American Horror Story's Evan Peters cut from Pose for this reason

Pose boss Steven Canals has explained just why Stan Bowes suddenly disappeared from the show after its first season.

Season one of the FX drama featured American Horror Story and WandaVision actor Evan Peters as Wall Street worker Stan, a disillusioned family man who began a secret romance with Angel Evangelista (Indya Moore).

Stan hasn't been seen since his and Angel's break-up at the end of season one, after he became overwhelmed by ball culture, and fans may have wondered why he wasn't brought back again.

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Speaking exclusively to Digital Spy, Pose co-creator Steven Canals explained why the Wall Street storyline wasn't continued into season two, revealing that the show's focus shifted as it found its feet.

"It's a couple of things. I think one is, with any television show, it's always finding its way," he said. "Very rarely, even with classic television, are those first couple of episodes exactly what the show becomes.

"In most shows, you see a shift. Once you start writing and filming the show, and especially once it starts airing, you see what works and what doesn't work. So you make adjustments."

In fact, current real-world events also had an influence on Pose's storylines, with Canals revealing that Donald Trump's election as US President in 2016 changed one of the intended plots.

steven canals on the red carpet for fx's pose

Rich Fury//Getty Images

"When I pitched Pose originally, the show was always supposed to be grounded in everything that was happening socio-politically in New York, in the 1980s. So that's why, for example, the James Van Der Beek character (Matt Bromley) is working for Donald Trump in the first season," he said.

"When we were writing the version of the story where we had the real people from Paris Is Burning, Donald Trump was also a real character in the show. But once he was running for President and then he got elected, we were like, 'He doesn't need any more attention.'

"So we took that out, and we adjusted the Donald Trump character into the character that James Van Der Beek plays, where he just became like a Wall Street dude.

"But there was so much happening in New York City at that time. You had all the queer and trans people. You had Black and brown people who were struggling to survive. And then over in Wall Street, you had all the white people who were doing well, and were making massive amounts of wealth in the middle of Ronald Reagan's presidency. There was such a huge disparity in terms of experience.

"Originally, the show was going to highlight that. That was the thing I wanted to lean all the way into."

Pari Dukovic/FX

However, things changed when the show's producers realised that the heart of the show actually lay with Blanca Evangelista (Mj Rodriguez) – and so the Wall Street characters were dropped.

"What we found as the season went on is that the real beating heart of the show is Blanca, and her relationship to her kids," Canals said. "It was all about the House of Evangelista, and how they're surviving.

"And that's the thing that the audience seemed to be super invested in. So it just made sense to us that, moving forward, that is where all the attention should go.

"Which isn't to say that we didn't do really great narrative things that first season, because I actually really love the Angel/Stan storyline. That's a very real experience that I've heard from a lot of trans women about, that they'll date these men, and they're kept in a corner, or the men are not proud of them. So that storyline was really important."

Pose, which was also co-created by Ryan Murphy, is about to begin airing its third season, which was recently confirmed to be its last.

Pose season three starts airing with two episodes on Sunday, May 2, on FX, and subsequent episodes will air weekly. A UK air date has not yet been confirmed.

American Horror Story airs on FX in the US and FOX in the UK. Catch up on series 1-8 on Netflix, with seasons 1-9 available to buy on Amazon Prime Video.