10 Scariest Stories That Inspired American Horror Story Episodes
Many episodes, characters, and stories of all nine seasons of American Horror Story are based on real true crime events and supernatural characters.
Many of the episodes, characters, and stories throughout all nine seasons of American Horror Story are actually based on real-life true crime events and famous supernatural stories and figures. This real-life aspect makes the show way more compelling to audiences who happen to be fans of the strange yet true events that happen in the real world beyond the TV show.
This aspect also makes American Horror Story a lot darker in nature as it is surrounded by morbid stories that have haunted America for decades, and even centuries. It makes the “horror” of the series that much more real.
10 Drink The Kool-Aid
In American Horror Story: Cult, Kai Anderson is a pretty demented kid that is absolutely obsessed with anarchy and chaos. He creates the cult in the series and develops it very similar to how the Mason Family operated and acted like a blue-haired version of the famous cult leader. In episode 9 of the season, titled “Drink the Kool-Aid,” Kai convinces his cult members to drink the artificially flavored drink that is based on the real-life tragedy of Jonestown which was a cult that committed mass suicide by drinking a Kool-Aid-like beverage dosed with cyanide.
9 Piggy Piggy
In the first season of the series, Murder House, Tate Langdon goes on a mass shooting spree at his high school to get back at the bullies who had been tormenting him. This incredibly dark scene in the sixth episode, “Piggy Piggy,” is heavily based on the Columbine shootings from the mid-1990s in which two students in trench coats raid their school. This scene is super heavy and shows how twisted Tate actually is, as the scene mirrors the real-life events all the way down to the dialogue of the victims.
8 Dr. Thredson
While Dr. Thredson is a prominent character throughout the second season of American Horror Story: Asylum, the character doesn’t reveal his true colors until part two of “I am Anne Frank” and “The Origins of Monstrosity” when it is unveiled that Thredson has been the notorious killer, Bloody Face, the entire time.
Dr. Thredson was heavily based on the notorious serial killer, Ed Gein, who butchered his victims and used their skin to make himself household items and clothes. The lampshade made of skin that Lana discovers was the perfect example of what could be found amongst Gein's trophies. A number of other popular movie characters such as Leatherface from Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs were also based on Gein.
7 Madame LaLaurie
The story of the real Madame LaLaurie and her torture house is probably one of the darkest, sickest stories in American history, and became one of the main focuses of the third season of the series, Coven. The LaLaurie mansion currently resides in New Orleans and is a center of bad luck with cursed energy emitting off of it. Madame LaLaurie was a rich slave owner who presented herself well to the other locals of the time. But behind closed doors, she would brutally torture her slaves and often kill them. The season covers some of her atrocities throughout a few of the episodes, from her nightly rituals to her torture chamber, and awful “creations.”
6 Twisty The Clone
Twisty the Clone was one of the most iconic aspects in the fourth season of American Horror Story: Freak Show and made a number of appearances throughout the season. He even showed up in a horror comic book once again during Cult. Twisty was based on Pogo the Clown, the real-life serial killer John Wayne Gacy. Gacy dressed as Pogo would go around often bringing young men back to his house where he would murder them and place their bodies underneath so no one could find them again. While Twisty doesn’t share a ton of characteristics with Pogo, his initial creation and design were definitely based on the serial killer.
5 Papa Legba
Papa Legba appears in a few episodes and seasons of American Horror Story, notably in Coven and Apocalypse. The character is based on the loa in Haitian Vodou who acts as a mediator between humans and the loa. In the series, the character does the same, connecting the witches to the spirits in the next life. He also collects souls and ends up collecting a few of the souls of main antagonists in the seasons, such as Delphine LaLaurie, Fiona Goode, and Michael Langdon, and ends up helping many of the protagonists inadvertently.
4 James March
James March, the owner of the Hotel Cortez and main spirit of season five, Hotel, was actually based on the very real and notorious serial killer of the 1890s, H.H. Holmes. Holmes, like March, also owned a hotel and used his business as a way to trap, murder, and hide the bodies of countless women. It is believed that he could have killed over 200 people as there had been a number of bodies found within the numerous hidden chambers.
Holmes’s hotel was called the World’s Fair Hotel and often nicknamed The Murder Castle after the killer confessed to 27 murders. The Murder Castle had soundproof rooms, maze-like hallways, and hidden passages and rooms.
3 Roanoke
Roanoke was a colony that up and disappeared on the coast of North Carolina back in the 1500s. The island was left totally deserted and it has always been a mystery as to where the people actually went and disappeared to, but there have been some pretty wild theories, mostly associated with that of aliens of supernatural intervention. This lost colony is exactly what the sixth season of American Horror Story is about and even features the ghosts of many of the people who had been lost in Roanoke. One of the other interesting facts about the disappearances is that all that was found was the word “Croatoan” carved on a tree, which is also seen in the season.
2 The Night Stalker
Richard Ramirez, the Night Stalker, was a serial rapist and killer that was active during the ‘80s. He murdered and killed women of all age groups in his active years and had a heightened interest in satanism. In the most recent season of American Horror Story: 1984, Richard Ramirez makes his first appearance and almost immediately becomes one of the main antagonists of the season. The character does a pretty awesome job at portraying the serial killer, even though it doesn’t perfectly align with the original story and seems to do the satanism aspect up a bit more.
1 Devil’s Night
Devil’s Night appears a few times throughout the series but is most notable in season five, episode four when Mr. March hosts a ghoulish dinner party with some familiar faces. The table is filled with famous serial killers, all accounting their murderous crimes and trying to one-up each other. Fans see Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Richard Ramirez, The Zodiac Killer, Aileen Wuornos, and more. This episode is extremely dark and takes a number of real-life horror stories, bringing them all together like a messed up version of the Avengers.