‘American Horror Story’ Season 13 Premiere Recap: Who Returns and What Is Mr. Nas?
Warning: This recap contains major spoilers for American Horror Story: 13 Episodes 1-3.
American Horror Story is back, and Season 13 clearly has no interest in easing us into things. FX kicked off American Horror Story: 13 with a three-episode premiere that reaches deep into the franchise's history, resurrecting familiar characters while introducing a new mystery surrounding the number 13 and one extremely unsettling old man named Mr. Nas.
Jessica Lange's Constance Langdon is back. Sarah Paulson returns as Cordelia Goode and Wilhemina Venable. Evan Peters is already pulling double duty as Tate Langdon and Kai Anderson. Twisty the Clown has somehow entered the chat, too, because apparently Season 13 decided subtlety was overrated. And we're only three episodes in.
Something Wicked Is Coming
Episode 1, appropriately titled “13,” introduces Ben DeSoto, played by Joey Pollari. Ben suffers from triskaidekaphobia, an intense fear of the number 13, which happens to clash spectacularly with his girlfriend Kira's obsession with the number.
Kira plans a birthday trip centered around all things 13, and Ben initially refuses to join her. He eventually changes his mind and races to catch the flight, only for his worst fears to seemingly come true when the plane suffers a catastrophic midair disaster.
Kira and most of the passengers are killed, but Ben survives. At the same time, AHS brings us back to Miss Robichaux's Academy, where Cordelia Goode senses that something terrible is coming. Madison Montgomery tries to convince her that she may be overreacting, but this is American Horror Story. When a witch says something wicked is coming, it is probably best to listen.
Ben eventually takes a hospice job caring for Mr. Nas, a disturbing elderly man living on the entire 13th floor of the Apollyon in New York City. His daytime caretaker is none other than Constance Langdon, and Jessica Lange slips back into the role as if she never left. Constance claims Mr. Nas is 87 years old, but there is clearly much more happening inside that apartment. She also casually tells Ben that all of her children are alive and thriving, which should immediately raise eyebrows for anyone who remembers the Langdon family's history. By the end of the episode, Mr. Nas proves he is anything but an ordinary hospice patient when Ben discovers him lying beside him in bed.
Mr. Nas Is Definitely Not Just an Old Man
Episode 2, “1:13 a.m.,” gives Ben several more opportunities to quit this job, run out of the building and never look back. Naturally, he does none of those things.
During another deeply uncomfortable sponge bath, Ben discovers that Mr. Nas has some distinctly nonhuman features, including a tail. He also begins studying the strange objects scattered throughout the apartment and realizes that references to the number 13 are everywhere. Things only become stranger when Mr. Nas begins contorting, vomiting black liquid and displaying what appear to be horns. His episodes also seem connected to violent events happening elsewhere, suggesting that whatever Mr. Nas is, his influence stretches far beyond the Apollyon.
The episode then jumps to Los Angeles, where Freak Show's Twisty the Clown returns at a clown school run by a character played by Tig Notaro. Twisty's attempt to join the class doesn't exactly go well, and the encounter ends in a massacre.
The number of victims? Thirteen, of course. Ben later learns another disturbing piece of information: the previous person who worked alongside Constance caring for Mr. Nas died by suicide. That revelation would probably be enough for most people to start updating their résumé, but Ben remains caught in Mr. Nas' orbit.
Meanwhile, Constance reunites with her daughter Adelaide, who is somehow alive again. Mother and daughter begin preparing a dark holiday celebration before two more familiar faces arrive. Tate Langdon and Kai Anderson are both back, giving Evan Peters twice the opportunity to remind us just how many disturbing characters he has played in this franchise.
The Dead Are Coming Back
Episode 3, “Rauhnacht,” turns the season's crossover ambitions all the way up.
Winter Anderson arrives with a mysterious masked woman who is eventually revealed to be Elizabeth Short, the Black Dahlia, played again by Mena Suvari. Constance tells Elizabeth that she will soon become one of 13 legendary leading ladies, which sounds less like an invitation and more like something Elizabeth should immediately run from.
The gathering is celebrating Rauhnacht, when the veil between Earth and the spirit world is supposedly at its thinnest. That certainly helps explain why so many dead characters are suddenly walking around again, although Season 13 isn't giving us the entire answer just yet. Elizabeth learns more about her own death and resurrection while Constance continues orchestrating whatever larger plan is unfolding around Mr. Nas. Ben then ruins the party by unexpectedly showing up for work.
Instead of letting Tate kill him, Constance drugs Ben and suggests that when he wakes up, he may finally understand who he really is. That line feels important, especially considering the mystery already surrounding Ben's survival of the plane crash.
Whatever his connection to all of this is, it clearly goes beyond being the unlucky hospice worker who got assigned to the world's worst night shift.
Welcome to Hell
The biggest reveal comes when Elizabeth is taken beneath the Apollyon to Club Hell. There, another familiar face is waiting.
Sarah Paulson appears again, this time as Apocalypse's Wilhemina Venable, who welcomes Elizabeth to what she calls the portal to hell. Elizabeth is then seemingly prepared for some kind of ritual, leaving plenty of questions about why Constance selected her and exactly what the group plans to do next.
More importantly, all roads appear to lead back to Mr. Nas. His true identity hasn't been officially revealed, but the demonic physical features, Constance's devotion to him, the resurrections and the growing connection to hell make it pretty clear that we're dealing with something much bigger than a creepy patient on the 13th floor. Cordelia's warning at the beginning of the premiere is looking more justified by the minute.
AHS Is Going Full Crossover
Three episodes into Season 13, American Horror Story isn't simply tossing old characters onto the screen for nostalgia. The show is actively connecting Murder House, Coven, Freak Show, Cult and Apocalypse while establishing a new mystery around Ben, Mr. Nas and the number 13.
There are still plenty of unanswered questions. Why have Constance, Adelaide, Kai and Winter returned from the dead? Who survived the plane crash in seat 13F? Why is Ben so important to Constance? And just how many familiar characters are about to walk through that portal to hell? Whatever AHS: 13 has planned, the first three episodes make one thing clear: this season is digging through the franchise's entire toy box.
After 13 seasons, maybe that's exactly the kind of nightmare American Horror Story needed.
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