The pilot opened with a look back into the murder of twin boys in 1978. When time forwards to present day, we are introduced to the main stars, Vivien (Connie Britton), Ben (Dylan McDermott) and their daughter Violet (Taissa Farmiga). They move from Boston to LA after Vivien discovers Ben having an affair with a student. It is quickly established that things are tense between each of the family members and that the move is a way to “reconnect.” Strange occurrences begin happening almost immediately including strange appearances from a man in latex, a menacing goblin-like creature and the murdered twins mentioned earlier.

The pilot episode is 70 minutes long and much of it is back story. Several characters are introduced, but their ties to the house are not completely clear. There is an interesting dynamic between them, so it will be interesting to see how these characters develop throughout the series.

The pacing of the pilot was a little slow, but given the amount of back story that was introduced, it's a little understandable. The pilot plays out like an actual horror movie, but there doesn't seem to have the closure that is normally found at the end of a movie. Instead of a “freak of the week” style of story telling, this show seems to prefer to tell one continuous story about the family and the house. This could be a wrong assumption, but that seems to be the direction that the show is headed.

There are several instances where time seems to jump and this can be a little jarring. It seems to give an the show a feeling of being on edge and in small doses, works well. Without out more episodes to compare, it is hard to decide if this will be an irritant or not. Several of the “scary” scenes are edited the same way, giving viewers glimpses of images, but not allowing what it happening to be truly understood.

There are several bits of dialogue that reference things that happened in the house and between the side characters that are not explained in the first episode. These little tidbits are spaced throughout the show and give viewers small snippets of back story for the side characters and the house.

The only problem with the show is there is a lot of sexual content. This mostly seems to play into the psychosis of the main characters, but there is a chance that this could become more graphic as the show progresses. Due the ending of last night's show, it's possible that multiple sex scenes (most were not incredibly graphic, but some edged towards soft-core porn) were included to progress the story faster. This also could have been an excuse for Dylan McDermott to get naked, which he does... a lot.

So far, I would recommend this show to other horror fans. The pacing and editing can be a little jarring for viewers that are not used to the genre. The story is intriguing so far, but as this is review is based solely on the first episode, there is the potential for this show to horribly miss the mark.

American Horror Story can be seen Wednesdays on FX at 10 EST/9 CST

-DJ Creepiz