American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

American Horror Story Asylum: The True Story That Inspired Season 2

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American Horror Story: Asylum is inspired by several real people and places. From institutions to killers, to aliens, Asylum is chillingly true.

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American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

American Horror Story: Asylum is easily one of the darkest seasons of the anthology TV series, and several of its twisted storylines are actually based in truth.

Before Kathy Bates, Angela Bassett, and Lady Gaga starred in the series, American Horror Story: Asylum boasted some of the biggest and best actors the series had seen. Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, Lily Rabe, and Zachary Quinto all returned from the first season, Murder House, as new characters.

Asylum tackles serial killers, aliens, a rundown psychiatric facility, demonic possession, evil Nazi doctors, among other topics, making it one of American Horror Story’s more confusing seasons. Even still, the stories are cleverly woven and most of them tied are up well enough by the end that viewers are left satisfied, which can’t be said for every season. Though it takes on a lot, Asylum looked to many aspects of history that are rooted in the same darkness as the season – and series – itself.

Briarcliff Manor Was Based The Notorious Willowbrook State School

American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

Briarcliff Manor, despite being a backdrop much of the time in Asylum, is indeed one of, if not the main character of the season, as a majority of what transpires is within its walls. It may seem like a truly horrific place, but it pales in comparison to its inspiration, the Willowbrook State School. Willowbrook was an institution for intellectually impaired children in Staten Island, New York that operated from 1947 to 1987. Within that 40 year period, the happenings that occurred were truly gruesome.

According to The Praeger Handbook of Special Education by Alberto Bursztyn, by 1965, the institution held six thousand patients even though it could only comfortably accommodate four thousand. The children were left to their own devices; many were malnourished and covered in their own body matter. There were also signs of physical and sexual abuse on some of the children at the hands of the staff.

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Then there were the experiments. In 1956, a disturbing research study began at Willowbrook, in which researchers intentionally infected patients with hepatitis A to study the virus. The people behind the inhumane experiment claimed that there was already a high infection rate of hepatitis at the school before the study began, and attested that the intentionally-infected children would have more than likely gotten it anyway. The experiment lasted for 14 years before being shut down.

Much like Sarah Paulson’s character did with Briarcliff, Geraldo Rivera released his exposé about the institution in 1972 called Willowbrook: The Last Great Disgrace. The report showed the truly deplorable conditions the patients were living in and gained the attention of the nation. However, it wasn’t until 1987 that Willowbrook finally shut down.

Lana Winters Is Based On Investigative Journalist Nellie Bly

American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

Lana Winters is probably one of the greatest characters Sarah Paulson has ever played on any season of American Horror Story. Much of the season revolves around her character, a reporter trying to get her big break by going to the asylum under false pretenses, only to be admitted against her own will. She pushes through everything that’s thrown at her, and audiences can’t help but root for her along the way. Possibly the best part about Lana Winters’ character is that she’s based on the very real Nellie Bly.

Bly was born Elizabeth Cochran Seaman, although most know her by her pen name, Nellie Bly. Though known for various impressive writings, one in particular struck a chord with American Horror Story creators, called 10 Days in a Madhouse. In 1887, Bly took an undercover assignment for Joseph Pulitzer’s newspaper, New York World to unearth and report on the poor conditions at the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island, or Roosevelt Island as it’s known today. To do so, Bly had to get involuntarily admitted by pretending she was insane. She succeeded and was admitted. 10 days later, she was released and her exposé about the incident put her on the map as an investigative journalist.

Kit and Alma Are Based On Betty and Barney Hill

American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

Some may think American Horror Story: Asylum’s alien plot was a bit too much or didn’t belong in the season, especially with so much else going on. While it’s true that the season featured several storylines, aliens played a critical role due to the people who inspired the characters Kit and Alma Walker. The on-screen couple is based on a real-life one, Betty and Barney Hill.

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Betty and Barney Hill too were an interracial married couple who reported seeing and being abducted by an alien spacecraft on September 19th, 1961. They were driving back home to Portsmouth, New Hampshire at night and witnessed a strange object fly across the sky, only to watch it descend and get closer to their vehicle. After some time being followed by the UFO, the two said that they felt dazed and arrived at their home at 5 a.m. in the morning, but were unable to account for 2 hours. It was later that they began to remember what happened with the missing time and reported that they were abducted by humanoid beings.

Dr. Arthur Arden Is Based On Josef Mengele

American Horror Story Asylum The True Story That Inspired Season 2

Briafcliff’s resident doctor, Dr. Arthur Arden, AKA Hans Gruper, wasn’t the most likeable character, mostly due to the fact that he was a sadistic Nazi war criminal who experimented on his patients. The subjects that didn’t die from his brutal experiments became deformed, bloodthirsty creatures and were sent to live out in the woods surrounding Briarcliff. Unfortunately, this is another character who was inspired by an equally evil, real-life person: Josef Mengele. Mengele was one of the overseeing SS doctors at the Auschwitz concentration camp, and was later transferred to another, Gross-Rosen. He led several human experiments and had a particular interest in twins, subjecting them to several gruesome procedures that many died from.

Dr. Oliver Thredson Was Based On Ed Gein

Zachary Quinto did a phenomenal job playing Dr. Oliver Thredson in American Horror Story: Asylum. The series has dealt with powerful witches, ghosts, crazy cult leaders, and even the Antichrist, but Thredsen is a monstrous character that holds his own against other antagonists of the series, despite being human. It’s unsurprising that a character so evil was inspired by infamous serial killer, Ed Gein.

While he only confessed to murdering two women, Gein had a habit of graverobbing. It estimated that he exhumed up to nine bodies from cemeteries; he then “repurposed” them for various reasons. This included making lampshades, belts, vests, and masks out of human skin, and other various items from the bones of his victims, such as bowls and ashtrays. Dr. Thredson, AKA Bloody Face, was based on someone about as real and disturbing as it gets, but his wasn’t the only instance of Gein’s story. Gein also inspired The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s Leatherface and others throughout horror history.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/american-horror-story-asylum-season-2-true-story/

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