Waiting for the new season of American Horror Story to reveal its subject matter every year is arguably as exciting as anything that happens during any of the episodes. While nothing official has been announced just yet, it looks like Season 6 of American Horror Story will focus on one of the spookiest things the Internet age has given the world: Slender Man.
The haunting and featureless Slender Man became an Internet phenomenon in the past decade, stretching beyond its forum-based roots to enter the lexicon of supernatural entities. His lack of a substantial canon – beyond physical traits such as overly long appendages and vague motivations of abducting children – makes him a good character to serve as a central threat in American Horror Story, since co-creator Ryan Murphy likes to pile on influences and references into the show regardless of what each season is about.
Announcements for Season 6 are apparently being held up over rights issues to the specific Slender Man story Murphy & Co. want to use. Although you can find a plethora of online stories (dubbed creepypasta) with a quick search, this particular story is presumably just that good, and the creative team is reportedly figuring out how to get the rights from the screenwriter so that they can adapt his or her story to fit into the season as a whole, according to US Weekly.
It’s almost impossible to imagine just what Slender Man would do within this crossover-friendly universe. I mean, a fairly large part of American Horror Story: Hotel involved a child getting kidnapped and placed with a bunch of other missing kids, which could be quite similar. Granted, Hotel wasn’t about the actual kidnapping process, which Slender Man stories sometimes focus on, so I guess it could still get some new story ground covered. And that avenue might offer up a place for the seasons to connect through the child actors somehow.
First created in 2009 through a set of images posted by Eric Knudson to the site Something Awful, Slender Man soon became the subject of much online storytelling. To be expected, the character was soon used in different mediums, including fan art and several video games, and the YouTube series Marble Hornets became popular enough for a big screen adaptation to go into (seemingly neverending) development. Not that it’s all been harmless, as there have been multiple real-life murder cases over the years where Slender Man was blamed. Perhaps that side of it will also make its way to AHS narratives.
No casting news has come from the formation of American Horror Story Season 6, although it’s very likely that the Golden Globe-winning Lady Gaga will return to continue her reign as the new Jessica Lange. And we can also expect at least 90% of the major players from past seasons to return in some capacity, with a handful of new actors joining the madness. Here’s hoping they don’t bring in a top talent just to hide him or her behind the Slender Man mask for the whole season.
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