Ryan Murphy teased the American Horror Story Season 10 theme, and fan theories are going WILD

As we predicted, Ryan Murphy has leaked even more American Horror Story Season 10 details mere weeks after posting the much-anticipated cast list on Instagram. Murphy, who obviously likes keeping tension high and dragging out suspense, just gave us yet another hint as to what the upcoming season may be about. And fans are hard at work in the comments trying to piece together a possible theme.

Yesterday, March 10th, Murphy posted a teaser to his Instagram feed. It’s a low-saturated photo of a shoreline, plagued with marsh grass. Two weathered-looking hands claw at the coastline, as if someone is attempting to pull themselves from the ocean below. “American Horror Story 10″ is superimposed on the image in the series’ iconic font.

“Things are beginning to wash up on shore…” Murphy captioned the teaser pic.

Cue the mass hysteria.

If you’ve been playing along with Murphy’s game, you already know that Season 10 of the FX anthology will be taking place somewhere on a coastline. When Murphy debuted the cast list, the names appeared over black-and-white footage of waves crashing on the shore. (Side note: what a cast—amiright?)

Now that these hands are involved, fans are beginning to think “Mermaids?” as one Instagram user wrote on Murphy’s most recent post. Another wrote, “We need Sirens.” If you saw The Lighthouse, you know just how scary sirens can be.

However, if these hands belonged to mermaids or sirens, we have a feeling Murphy, king of monsters, would want them to look a bit more fish-like. Therefore, some fans have offered up other scenarios: “Shipwrecked!” one wrote. Another added, “Ghost ship?”

“Cruise ship turned into stranded island?” one fan offered, adding, “an island that the government use to do experiments on but abandoned the creatures.”

All terrifying, and all perfect potential plots for a season of American Horror Story, if we do say so ourselves.

This may, in fact, be the year we get American Horror Story: Cruise Ship, or something similar. Fans have been dying to see a season take place on a wrecked/abandoned/ghostly/just-whacked-out-and-weird cruise ship for years, and some theorists have even taken the time to flesh out what a potential season 0n the sea would look like.

YouTube channel Reel Talk crafted a hypothetical “Shipwreck” season back in 2018, although it did say it didn’t believe this would ever happen due to high cost and setting restrictions.

But, Reel Talk included screenshots of comments from fans made in 2018 that even theorized a “Bermuda Triangle” AHS season in which aliens and strange disappearances (and perhaps reappearances) are involved.

If the season went the Bermuda Triangle route, Murphy could connect a potential alien-related plot back to the aliens in AHS: Asylum. Then again, the upcoming season could also connect back to AHS: Roanoke if this Roanoke teaser is finally explored (and explained):

Murphy could also connect a coastal season to AHS: Coven as well if the 10th season takes place in the seaside town of Salem, Massachusetts. Perhaps we are introduced to another coven of witches, decedents from those hanged during the Salem Witch Trials. And maybe they have to save the town from whatever is lurking in the waters off the coast.

Then again, this season could be a horse of a different color and introduce fresh mayhem and foolishness.

What we know for sure is that American Horror Story Season 10 is going to be connected to the ocean, and someone—or something—is definitely going to be crawling out of it and kicking off a mystery. Think Big Little Lies, but with creatures from the dark lagoon.

Until we see any signs of a shipwreck, we’re going to have to keep AHS:Cruise in the back of our minds. We’re more so thinking Season 10 will be set in a small, coastal town where everyone knows everyone—or at least, they think they do—and a bad storm washes up something that will plague the town forever. The simpler we keep our theories now, the more details we can fill in later.

Thank you for coming to our Ted Talk, and stay alert for more American Horror Story Season 10 details.