At the Television Critics Association’s press tour, FX CEO John Landgraf revealed the new cycle will fall somewhere between the dark tone of AHS: Asylum and the kitschfest that was Coven.

“Some years it’s going to be big and bright and brash and campy the way Coven is. Other years it’s going to be dark and brooding—like Asylum was," he said. "I guess I would put Freak Show half-way in between the two. It’s not quite as brooding and formal and Hitchockian as Asylum. It’s got a little bit more humor and a little bit more camp, but its got a brooding period feel to it also."

Of course Landgraf admits that co-creator Ryan Murphy sometimes throws him a curveball with the series. “Having worked with Ryan now for 10 years—and I think I’m pretty good at reading scripts—I [still] often don’t fully grasp the tone of what he’s going for until we’ve seen it executed.”

Landgraf added that Freak Show is “going to have a really different look from a design and cinematography standpoint than any of the previous incarnations. The characters are really distinctive, really original. Some are really strange, but I think really compelling, I love what I’ve read so far.”

American Horror Story: Freak Show premieres on FX in October.