Credit: Netflix
Netflix Viewers Are All Asking The Same Question After Watching New Ed Gein Series
Netflix‘s latest iteration of the Monster series is back with the story of serial killer Ed Gein, and viewers are all asking the same questions.
Monster has returned for its third season, this time focusing on notorious American killer Ed Gein.
While Gein had only two confirmed murder victims, he admitted to taking dead bodies from cemeteries and making various items from their body parts, including bowls carved from skulls and lampshades fashioned from human skin.
Netflix’s eight-part series, which has had mixed reviews so far, focuses on the killer’s early life, his fatal crimes, and his impact on culture.
It was released on October 3 and, at the time of writing, holds a 54% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, along with a much harsher 22% rating from critics.
But many viewers have been left asking the same haunting question after watching the series: how much of it actually happened, and how much was made up for TV?
Since the show’s release, there have been over five million Google searches for Ed Gein in America alone, and more than two million in the UK.
We took a deep dive into the most trending questions fans have been asking and uncovered the truth behind what really happened:
Did Ed Gein kill his brother?
In episode one of Monster: The Ed Gein Story, Gein (played by Charlie Hunnam), is seen striking his brother Henry (played by Hudson Oz) in the head.
Gein hallucinated that Henry got back up and spoke to him, but when he later returned to find his lifeless body in a pool of blood, the horror of his actions became a reality.
After panicking over the reaction of his mother (Laurie Metcalf), he dragged Henry’s body into a brush pile, and sets it on fire.
He then alerted the authorities under the guise of an emergency.
But people are questioning whether the killing transpired in this way in real life, or if Gein ever killed his brother at all.
And it turns out that quite a bit was portrayed as it happened in real life.
Henry’s body was found on the family’s farm following a brush fire, with officials citing heart failure or asphyxiation as his cause of death.
No autopsy was performed.
However, in biographer Harold Schechter’s book ‘Deviant: The Shocking True Story of the Original ‘Psycho,’ he claimed that Henry may have had bruises on his head.
While Henry’s death remains somewhat of a mystery, the show definitely leans into the idea that Gein had some involvement.
Did Ed Gein help catch Ted Bundy?
In one episode, a pair of FBI agents go to Gein for some information to help them stop an active killer: Ted Bundy.
Bundy was an American serial killer who killed dozens of young women across several U.S. states during the 1970s.
Known for his charm and intelligence, he used his charisma to lure victims before attacking them.
Bundy later admitted to keeping some of his victims heads as trophies, details he confessed to shortly before his execution in 1989.
In the show, Gein assists the FBI by describing the kind of saw he would use to dismember victims and by sharing information from letters he received that supposedly reveal Bundy’s name and the car he drove.
Later, ‘The Butcher of Plainfield’ watches on TV as Bundy is caught, and an ‘anonymous’ tipster is credited for helping to deliver him to justice.
Except no, none of that happened in real life.
There’s no record of Gein ever being interviewed by the FBI for something like this.
And Bundy was not found based on his name or car make, or type of saw he used, as the show suggests.
Bundy was arrested three separate times after escaping custody twice.
His first arrest happened during a traffic stop, the second when he was found hiking near Aspen, and the third after another traffic stop.
Did Ed Gein have a girlfriend?
Adeline, Gein’s girlfriend in the series, is based on a real resident of Plainfield, Wisconsin, but information about her is few and far between.
“What we do know is that she came out at first talking about how they were an item, and they were going to get married,” co-creator Ian Brennan said.
“And then she came out like, ‘No, I made that all up.'”
Viewers may also wonder if Adeline is a figment of the killer’s imagination.
Brennan added: “We talked about that a lot. To me, she is real.”
Actor Hunnman, who portrayed the serial killer, said: “My interpretation was that she’s in a large part a fantasy of Ed’s.
“He finds, whether in reality or in his mind, this sort of kindred spirit with Adeline, somebody who can relate and to understand these primal urges and instincts that he has.”
How did Ed Gein get caught?
Gein gets several chances to take an off-ramp from his crimes in the series.
But when local hardware store owner, Bernice Worden, went missing in Plainfield, Wisconsin, and witnesses said Gein had been the last customer in her store that morning, there was only one place police were looking first.
Police went to his farmhouse to question him and discovered her body, along with human remains and gruesome items made from body parts inside the house.
This evidence led to his arrest and eventual confession.
How many people did Ed Gein kill?
Ed Gein confessed to killing two people, Mary Hogan (1954), and Bernice Worden (1957).
However, investigators also found body parts from many other people in his home.
How did Ed Gein die?
Following his arrest, Gein was diagnosed with schizophrenia.
He continued to live under psychiatric care until he died at age 77 on July 26, 1984, from respiratory failure caused by cancer.
Did Ed Gein kill a nurse?
No, Gein didn’t kill a nurse while he was in the asylum, despite that being depicted in the series.
Did Ed Gein speak to his heroes via ham radio?
It turns out that there’s no evidence that Gein ever used a ham radio to communicate with anyone.
However, during his stay in a psychiatric institution, Gein did have access to a ham radio.
Watch the trailer for Monster: The Ed Gein Story below…
Monster: The Ed Gein Story is available to stream now on Netflix.
Related Article: Jeffrey Dahmer’s Killer Christopher Scarver Explains Why He Did It
Related Article: Viewers Of Netflix’s Ed Gein Series Complain That They’re All Getting Distracted By The Same Thing
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