Why Monster Creator Ryan Murphy Won't Make A Luigi Mangione TV Series (For Now)

Ryan Murphy's "Monster" franchise has generated loads of views and notoriety for Netflix. The first season got the series off to a grisly start by documenting the vile crimes of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, then made an interesting pivot to Lyle and Erik Menendez's murders of their parents (who allegedly abused their sons). Who, exactly, were the monsters here?

This year, Murphy returned to the serial killer milieu with "Monster: The Ed Gein Story," which dives into the sordid tale of Ed Gein, who, along with murdering women, engaged in grave robbing and body snatching. Given that Tobe Hooper's "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" was based in part on Gein's actions, Murphy's series is gaining extra attention from horror fans. But if he wants to put up record numbers, the next season would be about Luigi Mangione, the young man who allegedly shot and killed UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

You can forget about that for now. In a recent interview with Variety, Murphy said Mangione was never a possibility for season 3 because he's still a bit of an enigma. "We know nothing about him," said Murphy. "There was nothing to write — we didn't have information yet. Maybe something will come out in the trial." He did add that Mangione's name is in his "maybe one day" file.

Though we know Murphy currently has no plans for a Mangione season, there's no harm in speculating how one would play out.

Born on May 6, 1998, Mangione had, by all available accounts, a comfortable, stable childhood. He was the valedictorian of his high school class in Baltimore, and attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he got his Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Science and Engineering. He studied robotics, briefly worked in the video game industry (on the game "Civilization VI") while cultivating an interest in AI. He made a living as a coder, but he found the profession boring.

Why did such a promising young man allegedly gun down a healthcare executive outside the New York Hilton Midtown? He penned a manifesto in which he went scorched earth on the American health insurance system. "Frankly, these parasites had it coming," wrote Mangione. He expressed concern that the wealthiest country on the planet ranks somewhere in the neighborhood of 42nd in life expectancy, and lamented that this country has allowed these companies to make health care so expensive to the point that many can not afford necessary treatment.

Obviously, a public execution is not the right way to litigate the cruel corruption of the health insurance industry, but a series about Mangione would have appeal because he was clearly a bright kid. It's possible that his own health issues (most notably a spinal fusion surgery necessitated by a surfing accident) partially motivated his alleged murder of Thompson, but, reading that manifesto, it seems he acted out of despair. He knew these powerful folks would never face the music for killing untold numbers of people by denying their insurance claims. Mangione did something monstrous, absolutely, but, as with the Menendez season, is there more than one monster in this story?