WARNING! Spoilers ahead for American Horror Story season 11!American Horror Story season 11’s ending repeats a mistake previously made by Double Feature. Since American Horror Story season 10, Double Feature, is considered one of the series’ weakest installments, the expectations for NYC weren’t too high. While NYC was ultimately a stronger season in terms of its character development, villains, and writing, American Horror Story season 11 failed to improve upon a key criticism of Double Feature’s ending.
Just like Double Feature, Ryan Murphy’s NYC ending was too abrupt, which made for a less satisfying conclusion. This exact mistake was made with both Red Tide and Death Valley in American Horror Story season 10, with ambiguous final scenes failing to give sufficient story resolutions. Similar to how Red Tide ended with The Chemist driving away from vampiric chaos and Death Valley delivering the “perfect” alien specimen, American Horror Story: NYC’s ending suddenly cuts to black as Adam is preparing to give a speech at Gino’s funeral. This ending fails to wrap up a few storylines or provide answers to some of the season’s burning questions, such as confirming the deer’s real connection to the AIDS epidemic.
Why Did AHS: NYC End With Gino's Funeral?
After already experiencing several funerals and death scenes for American Horror Story season 11’s characters, NYC abruptly ends before Adam’s eulogy at Gino’s funeral. Considering almost the entire two-part finale consisted of AHS: NYC’s main characters dying of HIV/AIDS, ending on yet another funeral seemed somewhat anticlimactic. However, Gino had just spent the past decade seeing everyone he loves die from the virus, fighting for awareness about the disease and justice for the gay community, and trying to keep Big Daddy’s wrath away, so his death concluded a certain era in the story.
Gino’s death and Adam’s survival in American Horror Story season 11’s ending represented the notion that this disease is not done claiming lives, but the hopeful fight to bring an end to it still beats on. AHS: NYC implies that Adam has given this same unheard speech dozens of times, and Gino won’t be the last person he eulogizes. Adam will still continue Gino and Hannah’s work after American Horror Story season 11, with the true story of the AIDS epidemic giving clues as to what the future of Adam’s activism holds. While the finale could have used another scene to tie up some loose ends, concluding NYC with Gino’s death after he survived so many lethal threats makes sense.
Why AHS: NYC's Ending Was Still Better Than Double Feature's
American Horror Story: Double Feature notably botched both endings to its two parts, but the problems extended beyond abrupt endings. AHS: NYC at least has an emotional, heartfelt ending that generally wraps up the story, whereas Double Feature’s endings took very sharp turns from the main plot. Compared to season 10, the overall pacing for American Horror Story season 11 wasn’t rushed, with the finale arguably spending too much time on some dream sequence deaths. The messages in American Horror Story season 11 were strong and well-explored until the end, but simply struggled to sick the landing with the two-part finale’s pacing.