As a huge fan of true crime and horror movies, I fell in love with Ian Brennan’s “The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” in 2022. In 2024, Brennan followed it up with a take on the case of Lyle and Erik Menendez, but I wasn’t as thrilled with the result.
Brennan recently came out with a third installment in his “Monster” series on Netflix, casting his eye on the story of serial-killing grave-robber Ed Gein from the 1950s. Below is my review of each episode.
Warning: Massive spoilers ahead.
Episode 1 “Mother!”
The first episode of the series introduces us to the life of Ed Gien, played by Charlie Hunnam. Brennan sets up how truly revolting Gein is with a perverted scene of him taking a break from his farm life, to stalk neighbor girls changing and then strangely touch himself. Safe to say I was glad to not start the series with my parents.
I was thrown back by the voice Hunnam chose to use for the character. I listened to tapes of the actual Ed Gein, and I can see the idea behind Hunnam’s vocal performance, but it’s not as high-pitch as the voice I heard in the Gein tapes, which kind of took me out of the experience as a viewer. It really felt as though I was watching someone act and not Ed Gein. Putting the voice aside, I think Hunnam’s appearance matched Gein’s well, which was able to pull me back into the show.
All in all, the first episode was good at starting us from the beginning of Gein’s normal life. The atmosphere was quiet, which helped show the loneliness that Gein went through. This story line felt easy to follow and a good set up for the audience, but brought us to this cut away from the story to focus on the life of Ilse Koch. Koch played a role in formulating. Gein’s gruesome mind. It was a little confusing to switch to her life but it followed themes that some of the past monster shows did, so I wasn’t too thrown off.
Episode 2 “Sick as Your Secrets”
This episode picks up after Gein’s first retrieval of a dead body to embody his mother. While doing farm work, we see Gein interrupted and running from Nazi prisoners. I understand it’s based on the timeline and tried to show Gein’s schizophrenia without outright telling the audience, yet it felt like I had to ask myself what was happening.
We then jump to the next transition in the plot, this time, the story shifting to focus on Alfred Hitchcock. Played by Tom Hollander, in pounds of prosthetics. I almost didn’t see the resemblance other than him being white, bald, and bigger. Moving around in time, I was able to keep up with my background information on films, but my friends had to ask what and who they were now watching.
The rest of the episode we keep the pattern of jumping around on who to focus on. We go from Hitchcock, to then Gein on a date with his neighbor Adeline Watkins, played by Suzanna Son. He then has a schizophrenic moment where we see Koch and Gein together which enables his first murder. All of that to then somehow jump time again, to focus on Anthony Perkins, played by Joey Pollari, and his performance in Psycho, which is based off of Gein.
I liked the idea that Brennan had, but he got messy in this episode. It seemed like the audience had to keep guessing what and where we were. Brennan may have put too much on his plate with trying to layer themes of sexuality, mental health, and who in our lives is the true monster. But only being the second episode I had hope.
Episode 3 “The Babysitter”
I felt like Brennan got back on track with this episode. We get more flashbacks into Gein’s past and scenes of his father. I felt pretty spooked with the eeriness of the scenes. The normality of Gein’s character dressing in the skin of his dead bodies and dancing around made me sick, and I loved it. The episode didn’t have many murderous scenes, but the audience is still able to feel uncomfortable watching the stale Gein take care of and creep out children.
The accuracy starts to disconnect however from the actual true crime case of Gein’s. He did babysit, but it was never confirmed he kidnapped and murdered the babysitter. Perhaps Brennan was suggesting that it was dramatized, because when killing off the baby sitter he flashes to a movie scene from “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. This adds to his one theme, out of many, where Gein was one of first murders we see so creepy to this degree, that his story has been a baseline for other murders. This influence is then taken into horror films where things become fictionalized.
This drew me back into the show again and felt like it was following a clear path. I do want to add a shoutout to Addison Rea’s performance as the babysitter. I thought she did a great job, yet it was hard to take her seriously, knowing her background as a TikTok dancer. Like this girl went from shaking her head while biting her tongue, to now screaming for her life on my television.
Episode 4 “Green”
After discovering Gein uses a dead body to take the place of his mother, his romantic interest, neighbor Adeline Watkins screams in horror and leaves. Surprisingly, she then talks to him and decides it’s actually interesting and she’s still in, which feels unrealistic. Only to discover that it is. The real neighbor had said she had gone on about three dates with Gein in real life in the span of months. She even later retracted her statement but still stressed she had never been inside Gein’s home.
I was then disconnected even more with the added lies to an introduction of a new romantic character, Bernice Worden, played by Lesley Manville. A frantic older woman has a sexual relationship with Gein that allows him to be more of himself as he dresses in women’s underwear for her. I loved seeing this acceptance of Gein’s struggles with his sexuality and desires, but this had never been proven to happen in real life. Worden was a real victim of Geins though, so Brennan ties us back to reality by killing her off because of Gein’s inner conflict.
We then see Watkins again when Gein shows her the cut up dead body he has hanging in the barn. This episode really made me see Watkins differently and then hate her character. She became more unrealistic as not being phased by the creepiness of Gein. If they wanted to make a murderous couple, Brennan should’ve chosen the Bonnie and Clyde story instead.
To end it off, we’re thrown back into the movie theme, where Gein inspires the film maker of “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, Tobe Hooper, played by Will Brill. I liked this jump, and diving into the purpose of creating a monster that can reflect society. Yet, once again we ditch storyline A to jump into one of the many B storylines while not knowing what’s going on. The audience is confused and we watch a random character chainsaw someone in a store, which then is revealed as a flashback to a thought. If it sounds confusing, it’s because it is.
Episode 5 “Ice”
The worst one yet. Already seeing the small fictionalization of the Watkins character was annoying, but I understand it’s to help fill gaps and move the story along. But this is about Ed Gein and for how much Watkins was not involved in his real life, why does she have a whole episode about her.
I liked her just fine at first, but more and more as her true intentions are shown to the audience, she becomes even worse. Her character also humanizes Gein, by making it seem as though she manipulates him into doing her biddings and sleeping with a dead body. In real life, he just chose to do it on his own. I laugh though while I get to watch her cold reality hit in New York City. Of course it ends with her coming back after beating an old lady bloody, and robbing her.
Then we get to run into my other least favorite character, the Nazi woman Koch. We see the devilish woman, now caught in a prison, struggling. This jump confused me even more, not really understanding now what this woman’s role is. Is she real, or is she in Gein’s head? Further into her story, she has sex with a guard which storyline transitions to Gein having sex with a dead body. Brennan wasn’t afraid to really visualize the disgusting situations that happened in the case.
Episode 6 “Buxom Bird”
With this episode, I felt like Brennan got back on track with the actual plot. We now step in more of the detective’s shoes and watch as deputy Charlie Hunnam, played by Charlie Hall and sheriff Schley, played by Tyler Jacob Moore. We see that Charlie Hunnam is the son of Bernice Hunnam, which of course makes him the one discovering his mothers body. I thought Charlie Hall did an amazing job in this episode. He really brought emotion to the character, that I didn’t know was going to develop as much as they did.
This episode gave gravity to the situation and saw the grief of the deputy. Even better, the interrogation between Gein and the sheriff helped understand the boundaries of what Gein actually was thinking and how he wasn’t mentally present when committing the murders. This gave more of an answer to why and how someone could do the acts Gein did. The haunting impact gathered here through the town storylines helped steer the plot that gave me hope for what’s to come.
Episode 7 “Ham Radio”
Starting off, we still follow the aftermath of the town and their reactions to Gein’s horrific acts. Past that, Brennan seemed to focus more on the psychological aspect of Gein and his time at the mental hospital. We see Gein try to confront his problems by using ham radio talking to Koch and a famous transgender public figure. Both conversations were then revealed to be in his mind. They then show a breakthrough of Gein really understanding his schizophrenia when he thought he murdered a nurse but didn’t.
I imagine Brennan’s plan here was to answer the questions we had on what’s real and what isn’t. I liked the psychology explanation, but thought there was too much they had to cover and explain. It felt messy and forced after waiting for six episodes for this closure.
Episode 8 “The Godfather”
Crossover with “Mindhunter” on the last episode I guess. This episode followed the pattern that the other “Monster” series do on their last one. They dive into the distant impact and results of all storylines and themes. So Brennan introduces Ted Bundy’s killings and the search for the killer.
Now we follow a new storyline of all these egocentric murders giving all their credit to Ed Gein and how he did it right. The show then uses the “Mindhunter” cast to interview Gein to discover who Ted Bundy is. With no records of this actually happening, the show tries to say that Gein solved the case. He then passes away with all the murders dancing around him and celebrating him, to finally be accepted by his mother.
Brennan leaves the audience with a visual of some kids trying to mess with Gein’s grave. The kids are scared away by ghosts that morph from the killers in “Psycho”, “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “Silence of the Lambs”, and Ed Gein himself. Of course Gein inspired all the movies and the killers within them, as shown throughout the show to help make things full circle.
Concluding Thoughts
My first thought after binging the series was, “What in the world was that?” The latest installment of the “Monsters” series felt forced, as if Ian Brennan had reworked the Ed Gein story to fit a preconceived narrative.
Comparing “The Ed Gein Story” to previous installments, it seemed like Brennan lost his original vision. The story was everywhere, touching on sexuality and gender confusion, with a sprinkling of public figures, movies, murderers, and Nazis. He forced too much to happen. Brennan also took creative liberties, namely with fictional scenarios intended to help illuminate the theme of schizophrenia. It made me question what was based in fact versus fiction.
I was disappointed, but I’ll admit I did get spooked a few times. I still have hope in Brennan, so I will keep my eyes peeled if I hear about a fourth series added to the “Monster” collection.
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