The focus of last night's episode of American Horror Story: Apocalypse wasn't the end of the world, or Cody Fern's Interview With a Vampire-esque hair, or snakes pouring out of festering wounds. Instead, it was a character that longtime fans of the FX anthology series already know well: American Horror Story's iconic Rubber Man.
As promised, American Horror Story's eighth season crossed over with season 1's Murder House yet again, this time by bringing the mysterious figure in the fetish costume into the new season to have sex with, well, another character played by Evan Peters.
In season 8, episode 2's "The Morning After," Mr. Gallant (Peters) opens a door to a man standing in a full black rubber bodysuit. Assuming that it's Fern's character Michael Langdon (the Antichrist and son of Connie Britton's Vivian and Peters' Tate from Murder House) underneath the outfit, Gallant and "Langdon" get it on. Except, umm... it's not actually Langdon in the costume, and something real weird is going on here.
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American Horror Story fans will remember that this has happened before.
The history of the rubber suit begins in Murder House. The suit was originally purchased by previous Murder House tenant Chad (Zachary Quinto), who wanted to use the BDSM coverall to spice up his love life with his partner Patrick (Teddy Sears). However, after Chad and Patrick get into a fight, Tate — the evil, vengeful ghost of a school shooter — wears the suit and proceeds to murder both Chad and Patrick.
Tate dons the suit again when the Harmon family moves into the Murder House. He wears the outfit to trick Vivian (Britton) into having sex with him, in hopes that doing so will impregnate her. (He wants to give the baby to Lily Rabe's ghostly character Nora, who lost her own child.) Vivian does, in fact, get pregnant — and she gives birth to Michael-freaking-Langdon, the very person that Gallant thought he was having sex with when he initially saw the Rubber Man.
Right now, we have no idea why the Rubber Man would stir up drama in Outpost 3. We also don't know for sure who is really under the costume when Gallant initially interacted with it. Could it be Peters' Tate? It is possible, as we know that Tate will return to American Horror Story this season, though it would be a little odd considering the one rule of the Murder House, where Tate resides, is that you are unable to leave.
Then again, maybe nuclear war blew up all the rules of the American Horror Story universe. We'll have to wait until the Rubber Man is finally unmasked to figure the whole thing out.
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