Published Jun 14, 2026, 8:00 PM EDT
There are two important reasons why Ryan Murphy’s bloody new series setting its release date is important for psychological-gore fans. The first is that it’s Bret Easton Ellis’s story, and his horror stories usually come dressed as money, taste, youth, parties, beautiful people, expensive rooms, and the awful feeling that everyone is performing normality a little too well. The second is that while the film is helmed by Max Winkler, the development of it all and exec-producing credit go to Murphy, who is the brains behind American Horror Story.
When Ellis’s writing and Murphy’s work are combined, you kind of get a modern American Psycho. And the synopsis of the upcoming Murphy film basically tells that it is “a dark, coming-of-age horror thriller set in Los Angeles in 1981 and follows a group of privileged prep school seniors, whose reality is shattered by a serial killer.” That’s almost American Psycho, but instead of the corporate world, it’s the world of school seniors.
The series is The Shards, and it premieres August 5 on FX and Hulu, with international streaming through Disney+. Igby Rigney stars as a 17-year-old version of Ellis, while Homer Gere plays Robert Mallory. The cast also includes Kaia Gerber, Hayes Warner, Graham Campbell, Wes Bentley, Evan Rachel Wood, and Jordan Roth. Ellis’ novel first appeared as a serialized audiobook before its 2023 publication, and now Wrinkler and Murphy, among others, get to turn it into a full television nightmare about adolescence, class, beauty, and blood in Reagan-era Los Angeles.
Your instincts, your strengths, and your particular way of thinking under pressure point to one villain you actually have a fighting chance against. Everyone else — good luck.
Jason is relentless, but he is also predictable — and that is the gap you would exploit.
Michael watches before he moves. He is patient, methodical, and almost impossible to detect — until it’s too late for anyone who isn’t paying close enough attention.
Freddy wins by getting inside your head — using your own fears, your own memories, your own subconscious as weapons against you. That strategy requires a target who can be destabilised.
Pennywise is ancient, shapeshifting, and feeds on terror — but it has one critical vulnerability: it cannot function against someone who genuinely stops being afraid of it.
Chucky’s greatest advantage is that nobody takes him seriously until it’s already too late. He exploits the gap between how something looks and what it actually is.
The story of The Shards goes back to Ellis’ own teenage mythology, taking place in 1981 Los Angeles at an elite prep school, where wealthy seniors are already drowning in jealousy, obsession, image, and sexual tension before the murder angle fully takes over. So the show might have some of those Netflix’s Elite-ish vibes in there too. Then Robert Mallory (Homer Gere) shows up, and his arrival happens to coincide with the terror caused by a serial killer known as The Trawler. That is where the series gets its classic Ellis pressure.
The Shards is coming to FX and Hulu starting August 5, 2026. Stay tuned to Collider for more updates.