The Bond(age) of American Horror Story

As the Rubber Man stalks through the ominous mansion, he is avoiding comparisons but still conjuring up images of Green Man. The audience of the new TV series "American Horror Story" is bewildered in their realization that ghosts possess the ability to work themselves tangibly against and interact with their human victims. Traditionally, ghosts' interactions with humans have been subtle and kept within certain boundaries. "American Horror Story" takes a firm stance in the unsubstantiated rules of haunting. 

The Harmons are the stoic-faced family on whom the show centers. The parents, couch-therapist Ben and ever-forgiving Vivien, have recently experienced a tumultuous period in their marriage. In an effort to create a clean slate for themselves and their teenage daughter Violet, they establish a new home in a renovated Victorian mansion that was on the market for a curiously low price. Violet is unhappy about the move, but her newly formed attraction to the troubled boy Tate under her father's psychiatric care leads her to a more intimate involvement with the spirits of the house.

Two of the main spirits in the show are Larry Harvey, who has a half-scarred face, and Constance Langdon, the next-door neighbor. Constance consistently acts as the omniscient and confident protector of the Harmons and their home, while simultaneously alarming them with an overly curious daughter, faint allusions to the impending spirits, and an occasional eruption of displaced fury.

To delve into the psyche of this morally distressed family unit, as this show does often, is to be shuttled into bliss. The repercussions of infidelity are magnified and the results are exacerbated by the lives of those who died and whose spirits have been trapped for decades in the "Murder House." The story-lines of the dead tie in with those of the Harmons. Interestingly enough, as the tenants, out of fear, attempt to sell and abandon the house, they realize how inextricably attached they are to it.

Some conservative viewers shriek at several aspects of this small-screen gem. Among the subjects of controversy are implied rape, brain consumption and animal cruelty. These issues are intricately woven throughout the storyline, resulting in the tethering to forces out of their control. However, where the repulsion grips viewers, the detrimental psychology binds them and moral entropy ensues as a world unknown. 

The abandonment of traditional story-lines at the finale of Season One, allowing for the viewers to infer or fill in gaps, more than piques interest for Season Two. A demon baby manages to flee from its family and winds up under the throes of Constance, who cares for the child immensely. The subjugation sought after by Constance will no doubt involve the bad seed. A new family ripe for the "Murder House" may be the obvious direction for the writers to undertake in Season Two, as implied near the end of Season One. However, viewers may be left to focus consciously on supernatural leading roles. Either way, the skin-tight suits running rampant throughout more than one show on FX beckon the unknown, the unusual and the fixated.