American Horror Story: 13 easter eggs from Coven, Hotel and Murder House that are easy to miss on first watch
American Horror Story 13 brought back so many characters that it needed a building with an extra floor to house them. Some of the best callbacks went by in a second.
FX aired the finale of American Horror Story 13 on October 29, wrapping a 13-episode season that Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk built as a crossover of every season so far. Joey Pollari leads as Ben DeSoto, a hospice caregiver terrified of the number 13 who takes a job at The Apollyon, the only building in New York with a thirteenth floor. Jessica Lange plays four returning characters. The callbacks start in the pilot and don't let up.
Thirteen easter eggs from the three seasons the show leans on hardest, starting with the oldest one. Spoilers for the whole season.
Murder House
- 1. The Rubber Man: The latex suit from season 1 is back. It chokes Queenie to death in the finale, after helping Mr. Phibes (John Waters) kill her and Cordelia in episode 12.
- 2. Constance's deal: In episode 4, Constance Langdon (Lange) tells Mr. Phibes she made a deal with the devil to get her children, Tate and Addie, back.
- 3. The Black Dahlia: Elizabeth Short (Mena Suvari), one of the Murder House's ghosts in season 1, becomes one of the women sacrificed to hell in episode 4.
The Rubber Man is the sharpest nod in a season about Antichrists. In Murder House, Tate wore that suit when he fathered Michael Langdon, the show's first Antichrist. Now the suit works for Satan.
Coven
- 4. Miss Robichaux's Academy: The New Orleans witch school from season 3 is the coven's base again, and in episode 11, Ben shows up at the door asking to join.
- 5. Myrtle's hell: Myrtle Snow (Frances Conroy), last seen burning at the stake in Coven, has been stuck in a personal hell working as a department store attendant. Ben pulls her out in episode 11.
- 6. Papa Legba: The voodoo gatekeeper of the dead is back to answer for Fiona's escape, now played by Orlando Jones after the death of Lance Reddick, who originated the role.
- 7. Nan: Jamie Brewer's clairvoyant witch turns up in the finale inside Cordelia's personal hell, where Cordelia has to euthanize puppies forever.
- 8. Fiona's return: Fiona Goode (Lange), who died at the end of Coven, climbs back out of hell.
Myrtle's hell is the best joke of the season for Coven fans. The witch who shrieked designer names on her way to the stake spent the afterlife working retail.
Hotel
- 9. Devil's Night: Episode 6, "The Return of Devil's Night," brings back the annual dinner James Patrick March (Evan Peters) threw for dead serial killers in Hotel. This time, he takes the guests to New Orleans to attack the witches.
- 10. Jeffrey Dahmer: Seth Gabel reprises his Hotel role as Dahmer, March's co-planner in episode 6. The Zodiac Killer is among the attackers.
- 11. Queenie vs. March: Queenie (Gabourey Sidibe) checked into the Hotel Cortez in season 5 and didn't get out until Apocalypse. In season 13, March is the one leading the attack on her coven.
- 12. Holmes's murder maze: Fiona's personal hell is styled after H.H. Holmes' infamous murder maze, a Hotel reference built into a Coven character's afterlife.
That last one works twice over. James Patrick March was modeled on Holmes, and the Hotel Cortez on his murder castle, so Fiona's hell is essentially March's floor plan.
Season 13 put Fiona Goode's hell inside a Hotel killer's maze. That's the whole season in one set: Coven characters suffering inside Hotel architecture.
All three at once
- 13. The family tree: Episode 12 reveals that Fiona Goode and Constance Langdon are identical twins, and their mother is Sister Jude from Asylum. The devil got Jude pregnant at Briarcliff, baby Constance was sold to a couple in Virginia, and Pepper delivered Fiona to Miss Robichaux's.
That reveal makes all four of Lange's characters one family, and TheWrap's Jose Alejandro Bastidas pointed out that it has "considerable plot holes" for anyone who remembers the early seasons. Murphy has never treated the timeline as sacred, and season 13 doesn't pretend to.
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The finale also gave the season's number its last job. Ben turns out to be the 13th Antichrist, and the spell that finally traps the devil puts him in his own Last Supper painting as the 13th guest, TVLine recapped. Thirteen seasons in, AHS still won't let a number go to waste.
Previously we wrote: Yellowjackets deaths in order: who died in the wilderness, who died after the rescue, and who's next in season 4