American Horror Story has reached unlucky number 13, and Ryan Murphy is using the occasion to bring some of the anthology’s most memorable characters crashing into the same nightmare. The full official trailer for American Horror Story: 13 is here, with Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, Angela Bassett, Emma Roberts and plenty more familiar faces in the mix. Watch the trailer above and get the details below.
This Goes Much Bigger Than Coven
The witches are certainly all over the trailer. Sarah Paulson‘s Cordelia Goode senses “the harbinger of our doom”, Angela Bassett is back as Marie Laveau, Emma Roberts once again plays Madison Montgomery, while Gabourey Sidibe’s Queenie and Frances Conroy’s Myrtle Snow are also present.
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But anyone expecting a straightforward continuation of Coven or Apocalypse is thinking too small. “Everybody thinks it’s a Coven season, and it’s not. It’s all the seasons,” Ryan Murphy told Entertainment Tonight.
Murphy has compared the concept to The Avengers, with characters from across the anthology coming together against an “ultimate evil”. The trailer makes that idea clear almost immediately.
Jessica Lange’s Elsa Mars opens proceedings with an invitation back to “the greatest show on Earth”. Evan Peters‘ murderous Hotel owner James Patrick March resurfaces, Twisty the Clown is lurking again, Kai Anderson is in the mix, and John Waters appears to explain that the number 13 “stands for instability, chaos”.
Jessica Lange Is Playing All Four of Her Characters
Lange’s comeback is easily one of the season’s biggest draws. She was one of the defining faces of the series across its first four seasons before departing as a regular after 2014’s Freak Show. Her only subsequent appearance came when she briefly reprised Constance Langdon in 2018’s Apocalypse.
Season 13 isn’t limiting her to one old favourite. As People reports, Lange will play all four of her major American Horror Story characters: Constance Langdon from Murder House, Sister Jude Martin from Asylum, Fiona Goode from Coven and Elsa Mars from Freak Show.
Her involvement was apparently crucial to Murphy pursuing this particular season. “I reached out to her thinking she would say no, and if she had said no, I probably wouldn’t have done it,” Murphy told The Hollywood Reporter.
Lange proved easier to convince than expected. Murphy has said she had recently noticed how many younger fans still approached her because of American Horror Story, and his pitch to revisit all four characters caught her interest.
She did have one condition: another musical number.
Paulson and Peters Are Also Playing Multiple Roles
The crossover gets stranger from there. Paulson and Peters aren’t simply back; both are playing multiple characters. Murphy has said Paulson will take on “six or seven” roles across the season, while Peters is playing five.
At one point, Peters even had to perform a scene as Tate Langdon/Rubber Man and Kai Anderson, effectively having a conversation with himself.
The wider cast includes Kathy Bates, Billie Lourd, Leslie Grossman, Jamie Brewer, John Carroll Lynch, Mat Fraser, Mena Suvari, Zach Villa and Seth Gabel. Joey Pollari, Paul Anthony Kelly, Madelaine Petsch, Avantika, Alex Consani, Tig Notaro and Waters are among the newer additions.
There is also a notable recasting in the trailer. Papa Legba, previously played by the late Lance Reddick, appears again with Orlando Jones taking over the role, as noted by Nerdist.
So, What Is Season 13 Actually About?
The trailer shows us plenty of familiar faces, but keeps the reason they’re all colliding mostly under wraps.
The new story is partly anchored around Ben, played by Joey Pollari. The opening episode finds him taking a hospice-care job following a near-death experience, only to discover that his mysterious new client lives in a particularly ominous penthouse.
From there, the season begins folding past characters into the new storyline. Constance features prominently early on, the witches of Miss Robichaux’s Academy eventually enter the fight, and Murphy has teased an enemy dangerous enough to justify assembling this enormous collection of heroes, villains and everything in between.
He has so far avoided identifying the threat outright, describing it only as the “ultimate evil”. Considering American Horror Story has already thrown the Antichrist at its characters, that leaves plenty of room for speculation.
Longtime viewers should also expect smaller callbacks throughout. Murphy has revealed that costumes and props from earlier seasons were pulled out of storage and worked back into the production.
“This season is a thank you to the fans for continuing to watch,” he told People.
Season 13 Gets 13 Episodes
American Horror Story: 13 consists of 13 half-hour episodes, with FX leaning all the way into the number.
As Variety reports, there’s also a slightly unusual rollout. The first three episodes premiere together on September 24 in the US, followed by another three the following week. Two episodes will then arrive each Thursday before episode 13 lands on October 29, just in time for Halloween.
American Horror Story: 13 premieres September 24 on FX and Hulu in the US. In Australia, the three-episode premiere arrives September 25 on Binge.
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