After months of waiting to see all the ways in which American Horror Story: Cult would attempt to send viewers hiding under their beds with its surplus of freaky ass clowns, the season premiered on FX last night to high praises from both longtime fans and new ones. And it turns out another horror-esque TV show was also paying attention, as Audience Network's Stephen King adaptation Mr. Mercedes gave a social media shout-out to American Horror Story: Cult about its use of a similar dessert-delivery system.
As a mega-fan of both American Horror Story and Mr. Mercedes, I may have had a nerdgasm upon seeing that post. It's quite perfect in its approach, both due to the subject matter at hand and the kind of crossover speculation that random social media mash-ups are so good at inspiring. (I'm still loving the BoJack/Jessica Jones one.)
Time for an explanation for those who've watched one show and not the other, or who've seen neither, or who actually watched both and still can't grasp the point. On Mr. Mercedes, Harry Treadaway stars as the mentally unstable Brady Hartsfield, who has for years been a fugitive from justice after intentionally plowing a car into a crowd of innocent people, which earned him the titular nickname. Brady antagonizes the former detective on the case, Brendon Gleeson's Bill Hodges, and for a second job that allows him easy access to keep tabs on Hodges, Brady is a legitimate ice cream man, driving his truck around neighborhoods to sell to the local kids.
Meanwhile, over on American Horror Story: Cult, Sarah Paulson's Ally Mayfair-Richards is going through some thangs, and such thangs include "suffering from a crippling fear of clowns." And so it's not very cool that clowns just so happen to be springing up all around her Michigan home. During one part of the episode -- as it's seen in the trailers -- an ice cream truck pulls up in front of a house, and clowns emerge, set to cause all kinds of mayhem. Thankfully for both Ally and viewers, this ice cream truck isn't meant to stand in for a traditional clown car from a circus, so there is only a limited number of masked creepsters that emerge.
And now for some vaguely pointless speculation about what it would be like if Mr. Mercedes' Brady Hartsfield actually got involved with the cult-esque gang of clowns on American Horror Story: Cult. Really, we don't know much about what they're up to at this point, while Brady is someone who likes to have some clear plans set out ahead for himself. It's presumed that the masked killers are following Evan Peters' Kai Anderson, who has a bone to pick with all of liberal America, and I'm not sure that Brady would do well taking orders from others, even if they're similar in nature. I'd definitely watch Kai and Brady go hard on a bare-knuckle fight in a parking lot, though. And they can share a Bomb Pop and a Choco Taco afterward.
Now that it's finally here, American Horror Story: Cult will air on FX on Tuesday nights at 10:00 p.m. ET. And over on Audience Network, Mr. Mercedes is hitting the middle of its first season, airing Wednesday nights at 8:00 p.m. ET. If you're looking for even more sordid horror on TV, or perhaps something lighter, check out our fall premiere schedule.
