Everything We Know About "American Horror Story" Season 7

Season 7 will be subtitled Cult. Here's how Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton will factor in.

1. Watch the first footage from the new season!

Jarett Wieselman @JarettSays

"American Horror Story: Cult" Trailer: https://t.co/MVFdwasJsV #AHSCult

05:46 PM - 22 Aug 2017

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2. Trump and Clinton make cameos (sorta...) in the Cult opening credit sequence. Watch!

AmericanHorrorStory @AHSFX

Watch it begin. Witness the opening credits for #AHSCult.

04:00 PM - 21 Aug 2017

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3. Get to know the cast

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An official website has launched that challenges fans to complete tasks for rewards. The latest prize was these first look photos of the cast, which reveal their character names. Colton Haynes will play Detective Samuels, Billie Lourd will play Winter Anderson, Cheyenne Jackson will play Dr. Rudy Vincent, and Billy Eichner will play Harrison Wilton.

4. A new 'ship arrives

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During a Women of American Horror Story panel during FX's Television Critics Association summer press tour day, Sarah Paulson revealed that her character is in a relationship with Alison Pill's character, who is named Ivy Mayfair-Richards.

5. A Scream Queen returns!

Emma Roberts

Fresh off two seasons of Fox's Scream Queens, AHS: Coven and Freak Show alum Emma Roberts has announced she's back in the Horror Story fold for Season 7. "I've joined #ahscult will you?" she captioned this photo on Instagram.

During a press conference, Ryan Murphy said that Roberts — who only appears in one episode — will play a Michigan newscaster named Serina Belinda who is "promoted above Adina Porter's character simply because she's much more superficial and willing to do what it takes to survive."

6. The official poster hints at a hive mind.

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With the show's Cult subtitle it makes sense the official poster for Season 7 would play into the hive mind mentality that is so often at play with cults of every ilk.

7. Welcome to the Cult.

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After putting the kibosh on a few fan title theories, Ryan Murphy announced that Season 7 would be titled American Horror Story: Cult. The next chapter premiere Sept. 5.

8. Say hello to Lena Dunham.

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The Girls star will make her American Horror Story debut in Season 7. Ryan Murphy tweeted, "Thrilled that my talented friend Lena Dunham is joining the AMERICAN HORROR STORY family. Always wanted to work together, and now we r!"

Murphy revealed during a press conference that Dunham plays Valerie Solanas, the real woman who tried to shoot Andy Warhol in an episode titled "Valerie Solanas Died for Your Sins, Scumbag."

"That episode is about the female rage then, and in the country now. Back then, Valerie Solanas created the thing called The Scum Manifesto, in which she told women — all women — to kill all men, and that was the only way you could rise to power," he said.

9. A nightmare returns

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Twisty the Clown (John Carroll Lynch) made his AHS debut during 2014's Freak Show and despite the fact the character was killed (and maybe became a ghost? This is AHS, so nothing is really crystal clear) Ryan Murphy revealed the killer clown will return in Season 7 when he shared the image above. "He's baaaaack," Murphy captioned the set snap.

10. Colton Haynes will make his AHS debut!

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Ryan Murphy announced on Instagram that Arrow alum Colton Haynes has joined the new season. "Already feels like home," Haynes wrote on Instagram. "So excited." No word yet on who he'll be playing.

11. Adina Porter and Cheyenne Jackson are back!

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FX

Porter, who previously appeared in Murder House and Roanoke, will be returning to the franchise, as will Cheyenne Jackson who previously appeared in Hotel and Roanoke. According to set photos, Porter plays a reporter and given the fact this is an election-themed season, she could possible have the most dangerous role on the show.

12. Here's your first look at one of the new season's creatures.

Instagram: @mrrpmurphy

Ryan Murphy shared this photo on Instagram, calling it a "Season 7 tease." And since the elephant is the symbol of the Republican party, looks like we could be getting a donkey sketch any day now.

13. Billie Lourd segues over from Scream Queens.

Ryan Muprhy

Billie Lourd, who played Chanel #3 on Murphy's Fox series Scream Queens, has joined the upcoming season of American Horror Story. "Winter is coming," Murphy captioned this photo of the actor. During a TCA panel, Lourd revealed this role would feature little to no comedy — or, as she put it, "straight up horror drama."

14. Billy Eichner will be part of the cast.

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Best known for comedy, the Difficult People star has joined the cast of Season 7, per Deadline. He'll reportedly play "a close confidant of Paulson’s character and will mostly be wearing mysterious tank tops."

15. Two fan favorites will be back.

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At the Television Critics Association winter press tour following a panel for Feud, Murphy told reporters that Sarah Paulson and Evan Peters would be returning for Season 7.

John Landgraf — CEO of FX Networks and FX Productions — also told reporters at TCA, "Ryan has yet another, I think, really innovative idea for how to do something fresh and different with the franchise that audiences haven’t seen before."

16. The presidential election will factor in to Season 7.

Bravo / Charles Sykes/Bravo

In February 2017 while on Bravo's Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen, Murphy said Season 7 "is going to be about the election that we just went through. So I think that will be interesting for a lot of people."

His statement triggered quite a lot of online speculation, leading Murphy to later elaborate to E! Online: "People literally think Sarah Paulson is playing Hillary Clinton and I wanted to clarify that that is not true. Horror Story is always about allegory, so the election is allegory. It's our jumping off point. It is about the election we just went through and what happened on that night and the fallout of that night, which to many people, from all sides of the camps is a horror story. And you know, that show is always so fun when it's about the zeitgeist and what we're doing now."

17. And it will begin on election night.

Jim Watson / AFP / Getty Images

"It's very scary, that night, for many people," Murphy told E! Online. "It's fun, you will like it. It's really a season that will have a lot of people interested and I think there's something for everybody in that season."

18. Also, Season 7 may have ties to Season 4.

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The very first time Murphy revealed anything about Season 7 was in October 2016, when he said, “Next year, we will be going back to some Freak Show characters, deeper histories and mythologies. So we’re sort of still exploring Season 4 in Season 7.”

And while that might still hold true, that was before Donald Trump won the presidential election, so Murphy's plan could've changed completely.

CORRECTION

May. 06, 2017, at 00:15 AM

John Landgraf’s name was misspelled in an earlier version of this post.

CORRECTION

Aug. 22, 2017, at 18:05 PM

Adina Porter made her AHS debut in Season 1. A previous version of this story said her debut was in Season 6.