American Horror Story: 1984 finale causes major Richard Ramirez continuity error as Hotel crossover backfires
AMERICAN Horror Story tripped itself up with its latest multi-season crossover.
The Ryan Murphy anthology series is famed for referencing previous seasons with each new iteration, with each story line existing within a shared universe.
The latest series, 1984, paid homage to the slasher flicks of the 80s and even included real life serial killer Richard Ramirez aka The Night Stalker in the cast.
In the finale episode, we saw how the ghost of Ramirez was trapped in Camp Redwood, from the time of his death, all the way up to the present day in 2019.
His fellow spectres kept a “death watch” over the Satanist, butchering him every time he was reincarnated so he couldn’t harm anyone else.
We saw this at work when Ramirez tried to murder Mr Jingles’ son, who visited the site to try and learn more about his father’s troubled history.
Most read in TV and Showbiz
Unfortunately this timeline is completely incompatible with the one laid out in former season Hotel.
In a dinner party scene, we saw how some of the US’ most prolific murderers had gathered for a feast in spectre form.
Among the likes of Jeffrey Dahmer and Aileen Wuornos was Richard Ramirez, dressed all in black with dark sunglasses on.
The celebration, named Devil’s Night, was set in 2015, and Ramirez mentioned having died two years earlier in 2013.
This raises two problems – firstly, Ramirez died long before 2013 in the latest season.
Secondly, how could he have taken a trip to the Hotel Cortez when he was trapped in a cycle of death and reincarnation at Camp Redwood all the way through to 2019?
While the show has got around plot holes like this in the past with the use of time travel, no such thing was explored in either the 1984 or Hotel seasons.
Looks like it might be time for Ryan Murphy to go back to the drawing board when it comes to his timelines…
American Horror Story: 1984 is available to stream on NOW TV.