In this blog post, I’ll examine the fate of the typical slasher horror killer, focusing on Norman Bates from “Psycho,” and reflect on the question of whether a monster must necessarily die.

Are horror movies really that predictable?

I remember when I was twenty. I recall vehemently refuting a friend’s claim—made during a drinking session with friends—that “horror movies are predictable.” As a die-hard horror fan who couldn’t get enough of the genre, the phrase “predictable” felt like a slight against my very identity, which was inseparable from horror movies. Back then, I presented a variety of elaborate arguments to prove that “horror movies aren’t predictable,” but the more I argued, the more the flaws in my reasoning became apparent. That’s right. I couldn’t come up with a proper rebuttal and had to concede that “horror movies are predictable.”
Still, I stubbornly clung to my belief that my argument was correct and continued to hold onto that conviction. But really… are they not predictable after all? Now, eight years later, my answer—or rather, my argument—is, ironically enough, “Horror movies are predictable!” As time has passed, the more I recall that incident from eight years ago, the more ashamed I feel of my angry rebuttal.
Of course, when you look at it from various angles, horror movies might not be predictable after all. But the reason I now say they are predictable is that I’ve come to realize that genre films—and horror films in particular—follow certain conventional rules to some extent. Even on Sunday morning TV movie shows, a theme that would occasionally pop up when they were running low on ideas was “Horror Movies: These Scenes Always Happen!” For example, “The character who sticks their neck out for no reason early on is bound to get killed,” or “If you have sex, you die,” “When fleeing from a killer, the car won’t start, as if by design”—these are the kinds of predictably cliché rules.
However, these “predictable” rules we’re all familiar with don’t apply to every horror movie. These rules clearly belong to the “slasher horror” subgenre, one of the many subgenres of horror. Genres such as “gore,” where indiscriminate mutilation runs rampant; “zombies,” where living corpses roam; “vampires”; “monsters”; and “occult”—each have their own distinct rules, which may differ somewhat from the rules of horror movies we generally know.
Viewed this way, horror movies aren’t predictable. Even if we consider only the subgenres mentioned above, the variety is endless. However, when we logically examine the characteristics of each, the claim that they are “predictable” holds true.
Thus, horror movies are predictable. In particular, the subgenre widely recognized by everyone as “predictable” is “slasher horror.” It follows a typical storyline in which a killer—who also serves as the film’s mascot—commits murders one after another or in a random sequence, chasing the protagonist in a game of cat-and-mouse until the protagonist ultimately defeats the killer in a final, bloody showdown. While each killer’s motive, background, characters, and thematic focus may differ, nearly every slasher horror film simply adds its own unique flair to this basic plot.
But this raises a question for me. Is it really necessary to kill or punish the killer? Of course, since the very name implies “murderer,” it’s clear that this is someone who kills people. But does that mean we have to kill them back, following the motto “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”?
I’m surely not the only one who has questioned this kind of unwritten rule. For horror movie fans like me, every time Jason or Freddy gets killed off—well, even though they’re like phoenixes who come back alive in the next installment no matter how many times they die…—I still went back in time to find the father of Jason and Freddy to get to the bottom of this question. All the way back to 1960. “Norman Bates,” the murderer from “Bates Motel” in Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece ‘Psycho’.
From here on, as I reflect on the deaths of the villains in slasher horror—represented by Jason and Freddy—who are, in a way, the sons and grandsons of Norman Bates, I will discuss whether their father, “Norman Bates,” is truly dead or alive. Must the monster be killed? Or should he be spared? Even I, as I write this, am eager to see what conclusion I’ll reach.
Ethics aside, as a huge fan of the “Jason” character, I’m actually grateful for his immortality. However, I’ll focus on the rules of the “slasher horror” genre—where the monster dies and the protagonist triumphs—to find an answer to my question.

Similar Fates for Monsters

First, let’s talk about the fates of monsters in slasher horror movies.
To begin with, the ‘Friday the 13th’ series, which has influenced the conventions of nearly every slasher horror movie. If you watch the first ‘Friday the 13th’ film, directed by Sean S. Cunningham in 1980, our mascot “Jason” does not appear. Only a vision of young Jason, who drowned in the lake, appears in the female lead’s nightmare at the very end; the killer in the first film is, true to the series’ “mother” theme, Jason’s mother, Mrs. Breeze.
Driven by the psychological trauma caused by her young son Jason’s drowning in the lake, Mrs. Bris believes that the indifference of the campers who were visiting the campground led to her son’s death. Out of “envy” toward them, she becomes a killer who indiscriminately murders them. Mrs. Bris engages in a final, bloody battle with the heroine, Alice, and Alice cuts off Mrs. Bris’s head.
To be honest, Bree is one of the victims born out of the indifference of a society rife with individualism. If anyone had stepped in to save Jason—who had an intellectual disability—while he was struggling in the lake, he would not have died, and Bree would not have become a killer.
However, as soon as Bris is branded a “serial killer,” he is executed by the heroine, Alice, in a manner reminiscent of the beheadings carried out in the Middle Ages. In the sequel, ‘Friday the 13th Part 2’, released exactly one year later, a resurrected Jason finally appears; from then on, he dies in every installment except for Part 2 and Part 5 (the killer in Part 5 is not Jason).
Jason, who first appeared in the second film, has two motives for killing: revenge against those who ignored him, and revenge for his mother, who died in the first film. This is evident from the fact that Bris’s severed head is kept in Jason’s hideout. Although he fulfills his role as a killer for these purposes, rules are rules, and as mentioned earlier, he always meets his end through “death.”
Next is the “Nightmare” series. Unlike Jason, Freddy Krueger was a serial killer from the start. He murdered 20 children, and when the townspeople learned he was hiding in a boiler room, they doused it with gasoline and burned him to death—only for him to return years later as a killer in people’s nightmares.
Although his origin story differs from that of Bris and Jason—who became killers due to traumatic psychological wounds—Freddy, like Jason, is a phoenix who rises from the ashes, yet the premise that he dies in every installment is similar. In addition, Michael from ‘Halloween’, as well as the killers from ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ and ‘Scream’, all return for their respective series, yet they invariably meet their demise at the end of each installment.
But why do these killers always meet such similar ends? Perhaps this convention stems from the fact that viewers experience a kind of sadistic catharsis when they see a killer—who has been threatening the protagonist or the audience by murdering people throughout the runtime—meet their end in a way that aligns with the classic theme of “good triumphing over evil.”
The satisfaction of seeing a killer who has murdered many innocent people receive the punishment of death may serve as compensation for the anxiety and fear instilled in the audience throughout the film. Furthermore, this provides a sense of vicarious satisfaction, as if the audience were directly judging the “evil” in the world, and it can be seen as one of the elements viewers expect from slasher horror films.
So, isn’t it possible that slasher horror films have continued to churn out similar endings precisely to meet these audience expectations? And are these audience expectations ethically justified? After all, in a way, the film’s protagonist—and the audience, who have become one with that protagonist—might also be another killer who kills the murderer.
To summarize, the expectations held by the audience—acting as a second killer—have effectively established the murderer’s demise as a genre convention. The audience’s response to the “murderer” communicating through murder is, in itself, the convention.
So, when watching the film ‘Psycho’ through the lens of the “second killer’s” expectations, how can Norman Bates’s fate be explained? Is his fate merely a justifiable conclusion based on genre conventions? Now, let’s move on to the main discussion.

Who is Norman Bates?

As we delve into the main discussion, we must consider who “Norman Bates,” the mascot of ‘Psycho’, really is. When examining the character of Norman Bates, the most important factor is his past. Let’s explore the causes and consequences that led Norman to become a killer.
Norman lost his father when he was five years old. Still reeling from the shock of his father’s death, he spent several years living in isolation and oppression with only his mother. Then, one day, his mother began seeing a new boyfriend. Norman fell into the delusion that his mother had abandoned him for her new lover, and ultimately murdered both his mother and her boyfriend.
However, having committed the crime of parricide, Norman was tormented by extreme guilt. He stole his mother’s corpse and brought it home, sharing half of his life—half of his very being—with his dead mother. To create a vision of his mother, he wore her wig and clothes, becoming one with her; ultimately, by giving everything he had to his mother, Norman effectively erased his own life. Norman is, in a sense, a being who both exists and does not exist.
Later, whenever Norman meets women, he becomes interested in them, but his mother—who is his entire world—becomes jealous, turning him into a murderer who kills those women.
So why did Norman become a murderer? It was precisely because of Norman’s own “love.” After losing his father, Norman lived as a son who obediently submitted to his mother’s constraints and oppression. In other words, within the confines of his mother’s restrictive framework, Norman lived quietly, much like the taxidermied birds hanging in the motel office’s living room; to Norman, his mother’s oppression was, in essence, love.
So, while the fact that his mother had a new boyfriend might, in a way, have represented “freedom” for Norman, from a decisive perspective, it could also have meant being deprived of his mother’s “love.” To win his mother’s “love,” Norman had to either eliminate the new boyfriend or return to the way things were before. Norman chose the latter and ultimately murdered both his mother and her new lover; however, in Norman’s psyche, this amounted to simply removing the new lover—an obstacle to his return to the past—and recreating the mother of his past memories, the one he had always imagined.
Thus, Norman himself created his mother’s love—defined by confinement and oppression—and, whenever women caught his attention, he also created a murderous mother who became the embodiment of jealousy. Since jealousy is the result of intense love, one could argue that this directly reflected Norman’s own desires.
To summarize, Norman is nothing more than a young boy thirsting for his mother’s “love.” His father’s death was a shock to Norman—and, in turn, to his mother as well. Thus, he was nothing more than a lonely and pitiful young boy whose entire existence consisted of life within the prison of his mother, from whom he could not easily escape.
Norman’s desire to win his mother’s love at any cost led him to become one with her, and this ultimately turned him into a murderer.
In conclusion, Norman Bates is a victim of both “death” and “love.” For Norman Bates, murder represents his mother’s unwavering love and jealousy, as well as the reenactment of his desire to constantly turn the present back into a specific day in the past when it was just him and his mother alone.
Realistically speaking, Norman is undoubtedly both a murderer and a pure, deeply wounded man who has never actually killed anyone. And Norman is someone living next door to us, a friend of mine… or even myself.

Norman Bates! To kill or to spare?

So, should Norman Bates be put to death according to convention? Or should he be embraced and shielded with sympathy and compassion? …It’s a truly difficult question, but finding an answer based on the conventional characteristics of the slasher horror genre versus finding one based on Norman Bates as a human being and the story of his past— Finding a decisive point between these two perspectives will likely provide the answer to my argument.
First, let’s consider the characteristics of the slasher horror genre. From the perspective of the audience—who are, in a sense, the second killer—Norman Bates’ death represents our victory. So, to savor the thrill of that victory, should he be killed?
Norman, the judge and killer who sentenced Marion—who had stolen $40,000 and fled—to a “shower room kitchen knife execution” instead of a legal punishment, was simply carrying out the rule of slasher horror: that those who commit crimes must be killed by a killer. Norman Bates has more than fulfilled his role as a serial killer, making him something of a guardian of the slasher genre’s laws.
Therefore, his demise must, in accordance with the genre’s laws, provide the audience with a sense of catharsis. The audience—who are, in a sense, serial killers themselves—are watching him and waiting for him to die. To meet the audience’s expectations—even if only by feigning suicide—he must fall in the face of their diabolical anticipation.
But wait! Here’s the second point! Just as Norman Bates possesses two faces—his own and that of his mother—he is both perpetrator and victim. Here, we need to focus on the latter: his position as a victim.
As mentioned earlier, he is merely a young boy overwhelmed by the anxiety of losing his mother’s love—and a victim wrongly accused of the murders committed under the influence of that anxiety. Norman simply adopted a new survival strategy to escape his anxiety; he is a pitiful man forced to hide the bodies while bearing a false accusation.
To view Norman Bates as merely a murderer is a mistake and a misjudgment. Therefore, the audience should not take pleasure in the sense of catharsis—the relief from the anxiety they felt throughout the film—by subjecting Norman Bates to a predictable end.
If the audience kills Norman Bates for the sake of this satisfaction, it is no different from Norman Bates taking the blame for a crime committed by anxiety. Killing Norman Bates according to convention is not a victory for the audience but a defeat in which the audience itself becomes the victim.
Therefore, Norman Bates cannot be given the conventional ending typical of the slasher horror genre. He must be spared.
Now, only Norman Bates’ fate remains. Should we give him a predictable death dictated by genre conventions? Or should we break those rules? My final answer is: No!
I will save Norman Bates and break the rules. In genre terms, this also means stepping outside the genre’s framework. Honestly, when considering these two points, the answer to the second point—when viewing Norman Bates as a human being—was “No!”
Just as I approached the first point from a genre perspective, I can once again use a genre-based approach to present new grounds for this second point. While there is value in adhering to the rules and laws of the genre, breaking those established rules can also give rise to a different, even more compelling meaning.
Furthermore, we must consider that breaking the rules of a genre can sometimes appear more “genre-like” than adhering to them. When reflecting on the character’s fate, Norman Bates’s fate becomes even more profound when the audience steps outside the box and draws upon their own humanity—this is when the meaning of the killer Norman deepens.
Thus, by examining Norman Bates’ fate—based on the conventional nature of character endings—from the perspective of a rule-breaker and with a desire to defend him as a victim, I conclude that he is alive.

Does the monster really have to die?

Horror movies are predictable. Their endings are predictable too. The endings of slasher horror films, in particular, are even more predictable. These predictable endings may well be a convention born of our sense of judgment, as well as our curiosity and desire to witness a public execution.
Genre films are like a game in which the audience’s expectations serve as the protagonist. Within that game, we debate whether our expectations live on or die—that is, whether the outcome matched or deviated from our expectations—and we seek out even more unconventional games.
Taking this aspect of genre films into account, I’ve tried to align the fate of killers in the slasher subgenre of horror with audience expectations, and I’ve also tried to evoke human sympathy and compassion. As a result, I arrived at the answer “No” to the genre-specific question, “Does the monster absolutely have to die?”
The character of the killer only has meaning while he is alive. Rather than meting out death with a “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” mentality, shouldn’t it be our role to break free from conventional judgment, view the monsters around us—not as monsters but as human beings—through the lens of “forgiveness” and “healing,” and at the same time prevent the emergence of a second or third monster? I conclude this piece by pondering this very question.