For "Chapter 4," American Horror Story: Roanoke kicked the exposition into high gear, as viewers finally got some streamlined information about the central house and the many entities seen in and around it. We learned from Denis O'Hare's Dr. Elias Cunningham that the haunted abode has one huge connection to American Horror Story: Freak Show: it was originally built by Edward Philip Mott, distant ancestor to Season 4's Dandy and Fiona Mott.
Ryan Murphy recently teased that American Horror Story: Roanoke would be going into the backstory of the Mott family, saying it would be an amusing affair. This most recent episode sadly only gave us the brief namedrop as Elias was getting his drink on and popping open fake wall panels and sharing all of his research. (I really hope there's a real world tie-in book by Dr. Elias Cunningham released in the next year.) But while that's a shame, it just means we now have more information on which to base our anticipatory speculation.
Edward Philip Mott built the house, which unfortunately doesn't have a set nickname yet, back in 1792, but he should have looked around for some less haunted real estate. This eldest (that we know of) Mott ancestor went missing, making him not the first victim of Kathy Bates' Butcher, but the first of the homeowners to suffer her eternal vengeance. And considering The Butcher was literally pulling arms off of people's bodies as recently as 1989, I have to imagine Mr. Mott's death was particularly horrifying and possibly pig-related.
While it would be great to see how that death played out - and we probably will - I wonder if the backstory will allow for any cameos from either Dandy or Gloria Mott, and how that would even happen. Not that I'm against meeting others closer to the top of the Mott family tree. It wasn't made clear if Edward Philip Mott was the only person who vanished from the house after it was built, or if he had a family there with him. I really hope they just use Finn Wittrock to play his own descendant, and that he also has a swell head of hair.
Lots of other informational tidbits were shared during "Chapter 4," such as Lady Gaga being the magical and super horny ancient spirit that The Butcher worships, and the fact that she might be trying to have Matt's kid by mesmerizing him into having sex all the time. As well, we learned about an Asian family's troubles and discovered everything that's happening is tied to a six-day period in which the Dying Grass Moon gives way to the Blood Moon, which is when The Butcher and her league of ghouls are able to straight up murder real people. (Naturally.) And as indicated by the end of the episode when the mob is right outside, the Millers are in for some bad times.
With more dark histories, twists and people yelling "Croatoan" yet to come, American Horror Story: Roanoke airs Wednesday nights on FX at 10:00 p.m. ET. To see when everything else will hit the small screen later this year, check out our fall TV schedule.
