American Horror Story: Apocalypse / YMMV

Alternate Character Interpretation: It's never made clear how much of Michael's murderous behavior is under his control. Whether he gives up fighting it, or gives up pretending to care for others' sake, he ends up embracing it.
Angel/Devil Shipping: A lot of fans ship Mallory and Michael in this way. Mallory is a very powerful witch who is shown to be especially inclined to healing and reviving animals and humans, and dresses in a very angelic style, while Michael is The Antichrist, and is obviously shown to be erratic and violent, though he still has some residual humanity deep down. Michael seems very interested in Mallory while he’s interviewing her, and despite earlier stating that anyone who doesn’t want to leave with him is free to “stay here and die,” he tries very hard to get Mallory to go with him, even at one point physically preventing her from leaving the room, which led to a lot of fans shipping them. Many fans even take this further, theorizing that Mallory is actually an angel or a Nephilim.
Arc Fatigue: The season's initial promising postapocalyptic bunker setting quickly made way for a drawn-out How We Got Here plot that most fans grow more tired of every week.
Ass Pull:
- The Robotic Reveal for Mead comes out of left field at the end of the second episode.
- The events of "Forbidden Fruit" seem to happen only to throw everything established until then out of the window to do a completely different storyline, pretty much wasting two episodes of buildup. Whether or not this twist was seemed cheap or exciting depends on the viewer. Although the last few scenes of the season finale at least provide a pay-off for Timothy and Emily.
Awesome Music:
- ''The Devil's Playground'' by The Rigs as used in the trailers perfectly adumbrate the ominous, creepy tone of the season.
- In Episode Four, Michael's Team Power Walk with Madison and Queenie is made all the more awesome and minacious by Portishead's ''Glory Box'' serving as the musical score.
Complete Monster: Jeff Pfister and Mutt Nutter are the childish co-founders of Kineros Robotics, using their company as a front to conceal their real identities as vile supporters of the Cooperative. Assisting Michael Langdon in his endeavors as the son of Satan but frustrated at his lack of vision, Jeff and Mutt come up with the plan to annihilate mankind by guiding Michael into becoming the leader of the Cooperative to launch their nukes around the world, proudly noting that seven billion would die in the first ten minutes. As apathetic participants in Michael's personal war against the witches, they are also responsible for the near-extermination of the New Orleans coven.
Continuity Lock-Out: For the most part, averted with Coven characters, whose presence is adequately explained by context cues and exposition, though some new fans may assume ties between Venable and Cordelia that the show doesn't intend. "Return to Murder House," however, positively wallows in it, with little to no mercy given to viewers who skipped Murder House.
Crack Ship: Cordelia/Michael has fanart of it. No really. Doubles as Foe Yay Shipping.
Draco in Leather Pants: Michael Langdon has a huge group of fangirls who like to forget the fact that he is The Antichrist due to his good looks and tragic backstory. He manipulates his way into the warlocks' good graces, has little problem killing innocent people, and starts the Apocalypse. However, almost any fanfiction featuring him will have that one girl, usually a Self-Insert, who can fix him. In fact, on AO3, stories featuring him with an OC are the second most popular pairing, topping some of the fandom's most popular couples.
Ensemble Dark Horse:
- Brock, played by Billy Eichner, was only in the first episode and he's become one of the most funniest characters in the opening of the series. Shame he never got to see Coco one last time or make that Free Willy primetime series. Or will he?
  - Which lead to many fans of him rejoicing when he came back in Episode 3.
- Mr. Gallant, for his quips and Evan Peters's delightfully hammy performance.
- Ms. Meade, for being hilarious and a doting, if evil, mommy substitute.
- John Henry and Behold Chablis, for being the only sane warlocks around, and also for showing more character depth than some of the ostensible leads this season.
Epileptic Trees: The teasers featuring the buildings from Asylum, Freak Show and Hotel, along with a pig head from Roanoke and the smiley symbol from Cult, are giving fans the feeling that this will be a bigger crossover than just having Murder House and Coven in it. As of the fifth episode, there has been at least one tie-in with Hotel.
- When the witches arrive and resurrect their three "sisters," many fans theorized they were actually Queenie, Zoe and Misty under a magical disguise.
- In the same episode, there were theorists who claimed that Langdon based the personality of the Mead android off of Constance Langdon. This was around the time where it was assumed that Langdon had a loving relationship with his grandmother.
- Because of how short this season is and how most of it has been flashbacks, a growing amount of fans think this season will end on a cliffhanger and revealed to be a two-part season, with the upcoming season 9 being the second part. Insert jokes about a certain Marvel movie here.
- One theory that’s been around since about episode 4 when Mallory was introduced has been that she or all the witches will travel back in time and somehow prevent the apocalypse and this time around be succesful. Turned out this theory was accurate.
Fan Nickname:
- The season itself has "Coven 2."
- The woman that the Mead android is based off of is commonly referred to as "Devil Mama," as it was initially unclear if "Miriam Mead" was her name, too, or just the android's.
- “American Horror Story: Infinity War”. Even Ryan Murphy himself is in on it.
- The season now has the additional nickname of “American Horror Story: Days of Future Past” after the final episode.
Harsher in Hindsight:
- In Coven, Cordelia mentions how witches are a dying breed and how the group in that season were the last of Salem’s descendants. Fast forward to “Fire and Reign” and that not only may actually be true but Cordelia,Madison, Mallory, Coco, Misty, Stevie and Myrtle might be the only ones left at all.
- On a similar note, Cordelia saying she’s happy Zoe and Queenie will be by her side to lead the Coven into the future. Um, yeah about that...
- A line in Murder House about how Tate hates the house becomes a lot more poignant when it’s revealed that the entire house was very likely built over a gateway to Hell.
- In “Traitor”, Mallory says she doesn’t want to rise if it means Cordelia has to fall. By the time “Fire and Reign” is over, she pretty much has no choice since there’s no Coven left.
Heartwarming in Hindsight: In “The End”, Coco insists Mallory stay with her and so she does. This becomes much sweeter when in flashbacks we see that the two of them were close friends at the Academy, to the extent Mallory helped mentor Coco in honing her powers. It wasn’t just a gesture of kindness, she wanted her best friend to be safe.
Hilarious in Hindsight: This wouldn't be the first Apocalypse that Evan Peters has to deal with. Or Time in A Bottle was played during a scene of his.
- In the third episode, Cordelia, Myrtle and Madison revive Coco, Dinah and Mallory, after which Madison, played by Emma Roberts, bends down and says her signature line point blank to Mallory, played by Billie Lourd. This can be funny for viewers familiar with Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk's other horror series in which Lourd and Roberts played bitchy murder friends (also, Madison and Chanel are both the Alpha Bitch of their respective shows. So, there's that). It's like a nice little reunion at the end of the world!!
Ho Yay: Despite his claims to the contrary, Michael ignores even the barest concept of personal space when interviewing Gallant, and their interactions reek of disdainful sexual tension. He acts similarly invasive towards Venable, but it’s more of the line of No Yay.
Just Here for Godzilla: Most fans watching this season have stated that they were more interested in seeing the main witches from Coven again.
Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Mallory is a big fandom bicycle. She has been shipped with Michael, Coco, Cordelia, Zoe, Misty, Madison, Wilhemina, and Duncan Shepard from House of Cards (US), just to name a few of them.
Les Yay:
- Tons of it between Meade and Venable.
- Some people see this between Madison and Mallory, based on their first interaction in the show.
- Misty and Cordelia when she’s brought back. The tea scene anyone?
- After Michael made Zoe and Madison dance during the Seven Wonders, the pairing of Zoe/Madison (or Zadison as it’s called) started gaining more traction.
- Mallory and Coco have some both before and after having their memories and identities wiped.
Like You Would Really Do It: Or rather, they did do it but it won't last. Most fans think Gallant, Timothy, Emily and Andre aren't going to stay dead for too long due their popularity and their unfinished plotlines and the Coven wouldn't just let innocent people stay dead anyway.
- In a similar note, it’s unlikely Zoe and Queenie will stay dead since thanks to Hotel we have the Foregone Conclusion that the apocalypse is somehow reversed. As of “Apocalypse Then”, this is proven right.
Memetic Loser: Coco when it's revealed that she is a witch whose powers involve gluten detection and calorie counting. She also has an unlucky habit of being killed or harmed more times than her fellow survivors/witches.
Memetic Mutation:
- Amongst fans, “I’m just waiting for the witches/ghosts.”
- THE STEW IS STU.
- Where is Kyle?^note
- Some of the hairstyles on the show have memes of their own.
  - Evan Peters' wig. ^Explanation
  - Hair dick. ^Explanation
  - Langdon's luscious locks.
- “NOBODY GAVE ME A FUCKING INSTRUCTION MANUAL!”
- Fans lamenting Ryan Murphy for “making them” want to bang the Anti Christ.
- Jokes about Michael rejecting Mr. Gallant specifically in such a cruel way because of the fact that the latter looks just like his “father,” Tate who had coldly rejected Michael as his son himself.
- VROOM VROOM BITCH ^Explanation
Moe: Mallory and Coco before having their memories wiped are absolutely adorable. Mallory for her ethereal manner of dressing and her powers being primarily showcased through her saving the lives of humans and animals, and Coco for her insecurities about her seemingly lackluster powers and jubilation when her powers start to grow, and for just being so goofy.
Narm: The aforementioned Santa Monica scene from the promo. It doesn't help that, no joke, a short rendition OF THE INCREDIBLES THEME can be heard in the background!
- Also, during the plane scene, there's a Freeze-Frame Bonus where Evan Peters's character is throwing his hands up in the air like he just doesn't care while everyone else is taking cover. It's actually rather funny, especially coming from Evan.
- When Michael Langdon is showing off his apocalyptic powers for the warlocks, he menacingly... makes snow.
- The Black Sabbath of the Satanists in the Murder House, and everything they do leading up to it, tries to show how menacing and evil they are. Instead, the invocation of O Fortuna, the cliched human sacrifice, and the use of evil shadow puppetry just comes off as laughably over the top.
- Three words: Evan Peters' wig.
- Michael's emotional fits are meant to remind us he only looks like an adult, but they instead undermine his supposedly apocalyptic power.
- In the final episode, Michael is killed by being run over by Mallory. The Antichrist, everybody.
Narm Charm: The reveal that Miriam was based on a satanic middle-aged woman who took Langdon in as a teenager. It's pretty weird because of the satanist theme but it's quite adorable since the woman did genuinely care for Langdon; even labeling herself as his "Devil Mama".
Nausea Fuel: In the third episode, the deaths by mass poisoning, complete with projectile-vomiting, are a truly stomach-churning sight to behold.
Nightmare Retardant: The first and second teasers seem to shove the fact that it is an apocalypse season right in the viewer's face to a degree in which it gets annoying. The scorpions coming out of a fig and fighting don't help either.
Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
- In the first three episodes, Coco was one of the easiest characters to hate on account of being a shallow, self-centered Rich Bitch who shamelessly abused Mallory. The hate began to die down when later episodes revealed that Coco was a much nicer person in the prior to the memory wipe who had insecurities about her powers but ultimately wanted to be useful. She also had a great friendship going with her sister witches, especially Mallory.
- Madison was, at best, a divisive character during her season, where she could arguably be considered a villain, and grew a sizable base of people who cheered for her death. By the end of Apocalypse, she had made good on her promise to live a better life, showing compassion to the ghosts at the Murder House (including putting Moira to rest as opposed to sealing her away), and then volunteering to be the first to face Michael during the finale, knowing full well she'll die in the attempt. This caused a major shift in how she's seen by the fandom.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
- For many fans, Zoe and Queenie come off as this for the season. Despite being witch alumni and teachers for the new students, they stay in the background and are rarely involved in the events of the story. The fact that they instantly died during Langdon and Mead's massacre without putting so much as a decent fight against them is something that the fans can never let go of.
- Additionally, Marie Laveau returns in the finale, only to die mere minutes later without putting up much of a fight against Michael. That she comes back to murder a character who was already killed and then revived by Cordelia only makes this worse.
Unexpected Character: Since this season is branded as a crossover between Murder House and Coven, so hardly anyone can truly see it coming when Mr. James March returned in the 4th episode along with the entire set of Hotel Cortez.
- The last minute return of Marie Laveau is also this, not that it changes matters much.
Vanilla Protagonist: Timothy and Emily are seen as this. They're the few, if only, morally 'good' characters in the cast but are considered pretty boring compared to their more exciting, memetic and morally grey/dark colleagues. It also doesn't help that they were shown in a romantic relationship that had no significant buildup or chemistry. Possible intentional, since Mead refers to them as "those relentlessly boring young people," and they both end up dead quickly into the season.

YMMV / American Horror Story: Apocalypse

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