AHS 1984 finale creates a big plot hole for American Horror Story

Note: contains major spoilers for American Horror Story: 1984.

Since American Horror Story revealed its "huge twist", the last few episodes of AHS: 1984 have felt a tad repetitive, recycling the same-old ghost stories. It's somewhat ironic then that watching the ghosts of Camp Redwood murder Richard Ramirez again and again actually turned out to be the finale's biggest highlight.

To protect the world from his evil, the campers devised a "death watch" who were in charge of killing The Night Stalker every time Satan resurrected him. Channeling Groundhog Day just as much as the usual '80s slasher movies, the finale killed Richard off in a number of surprisingly inventive ways.

Unfortunately, not even all of the Misery-style hobblings in the world can keep a good Night Stalker down for long. While Chef Bertie distracted Chet with her feminine wiles, Satan popped in with some black mist and freed Ramirez from his endless torment.

But wait a minute. This scene was set in 2019, so who was that other Night Stalker guy in American Horror Story: Hotel?

richard ramirez, american horror story, season 5 hotel

Bettmann/FOX//Getty Images

Back in an early episode of season five, James March held a party for deceased serial killers like Jeffrey Dahmer and Aileen Wuornos. Richard 'Night Stalker' Ramirez was also invited to this 'Devil's Night', where he mentioned dying two years before in 2013.

What to Read Next

So how did the Night Stalker show up in 2015 if he was under 'death watch' in Camp Redwood? Even if he somehow escaped to casually drop by the Hotel Cortez, this still wouldn't explain how the other party guests also knew about his death in prison (which is actually how Ramirez died in real life).

As even casual fans of American Horror Story know by now, every season is connected in one shared timeline, so there's no way Ramirez could have been in two places at once... unless that timeline has now been altered.

Thanks to Mallory's time-hopping exploits in Apocalypse, some canonical events from past seasons have been changed forever, but even so, it's hard to see how Michael's death would have impacted much of what happened in season five.

Fox

Aside from Queenie's death, Apocalypse's big timeline change would have had little bearing on Hotel or the Night Stalker's life at Camp Redwood either.

Instead, it's far more likely that Richard's fate is just one big old plot hole we can either choose to ignore or continue griping about until the real apocalypse arrives. Either way, we blame the aliens.

American Horror Story: 1984 airs on Wednesdays at 10/9c on FX in the US. You can watch season 9 on FOX and NOW TV in the UK. Catch up on series 1-8 on Netflix, with seasons 1-9 available to buy on Amazon Prime Video.