Walt's Corner

The no spoiler part. Keep reading until you get to the part that warns of spoilers. You are safe.

As with most really cool TV shows and movies, I’m a latecomer to this block party. I started seeing all the memes appear and had to go deep undercover to figure out what they mean and where they came from.

The Ed Gein Story is no different. As I write this particular paragraph of this post, I have one more episode to watch. I won’t publish this until after I’ve completed the story. And that is what it is, really. A story. It is not a documentary. Nowhere does it say this shit really happened. If you want facts, go check out the Wikipedia page on Ed Gein. But if you want a good horror story that’s loosely based on some things some guy did, and will probably be the most demented shit you’ll ever see (assuming you’ve never watched a snuff film, because damn – nothing would be more demented than that), go check it out. You won’t be sorry. Currently on Netflix.

Spoiler alert!

Warning, beyond here, there be spoilers.

If you don’t plan on watching it, please continue on. If you plan on watching it, go watch it first then continue.

Still with me? Or back with me?

Cool.

I knew Psycho was based on a true story. I knew the Texas Chainsaw Massacre was based on a true story. I knew Silence of the Lamb – yup, inspired by a true story. What I didn’t know was they were all based on the same person. Or the fact that the person’s name was Ed Gein.

This show does a wonderful job of bringing all 4 events into perspective with each other, while providing you with the necessary elements to keep you on the hook and engaged with the story. And by story I mean fiction. Yes they ad-libbed. They expounded. They filled in the blanks with something only the gods will ever really know. They took what was in real life a totally sick fuck and his unmentionable deeds and breathed the life of a horror story into it.

The show’s producers really could have ended the series with episode 7. Episode 8 was really out there. In my opinion, the only meaningful part of the plot in episode 8 is Gein’s death. Yes he died in the mental hospital from complications of lung cancer, but that really could have been incorporated into Episode 7 and then called it a wrap. He did not assist with any other investigations or help the police catch any other serial killer.

All in all, I thought it was a great watch, if you’re into that type of horror show. I think that anyone who doesn’t watch it because it’s not true is simply missing out on a good story that they would have otherwise loved. Their loss, I guess.