Monster: The Ed Gein Story - Part 1 (Bonus Episode) - Criminal Adaptations

Episode Transcript
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Episode intro (00:09):
My Ed Yes.
Did you kill Bernice Warden?
I don't remember.
Did you kill Mary Hogan?
I don't remember.
Did you kill Ray Burgess andVictor Travis?
No.

(00:29):
Did you kill an eight-year-oldgirl?
Georgia Jean Weckler?
No, I didn't.
Did you kill your brother, Ed?
He died in a fire.
Asphyxiation, they said.
Oak Mother's heart.

Ashley (00:51):
And welcome back, everyone, to part two of our
bonus episode on Ed Gean.
If you did not listen to lastweek, you should definitely go
back and listen to that.
We highlighted the life of EdGean and also talked about the
three Hollywood adaptationswhere he is a primary
inspiration.
This week, we are going to befocusing solely on Ryan Murphy

(01:15):
and Ian Brennan's season threeof Monster, which is all about
Edward Geane.
And this is the second timewe're actually covering a TV
show.
Ironically, also the first onewe did, feud Capote vs.
Swans, was also Ryan Murphy.
But Remy, we chose this oneprimarily because we were both

(01:38):
big fans of season one andseason two.
Why don't we talk a little bitabout those seasons of Monster?

Remi (01:44):
Yes, we are big Ryan Murphy fans.
To an extent, I think I'm kindof falling off the Ryan Murphy
bandwagon as of late, but thefirst two seasons of Monster,
Dahmer and the Menendez Brothersstory, were surprisingly
accurate and I thought did avery good job of even in the

(02:05):
Dahmer season at leasthighlighting the victims in the
scenario.
They do have scenes that arebased on urban legends or
hearsay here and there, but forthe most part, many of the
things ended up checking out,and I thought Evan Peters'
performance as Jeffrey Dahmerwas brilliant.
He did a magnificent job, and Ithought the miniseries did a

(02:28):
really good job of not justfocusing on him, but actually
drawing attention to the livesthat he took and who those
people were.
The Menendez Brothers was avery similar story, but I knew a
lot less about the MenendezBrothers.
And again, we looked into itand a lot of the details ended
up checking out and beingsurprisingly really accurate.

(02:49):
Plus it had Javier Bardem asthe father, and all of these
seasons have really greatperformances.
So when we heard that Ed Geenwould be the focus of the newest
season, we both were like,yeah, this is the time to do it.
We try and focus on usuallyjust one serial killer per

(03:10):
season.
I guess this technically wouldbe two because we did memories
of murder earlier this season.
But I remember hearing aboutthis and getting really excited,
and then being kinda surprisedwhen I heard that Charlie Hunnam
was playing Ed Gean in this.
I mean, he's the good-lookingSons of Anarchy guy.

(03:33):
I remember he was in PacificRim.
He's always like the hero instuff.
And from what I know about EdGeane, Charlie Hunnam was
definitely not the person that Ienvisioned.
What about you, Ashley?

Ashley (03:45):
He definitely wasn't, and I was really thrown off too
when I first heard that casting.
But then, right when I saw apicture of him, and I actually
compared it to Ed Gean, theysomehow did a really good job
making him look like him.
I guess Ryan Murphy sawsomething that none of us did.

Remi (04:05):
It is strange.
I had my doubts, but then I didsee the comparison photos, and
they do have a lot ofsimilarities in their facial
structure, and they gave CharlieHunum the lazy eye that Ed had
in real life as well.
But the voice definitely threwme off a little bit the first
time that I heard it.

(04:25):
I do have a brief clip ofCharlie Hunnum discussing the
voice, and let's start with anexample of Charlie Hunum doing
Mr.
Ed Gean's voice in the series.

She killed herself.
Oh boy.
And you happen to know wherethey buried her.

Remi (04:45):
So, Ashley, what do you think of Ed's voice in the TV
series?

Ashley (04:51):
It is a choice, that's for sure.
I actually scrolled pastsomething on Instagram, and I
think it said something like heactually heard some sort of clip
of the real Edgein's voice, buthad to like sign some sort of
like non-disclosure,non-re-release agreement or
something like that.
So he did say I'm pretty surethe voice is based on how Edgein

(05:13):
sounded.

Remi (05:14):
Well, I do have a clip of Charlie Hunnam discussing his
choices for that particularvoice in the show.

Charlie Hunnam (05:22):
So that voice that I use grew out of my
research.
And the thing that I couldn'tstop thinking about was Ed's
burning desire to get the loveand affection and acceptance
from his mother that he nevergot.
And she told him every day for41 years that she hated him
because he'd not been born thedaughter that she wanted.

(05:44):
So I thought if you don't haveany other contact with the
outside world, what would thatdo psychologically and
emotionally, and how would thatmanifest in the body?
And so I thought this sort ofum gentle, high-pitched voice
might be a way that Ed, youknow, uh gave permission to his
mother to love him.

Ashley (06:05):
Okay, so it's not really clear from that clip if he
actually sounded anything likethat or not.

Remi (06:11):
It's clear that Charlie has given this a lot of thought,
but I'm not sure that the voiceis actually based on the
recordings of Ed Gean.
I did find some randomrecordings of Ed Gean's supposed
voice online, but I can'tverify any of them, and I can't
in good conscience play themhere today.

Ashley (06:34):
Yeah, when I typed this into YouTube, one of the videos
on the side said, like, Ed Geanremastered voice, but it
wouldn't really make sense ifthat's the case if Charlie
Hunnam said that these videoswere or these audio recordings
were never released and it tookhim forever to track them down.
I have a feeling those areprobably all phony.

Remi (06:53):
Yeah, one of the ones I came across on YouTube had been
up for seven years and had 24views.
So I'm skeptical of thelegitimacy of that one and
basically any of the other onesI found on YouTube.
But should we get into the maincourse, so to speak?

Ashley (07:12):
Let's do it.
And before we do, I want togive our listeners kind of like
a little breakdown on how theformat of this is gonna go.
If you listen to our episode onCapodium and the Swans, we
really did a play-by-play ofeverything that happened in each
of those episodes while wediscussed it throughout.
We're not really gonna takethat same route this time.

(07:34):
Remy is gonna walk us throughthe episode, kind of touching
more of the big takeaway points,but really what we want this to
focus on is highlighting thesimilarities and differences
between Ed Geen and CharlieHunnam's portrayal of him and
Monster, and also really talkingabout some of the what the fuck

(07:56):
moments.
Because unlike the first twoseasons, there are some wild
what is happening moments here.
This season has a very, verydifferent vibe from the first
two.
The first two are actuallyGolden Globe nominated.
Evan Peters actually won aGolden Globe for his portrayal

(08:16):
of Jeffrey Dahmer.
I'm gonna go out on a limb hereand say I don't think season
three is gonna get very manynominations.

Remi (08:24):
It does seem a little more over the top than the previous
two seasons do.
I know Ryan Murphy's stuff isalways pretty boundary pushing,
but how the first episode beginsalone really set the bar high,
I guess, for what the fucks thatwere to come.

Ashley (08:44):
And I actually have a theory that I feel pretty
confident in about why thisseason feels a lot different
than the first two.
Ryan Murphy is actually listedas a writer for all the episodes
in season one and season two,but none of the episodes for
season three.
He's just listed as a createdby.
So it's Ian Brennan who is thesole writer of all of these

(09:07):
episodes.
Apparently, Ryan Murphy isworking on some other project in
this moment.
So it seems to me that he tooka big step away from season
three to focus on anotherproject, and I think that's why
it feels different.

Remi (09:22):
He seems to get bored of projects and move on.
I don't think he's veryinvolved with any of the newer
American horror story seasons.
He's a very, very, very busyshowrunner, and he's constantly
releasing new shows.
There's something coming outstarring Kim Kardashian about
like divorce attorneys that'scoming out in a couple of

(09:43):
months.
We just watched the trailerfor.

Ashley (09:46):
And I wonder if he's going to come back in because
they've already announced seasonfour of Monster, and it is
about Lizzie Borden with CharlieHunnam playing her father.

Remi (09:55):
The jury is out on whether we will be covering that one or
not.
But let's get into this seasonof Monster, the Ed Gean story.

Augusta Gein (10:07):
Eddie.
Why were you in my Brazier andnylons?

Explosives.

Ed Gein (10:16):
Just trying to be funny.
Oh, you're Josh and me.
Huh?

Remi (10:20):
Josh and The title for episode one is Mother.
We have also decided that weare going to create our own
taglines for each episode,summing up our feelings after
seeing what we just saw.
Ashley, will you give thetagline for the first episode?

Ashley (10:40):
My tagline was Ed copes with the death of his family in
the most peculiar ways.

Remi (10:47):
Mine is Quaint Beginnings, Autoerotic Asphyxiation, Nazis,
and Mother's Underwear.

Ashley (10:56):
So, uh audience, I think that kind of gives you a little
hint that we enter Crazyvillewith this series right off the
bat.

Remi (11:04):
Yes, we start with Ed on the farm milking a cow.
We see his house.
The house is huge.
And then there's the firstscene that threw us both off,
where we see Ed peeping in onsome girls in their bedroom as
they're getting undressed.
It's very horror moviekiller-ish, and it's not

(11:25):
something that I ever found anyproof that Ed did.
He's literally snuck into thishouse and is peeping through a
little hole.

Ashley (11:35):
This is a point that I have in the differences column.
This woman that he's peepingon, or this girl, I'm pretty
sure it's like the girl he'sdating throughout, Adeline, but
I never found anything that hewas peeping, and it looks like
he's like snuck into this houseto do so.
It's really weird.

Remi (11:53):
The girl in the scene is Adeline, who I will get to more
in a minute.
But the girls hear Ed outsideof their door and they begin to
freak out, and Ed runs away.
But things get crazier fromthere because in the next scene,
we see Ed back home, dressed inhis mother's underwear, jerking

(12:16):
off while hanging himself froma belt.

Ashley (12:19):
And this practice is something he does several,
several times in this episode,which is another point that I
put in the differences.
There was nothing about anysort of autoerotic asphyxiation
or him literally masturbatinginto his mom's bra and
underwear.

Remi (12:39):
I know we both kind of looked at each other when the
scene of him peeping washappening, but when this scene
happened, we both audibly said,What the fuck is happening here?
Like, this is not anything thatI have read that is in any way
based in reality.

Ashley (12:58):
Well, and then immediately we get another what
the fuck moment.
He's standing in the middle ofhis like living room, naked,
covering his genitalia, butnaked, while mother is reading
scripture to him and chastisinghim for his behavior.

Remi (13:15):
Yeah, he is caught by his mom, Augusta Gean, who scolds
him for being sinful and, asAshley said, brings him out to
the living room naked and justridicules and humiliates him and
berates him.
His mom is played by an AcademyAward nominee named Lori
Metcalfe, who I primarilyremember as playing Roseanne's

(13:38):
sister on the old 90s sitcom.

Ashley (13:41):
Oh yes, I totally, throughout the first couple
episodes, was like, she looks sofamiliar, but I can't place
her.
That makes sense.
I totally remember her fromRoseanne, and she is fine in
this.
I'm not gonna lie, the entiretime we watched this series,
every time she was on thescreen, I just thought to
myself, I wish this was JessicaLang.

Remi (14:03):
You had also said that Kathy Bates would have made a
good choice for this.
And when the trailer came outand I heard the voice, I did
think that his mom was gonna beplayed by Jessica Lang, who I
think would have been brilliant.
And I was pretty critical ofLori Metcalfe going into this,
but by the time her character isdead and comes back as a ghost,

(14:25):
she is really giving it herall, and her screechy
performance is prettyimpressive, I gotta say.

Ashley (14:33):
Well, even though all we've been talking about now are
highlighting the differences,at this point we do start to get
some similarities in Mother'steachings about sin and all
that.
She does go into longdiatribes, both here and
throughout the rest of theseries, about how women are
sinful and how Ed needs to havenothing to do with them.

Remi (14:55):
We also learn that Ed likes milkshakes and Nazi
comics, because the next scene,he's in a 1950s-style diner
waiting on his girlfriend orlove interest or someone he's
casually seeing, a girl namedAdeline, which was another what

(15:17):
the fuck moment for me, becauseI never heard of Ed Dean having
any sort of relationship with agirl.
So this was very surprising tome when this person showed up.

Ashley (15:26):
From my research, he had two love interests, but they
were both when his mom wasalive, which I guess at this
point she still is.

Remi (15:35):
Well, Adeline is based on a real woman from Plainfield
named Adeline Watkins, though alot of the show's portrayal of
her is obviously fictionalized.
In real life, Adeline Watkinscame forward in 1957 claiming
she'd had a long-termrelationship with Ed Gean,

(15:55):
describing him as kind andcourteous.
However, she later retractedmany of her statements and
denied involvement in any of hiscrimes beyond their alleged
acquaintance.
In Monster, she is dramatic asa much more active romantic
partner and accomplice, whichhas absolutely no historical

(16:21):
evidence to back it up.

Ashley (16:23):
She's also kind of painted as the person who is
really fueling his obsessionwith Nazis and true crime in
general.

Remi (16:31):
She brings him like a box of horrific photos from the
Holocaust, including a Nazicomic book, which I'll get into
more in a moment.
But yeah, she seems very intohorrific scenes of murder and
that sort of thing, so the twokind of seem like a match made

(16:52):
in heaven at first.
But again, I've neverenvisioned Ed Gean with a living
normal woman in anything thatI've read.
From here we go to the death ofEd's brother.
Ed's brother in the show seemslike a pretty normal dude.

Ashley (17:10):
Yeah, I have that.
That's kind of a similaritywith how Henry came across in my
research.
He just is portrayed in thefilm and from what I've read as
much more well adjusted than Ed,and someone who's really
striving for his independenceand fighting against their
mother to get it.

Remi (17:30):
He wants to leave with, I think, a girlfriend of some
sort, but he just wants to getout of town and get away from
Mother, and he advises Ed to dothe same, but the moment that he
starts to badmouth Mother, Edsnaps and then kills him by
beating him in the head with ahammer.

(17:51):
Which again was prettyunexpected.
After murdering his brother, Edleaves him in the barn in the
freezing winter for about aweek, and then drags his brother
out to a field and starts abrush fire.
The police are called, mom isdistraught.
Ashley, how accurate do youthink the series of events

(18:15):
depicted in the TV show were?

Ashley (18:17):
So there definitely are some similarities here, but also
differences.
The biggest difference is fromwhat I recalled, they were
fighting a fire together, and hedied the day of that fire.
And the fire was not in thedead of winter, because how
would there be a brush fire ifthere was snow covering the
ground?

(18:38):
That does not make no sense.
And the coroner in both reallife and the show do rule his
cause of death asphyxiation.
So, with the real life death ofHenry Geen, if you recall from
our last episode, he was foundin a field that was scorched,
but the body wasn't burned, andhe did have some unexplained

(18:59):
bruising on the back of hishead.
And so, with this show, which Iam assuming this is what the
writer of the show, Ian Brennan,thinks happened, is that they
got in some sort of argumentabout mother and Ed impulsively
killed his brother and then wentto report him missing as a way
to cover it up.
The big key differences here,regardless of what did or did

(19:23):
not happen, because the deathwas obviously suspicious, is
that they're saying Henry waskilled a week before, which if
you kill someone and let themsit in a barn, regardless of if
it's cold or not, for a week andthen drag them into a field,
they're not gonna look the sameas someone that's freshly
killed.
So I think that's a big keydifference here.

(19:44):
I don't think Edgeen killed hisbrother a week prior and then
concocted this master plan.
We've seen that Edgein is animpulsive person and is not good
at covering up his crimes.
If he did kill his brother, Ido think it was an impulsive
thing.
And this show is framing it asthe motive being jealousy
because he wants his mom tohimself.

Remi (20:06):
Do you think that Ed killed his brother in real life?
I know that there wasn't enoughevidence to substantiate it,
but personally, do you thinkfrom everything you've read and
all the research, do you thinkEd was the one who murdered his
brother?
Or do you think it was justsome sort of accident?

Ashley (20:22):
I think the fact that he was found in a place that Ed
led investigators directly to,where everything around the body
was burned, but the body of hisbrother was not burned at all,
and he had contusions on theback of his head.
It does seem to me that it wasa murder, whether it was
accidental, whether maybe theygot into a fight and his brother

(20:45):
fell and hit his head, I don'tknow.
But it does sound to me thatEdgeen had something to do with
it.

Remi (20:51):
I agree with you.
There are just too manysuspicious elements involved
with the brother's death.
But his mom takes the deathvery, very badly, leading to her
first stroke.

Ashley (21:06):
Which she did have a stroke not long after the death,
but this show is implying thatthe death had a direct impact on
it.
In reality, it was like eight,nine months later, not right
after he's found.

Remi (21:20):
In the show, there seems to be things that set off her
strokes, and in this, the deathof her son is one of them.
And afterwards, Ed is, ofcourse, her caretaker, doing
everything for her.
There's a really creepy scenewhere he's giving her a sponge
bath.
But in retrospect, this issomething you would have to do

(21:42):
to a person you were tending toin this way.
Though the focus on it in theshow is questionable.

Ashley (21:49):
This is also when we get a nice little nod to how
Augusta viewed sex and that theonly purpose of it was to have
children, and she actually tellsEd that she was only defiled
twice, which resulted in thebirth of him and his brother.

Augusta Gein (22:07):
All I wanted was a girl.
Prayed and prayed to the goodLord for it, but was not his
will, so I must abide by that.
No matter how much it pained meto lay with your father.
Oh, they only let him defile metwice.
You know that.
I told you that.
Stank like a farm animal.
And what did that shiftlessdrunkard ever give me?

(22:30):
First, an evil son whohumiliates his mother and is
determined to drag us all tohell, and then I got you, a son
so prone to all manner ofweakness, who seems set on
breaking his mother's heart.

Remi (22:42):
Well, not long after, Ed takes his mom to a neighbor's
house, or the closest thing to aneighbor they have in their
secluded little home, in orderto sell them some straw.
And something happens where themother sees like a couple
coming out of the house, and itcauses her to have a stroke

(23:04):
right then and there.

Ashley (23:06):
So this woman is supposed to be someone who is
leaving the neighbor's housethat Augusta knows is not this
man's wife.
And they are having whatappears to clearly be a lover
spat.
And so Ed later, when he wasarrested, blamed this woman and
her unholy ways as what causedhis mother's second stroke.

(23:26):
So this is true.

Remi (23:28):
So his mother basically saw someone having an affair,
and that caused her to have astroke.
The realization that that wasoccurring in that house.

Ashley (23:37):
She had a stroke the same day this happened, yeah.
And Ed thinks that this is thereason why.
And then she dies.

Remi (23:44):
Yeah, that is the end of Ed's mom.
She passes away because ofthis.
And then we cut to somethingcompletely different.
Germany, where we areintroduced to the quote unquote
bitch of Buchenwald, Ilse Kotch,who was a real person.

(24:05):
She was the wife of Karl OttoKotch, a Nazi commandant of the
Buckenwald concentration campsduring World War II.
Ilsa gained infamy for hersadistic behavior towards
prisoners, which includedbeatings, humiliation, and
cruelty.
Allegedly, she also collecteditems made from tattooed human

(24:29):
skin, though evidence of thiswas never fully proven in court.
Some human skin artifactsexisted in Buckenwald, but none
were definitively tied to her.
So much of her post-warnotoriety came from a lot of
sensationalized reports.

Ashley (24:48):
And I had this in one of my biggest what the fuck
moments is happening.
All of these scenes areportrayed as Ed imagining what
life is like in Nazi-occupiedGermany, but they are just the
most bizarre and out therescenes.
In this one, we start with ElsaKoch bitch slapping this little

(25:09):
girl sitting on a horse forseemingly no reason, and then
teaching little girls how toshave prisoners' heads.
And it's a very long scene thatjust seems completely out of
place.

Remi (25:23):
It did come out of nowhere, and it is revealed that
these are stories from some ofthe Nazi comic books that Ed
collects and reads.
So I guess it does have somesort of grounding in Ed Geen's
real life, but it is definitelyjarring when we suddenly cut to

(25:44):
these scenes.
And it happens a lot.
The bitch of Buckenwald comesback in at least the second
episode.
We haven't gotten to the thirdone yet.

Ashley (25:52):
To me, they just feel completely out of place and not
in line with seasons one andtwo.
You can easily show that EdGean is fascinated with Nazis in
these comics without includingthese weird ass flashbacks.

Remi (26:08):
Well, after Ed's mom's death, Ed has the house all to
himself, and he can finally eatall the pork and beans from a
can he wants for every meal.

Ashley (26:21):
Which was his primary meal.

Remi (26:23):
Not long after, Ed gets antsy, I guess, and begins
missing his mom, and he tries todig up her grave, but he fails
to do so.
He can't get through theentombment.

Ashley (26:37):
This was true.
He later did say he did try todig up her grave but couldn't
get in.
And before we get to that,before he moves on to the next
grave, he lies on her grave andis clearly so upset.
I don't know if any of ourlisteners have seen Saltburn,
but I was fully expecting arepeat of what happens in

(27:01):
Saltburn with just Ed startingto hump the ground.
Thankfully, that did nothappen.

Remi (27:07):
Yeah, it gets a lot worse, actually.
From there, he finds anotherrandom grave, digs up a body,
takes the corpse home with him,and the episode ends with him
undressing her and staring atthe naked corpse in front of
him.

Ashley (27:25):
Which was my last what the fuck moment.
The undressing of the leggingson the corpse was very
disturbing.

Remi (27:33):
The way a lot of this is shot, I guess would be a big
part of my problems with thisparticular season of the show.
Stuff like that should not beshot sensually, but they are
doing it that way.
And I understand they're justtrying to be edgy and
controversial, but I don't know,man.

(27:53):
You don't need to shoot it likethat.
It's something disturbing.
It should not be shot the waythat they do.

Ashley (28:00):
And that leads us to episode two, Sick as Your
Secrets.

Ed Gein (28:06):
Mother, don't pout now.
Be polite.
This is my friend, and I'd likeyou to be friends.

Ashley (28:14):
Remy, what's your tagline for episode two?

Remi (28:17):
I kept it short and sweet for this one.
My tagline is Norm Meets Ed.

Ashley (28:25):
That's a good one.
Mine's very similar.
The worlds of Alfred Hitchcock,the production of Psycho, and
Ed Gean start to merge.

Remi (28:34):
Yours is a bit more accurate than mine.
I think mine is uh a little bitmore vague.
But let's kick things off herewith the beginning of this
episode, which again is anotherwhat the fuck moment.
Ed is tending to his fields inthe farm, and all of a sudden,

(28:56):
hordes of Jewish internment campprisoners begin running through
the field towards him, and Edstarts to freak out, and there's
more and more and more of them.
They're almost depicted likethe zombies from Zack Snyder's
Dawn of the Dead.
And Ed is hiding in his home,he's freaking out, and they're

(29:21):
banging on the windows, they'rebanging on the doors, and I'm
just sitting there like, what ishappening?

Ashley (29:28):
I thought for sure this was gonna be the biggest what
the fuck moment from theepisode, but it's not.

Remi (29:34):
No, not at all, and that's a trend that will probably
continue.
It starts off with somethingvery shocking at the beginning,
and I would always assume thatthat's gonna be the craziest
thing I see in the episode.
But no, something crazieralways comes along.

Ashley (29:53):
It ends up being that this is a hallucination that Ed
is having that his mother shakeshim out of.
And I'm assuming now at thispoint that all of these
hallucinations that we arebombarded with throughout the
rest of the series is somethingthat's added because Ed was
diagnosed with schizophrenia.

Remi (30:14):
And you mentioned that Ed's mom shakes him out of it.
Ed's mom's voice, Ed's mom is,of course, deceased by this
point, but he is still hearingher voice on a pretty regular
basis.
From here, we again cut tosomething completely different.
We go to 1959, where we see theauthor of the book Psycho,

(30:37):
Robert Block telling the storyof Edgein to Alfred Hitchcock
over some sort of dinner partyof sorts.

Ashley (30:46):
And here we get a really down and dirty summary of
Edgean's history.
Block tells Hitchcock that hewas diagnosed with
schizophrenia.
He says his perception of whyhe thinks Edgein dug up graves.
And they have repeated meetingswhere Block is educating
Hitchcock on Edgein.
And this very much confused mebecause from what we have talked

(31:11):
about in our last episode, thisdoes not line up with what we
know about the production ofPsycho at all.
And it doesn't line up withBlock trying to argue that
Norman Bates wasn't inspired byEd Gein at all.

Remi (31:25):
Yeah, from all of the research that I have done, it
seems like the Ed Gean influencewas added much later.
I tend to question that alittle bit.
But again, the show is runningwith more of the urban legends.
And in this particular version,Robert Block is fully basing

(31:46):
his character of Norman Bates onEd Gean.
He also mentions that Edlearned about scalping in grade
school while he was learningabout Native Americans.
And Ed had a morbid fascinationwith true crime magazines,
which would typically containgraphic, sexual, and bloody

(32:07):
images.

Ashley (32:08):
And this was true.
He did subscribe or at leastpurchase multiple of these
magazines, and at least at somepoint in his life, it was kind
of all he could talk about.

Remi (32:20):
It is also mentioned that Ed would return the bones to the
graves after stripping theflesh in certain instances, and
that he was also inspired by theBitch of Buckenwald.
Which brings us to the mostwhat the fuck scene of this
episode.
For me personally, the Nazihorse party scene.

Ashley (32:43):
Surprisingly, this is not my biggest what the fuck
moment.
So get ready, folks, because weare just going up and up and up
from here on out.

Remi (32:52):
Surprisingly, this isn't the only Nazi party scene in
this episode.
And apparently, according tothis show, Nazis used to have
some pretty crazy parties.

Ashley (33:05):
Yeah, none of this was shown in the zone of interest.

Remi (33:08):
And in this specific party, it shows Ilsa Kotch, the
bitch of Buchenwald, in a bigNazi shindig.
Everyone's drinking and havingfun and doing this and that.
And she gets on a large horse,like one of those big horses
that you see tromping aroundCentral Park.

(33:30):
And then a Jewish person is putin front of her, and it is
implied that she tramples thisperson to death in the middle of
this party.
All of this occurs inside, Ithink it's in like a den area.
And yeah, none of this actuallyhappened.
Witnesses during the Buckenwaldtrials testified that Ilse Koch

(33:53):
would sometimes ride her horsearound the camp and whip
prisoners from her horse.
However, the more extremestories of her trampling
prisoners with the horses, orusing a horse to kill them, were
never substantiated with anycredible evidence.

Ashley (34:12):
I think this is again an illustration of shit Ryan
Murphy would have edited outbecause it is not true.

Remi (34:19):
It's just too over the top.
I should not be saying what ishappening so often in these
episodes.
And this was definitely amoment that is really
off-putting and jarring andunexpected and unnecessary.
We don't need to keep cuttingback to this character.

(34:40):
And fortunately, we do go backto Ed after this scene.
Ed seems to have been doing histhing for some time now.
And there's also a moth in hisapartment during one scene,
which is a Silence of the Lambsreference.

Ashley (34:58):
I do think that that's kind of one of my favorite parts
of this entire episode, orpretty much this entire series
thus far, is just this slightlittle moth that flies through,
Ed looks at it, and then it justlands.
And it is something that is aclear reference to Silence of
the Lambs, and it is reallyexpertly placed there.

Remi (35:22):
And it was at this point that I began to realize that Ed
Gean in this show sort of has aforest gump quality to him.
I don't know.
They are portraying him as avery simple man and the voice
and everything.

Ashley (35:35):
I mean, he is a simple man.
He's still eating pork andbeans, which he's upgraded his
kitchenery set to the tops ofskulls, which is what Ed did.
His favorite bowl was a skullcap.

Remi (35:49):
He's been doing this for a while at this point, according
to the show.
He's been digging up corpses,he's been doing things with the
bones and the bodies and theskin.
And we then go to Ed on aroller skating date with
Adeline.
And as we said earlier, sheseems really into fucked up shit

(36:10):
and murders, especially crimescene stories and photographs
and all of that.
It's basically all she talkswith Ed about.
Because of this, Ed tellsAdeline about his human skull
bull collection back home, asAshley mentioned.
And she seems pretty into it,so Ed takes her back to his

(36:31):
place.
And he shows her his coffee tinfull of used chewing gum, which
is accurate.
Ed did have that in his home.

Ashley (36:40):
She also mentions that the lighting in the house is
very dark, and that is becauseEdgeen did not have electricity.

Remi (36:47):
He also shows her his human skin chair that still has
a nipple.
And it is portrayed likeAdeline is just kind of going
along with this, but not reallybelieving anything that she's
seeing.
But the second that I see achair that has a nipple on it, I
freak out.
But she keeps going at thispoint.

(37:08):
Though she's clearly uneasyabout this situation.
So Ed brings Adeline to meethis mother, which is, again,
another what the fuck moment,because it's implied that Ed has
his mother's corpse up in theattic.
Although it's never reallystated it's his mother's corpse

(37:31):
and it's never shown directly,so it could turn out to just be
a random corpse he kept up therepretending as if it was his
mother.

Ashley (37:38):
It has to be because her body was entombed and they
showed us that.
So what this series is sayingis he dug up another body and is
pretending that it's the bodyof his mother.

Remi (37:49):
Well, he tries to introduce Adeline to this
corpse.

Ashley (37:53):
Which, by the way, she is sitting exactly like how
Norma Bates is sitting inPsycho.

Remi (38:00):
There is a scene where Adeline and Ed are getting out
of his truck and they're gettingready to go into the house.
And it shows from Ed'sperspective, he sees his mother
standing in the upstairs windowlooking down at them with her
silhouette.
And then it shows fromAdeline's perspective where it's
completely dark up there.
And I thought that was a reallycool scene.

Ashley (38:22):
And even with this one, when he opens the door and is
like, Mother, this is Adeline,and it looks exactly like in the
scene of Psycho.
So it's some nice referencesthere they're doing.

Remi (38:33):
Well, Adeline eventually gets too creeped out to proceed
and makes up an excuse and getsthe hell out of there as quickly
as she can, though this is notthe last we will see of Adeline.
Frustrated, Ed heads out toMary's tavern and tells Mary,
the bartender and owner, thatshe reminds him of his mother.

Ashley (38:58):
Specifically pointing out her body type, which is
gross but probably accurate.
Because it was later revealedthat Ed Gean did say that both
of the two women he murderedreminded him of his mother in
certain ways, most likelyprobably because of their age
and maybe physical appearance,but that they didn't lead the

(39:19):
same moral life that she led.

Remi (39:22):
And from here, we enter Nazi Party number two.

Ashley (39:27):
Which is my biggest what the fuck moment of this entire
episode.

Remi (39:33):
I am betting it's because of the topless women in
Lederhosen that are at thisparty jumping around.

Ashley (39:40):
Yeah.
And how many of them there are.

Remi (39:42):
And Ed is walking around the party.
It's a pretty rowdy party.
Everyone's throwing confetti.
The bitch of Buckenwald isthere.
Her and Ed don't seem to reallyget along.
They kind of get into anargument of sorts.
And then from out of nowhere,it cuts back to reality, and Ed
is in the bar and shoots Mary inthe head with a rifle.

(40:04):
He then drags her out of thebar, leaving a trail of blood
behind him, and brings hercorpse back home with him.
The bloody crime scene isdiscovered the following day,
and the police are called, andEd is immediately a suspect.
From here, we cut to AnthonyPerkins prepping for his role as

(40:26):
Norman Bates.
Anthony is portrayed as acloseted gay man who is
uncomfortable with hissexuality.
In a therapy session, he admitsthat he vomits after sex, and
in this episode, he uses his owninternal struggles to help him
get into the character of NormanBates.

Ashley (40:47):
So this episode led me to do a little bit of research
on Anthony Perkins, and what Ifound was very, very
fascinating.
So reportedly he had anabnormally close relationship
with his mother, to the pointthat he was jealous of his dad
and actually wished he was deadso he could have her all to

(41:08):
himself.
Shortly after his father'sdeath, when Anthony was seven,
which Anthony then blamedhimself because he had wished
his dad was dead, his momactually started to sexually
abuse him, and this continuedinto adulthood.

Remi (41:22):
Wow, so he had a tremendous amount of trauma to
draw upon for this performanceas Norman Bates.

Ashley (41:30):
Anthony Perkins wasn't open about his sexuality, but as
he started becoming more wellknown in Hollywood, many people
were aware of it.
In fact, per multiple accounts,before he began filming Psycho,
the president of Paramount,where Perkins had a contract,
pressured him to end hisrelationship with Tab Hunter,

(41:53):
who is the unsupportiveboyfriend portrayed in this
series.

Remi (41:57):
There is a scene where Anthony Perkins comes out
dressed in drag, preparing forhis role as Norman Bates, and he
sort of surprises hisboyfriend, and the boyfriend is
not supportive or into what he'sdoing at all.
He thinks it's very strange.

Ashley (42:14):
The president of Paramount also pressured him
into undergoing conversiontherapy.
The relationship with TabHunter did continue until 1959,
which is while Perkins wasfilming Psycho.
But during the filming of it,the studio's efforts to separate
the two increased and waseventually successful, which

(42:35):
Perkins said was a contributingfactor to why he later bought
out his contract after the filmwas released.

Remi (42:43):
Well, I did read that most biographers do believe that he
was pressured into living aheterosexual public life because
of the studio and, of course,social stigma at the time.
In fact, there is aninteresting quote from Anthony
Perkins, hiding secrets in plainsight, which is, of course,

(43:03):
where the title of the episodecomes from.

Ashley (43:06):
All of this just made me really, really sad.

Remi (43:09):
It is pretty tragic.
I know that he did get marriedand he had some children because
he was living in the closet formany, many years.
And it is very heartbreaking.
I know he was typecast as thischaracter afterwards.
I believe he played him in someof the sequels, which I have

(43:30):
never seen.
And it seems like he just gotpigeonholed into this thing, and
he never got to be himself.
He was just hiding who he wasfor almost his entire life, and
only the people closest to himknew who he really was.
So I guess in that regard, hecould identify with Norman

(43:51):
Bates, having something hiddenand projecting something else to
the outside world.
There is also a scene in theshow where Anthony Perkins is
being shown around Ed Gean'sreal home by Alfred Hitchcock.

Ashley (44:06):
Which, by the way, we have to point out is being
played by Tom Hollander, who isthe same guy who played Truman
Capote in Feud Capote vs.
Swans.
And while we were watchingthis, Remy said, That's Truman
Capote.
And I said, No, it's not.
And I looked it up, and it was,and wow, this guy's vocal range

(44:29):
is insane.

Remi (44:30):
And he is wearing a lot of prosthetics to play Hitchcock
in this performance.
But he is a brilliant actor.
Honestly, his cadence and theway he speaks as Hitchcock is
really on point.
And I think you and I agreedthat his portrayal of Capote was
one of the more accurate onesas far as vocal range and

(44:53):
everything went.

Ashley (44:54):
Let's play our audiences a little clip of the trailer to
Psycho that is being narratedby Alfred Hitchcock, and it will
kind of give you a very goodidea of how Tom Hollander sounds
in this series, because itsounds exactly the same.

Alfred Hitchcock (45:13):
An old house, which is, if I may say so, a
little more sinister looking,less innocent than the motel
itself.
And in this house, the mostdire, horrible events took
place.

Ashley (45:33):
And before Remy tells you what happens in this entire
sequence, I'll just say it wasanother big what the fuck moment
for me.
The whole time I was basicallysaying what the fuck is
happening, and Remy's tellingme, it's metaphorical, it's
metaphorical.
I don't care if it wasmetaphorical, I hated it.

Remi (45:51):
Yeah, obviously, none of this actually happened.
It's supposed to be symbolic orsomething like that.
But Perkins is getting a tourof Geane's home by Hitchcock,
and Hitchcock makes a point tostop and show Anthony Perkins Ed
Gean's Vulva collection.

(46:12):
From there, Perkins has a briefdreamlike interaction with Ed
Gean upstairs, where AnthonyPerkins is dressed as Norma
Bates, and he's basicallyyelling at Geane, saying, What
you're doing is disgusting.
How can you do this?
And he seems just repulsed bywhat Ed Gean is doing.

(46:35):
And Ed Gean's response to himis, well, then why can't you
look away?
And from there, in my opinion,the third what the fuck moment
from this episode, we cut to EdGeane dressed as his mother,
murdering Adeline with a knifein the shower, exactly like the

(46:57):
scene from Psycho, only way, waymore graphic.

Ashley (47:02):
That's what I have.
They are basically using thisscene to show the opening day or
premiere of the movie Psycho,but having it be acted out
between Edgeen and Adeline, andit is so graphic.
There is so much blood, there'sso much boobs, there are
graphic sab wounds, and I wasjust thinking, this wasn't like

(47:25):
how the movie was.

Remi (47:27):
Not at all.
They seem to up the slashermovie vibe in this series, which
I'm not down with.
I don't think you need to justgratuitously add all of this
shit.

Ashley (47:40):
They have this scene go on for like a full minute, and
then they show the crowd likejust being disgusted.
They are gasping, looking away,making just disgusted faces.
One man goes outside and pukestwice in the trash can, another
woman goes into labor.
And that's just not really whatI remember you telling us about

(48:02):
what the reception of Psychowas.

Remi (48:04):
Well, contemporary news reports did mention that
audiences did scream and walkout, and some did faint, but
there were no confirmed cases ofvomiting or childbirth
incidences that occurred duringthe actual event.

Ashley (48:22):
It seems like they're taking a lot of that over what
was reportedly happening withthe Exorcist.
Because I know there werepeople that walked out of the
theater and puked at theExorcist.

Remi (48:33):
Again, I can't verify that off the top of my head, but a
lot of this seems to be basedoff of urban legends and just
how the story has beensensationalized throughout the
years.
And at this screening, AlfredHitchcock is there watching all
of this unfold.
He's totally thrilled withwhat's going on, however.

(48:53):
He's like, this is exactly thereaction I wanted.
And the episode ends withHitchcock going out to his car
with his wife waiting for himand looking very, very pleased
with himself.
Which brings us to episodethree, The Babysitter.

Ed Gein (49:13):
I want to go home, please.

Remi (49:20):
I will start things off with the tagline I have chosen
for this particular episode.
My tagline is Who the Hell isEvelyn Hartley?
What is your tagline for theepisode, Ashley?

Ashley (49:35):
Well, first I can't wait to learn about Evelyn Hartley,
but mine is two children witnessa magic trick they won't soon
forget.

Remi (49:45):
Well, let's get into another crazy episode with Mr.
Ed Geen.
We start with a flashbackshowing Ed's father passed out
on the floor, drunk and coveredin his own piss.
He is beaten awake by his wifeAugusta.
She berates him while Ed lookson from just a few feet away.

(50:11):
Ed's father finally snaps andends up slapping Augusta, but
Augusta responds by knocking theever-loving shit out of her
husband and kicking him out ofthe house once and for all.
She's had it with his drunkenbullshit.

Ashley (50:28):
During this scene, one of the things she berates him
for is soiling himself before hecan make it outside to the
outhouse.
And this is a little way to letthe audiences know that the
game house did not have indoorplumbing.

Remi (50:42):
That is something I do forget about whenever we're
discussing this home.
Literally the fact that theywould have to go outside into a
wooden structure in order to dotheir business every single day.
It had to be pretty unpleasantin there.
Not knocking anyone who stillcurrently uses outhouses, of
course.

(51:03):
But from here, we get our firstwhat the fuck scene of this
episode, in my opinion.
The broom dance scene, which Ihave dubbed it.
Ed is dressed as his mother,wearing Mary's skinned face,
doing a saucy little dance whilesweeping the kitchen floor.

Ashley (51:24):
I actually have a little comment here that his moves are
pretty impressive.

Remi (51:29):
It sort of reminded me something that I would see in
the film Chicago.
Swinging that broom around,he's kicking those legs, he's
definitely enjoying himself.

Ashley (51:38):
This is also probably a good time to mention that before
we shifted to this in the scenewith Ed and his mom, this is
really the first time I noticedhow thin Charlie Hunnam looks.
And so I looked up how manypounds he lost for this role.
He actually lost 30 pounds injust three weeks.
And it wasn't anyone inproduction that urged him to

(52:01):
lose weight.
He chose to do so himself afterthe first costume fitting,
which is why he only had threeweeks to do it.
He was in some sort of costumeand just is like, this doesn't
fit right, this doesn't lookright, I'm too bulky.
So he dropped almost 10 poundsa week.

Remi (52:18):
You were also curious about how they achieved the
effect of Ed Gean's lazy eye onCharlie Hunnam, because it is
very noticeable throughout theseries.
Hell if I knew how theyaccomplished it.
But I was actually able to finda video of the makeup process
for the show.

(52:39):
So I'm gonna show that toAshley really quick and she will
give you her reaction.
Now, Ashley, what you areseeing here is makeup artists
Corey Castellano and Mark Neimanapplying a delicate hooded lid
appliance to Hunum's eye inorder to recreate Geen's lazy

(53:02):
eye for the camera.
And he would have to do thisevery single day for several
months while they were filmingthis.

Ashley (53:09):
It is crazy that is a prosthetic.
It does not look like it atall.
Makeup artists in Hollywoodjust never cease to amaze me.

Remi (53:17):
Well, back to Eddie dancing his heart out wearing a
human skin mask with a broom,when he is suddenly interrupted
by the local sheriff'sdepartment who are investigating
the disappearance of Mary.
Ed answers the door afterstashing away his human skin
mask and basically says that hewasn't there, and that's good

(53:39):
enough for the cops.
They're like, all right, we'reout of here.
No further questions, Mr.
Gean.
In fact, he even tries to getthese sheriffs to ask his mother
to verify his alibi.
But they don't need it.
Ed's word is good enough forthem, and they take off.

Ashley (53:56):
One thing that didn't make sense to me is this is a
very small town.
I find it hard to believe thatthese sheriffs, who clearly know
who Ed is, I'm pretty sure theyeven call him Eddie.
I just don't get how theywouldn't know that Augusta had
died.

Remi (54:10):
Agreed, it seems like something like that definitely
would be spread around in asmall town like this.
It would be hard for me tobelieve that the police were
unaware that his mother hadpassed away.
Back at the diner, Ed iswatching some kid blowing
bubbles into his chocolate milk,which I'm sure we all used to
do and brought back some fondmemories for me.

Ashley (54:32):
But this kid is doing it so aggressively, it's like
overflowing all onto the table.
It's pretty gross.

Remi (54:39):
Then who should show back up?
Miss Adeline! She is back,despite the creepy encounter in
the last episode.
And she is here to give Ed anarticle about sex change
operations.
And the show seems to be reallyimplying that Adeline sort of

(55:00):
inspired a lot of the shit thatEd started to get into.

Ashley (55:05):
My theory about why they're making Adeline a much
more central character than shewas in real life is because if
they didn't, it would just beEdgeen and deceased mom that we
would be following throughoutthis whole thing.
So by throwing in Adeline, it'stheir way of being able to
include another character for usto follow.

Remi (55:26):
Well, that was one of the first things that came to my
mind when I heard that they weremaking an Edgeen miniseries.
He was a very secluded, lonelyguy.
He didn't really have a lot offriends, he didn't have many
female acquaintances.
It was just Ed alone in thishouse with his crazy thoughts

(55:47):
for the most part.
So I really didn't understandhow they could make that sort of
thing into a full show, unlessthey leaned in heavily into the
hallucinations, which they haveand then some, but this Adeline
character just caught me so offguard.
I was just really not expectingEd to have a love interest

(56:08):
throughout this show.

Ashley (56:10):
It also just doesn't fit with the past two seasons.
The past two seasons, therewere so many things that we
weren't even sure about andwould Google, and they would
turn out to be true.
It just feels like this one isdrifting so much further away
from sticking as close as theycan to actual events to just

(56:31):
incorporating a bunch of randomshit, a bunch of rumors, and
just taking a lot of artisticliberties with it, which is
fine, but it's really not what Iwas expecting or really wanting
from this series.

Remi (56:45):
Agreed.
And then we continue into CrazyTown, where we see Ed robbing
another grave, per usual.
Only this time he is robbingthe grave in order to steal the
wedding ring from a corpse.

Ashley (57:01):
Which Edge did, as we know, dig up fresh graves to
take freshly buried bodies forhis skin collection.
But from what I read, he neverdug up a grave solely to do what

typical grave robbers do (57:17):
steal jewelry, gold, yada yada yada.

Remi (57:22):
Well, we're continuing into this never happened, Ville,
because Ed takes Adeline out ona date at a nice Italian
restaurant, and then they followit up with a lovely walk
through the graveyard, where Edproposes to Adeline with the
ring that he stole from a corpsethe previous night, and she

(57:44):
says yes, she is totally down,she loves Ed, and she is DTF.
She wants to jump Ed's bones inthis graveyard.
And Ed is kind of going alongwith it until he sees his
mother's grave not far off, andthat of course kills the mood

(58:04):
for Ed.

Ashley (58:06):
This was my first what the fuck moment.
I found this so weird anddisturbing.
I can't imagine being so turnedon by a proposal in a graveyard
that it's just like we gottahave sex right now on top of
this freshly dug mound of earth.

Remi (58:21):
Adeline is weirdly down with like everything, Ed Geen.
She is just into Ed.
Which brings us to the mainplot of the episode, I would
say.
It's what the episode is namedafter.
The babysitting scenes.
And boy, oh boy, buckle up,everybody.

(58:42):
Adeline takes Ed to babysitsome random kids, and she thinks
it will help him prepare forfatherhood and a family with
her, seeing how they're gonnaget married now.
And so she gets him to babysitthese random kids for 10 cents
an hour.
And it's a little boy and alittle girl.

Ashley (59:02):
So I don't know if Ed Gean was ever a family's go-to
babysitter.
I find that pretty hard tobelieve just because the time
this is set.
I feel like stereotypes wouldhave led anyone to prefer women
to watch their children.
But what I think this isreferencing is the fact that
kids actually really did like Edand kind of gravitated to him.

Remi (59:25):
There is even a scene where Adeline is introducing Ed
to the woman whose children he'sgonna be babysitting.
Apparently, this is a woman whoAdeline has babysat for in the
past and is just having Ed stepin for her.
But it's pretty clear that thiswoman feels uncomfortable with
Ed taking care of her kids.

(59:46):
She triple checks that Adelineis not the one available to
babysit.

Ashley (59:51):
When he is first meeting the kids, the look on their
faces is just like pure terror.
And this is even before.
The events of the night unfold.

Remi (01:00:02):
So Ed gets his babysitting job and he starts off in the
kids' home as he's supposed to.
But for whatever reason, hedecides to take the children on
a little road trip over to hishouse for a while, where he
proceeds to show them some skullbowls.

Ashley (01:00:22):
Which is another reason why I think this is based on the
fact that kids liked Ed.
I remember in the book I read,there were those rumors that
were going around that certainkids saw shrunken heads at his
house.
And so I think this is kind ofa nod to that: that there are
two kids in his home and they'reseeing some weird shit.

Remi (01:00:43):
That's what I think this is referencing as well, but the
show takes it a bit further thanthat, of course.
Ed starts off with a magictrick where he takes a finger
bone and puts it under one ofthe three skull bowls, and then
mixes them all up, and then whenhe reveals it, it is a human

(01:01:05):
finger with the skin and muscleand everything attached.
But for whatever reason, thekids think it's fake and they
are totally unimpressed withthis.
So Ed kicks it up a fewnotches.

Ashley (01:01:18):
And this is my favorite quote in the entire series thus
far.

Episode intro (01:01:24):
I can turn a lady and pull my head off.

little boy (01:01:31):
That's impossible.

Yeah.
Prove it.

Okay, I'm turning into a lady.
What are you doing?
Into her.

Ashley (01:02:00):
Which is my second what the fuck moment.

Remi (01:02:03):
And for our listeners at home, Ed comes out in front of
the children wearing a severedhead on top of his head, acting
as if it's his head.
Underneath, he is wearing oneof his human skin masks, and
then topples off the severedhead on top and reveals the
human skin mask underneath, andthe kids are traumatized and

(01:02:27):
scream, and yeah, it's bad.
So Ed takes them home and thekids' parents are mad as hell
and they refuse to pay him the40 cents he is owed for
babysitting for the night.

Ashley (01:02:41):
And this made me think like maybe this is supposed to
be a mention of how some of theneighbors were robbing him of
money.
But if that's the case, thatdoesn't make any sense because
if someone essentially liketakes your kids away and don't
tell you or even leave a note ofwhere they're going, I think
these parents, especiallyconsidering that the kids come
back like scared as shit, andonce they tell them what they

(01:03:05):
saw, I think the parents arewell in their right to not pay
Ed for his four hours ofbabysitting duty.

Remi (01:03:11):
What would you think if you were these children's
parents and they were tellingyou about the things that they
saw that night?
Would you think that theirimaginations were probably
exaggerating things?
Because it would be hard tobelieve that the babysitter took
them to his home, showed them asevered head, a human skin
mask, and several skull bowls.

Ashley (01:03:34):
And a finger.

Remi (01:03:35):
Yeah, I don't know what I would believe.
It would seem so far-fetched tohear this coming from my kids,
but I would be wrong.
And now we get to the questionthat was burning in my brain.
Who is Evelyn Hartley, thereplacement babysitter for Ed?

Ashley (01:03:54):
That's not quite true.
They mentioned this in verybrief passing, but the kids
actually know her and are askingher about her ailment, which is
why the parents had to find anew sitter.
And it turns out that thereason why she was out and
unavailable is because shecontracted polio.

Remi (01:04:13):
This was a character that immediately had us looking at
each other like, who is thisperson?
This is not someone that cameup in either of our research
egg.
And it turns out that EvelynHartley was a 15-year-old high
school student from La Crosse,Wisconsin, who vanished on

(01:04:33):
October 24th, 1953, whilebabysitting for a local family.

Ashley (01:04:38):
Okay, I called it right away.
I was like, this has to be areference to after Ed is
arrested, pretty much everyonein Wisconsin tries to link him
to every disappearance in thepast decade.
So I had mentioned that I betthis babysitter is one of those,
and it sounds like that's whatyou're about to tell me.

Remi (01:04:59):
You are exactly correct.
When the father returned home,there was signs of a violent
struggle, a broken window,bloodstains, and Evelyn's body
was never found.
Over the years, some speculatedEdgeen's involvement because he
lived only a few hours away,and his crimes were discovered

(01:05:20):
four years later.
Yet there is really no evidencethat ever linked him to her
disappearance, and Evelyn's casestill remains unsolved.

Ashley (01:05:31):
It doesn't fit his MO.
There's no evidence that heever even left Plainfield except
for the one time to fail anarmy physical, and he passed two
polygraphs actually when theyasked him about multiple other
crimes.

Remi (01:05:47):
In the series, she is portrayed by actress Addison Ray
and is depicted as sufferingfrom polio and even has a leg
brace as a result.
However, the medical detail inactuality has never been
confirmed, and there are norecords of the real Evelyn

(01:06:08):
having polio.

Ashley (01:06:09):
Again, this is just such a weird thing to put in.

Remi (01:06:12):
Well, it gets weirder from there, because Ed stalks Evelyn
as she is babysitting thechildren, and then sneaks into
the house and kidnaps her.
From here, we cut back to Edand Adeline, and Adeline telling
her parents that she's gonna bemarrying Ed Gean.
And her parents totallyfreaking out and not being into

(01:06:36):
this idea at all.
So what does Adeline do?
She's like, well, F you, Momand Dad, I'm gonna go move in
with my fiance, Ed Gean.

Ashley (01:06:48):
And his mom, who she thinks is still alive and is
just a corpse upstairs, sittingand looking out the window.

Remi (01:06:56):
Yeah, she really shrugged off that whole interaction with
the corpse in the last episode.
And the show also begins kindof insinuating that there is a
folio doigt type situation goingon, where a shared delusion
amongst two people, because Ibelieve there's a scene where
she hears the mom in somecapacity.

(01:07:18):
From here, we cut back toAnthony Perkins taking a man on
a date to watch the film Psycho,and he gets head in the movie
theater while watching himselfon screen.

Ashley (01:07:31):
Which was another what the fuck moment of mine.
It's very weird.

Remi (01:07:36):
Back at his place, Perkins tells the man that he's met a
woman and is basically goingback in the closet.
There is also a scene ofPerkins trying conversion
therapy, and he is inevitablytypecast as the Norman Bates
character for the rest of hiscareer.

Ashley (01:07:55):
So I did some additional research on Anthony Perkins,
and I just don't really feellike this end note on him,
because as Remy will share withus soon, this does seem to be
the end of Anthony Perkins inthis series.
But basically, before Psycho,Anthony was a very successful

(01:08:15):
actor.
He started in theater andactually won a Golden Globe and
was nominated for an AcademyAward for Best Supporting Actor
in 1956's Friendly Persuasion.

Remi (01:08:28):
I have not seen him in anything else, but he steals
every scene he is in in Psycho.
His acting is on another level.

Ashley (01:08:37):
Well, his role in this led to Paramount signing him for
a seven-year contract.
In 1958, he was nominated for aTony Award.
And between 1956 and 1960, heacted in films with Henry Fonda,
Sophia Loren, Shelby McLean,Audrey Hepburn, Ava Gardner, and
Jane Fonda.

(01:08:58):
After Psycho and themistreatment he got from the
studio, he actually ended upbuying out his contract and he
moved to France and beganworking in European cinema.
His first film was GoodbyeAgain with Ingrid Bergman and
earned him the Cannes FilmFestival Award for Best Actor.
He had a successful actingcareer in Europe and came back

(01:09:21):
to the States where he alsoresumed acting in 1966.
And it actually wasn't until1983 when he first reprised his
role as Norman Bates in Psycho2.

Psycho 2 trailer (01:09:35):
I have a petition here signed by 743
people against Norman Bates'release.
Madam, please sit down.
This matter is beingrepresented by the district
attorney.
Norman was not convicted ofmurder.
He was found not guilty byreasonable insanity.
Norman Bates is judged andrestored to sanity and is

(01:10:00):
ordered released forthwith.
It's 22 years later.
And Norman Bates is cominghome.

Ashley (01:10:09):
After that, he starred in and directed Psycho 3 in
1986.
This one was not as successfulas the first two and did lead to
bouts of diminishedself-confidence.
Psycho 2 actually has like inthe 60s on Rotten Tomatoes.
Have you seen it?

Remi (01:10:27):
I have not seen any of the Psycho sequels, and the trailer
we just played for you wasactually the first and only
footage I've ever seen of any ofthe Psycho sequels.
I forget they exist.

Ashley (01:10:40):
Well, the last time he played Norman Bates was in
Psycho 4, The Beginning, amade-for-TV movie in 1990.
During the filming, he learnedhe was HIV positive and he died
at home on September 12th, 1992.

Remi (01:10:56):
It's a very tragic end for a brilliant actor.

Ashley (01:10:59):
But how this series is playing it is that immediately
after he is in psycho, everysort of acting job dries up and
he's just being offered roles asNorman Bates, which isn't true.

Remi (01:11:12):
They do skip over a lot of that.
The trailer even begins withsaying how long it's been since
Norman Bates has been in a film,and I didn't realize that it
was that big of a gap in betweenPsycho 1 and Psycho 2.
Hitchcock was not involved withany of the Psycho sequels, and
the series seems to imply thathe sort of got typecast in his

(01:11:36):
own regard, and couldn't getother films financed because
Psycho was such a big hit, andit basically invented the horror
genre.
Because he couldn't get any ofhis other projects financed, he
resorted to making anotherhorror film, The Birds, just a
few years later.

Ashley (01:11:55):
Again, which also I don't think happened, he made
the equivalent of $15 millionfrom Psycho.
If he wanted to finance a film,he could have done so by
himself.
He also at some point ended upgetting 15% of the studio.

Remi (01:12:12):
Yeah, I do feel like he probably had a bit more creative
freedom than the series isletting on.
Which brings us to the endingof episode three, where we are
back with Evelyn in Ed'sbasement, tied to a chair
wearing only her underwear.
Ed drags his mom's corpsedownstairs and then tries to get

(01:12:37):
the dead body to kill Evelynwith a hammer.
The scene is clearlyreferencing a scene from the
Texas Chainsaw Massacre film,which we watched recently.

Ashley (01:12:48):
And I feel like this is something they're gonna do
throughout, where they'reintroducing these movies and
recreating them with Ed Gean anda quote-unquote supposed
victim.

Remi (01:12:58):
This was also the point in the series where it dawned on
me that the show is kind ofdoing a slasher movie thing that
seems wildly inappropriate forthe story of Ed Gean.
And from here, the episode endson the scene of Evelyn and Ed

(01:13:20):
transitioning into that scenefrom the Texas Chainsaw Massacre
being filmed, and we seeLeatherface in all of his big
creepy glory.

Ashley (01:13:31):
And that leads us to episode four of Green.

He's seeing me! Fornicating with a divorced
woman?
Drinking wine and these sinfulcoal cuts.

Ashley (01:13:47):
Remy, what is your tagline for episode four?

Remi (01:13:50):
My tagline for this episode is Liberties,
Leatherface, Glowing GreenUnderwear, and the Pursuit of
Happiness.

Ashley (01:14:02):
Mine is my favorite quote from this entire episode.
If you pump me good, EddieGeen, I'll let you wear my
panties.

Remi (01:14:11):
We'll get to that line in just a minute.
This episode starts with Edlotioning up Evelyn Hartley's
corpse.
He wraps her up in bandageslike a mummy, and meanwhile,
upstairs, Adeline discovers thatEd's mom is a corpse and
proceeds to freak the fuck out.

(01:14:33):
She runs out of the housescreaming, and Ed chases after
her.

Ashley (01:14:38):
I'm gonna preface this by saying we have watched this
episode and then the one afterthis one thus far.
And there are going to beincreasingly less similarities
for us to highlight, andincreasingly more what the fuck
moments for us to comment on.
And this wrapping thebabysitter up like a mummy and

(01:14:59):
rubbing lotion all over herentire body is the first one of
this episode.

Remi (01:15:05):
Well, it keeps going from there because Adeline makes it
back to her home, which isapparently running distance from
Ed's house.
And Ed sneaks in through thebasement just like he had when
he was peeping on Adeline,changing in her bedroom in some
earlier episodes.

Ashley (01:15:24):
It was also really weird because when Adeline runs home,
there's a note from her mom onthe door that says, Out to
church, won't be back anytimesoon.
And Adeline has moved out atthis point, or so I thought.
So I just found it really weirdthat the mom would just
broadcast to the world that, oh,the door's unlocked and no

(01:15:45):
one's here.
Small towns, I guess.

Remi (01:15:47):
I guess a little bit of a spoiler for the next episode,
but it seems like she's kind ofgoing back and forth between
staying at Ed's home and stayingat their home.
And back in the day, a letteron the door was the best way to
communicate to people,apparently.

Ashley (01:16:04):
Or put it on the kitchen table or something, like my mom
would do when she needed tocommunicate something to me as a
teenager.

Remi (01:16:11):
No, you gotta put it on the door.
You will see it if it's on thedoor.
It doesn't matter in thissituation if it's on the door
because she just goes inside andEd Gean is after her in a
moment.
But in normal situations, Iwould say you should just leave
the note on the door.
It's the first thing someonewill see.
I leave a note on the door forthe Grubhub person every time.

(01:16:32):
Anyway, while Ed is in thehouse searching for Adeline, he
gets sidetracked by a pair ofglowing emerald green panties
that are laid out on one of thebeds in one of the other rooms.
It's literally like Wizard ofOz panties.

(01:16:53):
They are glowing like theEmerald City, and Ed is so drawn
to them.
So Ed is there basking in thegreen glow of these panties, and
Adeline comes into the room andcasually joins him.

Ashley (01:17:11):
And I'm gonna point out she ran away from this house
screaming bloody murder at thetop of her lungs, and now she is
super, super chill.

Remi (01:17:21):
The two of them proceed to have a bit of a heart-to-heart,
and Ed tells Adeline that thecorpse that she found in his
house was not really hismother's corpse, it was actually
just another body that he hadtaken and is using as her
stand-in.
And it turns out that Adelineis more mad that Ed lied to her

(01:17:46):
than the fact that he is keepinga dead body up in his attic.
In fact, she is so cool withall of this that even Ed seems a
little bit freaked out by howwell she is taking all of this
information.
Which leads us to Ed andAdeline back home with Ed now

(01:18:07):
wearing the emerald greenpanties that were glowing in the
previous scene, but aren'tanymore.
And he is modeling them forAdeline, and I am just sitting
there like, what the fuck ishappening?

Ashley (01:18:23):
What the fuck moment like number four, and we're only
what, like 15 minutes in?

Remi (01:18:28):
This is the intro.
I always tell Ashley that theopening to all of these episodes
is usually pretty out there,and this episode is no
different.
Which brings us to BerniceWarden.
We next meet Bernice, amiddle-aged woman working at a

(01:18:48):
hardware store selling Ed somelime.

Ashley (01:18:52):
And she's dressed to kill.

Remi (01:18:54):
And she is also a mess.
She is extremely scattered anddramatic and very emotional, but
she seems to really like Ed.
And there are also a lot ofclose-up shots of Bernice's
breasts throughout all of thesescenes, presumably from Ed's

(01:19:16):
POV.
And it's funny because everytime I was looking down to take
notes while we were watchingthis, apparently that's when
these scenes would come up, so Imissed every one of these
scenes and Ashley had toactually point them out.

Ashley (01:19:30):
There were so many of them.
And after the fourth one, Irealized that you were missing
them, and I asked you, like, doyou see that?
They have just cut to hercleavage so many times.

Remi (01:19:42):
I'm being 100% honest with you.
I did not see any of theseshots.
This is 100% based on Ashleytelling me that this occurred in
these scenes.
Apparently they were reallyquick shots, and I was always
looking down, taking notes whenthey occurred.

Ashley (01:19:59):
Well, and these all happen primarily on their date,
because yes, they go on a date,and it is literally a recreation
of the date he took Adeline on.

Remi (01:20:09):
Yeah, he takes her out to dinner at the diner, and Ed is
drinking milk per usual, andasks if he can wear Bernice's
bra, which Bernice finds totallytantalizing.
So she slips off herundergarment right there in the
restaurant and hands it over toEd.

Ashley (01:20:31):
And tells him to smell it, which is what I have in my
notes here that this entireepisode is a what the fuck
moment, honestly.
This is not true, folks.
Ed and Bernice never went on adate.
Not only that, everything thattranspires between them from
here on out is totally, totally,totally, totally fabricated.

Remi (01:20:52):
Then we get to a scene of Ed taking Bernice roller
skating, and Ed begins tohallucinate, seeing some people
that he had killed.
And at this point, it occurredto me that Ed is very social in
this show.
He's starting casualconversations with strangers,

(01:21:13):
inviting girls to dinner, goingroller skating on a regular
basis.
It's just not how I everpictured the real Edgeen.

Ashley (01:21:24):
I do think it is supposed to be a little nod to
how the townsfolk described himas someone who was personable
and helpful and friendlywhenever he did interact with
them.

Remi (01:21:34):
They didn't describe him as a ladies' man, which is kind
of how he's coming across inthis series.

Ashley (01:21:41):
I do have a note here that Ed Geen is in high demand.
He is being portrayed as aladies' man.

Remi (01:21:48):
Anyway, Ed and Bernice head back to her place where
they drink glasses of wine likethey are shots of tequila.
Literally, they both just downan entire glass of wine like
it's nothing.
And then we get to Ashley'stagline of the show.
Bernice tells Ed.

If you all me good at Eddie Key, I'll let you wear
my panties.

Ashley (01:22:20):
This is after she just randomly flashes him.

Remi (01:22:23):
From there, the two of them have sex, and true to her
word, Bernice gives Ed herpanties, and he proceeds to
model them around the livingroom for her.

Ashley (01:22:36):
And she asks him to move in.
This relationship is escalatingso quickly.
And remember, Edgeen is engagedat this point.
Where's Adeline?

Remi (01:22:46):
Back home, Ed tells his mother about Bernice, thinking
she may approve of him seeing awoman closer to her age.
But mom is not impressed andrefers to Bernice as a Jezebel,
amongst other things.

Little note here (01:23:04):
a Jezebel is a term that originates from the
Bible, referring to QueenJezebel, who was a Phoenician
princess married to King Ahab ofIsrael.
It is a commonly used referencefor a seductive, scheming, or
morally corrupt woman who usesher sexuality to deceit or

(01:23:27):
control others.
I had to look that up becausethey really do throw the term
Jezebel around a lot.
So from there, we go back tothe hardware store where Ed is
watching Bernice through theshop window, which is now full
of chainsaws, so they must behaving a sale or something.

Ashley (01:23:48):
They do mention that it is the start of hunting season,
which is one of two similaritiesI have pointed out from this
entire episode.
Only similarity about Ed Geen.

Remi (01:24:00):
Would you have a chainsaw sale during hunting season?

Ashley (01:24:05):
Probably makes more sense to have rifles for sale.

Remi (01:24:09):
So Ed comes inside and Bernice takes him to the back of
the shop and presents him withher favorite pair of underwear.

Ashley (01:24:18):
A box of her favorite bras.

Remi (01:24:21):
Well, they're presented as like a gift box with her
underwear inside, and Ed ispretty thrilled about this.

Ashley (01:24:28):
It is weird, and if I were a descendant of her family
seeing this, I'd be fuckingfurious.

Remi (01:24:34):
And it just gets worse from there because Ed starts
accusing her of giving him avenereal disease.

You and your unmentionables, you lured me in.
Bernice, you made me dosomething that I didn't want to
do.
Bullshit, Eddie, how'd I forceyou to fuck me?
You see, that's what I'mtalking about.
I did every deadly sin in oneday.
The skis and the fornicating inthe white?

Remi (01:25:03):
And Bernice is obviously offended by this and starts to
kick Ed out.
They go to the front area ofthe shop.
Ed asks to see one of thehunting rifles that are, I
guess, for sale for huntingseason.
Bernice is really just givinghim a piece of her mind, and Ed
shoots her in the back of thehead.

(01:25:25):
Her blood also is emeraldgreen.

Ashley (01:25:28):
So I looked up why this episode was not only called
green, but why there was so manygreen references.
Remy had mentioned the bloodcoming out of her head, the
shiny emerald green underwear.
A lot of the backlighting inthis entire episode is bright
emerald green.
Apparently, the green issupposed to represent Ed Gean's

(01:25:51):
delusion about Bernice's bloodbeing poisoned from an STD, and
it's used as a narrative tool toexplain to viewers why he was
declared legally insane attrial.

Remi (01:26:03):
Huh.
I didn't get that from watchingthe show.

Ashley (01:26:07):
Me either, because usually when you think of green,
you think of jealousy, envy.
No, in this it's supposed torepresent poison.

Remi (01:26:14):
It can represent sickness.
That is one of the things thatthe color green represents, but
the way it's presented in thisshow is like a glowing emerald
green.
It's not portrayed as like thesickly green that you would
imagine.
It's portrayed as almost ashiny treasure of some sort.
Back to the episode.

(01:26:36):
Ed drags Bernice's body out ofthe store, and on his way out,
he also takes the store's cashregister.

Ashley (01:26:45):
Which apparently he did do in real life.

Remi (01:26:48):
And here's a quick update on the real Bernice, now that we
have gotten this far.
She did own a hardware store inPlainfield, Wisconsin, and Ed
Gean was a regular customer, andthey would often chat whenever
he visited the shop.
Some of the townspeople saidthat Ed seemed fond of Bernice

(01:27:11):
or maybe had a crush on her, butthere is absolutely no
indication of a romanticrelationship or that she
reciprocated this crush in anycapacity.
Gean also told doctors when hewas being held at Central State
Hospital that he'd never had anysexual experiences his entire

(01:27:36):
life.
So what is true in this episodeis that Bernice owned a
hardware store, she disappeared,and investigators found her
store's cash register missingand a trail of blood.
They would later find herheadless, mutilated body hanging
in Ed Gean's shed.
The show omits the receiptwritten by Bernice that morning,

(01:28:01):
which had been made out to Geanfor antifreeze, and inevitably
led police back to Gean.

Ashley (01:28:09):
And they track him down real quick within a day or two
in the show.
It's not that quick.
We have a full nether episodethat we're gonna talk about next
before he gets caught.

Remi (01:28:21):
From here, we cut to two random dudes walking through the
woods at night who areapparently lost and happen to
take shelter in Edgean's barn.
Unfortunately for the dudes,Geen is in the barn, dabbling in
his various atrocities, andchases the men out with a

(01:28:44):
chainsaw.

Ashley (01:28:45):
Well, you left out that before we get to there, Ed Gean
actually invites Adeline intothe barn and shows her Bernice's
mutilated body, and she juststarts snapping photos and is so
thrilled with what she iswitnessing.

Remi (01:29:02):
But who the hell are these two guys?
That was my big question when Isaw this, and it turns out that
their names are Victor Travisand Ray Burgess.
They were two local men fromPlainfield, Wisconsin, who
vanished under mysteriouscircumstances back on December

(01:29:22):
1, 1954.
They were last seen leaving alocal tavern in Plainfield after
a night of drinking, and theytold friends that they were
heading home for the night, butthey never arrived.
Their truck was later foundabandoned, and despite extensive
searches, no trace of eitherman has ever been found.

Ashley (01:29:45):
Do you think that Ed Gean chased them through the
woods and killed them with achainsaw while wearing a women's
mask, which is what is depictedin this series?

Remi (01:29:55):
Well, locals did speculate that Gean may have.
Been responsible because theirdisappearance occurred three
years before Edgean's arrest,but investigators never found
any evidence connecting Gean toeither men, and Gean's crimes
were overwhelmingly focused onwomen.

(01:30:17):
So no, I do not think thatEdgean killed these two men with
a chainsaw.

Ashley (01:30:23):
Yeah, this does not fit his MO.
His body count has nowsurpassed the real Edgean.

Remi (01:30:29):
From here we go to Texas, 1959, where we see little Toby
Hooper learning of Edgean'scrimes from his father over
breakfast one morning.
And little Toby seems supercurious about all of this morbid
stuff.
We then cut to 1968, whereadult Toby Hooper is waiting in

(01:30:52):
line to make a return at adepartment store, and he begins
fantasizing about grabbing anearby chainsaw and massacring
everyone around him.
This is apparently how Hooperfirst got the idea for his film,
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Ashley (01:31:11):
I think we can all relate, being stuck in some sort
of very long line or just veryundesirable situation and
wanting to go ham on whateverand whoever is preventing us
from reaching our goal.

Remi (01:31:24):
We then jump forward to 1973, where Toby Hooper is on
set filming his movie.

Ashley (01:31:31):
And before we continue, there was one scene in the
middle where Toby Hooper istalking about how he is just
disgusted by the news media andthe government that he believes
are lying to citizens,particularly about the
atrocities of the Vietnam War.
And I think that this is one ofthe compliments I can give to

(01:31:55):
Ian Brennan, that it was a verynice, subtle reference to why
Toby Hooper started his moviewith the line of this is
inspired by actual events,because he actually did have the
perception that the news,media, and the government were
lying to people about thingsthat were going on overseas.

Remi (01:32:14):
Well, onset, there is an actor dressed as Leatherface,
chilling in the van that we seein the film.
Toby Hooper hops in the van andbegins putting lipstick on
Leatherface and explaining thethree personalities of
Leatherface.
The killer, which is thebrutal, efficient, and silent

(01:32:37):
one who will attack intruderswith a hammer or a chainsaw, and
their mask is plain, stitchedup, and looks like a human skin
mask.
Then the old lady, who actslike the homemaker, who sets the
table and helps the family withchores, and their mask is more
of a wrinkled elderly womanface, with makeup often paired

(01:33:01):
with an apron or a dress.
And finally, the pretty woman,who is self-conscious and
preoccupied with theirappearance and femininity.
Their mask is a more femininemask with lipstick and styled
hair, which presumably is theone that Toby Hooper is prepping
in this scene.
So after Toby Hooper tells theactor all of this, the actor

(01:33:26):
comes to the conclusion thatLeatherface is a transvestite
cannibal lesbian, and thenbegins to shriek wildly in his
lipstick skin mask.
That brings us to the ending ofthis episode where we cut back
to the two dudes, Victor Travisand Ray Burgess, running away

(01:33:47):
from Ed with a chainsaw.
Ed catches up to them andslaughters them both viciously
with his chainsaw, and thenbegins to dance around, just
like Leatherface did at the endof the movie, The Texas Chainsaw
Massacre.

Ashley (01:34:04):
And that will bring us to episode 5 titled Ice, but
before we get to that, we regretto inform you that we're gonna
take a little pause here.
We need a break from Edgein.
I'm sure you all need a breakfrom Edgein.
We weren't intending thesebonus episodes to go on for
three of them, but it has, andhappy Halloween.

Remi (01:34:25):
This is certainly a lot of Edgeen, more than I ever
anticipated filling up myday-to-day life.
But I am happy to bring theseepisodes to you guys, and I hope
you all are enjoying them.
And if you are, please like,share, subscribe, tell a friend.
It all goes very far to helpthe word get out about the

(01:34:46):
podcast, which we greatlyappreciate.
And we hope everyone had a veryhappy Halloween as well.
But until next time, one weekfrom now, court is adjourned.

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Monster: The Ed Gein Story - Part 1 (Bonus Episode)

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Monster: The Ed Gein Story - Part 1 (Bonus Episode)