Fox’s 23-Episode “Scream Meets American Horror Story” Horror Series Is The Perfect October Binge

While Fox’s underrated two-season horror series blended Scream and American Horror Story into one winning combo, the show only lasted 23 episodes before squandering its original premise. If the success of Netflix’s controversial true crime anthology Monster proves one thing, it’s that Ryan Murphy knows how to drum up publicity. The Glee creator may not always be a critical darling, but his shows have consistently managed to earn attention, whether positive or negative.

From 9-1-1’s ridiculous season 10 premiere, which unleashed a volcano on Los Angeles, to Britney Spears cropping up for a cameo in Glee season 2, Murphy’s output has long been defined by ambitious swings that don’t always pay off. If there is one thing that encapsulates Murphy’s 13-season FX horror anthology American Horror Story, with its countless celebrity cameos, jaw-dropping moments of gross out gore, and absurdly campy, arch plot twists, it would be this same relentless commitment to shock value.

It is something of a surprise, then, that one of Murphy’s most underrated shows didn’t gain as much attention as its flashy premise and starry cast would imply. What makes this even more surprising is the fact this show, Fox’s two-season horror comedy Scream Queens, is arguably Murphy’s most underrated title to date. While the 9-1-1 franchise spawned spinoff after spinoff and American Horror Story continues to shuffle along after over a decade and a half on the air, this inventive slasher satire was canceled after a mere 23 episodes.

Scream Queens Is A Rare Slasher TV Show That Works

Set in Wallace University, Scream Queens centers on the Kappa Kappa Tau sorority as its members fall victim to a masked murderer let loose on their college campus. While Skyler Samuels’s Grace is initially posited as the show’s ostensible heroine, Emma Roberts’s cruel sorority queen Chanel Oberlin is the true star of the series. With her sidekicks Chanel #2, Chanel #3, and Chanel #5, Chanel rules the sorority with an iron fist, and even the arrival of the show’s slasher killer can’t get in the way of her plans.

What ensues is an absurdly over-the-top campus character comedy with frequent interjections of surprisingly gory horror. The combination sounds like it should be an uneasy tonal blend and, admittedly, the mix of Giallo-inspired gruesome slasher horror and goofy comedic beats is not quite as masterfully balanced as Mike Flanagan’s later Netflix series The Fall of the House of Usher.

However, Scream Queens is still better than it has any right to be, and the show cracks a TV writing problem that many slasher shows have struggled with before and since. It’s a Ryan Murphy comedy, so all the victims are funny enough to be bearable and often amusing, but also annoying enough for viewers to want them dead and cheer on their eventual, often needlessly elaborate death scenes.

This sidesteps the usual issue that faces many slasher TV shows, where viewers either care too much or too little about the main characters. In some shows, solid character work results in viewers caring about the victims too much and not wanting them to die (as happened with Scream: The Series), or hating them and not wanting to wait for their deaths (as occurred with Harper’s Island and Slasher).

Admittedly, Shudder’s far gorier horror anthology Slasher is a better fit for viewers who want a genuinely grim, brutal slasher in the vein of the Terrifier movies. However, for fans of the campier, more self-aware slashers like the Scream franchise, the Happy Death Day movies, and particularly 2022’s blackly comedic mystery Bodies Bodies Bodies, Scream Queens is an ideal fit.

Scream Queens Has One of the Best TV Casts Ever

While the premise of a campus-set slasher horror from the creator of American Horror Story was always going to be appealing, Scream Queens massively benefited from a truly astounding cast. With slasher icon Jamie Lee Curtis as the college’s deadpan Dean Cathy Munsch, Scream 4’s Roberts as its spiteful protagonist, and Zombieland’s Abigail Breslin as Chanel #5, Scream Queens was blessed with horror royalty from the start.

However, the cast list only gets more impressive from there. Even compared to other slasher comedies like Totally Killer, the Scream Queens lineup is legendary. Future blockbuster star Glen Powell steals the entire series as Chanel’s contemptible love interest Chad Radwell, Wicked’s Ariana Grande plays Chanel #2, and Billie Lourd and Glee’s Lea Michele round out the sorority’s lineup.

Keke Palmer is the heroine Grace's sardonic sidekick, Zayday, while Diego Bonita plays her love interest, with Oliver Hudson appearing as Grace's suspicious father and New Girl’s Nasim Pedrad playing his love interest. As if this weren’t enough, Nick Jonas, Patrick Schwarzenegger, and Chad Michael Murray briefly pop up for cameo appearances, while season 2 of the show introduces the Twilight saga’s Taylor Lautner, Jerry O’Connell, John Stamos, Diane’s Cheers replacement Kirstie Alley, and Niecy Nash.

Scream Queens Season 2 Fumbled An Iconic Setup

Sadly, the divisive Scream Queens season 2 is also where things fell apart for this once promising series. Without giving away too many spoilers, suffice it to say that season 2 began with the survivors of season 1 relocating to a hospital under the guidance of their former Dean. This new setting had a lot of potential, but it was wasted in a show that didn’t know what it wanted to be.

In theory, Scream Queens could have kept reinventing itself with each new season’s new classic slasher movie setting. After college and hospital settings that borrowed from classic slashers like The Dorm That Dripped Blood, Final Exam, Visiting Hours, and X-Ray, co-writer Ian Brennan even suggested a summer camp setting for a possible season 3. This would have allowed the series to pay tribute to not just the Friday the 13th series, but also The Burning, the Sleepaway Camp franchise, and Madman.

However, instead of centering on the mystery of who was picking off the hospital’s inhabitants, the first half of Scream Queens season 2 unwisely focused more on weird medical mysteries than the main killer storyline. This sapped the show of its momentum and led to the series losing focus, an issue that wasn’t helped by the show killing off some of its most beloved characters with little fan fare in this sophomore outing. As a result, Scream Queens’s unique blend of American Horror Story and the Scream franchise didn’t share the longevity of either earlier series.