American Horror Story: Apocalypse left fans with more questions than it did answers. The anthology is slowly become more and more connected through its shared universe, so fans are hoping that some plotlines that weren't neatly wrapped up during Apocalypse's season finale (spoilers ahead) like Emily and Thomas' Satanic child and the co-existence of Mallory and Cordelia as Supremes in the new timeline will be returned to soon as the grand design of Ryan Murphy's crown jewel beings to come together.
The super-popular horror series has been renewed through season ten, easing audiences' fears that Murphy's $300 million, five-year Netflix deal meant that AHS would end with its ninth season. Speculating about the theme of the next AHS has become as much fun as actually watching the show, but fans do know a little about what to expect from the show when it returns in Fall 2019: the Coven witches will be back, but not next season. Other than that, Murphy has left viewers with few clues and a lot of ideas, like the popular fan theory that Easter eggs through Apocalypse mean that season nine will be about aliens.
Until the ninth season's theme is revealed and fans finally get some answers, there are tons of plot points that were drastically changed in AHS's altered timeline that didn't make a lot of sense after the first viewing. How could Emily and Thomas even create a new anti-Christ? ALso, what was the deal with the Rubber Man? In all of the chaos of Apocalypse, these answers have been hidden from the beginning. Other issues also come from widely-believed fan theories that actually never ended up being confirmed in the series.
With that said, here are 20 Things Everyone Gets Wrong About American Horror Story: Apocalypse.
Michael Langdon Was Actually The Anti-Christ
Half of the fun of American Horror Story is knowing that at any point in the series, everything fans know to be true can be proven wrong in an instant. It's happened before with the switch in narrative during Roanoke or with Tate's ghostly backstory in Murder House.
Many Reddit theories were certain Michael Langdon was a red herring, and that the real Anti-Christ would be revealed in a plot twist later on in the season or that there was no Anti-Christ at all. The theory was just crazy enough to make sense. It was even more surprising that Langdon did, in fact, end up being the Anti-Christ, and it took the powers of a newly-risen Supreme to put an end to him.
...But He Wasn’t The Only Anti-Christ
Fans may have been on the wrong track about the Anti-Christ, but they were right about one thing. It was too easy to have the Anti-Christ be defeated and humanity saved, so Michael Langdon ultimately wasn't the Anti-Christ, he was only an Anti-Christ.
After Mallory defeats Langdon at a young age by running him over with a car in a new timeline, Emily and Thomas give birth to a son that is heavily implied to be the new Anti-Christ in Langdon's absence in the final moments of the season. It points towards there being multiple Anti-Christs, as there are multiple Supremes. The Anti-Christ will just continue being reborn until he finally wins his battle.
It Was Never Supposed To Be A Full Murder House/Coven Crossover
As Vulture parodied in its review of the Apocalypse pilot, some American Horror Story fans thought that the Murder House/Coven crossover would mean that characters from both seasons of the anthology would be the leading characters in this season of American Horror Story.
While the witches did end up being integral to the plot of Apocalypse, beloved Murder House characters like Tate Langdon and Violet Harmon were only seen twice during the season. No one ever said Apocalypse would be a full crossover, just that the seasons would finally, officially intersect during Apocalypse. It's an understandable misunderstanding (and clearly viewers wanted more of Evan Peter's problematic fave Tate), but it is a misunderstanding nonetheless.
Emily Wasn’t Eve
More Reddit fan theories floated the idea that Emily and Thomas were the Biblical figures of Adam and Eve, which almost made sense after they created the new Anti-Christ. After giving into their primal urges and breaking the rules of Outpost 3, it could be argued that Emily and Thomas created their Anti-Christ from their act of Original Sin (even though he was technically conceived in the new timeline).
However, this theory was never confirmed, and it actually would make much more sense for Emily to be the lesser-known Biblical figure of Lilith, Adam's first wife in the Jewish Talmud who is a promiscuous demon that tempts Adam and steals babies. Odds are high that Emily and Thomas will come back when the Anti-Christ returns. Who knows, though, maybe they really are just aliens.
The Sanctuary Was Real
When Michael Langdon appears at Outpost 3, he says he is choosing who will be allowed to go to a mysterious Sanctuary where they can escape the End of Days. While it doesn't look like there was ever an actual, physical Sanctuary, that doesn't mean the Sanctuary wasn't real.
Redditor someenchantedeve cited Langdon's theory that all humans were innately evil and that evil would be brought out with the right stimulus and circumstance when explaining why he used the concept of the Sanctuary during the frame story. The Sanctuary may not have been a physical place, but it did exist, as it was the stimulus and circumstance Langdon needed to bring about the evils of humanity.
Mallory Was A Witch
Fans knew there was something up with Mallory. The hints scattered throughout the season that Mallory's powers were greater than the average witch's were so heavy-handed that even a casual viewer just tuning into one episode of the season could tell that there was a big reveal coming for her character.
The big hints and references went so far that fans thought Mallory might be an angel, an alien, or really anything other than a witch. As it turns out, though, Mallory is the next Supreme, and she takes her rightful place in the Coven hierarchy to defeat Michael Langdon. Because her powers did intensify once the last Supreme passed away, Mallory is definitely a witch.
...Mallory Wasn't Just A Witch, Though
There were so, so many references to Mallory being unusual during Apocalypse. Michael Langdon was confused when Mallory knocked him back with her anger, she tells him that there's something inside of her trying to get out, and her powers are far beyond even past Supremes'.
We know that Mallory is definitely a witch, but there's nothing that says she can't be a witch and also one of the many other creatures that people have theorized is her true form (like an angel, an alien, or even the second coming of Christ). She was definitely the key to defeating the Anti-Christ and American Horror Story likes to change the rules on its viewers, so only time will tell if Mallory is just a witch.
Emily And Thomas Could Create The Anti-Christ
Another source of confusion from the expansive final episode of the season is how Emily and Thomas were able to create a new Anti-Christ in the first place. Billie Dean Howard, Sarah Paulson's medium character from Murder House who has been seen in Hotel and Apocalypse, explained that a child created by a human and a spirit would bring about the End of Times and be the essence of evil -- and she was right.
Because of this prophecy, fans don't think that Emily and Thomas, supposedly two humans, could birth a new Anti-Christ. However, assuming Emily isn't a Biblical spirit, it's still possible that the pair could have created a new Anti-Christ since Billie Dean never said that was the only way to usher the end of times. Also, just because she knew one aspect of the future, this doesn't mean she knows the whole story.
The All-Sinners Choir Makes Perfect Sense
An amusing part of Michael Langdon's storyline was the All-Sinners Choir, which involved a welcoming crew of Satanists breaking into a song praising Satan. It seemed like it was either put in there as a joke, viewers were just missing something, or a poor creative choice was made. As it turns out, though, it was none of the above.
Having a choir of Satan worshippers is actually really fitting because Lucifer, the OG Satan, led the praise and worship songs in Heaven before he was cast out by God. As such, followers of Lucifer and his son would probably know this history and have some pretty great harmonies, like the ones viewers were treated to during Apocalypse.
It’s Still All A Metaphor For Politics
If viewers don't think American Horror Story is about politics, they aren't paying attention. Cult made this very clear, since it centered around politics, but this theme was also carried through to Apocalypse. The second amendment was put into the arm of a robot that eventually became a gun that started shooting people, and if that didn't hammer it in, nothing else could.
Beyond that, however, a large theme that came up during the storyline was the dangers of letting evil win just because that's the side that you chose. Even once it became apparent that Michael Langdon wasn't a warlock but the Anti-Christ, the warlocks continued to follow him to the detriment of human-kind just so that they could finally fight a winning battle. Does that sound familiar?
Murder House’s Loose Ends Were Tied Up
It was awful of Ryan Murphy to give fans the happy ending for Violet and Tate just to have it cruelly ripped away. During the first trip back to the Murder House, Violet and Tate finally reconcile thanks to the meddling of Madison Montgomery. Because the timeline is reset to 2015, fans thought that Violet and Tate's happy ending would be taken away since the past three years were erased, which included Madison's trip to the Murder House.
However, Comicbook noticed that spirit characters within the Murder House are likely subject to the same rules as the demonic world, which means that they're aware of previous and parallel timelines. This means the spirits in the Murder House are probably still aware of the events that occurred in the alternate timeline, and Violet and Tate are happily in love.
The Sanctuary Wasn't Hell
While on the subject of the Sanctuary, another popular theory (also referenced in Vulture's episode recaps for AHS) that many fans still believe states that the Sanctuary was actually hell and was accessed through the Hellmouth that resides under the Harmons' Murder House.
Because the Sanctuary wasn't a physical place as much as it was an ideological tool used as a stimulus for a test of human behavior (and because Michael Langdon never expressed any desire to actually take anyone to the Murder House in California or really had any way of transporting people to California from the Outpost), it is safe to say that the Sanctuary was not hell and was also not the Murder House.
The Rubber Man Doesn't Have To Be A Person
Another common question about the Apocalypse finale is who the Rubber Man was in Outpost 3. Gallant's tryst with the Rubber Man and its importance are never explained. Evie is shown seeing the Rubber Man, so it wasn't her in the suit with Gallant even though she's in the suit when Gallant stabs her. It's possible that it was Michael in the suit, but this is very unlikely.
With all of the hullaballoo around this open-ended event, people forget that the Rubber Man was never a person at all. When it was Tate in the suit, it wasn't really Tate in the suit. Instead, it was a manifestation of darkness inhabiting his body. There doesn't necessarily need to be a person in the Rubber Man suit, though -- it can simply just be a personification of darkness. It still might have been Michael, but nothing is confirmed yet.
The World Never Ended
Despite the name of the season, Apocalypse, there was never actually a world-ending apocalypse throughout the course of the season. Although the characters suffer from nuclear fallout after an explosion and have to go into bunkers, the world doesn't actually end.
Michael Langdon tried to bring about the actual apocalypse, but he was defeated before he got close. Going even further, since the timeline was reset to 2015, this erased the nuclear explosion from history, so the near-apocalypse never actually happened. Despite the logical fallacy to assume that the Apocalypse story actually featured an apocalypse, the world hasn't ended in American Horror Story... yet.
Not Everything Was Reset To The 2015 Timelines
A lot of surprise surrounded the timeline being reset to 2015 and many questions about what it might mean for the seasons that occurred from 2015 onward (namely, Hotel, Roanoke, and Cult) began to pop up. While there would be a butterfly effect from Michael Langdon passing away that will inevitably affect these seasons, one very important thing that definitely changed is the witches' fates.
Fans noticed that Queenie will live because she's warned by Mallory never to go to the Hotel Cortez, but Mallory also resurrects the deceased Coven witches (first Misty, with Madison soon-to-come) two years earlier than they were in the original timeline. Hotel, however, likely kept its timeline because the only way Billie Dean Howard could have filmed her television show in 2022 is if the world didn't end in 2019.
The Murder House'Title Isn't Just About The Criminals
Clearly, Ryan Murphy doesn't love the obvious. So, naming Murder House after all of lose of life that happened there seems a little on-the-nose for the master of mystery. In both events where the Anti-Christ is brought into the world and comes into his demonic urges, a murder of crows signals his arrival.
The Murder House is where Michael Langdon originally came into his powers, as he was signaled by that same murder of crows. This might be a stretch, but there's a good chance that Murphy knew what he was doing with the double entendre and that the Murder House refers to the harbingers of doom as much as they refer to the actual violent actions that occurred in the house.
Mallory Couldn’t Have Buried Herself
Another commonly cited plot hole from Apocalypse asks why Mallory and Coco couldn't have just buried themselves in the swamp along with Cordelia, Myrtle, and Fiona while waiting for the nuclear blast instead of getting new identities , complete with memory-wiping spells.
Thouhh Mallory's powers possibly couldn't have developed while she was buried and had to mature with her, the clear reason Mallory couldn't have been buried in the swamp with the other witches is that the witches weren't sure their plan would work. While they were willing to take the risk themselves, if Mallory had buried herself alive and still passed away due to the blast, all of humanity would have been doomed.
Madison Was Never Against Mallory
“Surprise, b***h. I bet you thought that you’d seen the last of me” might be one of the most iconic lines ever muttered on television. Viewers wondered why Madison Montgomery would say something like that to Mallory and the comment created a cliff-hanger that was never given any follow-through.
However, this was just a reference to the last time Madison had been brought back from the grave in 2013 during Coven. Madison lives for drama, and anyone who wasn't thrilled to hear her signature line or didn't understand the commonly-memed referenced might want to brush up on their American Horror Story knowledge.
It's Good That Tate Was Redeemed
Michael Langdon's spirit is revealed as the reason for Tate's behavior when he was still among the living. Some have argued that this oversimplifies Tate's character because his personal history was enough backstory to explain the mental illness that led him to such horrible actions. The issue here, however, is that viewers fell in love with Tate Langdon.
Having a legion of fans proclaim their love for a character who did the things he did in today's political climate isn't excusable, and it's been established that AHS is political. Retconning the character's internal motivations to something closer to demonic possession makes the viewers' persistent love of Tate slightly less horrible (but only slightly).
Outpost 3 Wasn’t Useless
Nothing big on American Horror Story is done without purpose. The frame story of Apocalypse at Outpost 3 was called pointless at the end of the season by many viewers because we didn't truly return to it in the finale. Instead, Outpost 3 served as a method of foreshadowing.
A prominent musical moment at the outpost, where a pointed pause was made to emphasize the song "Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft", calls to aliens during a season where musical moments were used very purposefully. Also, with all of the talk of "special DNA" in the bunker, viewers are reminded of the children who came from Kit Walker's alien abduction in Asylum. Outpost 3's true purpose will hopefully be explained in future seasons.
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Are there any other common misconceptions about American Horror Story: Apocalypse? Let us know in the comments!