American Horror Story: Kathy Bates' Characters Ranked Worst To Best

American Horror Story: Roanoke got real meta, with actors playing actors playing characters. Only Supernatural's The French Mistake comes close to challenging this season - and even that nly maxed out the meta for a single episode. Amateurs - try doing it for a full season.

As The Butcher, Bates was convincingly terrifying... in a very cartoonish way. It really fit the vibe of the re-enactment section of the season. The ghost of a ridiculous, over-the-top colonial leader is the perfect horror movie baddie, and you can so easily imagine Agnes taking her direction very seriously for her Roanoke Nightmare takes.

But the really unnerving bit came from seeing the unhinged character exploited for comedic purposes in the fictional show's follow up. We're used to seeing this kind of thing IRL - because what garners more views than the mockery of mental health issues - and seeing it so explicitly parodied in AHS was raw.

Of course, Agnes' real career-defining moment is when she finally came face to face with her idol - after sneaking back on set and wreaking delusional, murderous havoc - and promptly gets her skull cracked in half by the real Butcher and her infamous cleaver. If Agnes could have picked a way to go out, it probably would have been this. But still, get better idols, y'all.