mermaids or sirens for Double Feature’s sea-based theme, they surprisingly returned to creatures already explored within American Horror Story’s universe. Similarly, Part 2 of American Horror Story season 10 will take on aliens, which were also previously encountered in AHS: Asylum.
Double Feature: Red Tide follows a struggling screenwriter who moves to Provincetown, Cape Cod for the winter with his family in hopes of curing his writer’s block. With only a fraction of the town’s population remaining in the winter, Harry, Doris, and Alma get to know the real residents and nature of PTown, which has become a mecca for creative minds. Harry finds out that other writers and talented creatives come to Provincetown for inspiration in the winters, where they take a black pill that gives them a tremendous amount of ideas. As the ideas miraculously pour out of the AHS: Red Tide character's head onto the pages without stopping, he discovers the pills have a sinister side effect — turning its into a blood-sucking vampire.
One immediate way that both Hotel and Double Feature’s vampires relate is that neither of the seasons’ species is technically vampires. They’re vampiric in appearance and the need to suck blood, but neither Hotel’s Afflicted (as confirmed by Ryan Murphy) nor Red Tide’s Pale People fall under vampire definition in the traditional sense. Hotel’s vampires are known as The Afflicted, who are infected with an ancient virus that grants them eternal youth and immortality, where they must feed on fresh human blood to function. The way one spreads the affliction is similar to traditional vampiric transfusions, where the victim must drink or receive a transfusion of blood from an already affected host. Alternatively, Double Feature’s vampires are created when someone takes a black pill created by The Chemist, which gives talented creatives intense, celebrated inspiration for their craft at the cost of needing to drink blood.
An oddity of Double Feature’s vampires is the difference in side effects depending on who takes the blood-sucking-inducing black pills. If the is naturally talented, their appearance remains normal and lively while they receive immediate creative inspiration, they just still have to drink blood to function. If the isn’t talented, they become pale creatures that tweak out, lose normal brain function and speech, and go bald with a simple need to get more blood. AHS: Hotel’s Afflicted, on the other hand, have a come-one, come-all effect from the virus, where whoever receives the blood infection resembles a normal human, typically beautiful, though remains quite pale with a low body temperature.
Another difference between Hotel and Double Feature’s vampires is that season 5’s villains die before returning to life with immortality, whereas AHS season 10’s creatures never actually died and are not immortal. For AHS: Hotel’s creatures, one must drink the blood of a host, die, then become reanimated as an Afflicted, whereafter they hold eternal youth and life. When Double Feature’s vampires get their thirst for blood, they don’t have to die beforehand, they just take the pill and feel its effects. Additionally, they can still die after turning into vampire-like creatures, as demonstrated by Harry bludgeoning one of the pale creatures to death in his home. Aside from the supernatural talent that comes to artists, American Horror Story: Double Feature’s vampires also don’t hold the superhuman abilities that Hotel’s do, such as the powers of Concilium, regeneration, enhanced speed and strength, or transference of the vampiric nature.