Ryan Murphy is still being tight-lipped about the clues he dropped in the final few episodes of American Horror Story: Asylum that shed light on what’s to come in season 3 of the anthology horror series. But at a recent screening of the Asylum finale, he did open up to reporters about who’s signed on to come back and he gave a very big picture preview of the upcoming season.
When FX renewed AHS for a third season in November, it was revealed that Jessica Lange (Constance then Jude) would return for the third time in a row to star. Since then, Murphy has let slip that Sarah Paulson (Billy Dean then Lana) and Evan Peters (Tate then Kit) are also coming back as newly fleshed out characters for the new season. Also on tap to return is season 1 star Taissa Farmiga; she played Ben and Vivian Harmon’s daughter Violet. Murphy told EW: “I missed her this season. There wasn’t really a role for her. I feel very protective of her and I didn’t want her to go back into the loony bin—it was too dark. So I thought well ‘I want Taissa to be one of the leads next year.’ I called her up and pitched her the character for the season and she loved it and she said, ‘Yes let’s do it.’ So we’re in negotiations for her to headline season 3.” Rejoining the gang behind-the-scenes is director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon who helped some of the best episodes this season including “I Am Anne Frank (Part 2),” “Spilt Milk,” and the finale “Madness Ends.” Murphy said he’s signed on to direct every third episode next season and that he will have a creative hand in every episode produced.
As far as plot details go, Murphy isn’t diving in just yet but here’s what we’ve got so far. The third season will be “more historical in nature” and take place in modern day across three different cities (on location), though time will jump into the past as it did in season one. The show will continue to harp on our horrors but overall the new season will be lighter in tone than Asylum; it will feature more comedic elements and a romance story. The major arc will revolve around Lange’s character who Murphy hypes to be a “glamour cat leading lady” who will be privy to “hair and makeup and the best designer gowns ever.” Next year’s major monster following season 1’s Rubber Man and season 2’s Bloody Face will be “a great icon–and it’s a woman,” Murphy teases. In fact he says that a big theme in season 3 is going to be “female power.”
And here’s good news for fans of the series. Murphy sees it going for years and years. “I hope this show goes for 10 years because I have so many different kinds of horror that I would like to write about,” he says. “But, I love that you can jump periods and you can play with different actors. I know the actors love playing different characters. So, it’s something that we’ll always stay with.”
American Horror Story reboots next fall.