Evan Peters Is Playing Multiple Characters In ‘AHS: Cult’ & We’re Not Mad About It

In the past several months we've gotten a lot of terrifying details about the upcoming season of American Horror Story. From the clips, pictures, and trailers we've seen, this looks like it could be one of the scariest, most sinister installments of the series to date. So far, we know this season will open on the evening of the 2016 presidential election, and we've learned the theme of the season will deal with cults; but, of course, there are still plenty of questions that we won't get answers to until the season airs. Lucky for us, though, Ryan Murphy recently answered one major question we've had about the upcoming chapter: Who does Evan Peters play on American Horror Story: Cult?

One of the most exciting parts of American Horror Story Season 7 is that we'll see plenty of our faves like Sarah Paulson, Emma Roberts, and Evan Peters returning. The day one cast members always seem to have the juiciest, most dynamic characters and this season is no exception. During a Q&A after a media screening of the first three episodes of the season, writer/creator/director Ryan Murphy talked a bit about what we can expect to see in AHS: Cult; most notably, Murphy said that Evan Peters will be playing not one, but SEVEN different characters this time around.

Indeed, according to the show's creator, Peters will play a modern-day cult leader named Kai, as well as a series of famous cult leaders from recent history including Charles Manson, David Koresh, and Jim Jones. Murphy said of Peters' intense endeavor,

We examine how those people rise to power and why people followed them, when we can look at what happened and they're all such idiots. But for some reason, there was something going on in the culture, at that time, where people were so disenfranchised that they were like, 'I'm going to follow you, Charles Manson, and I'm going to do whatever you say.'

If you're a fan of the show, then you know this isn't the first time an actor will be playing more than one character (I mean, it was freakin' hard to keep track of who was who in Roanoke...), but it's definitely the first time it's been done on such a large scale.

Whether Peters will be playing these characters during flashback scenes, in his character Kai's mind, or as Kai emulating them is uncertain, but I'm sure we're going to be creeped out one way or the other.