American Horror Story is a horror miniseries/anthology, the subject of which varying between aliens, the supernatural, and being a homage to American horror movies and cliches.
Murder House is the first season, and it's arguably the weakest.
Murder House is about Ben Harmon, his wife Vivien, and their daughter Violet. They buy and move into the infamous murder house, which is about 3 doors down from where OJ killed his wife, so the street is a teeny tiny bit famous.
Of course, not before a flashback of two boys going into the house who get viciously murdered in the basement by something. Honestly, I didn't like them.
Right of the bat, they meet their neighbors, Constance (who is freakin' amazing) and Addie, along with Tate (who is the worst character in this mess) who doesn't seem to live with them. Rather, he wanders around the house, talking to Violet and generally making everyone miserable.
It's also around here that Violet and Tate's pandering begins. Most of their scenes can best be summed up with this conversation:
[sub]Violet: I think gay porn is hot.[/sub]
[sup]Tate: Totally.[/sup]
Not much happens with them, save the last few episodes and the Halloween one. Most of what they do is walk around the house, be hipsters, and allude to having had sex five minutes ago, but the dialogue is so vague that you could probably assume they were talking about paintball.
Not very interesting. Violet's not a bad character by any stretch, but not much is done with her. More on that later.
Ben cheated on his wife with a 21 year old student of his, which is very understandably creepy and put a massive strain on their relationship, and Vivien outright refuses to forgive him. And this is treated as being an iron *****. Which just isn't very fair.
This is not at all helped by Moira, the maid, whose main gimmick is that to men, or at least men who don't understand how the house and women work, she looks like a pretty young thing with stockings, and to women as a tired, sweet old lady. Her main purpose on the show is:
A) Advancing the plot when Ben and Vivien are being too fucking stupid to.
B) Flashing her black knickers.
C) Hypocrisy.
D) Being shot by Constance for... being raped?
The house's also haunted, and anyone who dies there is stuck there for all eternity. But the question is: Why the fuck are there so many damn dead people?
None of them get really developed, which is a problem sometimes shared with our three protagonists, but they're at least fun to watch, because they're heaps more interesting than the narcissist, idiot who won't stand up for ourselves, and stoner hipster we have as our main characters.
Thankfully, the pre-episode flashbacks get longer, and more focus goes onto the ghosts as time goes on, but it doesn't excuse the fact that being a ghost just means that you can't leave the house except on Halloween - which is when all the dead temporarily come back, and you can turn invisible when the plot calls for it.
In the end, the season's biggest flaw is that I can't tell who I'm supposed to like.
I can't like Ben, even though he's the only competent one (just slightly), because he's an adulterous dickhead who spends most of his time whining about how his wife is slightly pissed.
I can't like Vivien, because she simply doesn't stand up for herself; not once does she say "fuck you im leaving this cray-cray house", not until she almost gets killed, after being raped by a gimp ghost (it's complicated).
I want to like Violet, but not much gets done with her. She gets much more prominent, and gets much more of a personality, but she exists to defend Tate, and to show that ghosts can't leave the house even though we already knew that.
As for the ghosts, it's easier to like them.
Moira is much more likable because she got shot in the face by a Southern Belle demon mistress psycho, and she actually does stuff. But she gets grating because, aside from the symbolism, young Moira exists to seduce extras and attract male viewers. Granted, there's a lot of fanservice that goes both ways, so... eh?
The gay guys are kind of funny, and one of them is played by Spock.
Tate is pretty obviously dead, but his character is what is called a Complete Monster - just like when a character is too good do they get boring, the opposite is true: When a character is so irredeemably bad, even by the standards of the not-so-moral Harmon family, do they get boring as hell.
In the end, Murder House is good. Mostly because it's so ridiculously bad. It's full of narm, stupidity, but it's also incredibly watchable. It's full of camp, and it's horribly unpolished, but it's still a certain kind of good that doesn't really fit into "this is great" or "this is bad". You watch it to hate it.
You also watch it for the lingering shots of (Inset character's name here)'s ass, but fanservice will always be fanservice.
Murder House is the first season, and it's arguably the weakest.
Murder House is about Ben Harmon, his wife Vivien, and their daughter Violet. They buy and move into the infamous murder house, which is about 3 doors down from where OJ killed his wife, so the street is a teeny tiny bit famous.
Of course, not before a flashback of two boys going into the house who get viciously murdered in the basement by something. Honestly, I didn't like them.
Right of the bat, they meet their neighbors, Constance (who is freakin' amazing) and Addie, along with Tate (who is the worst character in this mess) who doesn't seem to live with them. Rather, he wanders around the house, talking to Violet and generally making everyone miserable.
It's also around here that Violet and Tate's pandering begins. Most of their scenes can best be summed up with this conversation:
[sub]Violet: I think gay porn is hot.[/sub]
[sup]Tate: Totally.[/sup]
Not much happens with them, save the last few episodes and the Halloween one. Most of what they do is walk around the house, be hipsters, and allude to having had sex five minutes ago, but the dialogue is so vague that you could probably assume they were talking about paintball.
Not very interesting. Violet's not a bad character by any stretch, but not much is done with her. More on that later.
Ben cheated on his wife with a 21 year old student of his, which is very understandably creepy and put a massive strain on their relationship, and Vivien outright refuses to forgive him. And this is treated as being an iron *****. Which just isn't very fair.
This is not at all helped by Moira, the maid, whose main gimmick is that to men, or at least men who don't understand how the house and women work, she looks like a pretty young thing with stockings, and to women as a tired, sweet old lady. Her main purpose on the show is:
A) Advancing the plot when Ben and Vivien are being too fucking stupid to.
B) Flashing her black knickers.
C) Hypocrisy.
D) Being shot by Constance for... being raped?
The house's also haunted, and anyone who dies there is stuck there for all eternity. But the question is: Why the fuck are there so many damn dead people?
None of them get really developed, which is a problem sometimes shared with our three protagonists, but they're at least fun to watch, because they're heaps more interesting than the narcissist, idiot who won't stand up for ourselves, and stoner hipster we have as our main characters.
Thankfully, the pre-episode flashbacks get longer, and more focus goes onto the ghosts as time goes on, but it doesn't excuse the fact that being a ghost just means that you can't leave the house except on Halloween - which is when all the dead temporarily come back, and you can turn invisible when the plot calls for it.
In the end, the season's biggest flaw is that I can't tell who I'm supposed to like.
I can't like Ben, even though he's the only competent one (just slightly), because he's an adulterous dickhead who spends most of his time whining about how his wife is slightly pissed.
I can't like Vivien, because she simply doesn't stand up for herself; not once does she say "fuck you im leaving this cray-cray house", not until she almost gets killed, after being raped by a gimp ghost (it's complicated).
I want to like Violet, but not much gets done with her. She gets much more prominent, and gets much more of a personality, but she exists to defend Tate, and to show that ghosts can't leave the house even though we already knew that.
As for the ghosts, it's easier to like them.
Moira is much more likable because she got shot in the face by a Southern Belle demon mistress psycho, and she actually does stuff. But she gets grating because, aside from the symbolism, young Moira exists to seduce extras and attract male viewers. Granted, there's a lot of fanservice that goes both ways, so... eh?
The gay guys are kind of funny, and one of them is played by Spock.
Tate is pretty obviously dead, but his character is what is called a Complete Monster - just like when a character is too good do they get boring, the opposite is true: When a character is so irredeemably bad, even by the standards of the not-so-moral Harmon family, do they get boring as hell.
In the end, Murder House is good. Mostly because it's so ridiculously bad. It's full of narm, stupidity, but it's also incredibly watchable. It's full of camp, and it's horribly unpolished, but it's still a certain kind of good that doesn't really fit into "this is great" or "this is bad". You watch it to hate it.
You also watch it for the lingering shots of (Inset character's name here)'s ass, but fanservice will always be fanservice.