Sarah Paulson is returning to American Horror Story as Cordelia Foxx, the Supreme witch from Coven, for Season 13 this September.
American Horror Story is now sequel-izing its own greatest hits, and honestly, it makes perfect sense.
According to Variety, the new season will serve as a continuation of Coven, the show's third season that aired way back in 2013 and remains one of the anthology series' most beloved installments. New Orleans witches, campy horror, and Jessica Lange chewing scenery—what's not to love?
The strategy is clever in a very Ryan Murphy way. American Horror Story has been running for over a decade, cycling through different horror subgenres with diminishing returns. Rather than continuing to chase new concepts, why not mine the seasons that actually worked?
Coven has built-in nostalgia, a devoted fanbase, and enough unresolved storylines to justify a sequel. Plus, bringing back Paulson—the closest thing AHS has to a franchise anchor—signals quality to skeptical viewers who might have drifted away from more recent, lesser seasons.
This is part of a broader trend in TV where even anthology series are becoming franchises. True Detective brought back Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson for Season 4. Limited series get surprise sequel orders. Nothing ever truly ends anymore.
The risk, of course, is that sequels rarely capture what made the original special. Coven worked because it felt fresh—a witchy soap opera with genuine scares and committed performances. Revisiting it 13 years later might feel more like Hollywood's inability to create new hits than a genuine artistic vision.
