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It's the end of the world as we know it — well, it was on the season premiere of American Horror Story: Apocalypse. Yes, if you had any doubt that the world would actually, you know, end on the eighth season of FX's horror anthology series, you were quickly disabused of that nation: the world ended before the first commercial break! Certain seasons of AHS like to ease us into things, build the world slowly and moodily (I'm looking at you, Hotel), but Apocalypse started things off with a literal bang as missiles hit all of the world's major cities, destroying civilization as we know it and brining on a nuclear winter. The premiere has plenty of OMFG moments, but 12 stood out in particular.
Before getting left to die with the rest of Santa Monica by his billionaire girlfriend Coco (Leslie Grossman), Eichner's douchebag movie exec says that he just pitched "Free Willy as a six-part limited series." Honestly, I'd watch that.
That's it, really. We knew she was coming, but still. Joan Collins!
The private jet that Coco, her hairdresser Mr. Gallant (Evan Peters), assistant (Billie Lourd) and Joan Collins (who I refuse to refer to as anything other than Joan Collins) escape on is revealed to be piloted by...no one. Is the pilot a ghost? Witchcraft? This is the Coven/Murder House crossover, after all.
Honestly nothing gets me like the AHS theme song. The opening sequence usually holds hidden clues about the season, and this one is chock full of satanic imagery and explosions so...the end of the world?
Just before the blast hits, incoming UCLA freshman Timothy (Kyle Allen) is captured — or saved, depending on who you believe — from his home by shady operatives who claim he's been selected to be saved from the apocalypse thanks to his ideal genetic makeup. When he asks how they could possibly know his genetic makeup, they replay that he "submitted his DNA to an ancestry website." All those conspiracy theories are true!
Well, it's American Horror Story. We later learn that they were executed for "unauthorized copulating." So this is apparently an abstinence-only dystopia.
Timothy and Emily (Ash Santos) are given the lowdown on their new life by Wilhemina Venable (Sarah Paulson in one fo the three roles she'll play this season): they are purples, the elite members of the new pecking order, who are served by the grays. A color-coded post-apocalyptic society? Hm, sounds familiar...
The survivors are served tiny gelatinous cubes that apparently contain all the nutrients they need but aren't all that appetizing. Coco can't take the hunger, screaming, "With al the thought that went into this place they don't have a single bag of Pirate's Booty?" That earns her a sharp bitch-slap from Wilhemina Venable, hopefully the first of many.
Miriam Mead (Kathy Bates) loses her shit when she discovers that two of the survivors are contaminated with radiation — Gallant and Jeffrey Bowyer-Campbell's hot boyfriend Stu — and forces them to the decontamination room where they are scrubbed clean until they bleed. That isn't enough to purify Stu, who is shot in the head by Bates.
Miriam and Wilhemina have a secret rendezvous with serious lesbian undertones where they show off their Victorian finery and make it clear that they've been lying to the survivors about what's actually going on. Miriam faked Stu's radiation, meaning they killed him for fun. "It's strangely satisfying, isn't it? Dispensing punishment," asks Wilhemina. Miriam wonders if the shadowy Cooperative will care that they're terrorizing "the guests," but Wilhemina isn't worried. "Forget the Cooperative. It's only us." Ok yes it's official they are a couple.
The survivors are served a meaty stew to perk up their spirits after Stu's death but quickly realize that the stew...is Stu, the hot dead boyfriend. Or is it? "I don't care what it is, it's absolutely divine — and it's full of fiber! I'm going to finish every drop," says Collins.
18 months into the apocalypse, a beautiful long-tressed gentleman shows up at the outpost in a horse-drawn carriage. The viewers know that this is Michael Langdon, the unholy son of Connie Britton and, also, the Antichrist. He tells Venable that mosts of the outposts have fallen and he's in town to select the worthy few to come join the only sustainable outpost left.
And that's it! No sign of the witches of Coven or Murder House's ghosts, and as there was no preview for next week so we're not sure when they'll arrive, but I am ready for Madison Montgomery to say something bitchy and, probably, kill someone. See you next week!
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