached by the Black Pope and a Satanist who instructs him. Eventually, he is found by a coven of warlocks searching for someone who can rise to the top of the witch hierarchy as the Supreme, a role traditionally held by witches.

Demons Among Us

Television has become a natural habitat for demons, especially in recent decades. Unlike shows like Lucifer or Supernatural, AHS seems to relegate demons to minor roles: they are hardly the protagonists and play a more traditional role within the horror framework. These demonic characters, however, serve as tools for the showrunner. They are tailored to match his artistic vision. They are depicted in specific ways that align with the author’s poetics and aesthetics, contributing to the overall narrative and its purposes. Every narrative element, demons included, along with tropes, themes, and settings, must adhere to the author’s language, aesthetics, and ultimate goals. Each element, though it may seem superficial on the surface, is strategically placed for a specific purpose. While some may perceive Murphy’s style as “purposefully light and superficial,”[v] it’s actually a highly self-aware form of superficiality, employing various postmodern techniques to serve the author’s artistic vision and overarching ideals.

In this way, Murphy’s postmodern approach allows him to lead characters down paths that suit his style while staying connected to various traditions—religious, folkloric, or cultural. The anthropomorphic and yet vague depiction of demons like Rubber Man and Addiction Demon holds great significance. They embody the nightmares and societal conflicts Murphy aims to emphasize, representing America’s inner demons. In Hotel, set in various periods of the 20th century in Los Angeles, the Addiction Demon symbolizes the diverse forms of addiction manifesting in the City of Angels. On the other hand, Rubber Man signifies the dark and hidden aspects of bourgeois life, reflecting the secrets lurking within seemingly perfect American families, such as those inhabiting Murder House. Even the possession example in Asylum, though somewhat conventional, when placed within the broader narrative context, points to the hypocrisies of institutions, including religious ones, and the marginalization of vulnerable groups.

While demons embody pure evil, the Antichrist embodies a dual nature, constantly torn between humanity and wickedness, especially due to his youth. The societal context and the ineptitude and stupidity driving towards evil further complicates this dynamic. Notably, the Antichrist reflects the contemporary moment when Apocalypse aired, with its roots in post-Donald Trump America. This season, along with its predecessor Cult, satirizes the deeply divided nation. The apocalypse itself is triggered by two Silicon Valley tech magnates driven by ego, who bored and frustrated, manipulate Michael into sowing irrationality and chaos in humanity, ultimately leading to the final destruction.

As noted, “AHS severs that vital nerve that connects us to the myth of the American Dream,”[vi] but the intention is not purely nihilistic. Ryan Murphy embodies the idea that every author harbors a single story and tells it in different ways. Murphy’s story surfaces not only in AHS’s horror but also in series like American Crime Story and Dahmer, part of the new anthology Monster, all centered on real events in the recent US crime and pop scene. These narratives depict real demons, with varying degrees of cruelty and victimization. Ryan Murphy’s recurring narrative, in fact, revolves around underdog retribution, even in the face of the most ruthless demons and deep-seated hypocrisies.

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Ilaria Biano is a post-doc independent researcher in the fields of Religious and Cultural Studies and Cultural and Intellectual History. She held a PhD in Political Studies, History and Theory from the Università degli Studi in Torino (Italy) with a dissertation on the debates about postsecularity and political secularisms. She also held an MA in Religious Studies by the same University. Since 2015 she has been fellow in high profile Italian research institutes such as Fondazione Einaudi (Torino) and Italian Institute for Historical Studies “Benedetto Croce” (Napoli).

Notes

[i] C. Barker, On Censorship, 1991: 402.

[ii] D. Clarke, My Freaks, My Monsters, 2019: 62.

[iii] E. Austin, Piecing It Together, 2017: 163.

[iv] .L. Crane, cit. M. Hills, The Pleasures of Horror, 2005:       161.

[v] W.S. Poole, American Horror Story: Hotel, 2015.

[vi] G. Hoppenstand, Editorial, 2012: 2.