Hello, blog readers. I have returned. After a near hospitalization, a lot of antibiotics and a week at a mysterious repair facility, I am happy to say that both my laptop and I have made a full and triumphant recovery since last week.

As if waiting to ambush me as soon as I had returned to health, the second season of “American Horror Story” dropped its first episode this week, because gratuitous butt shots are chicken soup for the soul.

(Sidebar: really, though, what is it with this show and butt shots? Last season inflicted about ten years worth of footage of Dylan McDermott’s naked, crysturbating glutes upon us, and the first episode of this season alone had at least two and a half sets of butt cheeks. Look, I get that you’re on FX and you’re tempted to push the envelope since you can get away with more, but “American Horror Story” should take a lesson from network buddy “Justified.” Last season featured their first ever butt shot, and the fact that we’d never seen that from the show made the moment even more shocking. It was perfect. It was a precision butt strike. Moderate your butts, y’all. Use them wisely.)

Honestly, I would be lying if I said I hadn’t been looking forward to this premiere. I am a sucker for Jessica Lange, and last season was just wackadoodle enough to make me wonder what kind of weirdness they’d pull out next. Plus, I really wanted to see if Adam Levine could act. (Spoiler alert: not really.)

The reason I will never truly be able to get invested in this show is that I just don’t trust Ryan Murphy as a showrunner. Setting aside the fact that he has a penchant for writing some of the most problematic stuff on television and somehow passing it off as the most progressive stuff on television and getting praised for it, he’s just not a good television writer. That’s it.

What Ryan Murphy is good at is stunts. He’s good at coming up with something totally off-the-wall that will make people tune in. He’s good at creating one isolated, sensational episode, but he is completely incapable of expanding that into a cohesive television series. Anybody who’s ever attempted to seriously watch “Glee” (as I did back in the halcyon days of 2009) could tell you that he does not know how to carry a story arc or maintain consistent character development.

And you know what? There’s nothing wrong with being good at being sensational. I personally resent Ryan Murphy’s particular brand of sensationalism because I think it exploits and capitalizes on a lot of issues that deserve better treatment, but I can respect a man who knows how to rock some faces.

But the thing is, if you can’t translate that into something long-term, you have no business writing for television. Because the beauty of television, the reason I love it more than movies, is the chance to develop stories and characters over time. That’s what makes watching TV so involving and rewarding. And Ryan Murphy doesn’t know how to do that.

However, if I take a step back from all of this and look at “American Horror Story” as my weekly dose of WTF-am-I-watching-and-why-is-Chloe-Sevigny-here escapism, it’s fun. Sometimes I just want weirdo, entertaining television that doesn’t require anything from me. Sometimes all I want is to watch a show and immediately call somebody afterwards to say, “You are not gonna believe what just happened to my eyeballs.”

So that’s why I’ll be watching “American Horror Story” this season, even though it pains me to give Ryan Murphy ratings. Also Jessica Lange, actual queen, who in my opinion is way too good for this show. But hey, she’s gotta eat too.

And now, alcohol.

AMERICAN HORROR COCKTAIL

Something appropriately dark for a very dark show, both figuratively and literally. No, really, it’s hard to watch on my laptop because of the lighting. Somebody go talk to their DP about this.

3 parts black coffee

2 parts Captain Morgan Black spiced rum

1 part Godiva chocolate liqueur

Combine on ice, garnish with crushed oreos on the rim.

BONUS DRINK: THE JESSICA LANGE

1 bottle of fine champagne

Drink slowly from crystal flute. Bask in your perfection. Then break the glass, stab somebody with it and put your menthol cigarette out on their chest. They don’t know what you’re capbable of.