'AHS' Has A New Subtitle & It's Not What You Think

The premiere of American Horror Story Season 6 felt long overdue, and not just because it felt like decades since the finale of the show's last installment, Hotel. American Horror Story Season 6 felt particularly long-awaited, because, this time around, the theme, plot, and subtitle of the new season was kept tightly under wraps. Fortunately, the premiere of finally revealed its theme, and it's delightfully creepy. The new season of the FX anthology series will explore a married couple's supernatural experience in the Lost Colony of Roanoke, through the framework of a documentary called My Roanoke Nightmare. However, one thing that's still a bit of a mystery is the subtitle for American Horror Story Season 6 — because, unlike what some fans believe, it's not My Roanoke Nightmare.

The documentary style is a new one for American Horror Story, but, so far, it seems that the show is committed to it for the rest of the season. A new preview for the second episode of Season 6 of AHS reveals that we'll be following Matt and Shelby's story once again through the format of their documentary, which includes both reenactments and "talking head" interviews. In the preview, the show is introduced as My Roanoke Nightmare, rather than, say, American Horror Story: My Roanoke Nightmare. Though the phrase "American Horror Story" is referenced at the end, it seems like the new preview wants to make it seem like we're watching the "show within the show" that is the ghost documentary, rather than a new episode of American Horror Story. We don't get the "real" subtitle for American Horror Story from this preview — but it does exist, according to the show's official Facebook page.

According to the Facebook page for American Horror Story's new season, the actual subtitle is — drumroll, please — American Horror Story: Roanoke. Pretty simple, sure, but it could also be pretty telling about what to expect moving forward.

The fact that American Horror Story isn't labeled American Horror Story: My Roanoke Nightmare or American Horror Story: Documentary suggests that Roanoke will be more important than the framing device used within the first two episodes (and likely the rest of the season). Considering that some fans considered the framing device a little distancing — we only see the "action" of the events play out by people whom the show has already labeled as actors — it's possible that the show will do something to flip the documentary style on its head. Perhaps it will even totally drop by the end of the season; it's a mystery like everything else.

While the show-within-the-show might be My Roanoke Nightmare, American Horror Story isn't claiming that title for its own — which is making me all the more suspicious of what's really going on in the current season.

Image: FX Networks/YouTube