Recent constant arguments with users around here have prompted me to post about season 2.

The long and short of it? I hated it. I couldn't stand much of it and it was a chore to watch. I slogged through the whole thing out of dedication to the only horror show on tv right now (well...that and the cinematography is just so beautiful).

I felt that it made no sense at all. They waited till the last 2-3 episodes to decide which plot to focus on and then made a mad dash to the finish, and in the end nothing else had anything to do with anything other than that the paths of the stories crossed within a building, but they had little to no bearing on each other.

I also had issues with the plot (Lana escaping, being caught, escaping, being caught) and the characterization (Thredson seemed inconsistent in the latter half). I was in love with the acting and the cinematography but as to the plot and some of the character work none of it impacted me as anything but obnoxious.

I also felt like many of the genres they forced in could have worked better if saved for seasons of their own. Nazis, Serial Killers, Aliens, Demons, Crazy Nuns, Crazy Santa, Persecution due to out-of-date thinking, all of these things could have been more interesting if given space from the rest of the stories but when you slam them all together it just felt disjointed and made for a clunker of a season.

I would like to state that Asylum horror can be done quite beautifully. Just as of 2010 we got Martin Scorsese's film Shutter Island based on the book of the same name and its theme of psychological manipulation and example as a period piece (as well as its examples of jingoism and Nazism in America in a traumatic post-war environment) made it amazing. The only fault I can find with it is that it lacked any strong female roles, though I'd fault the original story for that more than the film and what we got was still a beautiful, brilliantly put together example of what might have been.

Just some things to think about. I enjoyed the season 3 premier more than either of the other 2 premiers thus far and if the momentum keeps up (and some of the more awkward dialogue like "I'm a human Voodoo Doll bitch!" disappears) then it could well become my favorite season thus far.