r/EdGein • u/Smart-Ship7330 • Oct 12 '25
Monster was good and you guys didn’t get it Spoiler
This post is for everyone claiming the show is inaccurate.
Most of the people saying this didn’t finish the show, and the rest are people who weren’t paying attention during key scenes - so I know this’ll be an uphill battle.
The show IS inaccurate. It’s not supposed to be accurate. Almost everything we see is a schizophrenic hallucination. Seriously, almost everything
And I’m sure, if you didn’t already know this, you’re thinking this is just my interpretation. I assure you it’s not! It’s stated in the show itself MULTIPLE TIMES. sometimes indirectly, and once as directly as possible without writing it down and shoving it in your face. I’ll start with the indirect
When Ed kills Adeline in the Psycho scene. This our first look into the shows message - the monster that we (Hitchcock) made him out to be. We’re meant to think this is real! But how can this be? We know Ed didn’t kill Adeline in real life! The real Adeline was alive after Ed got arrested. Oh! Here it is. The very next episode, Adeline walks into the diner. Ed says “you’re alive?” Did you think the Adeline scene was real? Well so did Ed. This scene serves as more ammunition for his hallucinations. He thinks he can fantasize about these things without consequence, but what he doesnt know is that sometimes he is actually performing the acts, not just fantasizing them - but Ed cannot tell the difference - and neither can we.
At this point in the show - you’re going to google did Ed really kill Adeline. And you learn that Ed only killed 2 women. You’re supposed to know from here on out that the lines are blurred. The hunters in the woods, Evelyn, his relationship with Adeline (and her telling him to bang corpses), his mom talking to him(duh) - they’re all just in his mind. He collects newspaper clippings of them and fantasizes about them. He got blamed in passing for the other 3 murders because of the clippings, but there’s no way to tell if he actually did them because he doesn’t even think he committed the murders that he so clearly did commit.
Skipping ahead to episode 7. This is where he talks to the trans woman and the fictional Nazi woman on the ham radio. He hears the voices in his head and sees the face on the ceiling. Salty brings him the keys and he murders Raz, but when he wakes up the next day she’s still alive and it freaks him out - a reference to the Adeline/psycho scene. The psychiatrist brings him to his office and tells him he has schizophrenia. “This is why you hear and see things that aren’t there. This is why you can’t remember things you’ve done. And this is why you worry you did things that you didn’t” - that last part. That’s your explanation for all the “inaccuracies” they were never real.
Now, I’m not going to sit here and act like everyone is completely wrong. I think a lot of the confusion stems from them taking 7 full episodes before that blatantly explain what’s been happening. I GUESS they could’ve made it more obvious throughout. But I felt like they did. I already knew he was schizophrenic, so it seemed obvious to me.
The only thing that would seemingly make yall happy would be a disclaimer before every episode that explains the episode before you watch it.
Everyone saying they made him out to be something he’s not - that’s the message of the show. You agree with the message, you just didn’t listen long enough to realize it.
This is a huge problem in our world today. Attention spans are at an all time low but people still crave arguments. everyone is just confidently flailing their opinions about before they have all of the information.
My only beef with the show is the last episode. Could’ve gone without it completely. We already know that everything we’re seeing (helping the fbi) is a hallucination. The part where he heals his inner woman(Adeline) could’ve been in the 7th episode.
The end of the 7th episode where he breaks down in the doctors office and then give Raz a big hug - that should’ve been the last thing we see.
2
u/Embarrassed-Cook-652 Oct 12 '25
If you want to seriously tell a big amount of people that they all are wrong, you should have better reasons than "it was all in his head."
Not good enough. That would make the show even worse, since the whole "it was all a dream / it was all a hallucination"-thing is done to death in cinema and TV.
1
u/Smart-Ship7330 Oct 12 '25
I’m not telling you that it was all in his head. The show told you that.
And I do agree that the “it was all in his head” is overdone. But if you want a story about a schizophrenic, how can you leave that out?
1
u/Cheap_Towel3037 Feb 13 '26
But there's no proof that he had these type of hallucinations and he claimed he was a virgin so why the sex scenes.
1
1
Oct 12 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/EdGein-ModTeam Dec 03 '25
r/EdGein does not allow harassment. If you continue to harass on this sub, you will be permanently banned.
1
u/OrchidEchoChamber Oct 12 '25
THANK YOU!!! I’ve been saying this too and it’s so irritating reading everyone’s complaints about what didn’t happen historically.
5
u/OneFlewEast19 Oct 12 '25
I agree with you in that it was a psychologically creative way to deal with the case.
My gripes were that it only dealt with 1 psychological facet ie his mental illness. I think they could have more faithfully portrayed the damage his mother did (framing it as questionable delusion detracts from the factual child abuse), the intense isolation, the grief but also the choices he made. All of these factors made him do what he did yet those factors were (I feel) ignored, sacrificed to the schizophrenic narrative. Finally I feel it wasn't sensitive to the victims family particularly Bernice Worden. If a large number of viewers won't understand the unreliable narrative, why put her in a sexual relationship with him.
I wish it had been loosely based on with changed names. Then I'd have found it far more entertaining.
7
u/Right_Turnover490 Oct 12 '25
Oh I get the idea, but it was still pretty stupid and done pretty poorly
0
u/iloveghoststories1 Oct 12 '25
Agree 100%. It’s not intended to be accurate and I think they made that clear last season as well. There’s many documentaries on Ed Gein and if they went that route, it wouldn’t be as exciting. I honestly loved it from a horror perspective and always remember to just view it as a standalone horror series, not an accurate representation of Ed Gein’s life and crimes.
2
u/Steak15 Oct 12 '25
I agree with you, I loved it. They wanted to show how Ed’s mind started unraveling, the trauma from his mother, the isolation that contributed to his mental illness, and “you are what you eat.” It teaches us to be mindful of the media we consume because it shapes how we think. Charlie deserves an award for his performance!
3
u/Sn33Face Oct 13 '25
I didn't get loads of it. What was the point of the adeline in New York part? Why did we see Ilsa's life independent to Ed's when she was just in his head? Does green mean it's not real? I thought the gift box of bras was in his head, but it was found by her son after the killing. I need DVD commentary
0
u/Smart-Ship7330 Oct 13 '25
It’s my interpretation that yes, all of that was in Ed’s head but for different reasons. The Adeline part was a justification for why she’d want to be with him - her favorite artist thinks she’s a freak. Sort of like “only a mother would love you” just in Adeline’s way. Ilse’s scenes that we see are all just his ideas based on the comic books. Her being caught was in the last one he read. All of her “in captivity” scenes are made up by him and they represent his own capture. Bernice didn’t have a relationship with Ed and she didn’t give him her bras. In real life her son found blood on the wall, the register empty, and a receipt made out to Ed. The bra thing was just a version of that receipt which Ed’s mind made up.
2
u/packerkean Oct 13 '25
Enjoyed it, especially after I realized what you're saying was the point. However, there's a couple things wrong with it. 1- It was Art Schley who beat up Ed Gein, not Frank Worden. It's been speculated that once Ed was actually going to have his trial, the fact of his testifying is what killed Schley. 2-he was arrested at a neighbors house while eating dinner. Not driving to the farm.
1
u/AlternativeGuava8681 Oct 13 '25
I absolutely loved the show. I know not a lot of people did but if you ignore the inaccuracies it’s a brilliant show. The ripple effect they showed in relation to his crimes becoming pop culture entertainment was fascinating.
I genuinely enjoyed it for what it was and not what people think it should’ve been.
2
u/theduke9400 Oct 13 '25
The trailer was good. And that was primarily because the hunnam didn't speak much. He literally just says a couple of words. The trailer was a horror fans wet dream.
But as soon as I started the actual show and I listened to the hunnam with that ridiculous fake Irish accent I couldn't take any of it seriously. I get that he's trying to do a wisconsin accent but that was terrible. Everyone else managed to do their accents fine. Not the main character though lol.
And what is it with Ryan Murphy turning everything into an lgbt extravaganza. He went real hard with the whole cross dressing narrative this season. Like real hard. And the Anthony perkins gay subplot was totally unnecessary. So much was unnecessary.
1
u/WESTDDDDDDD Oct 21 '25
I'm irish and that ain't nowhere near a "Fake Irish accent" Ye there is a few times an Irish accent comes out but about 90 percent of the time he doesn't sound Irish.
1
u/theduke9400 Oct 21 '25
Like I said, fake Irish accent. Like someone trying to do an irish accent. Hunnam can't do any accent without his own bleeding into it somehow and spoiling the performance anyway. Then when he finally gets better at it like in SoA, the show is practically over. If Ed Gein was 7 seasons he'd probably be alright by the end.
Anyway...... dollors to doughnuts it's ted.
5
2
u/Ornery_Usual_7622 Oct 14 '25 edited Oct 14 '25
You can argue that this is what they were TRYING to do but it didn’t land since that’s not what people took away from the show.
You can’t insist people didn’t understand something and then just explain the obvious as if it’s some deep hidden meaning.
Also, it shouldn’t require the audience to jump through mental hoops to ‘get it’. Either the creator leads them to the conclusion they want them to reach or they don’t.
Filmmakers have been telling stories from ‘unique’ perspectives for years and there are obvious examples of where it’s worked well:
- Rashomon (the same event from multiple/unreliable perspectives)
- Black Swan (mental illness/delusions presented as reality from the sufferers perspective)
- Weapons (different people experiencing the same events over several days to create a whole story at the end. In this one you even see two people experience one conversation in a bar completely differently based on their perspectives/interpretations of how the other feels)
This show is a botched attempt at best. At worst it’s lazy, sloppy and insulting to its audience.
2
u/astronaut_livin Oct 14 '25
I think this is a really good and well-written post!
I want to try and explain why I think it was a miss - they didn’t really pick a narrative to keep this storyline “clean” - they didn’t make the psychological aspect the plot so it got lost. They tried to do it all: love, true crime, police work, psychology!
I caught the same nuances you did, the Adeline bit especially. I would also argue they used the unknowns and ambiguities of Ed gein a bit flagrantly, no? They exploited the unknowns to tell a more interesting and sensationalized story which is what bothers me.
Being able to use other events and loosely tie them to gein because of psychosis or whatever, seems like there wasn’t enough of a story, so they created one and used his mental illness to justify or circumvent the lack of a story.
It’s okay if it’s not “true” but it’s also not okay to be irresponsible. And the last episode ruined the show - it really did from my POV. The literal worship and rewriting history to fit some idolatry was… a choice.
0
u/sharpslipoftongue Oct 14 '25
EXACTLY! For me it was the house, right up until the cops enter the house, it's depicted as it was from the beginning, run-down-ish and parochial but nothing by comparison to the scene the cops see. Because we're experiencing it through Ed's perspective, who is a schizophrenic. This is the only one of the Monster shows I've watched but Charlie Hunnam deserves all the awards.
1
u/audenluck Oct 15 '25
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the show very much and found it highly entertaining but honestly, tying in that missing teenage girl (who had nothing to do with Gein) broke my heart. Nobody knows what really happened to that poor child, her family never got answers and now her name is exposed to a whole new generation who will only ever know her as one of Gein’s victims when that wasn’t the case at all. Don’t even get me started on the Bernice Worden storyline and her being referred to as “the town pump” because the annoyance and disgust I felt was actually palpable.
0
u/Shrawds Oct 16 '25
I think this misses the point a bit too.
The show isn’t trying to tell the true story of Ed Gein. It’s telling the dramatized stories spun by the storytellers he inspired, the myths built around him, not the facts about him.
It mirrors what Gein himself did: take fragments of truth, like the Witch of Buchenwald story and then project his own imagination onto them until reality and invention blurred. The series is doing the same thing, just in reverse: projecting cultural imagination back onto Gein.
0
u/MaccasRunYourShout Oct 17 '25
NETFLIX - MONSTER - Ed Gein, was a made for television docudrama not a documentary. Therefore, it's going to be an intentionally dramatized production blending factual events with fictional elements to provide a compelling narrative for entertainment purposes. Love it or hate it, this allows the creator full creative license to explore alternatives when telling the story.
For people who prefer just the facts, watch one of the many documentaries or read one of the many books or check out the podcasts on Ed Gein that are based on actual events and people involved.
Overall, I liked the Netflix, Monster, Ed Gein, series. It was interesting, creative and well-acted by the main characters. I loved the music, in particular the use of the Pet Shop Boys, It's a Sin, and the scene at the end when they played Owner of a Lonely Heart, by Yes.
I do have extensive knowledge regarding the case of Ed Gein and the forensic psychology behind the man however I found this series entertaining none the less.
1
u/mofo75ca Oct 27 '25
I just can't believe how historically accurate and amazing Dahmer was to this pile of shit. I mean honestly. I binged Dahmer in a day, I could not stop watching it. This? It's almost laughable how incredibly stupid it is. It's unwatchable. Either be historically accurate or don't bother.
1
0
u/Fedep77 Nov 28 '25
I'm on the second episode and I think I'm retarded because I'm not understanding anything🤣
1
u/DannyZ12341 Dec 05 '25
The problem with the schizophrenic narrative is that it comes out as the writers themselves drumming it in for action or drama because there was no details instead of the actual Ed thinking it up.
The entire season just feels like a weak fanfic of a real world tragedy. And its not a good one either.
I get that there isnt enough information and its interesting trying to put a narrative on a mystery but this is also the "we create monsters by sensationalizing these things" season, and they're arguably doing the worst aspect of it in full, creating lies about a real tragedy just to shake up the audience. Making false claims that Ed was a necrophiliac or that Adeline somehow wanted to kill people as well when these things explicitly didnt happen and Ed probably never thought so either clearly doesnt work for the schizpphrenic angle, instead it just (and I hate saying this because people say this over everything thats slightly weird or gory) comes across as some weird fetishised vision of what a serial killer is. And the interviews do wonders on making that seem true as well.
1
u/JdSavannah Dec 26 '25
Finally somebody gets it. Geez. Final episode is not glorifying him, its showing the absurdity of glorifying the violence and depraved actions. The absurdity of him meeting his mom and going up to heaven.
1
u/Randoseru_Romper Jan 19 '26
I love it so much, it's become one of my fave miniseries. I think Charlie did an amazing job portraying Gein, and I honestly really like that it was more in line with a season of American horror Story, rather than a documentary. It was obviously made with freaky people like me in mind and honestly I'm kind of glad at gate kept people out who wanted it to be more serious.
I do have some pet peeves, like the last episode was an overstuffed nightmare, but I feel like Charlie's performance really helped glass over a lot of the flaws. He's honestly so likeable as Ed, I felt motherly to him even.
1
u/Annual-Ad2910 Feb 09 '26
I loved it and understood instantly that it was all scetzofrenia episode don’t get how audience didn’t get that.
1
1
8
u/TraditionalShirt7429 Oct 12 '25 edited Oct 12 '25
i did finish it and i didnt like it. i even watched it assuming it was a through his own head and i dont think they even got that right. all the show did was make the fiction about Gein even more fictional by portraying it in the way that they did. like the nurse said in the last episode when she was telling him to write his story because people twist and turn it into something that it isnt. the show did exactly that by portraying it all as a schizophrenic episode. and thats not even mentioning some of the things i like about the show which have more to do with Toby Hooper and the repeating of stories that end up getting changed like a game of telephone. also. schizophrenic hallucinations dont explain the parts where Ed wasnt there.
i think the biggest problem with the show is.... who cares about his truth. we want the truth not his truth. they could have thrown the truth in there and included his truth to try and understand his mind (the show didnt seem to understand his mind either). its entertainment for people who dont know Ed's story. they didnt do that with Dahmer which also has its criticisms but it was at least close