Warning: This article contains mentions of child sexual assault, and slight spoilers for Channel Zero: No-End House.

With the new year, comes a new season. Well, not so much, but new to me. Channel Zero‘s second season, “No-End House,” hints at an intriguing twist on haunted house/slasher fare that has otherwise become a little formulaic. Its first episode seems to display some learning from the first season’s missteps.

For one, it’s to the show’s considerable benefit that it doesn’t feel beholden to a perpetually returning cast in the way of some other self-described anthology series. While that approach can and does work, from what I can tell the stories Channel Zero tells are nearly entirely disconnected. Because of that, it works well to use new faces and voices to tell this one. Watching Aisha Dee and Amy Forsyth bounce off each other as complementary-contrasting best friends is a delight and I’m looking forward to seeing them get more settled into their roles here.

“This Isn’t Real” has some familiar tonality from Channel Zero‘s debut season. However, curiously since its protagonists look to be in their early twenties at most, it seems to have developed a new maturity. Some of this stems from the hints that this season will be more violent than its predecessor. Furthermore, the topics it seeks to grapple with and the topics for which the horror are the vehicle seems more grounded, too.

Wrestling with a young adult’s grief and guilt over the death of her father already strikes a different note than the more obscure “Satanic Panic”-esque fear of parents losing control of their children due to influence from the television. This may offer the writers the chance to treat sensitive topics more carefully than they previously have.

At least, that’s my hope. “This Isn’t Real” maintains a dreamlike quality that seems to both set the stage for what’s to come, and evoke Nightmare on Elm Street on the way. This is a stylistic nod that (I’ll admit) had me initially wary, given some of the first season’s less tactful writing choices. Another thing about it that had me wary was the recent Elm Street remake’s choice to make explicit the child sexual assault that had deliberately been left unspoken in the original films.

Nonetheless, this first episode is (so far) smart about what is worth showing on screen and what is worth leaving to the imagination. I’m cautiously hopeful that that balance will be maintained, allowing for an experience that is both more cleverly crafted and less dependent on shock violence or cheap thrills.

On the note of “No-End House”‘s stylings, the fingerprints of Hannibal are clear, both visually and in the season’s soundtrack so far. This isn’t surprising given Nick Antosca’s and Don Mancini’s reprised involvement. However, if Hannibal at times got bogged down in enjoying its own aesthetic to the point of near-pretentiousness, “No-End House” is better served so far.

Here, the mish-mash of off-kilter artistry and regular human lives becomes the fulcrum on which the episode’s creepypasta tonality pivots. It is where the odd and the ordinary meet and clash, and I’m intrigued to see how that balance progresses from here.

So far, this season is no stranger to the slow camera pans and lingering shots I took issue with in the first season. It’s a relief though to see that the team at work here seem to have figured out how to use these for tension. They also use them to maintain the dreamy, off-balance quality of their atmosphere, rather than miring events in dead air.

Nonetheless, the season’s pacing remains a bit of a question mark for now. This first episode was principally spent on establishing the core cast and the “rules” of the season, rather than really unpacking the plot. It leaves me keeping half a wary eye out for subsequent episodes running out of time to say what they need to. Especially if valuable screen time in the first episode was sacrificed to atmospheric meandering.

For now I’m okay with it. I am intrigued enough by the fresh take on an otherwise over-trodden killer haunted house motif that I’ll hold my breath. Time will tell if the promise of “This Isn’t Real” can be carried through the rest of the season.

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Channel Zero

7.5

Score

7.5/10

Pros

• Intriguing concept
• Benefits from a new cast
• Strong sense of atmosphere

Cons

• Hasn't quite sunk its teeth into the plot yet