The maestro of camp, horror and crime has returned with the third season of Monster: The Ed Gein Story.
Ryan Murphy‘s hit anthology series takes a look at the life of a different killer (or killers) each season. So far, it’s covered Jeffrey Dahmer and the Menendez Brothers, and now season 3 gives macabre serial killer Ed Gein a chance in its twisted spotlight.
The season just debuted on Netflix, and not everyone is fan — Ed Gein is currently the lowest-rated Monster season on Rotten Tomatoes. Ouch.
So, is Ed Gein worth streaming? Watch With Us argues why you’ve got to give this grisly show a watch this week.
The Real-Life Story Is Fascinating — and Influential
Monster: The Ed Gein story gets brownie points just for being about a real-life saga that is as gripping as it is completely horrifying. During the 1950s, Ed Gein committed a reign of terror throughout his hometown of Plainfield, Wisconsin, and in 1968, he was found guilty and convicted for the murder of a woman named Bernice Worden. He was only confirmed to have killed two women but was suspected in several other killings, and was famously discovered to have exhumed numerous corpses to turn body parts into keepsakes.
It’s the ghoulishness of the grave-robbing and defiling of corpses that has inspired such a lasting fascination with Gein in popular culture. His exploits went on to inspire the creations of Norman Bates in Psycho, The Silence of the Lambs villain Buffalo Bill and Leatherface of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. But his influence can be felt on countless other media, including House of 1000 Corpses, Con Air and, unsurprisingly, American Horror Story.
The Performances Are Top-Notch
As it tends to go with Murphy productions, the cast of Monster: The Ed Gein Story is absolutely stacked. Gein is played by Charlie Hunnam of Sons of Anarchy fame, and the supporting cast features a who’s who of terrific actors: Laurie Metcalf plays Gein’s mother, Augusta; Suzanna Son stars as Gein’s love interest; Tom Hollander portrays iconic director Alfred Hitchcock and Vicky Krieps is Nazi war criminal Ilse Koch, whom Gein is obsessed with.
Hunnam and Metcalf have been highlighted in particular by critics for their fantastic performances as the toxic mother-son relationship between Gein and Augusta. But Son has also been regarded as a standout in her portrayal of a fictional woman named Adeline Watkins, who becomes romantically involved with Gein.
It Uses Pop Culture’s Obsession With True Crime in an Interesting Way
One of the most interesting parts of Monster: The Ed Gein Story is the way it weaves different time periods into its narrative. Instead of jumping back and forth with flashbacks, the series uses artistic liberty and surrealism to blend Gein’s personal life and the murders he committed with the influence he would later have in pop culture, such as with Hitchcock, Tobe Hooper (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) and The Silence of the Lambs.
Through a hefty dose of fictionalization, Monster brings to life the towering cultural figures who used Gein for their own ends, as the series crafts commentary about the exploitation of lurid crime for commercialized gain. Monster plays around with expectations of narrative true-crime and subverts them, creating something truly singular in the process.
The Production Design Is to Die For
Murphy’s shows may polarize both audiences and critics at times, but one thing that everyone can agree on is that they always bring the heat when it comes to the design department. And Monster: The Ed Gein Story is no exception. Sleek and stylish, the series makes use of a classic noir style, given an updated, modernized look. In particular, the fantasy Nazi sequences with Krieps’ Ilsa Koch are well-shot and lit beautifully, making the actions being depicted all the more gruesome.
With excellent direction by Ian Brennan and Max Winkler, along with camerawork from cinematographers like Michael Bauman (whose recent work can also be seen in One Battle After Another) and Carolina Costa, the series combines meticulous attention to period detail along with lush surrealism, and the result is genuinely impressive.
Watch Monster: The Ed Gein Story now on Netflix.
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