The One Famous Killer Ryan Murphy Won't Tackle In Netflix's Monster

The Netflix true crime phenomenon will continue until morale improves. But since that likely won't happen anytime soon, the streamer will keep on giving the greenlight to documentaries and other dramatized accounts based on some of the most fiendish serial killers in American history. One of the streamer's biggest true crime hits is the Emmy Award-winning horror-drama series "Monster" from Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan. After its controversial first entry "Dahmer" made a huge splash on the service back in 2022, it was only inevitable that the Murphy industrial complex would rear its terrible head again by tackling the Lyle and Erik Menendez case for its second season. Now, we come to the third installment "Monster: The Ed Gein Story," which stars "Sons of Anarchy" veteran Charlie Hunnam as the titular serial killer whose gruesome murders shocked the nation.

Gein's story served as the inspiration for horror classics like Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho," Tobe Hooper's "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre," and Jonathan Demme's "The Silence of the Lambs." Those films have largely served as his screen legacy to date, barring some documentaries here and there. But arising out of the ashes came Murphy and Brennan to present Gein in the guise of Hunnam looking surprisingly attractive. With Lizzie Borden set to get the "Monster" treatment next, there's an innate curiosity about who's going to end up being the focus down the line. However, one name you can expect to never see get a season of their own is the notorious serial killer Ted Bundy. "When you look at those crimes [...] What are the themes there? It doesn't ask you any questions about society," Murphy explained in an interview with Variety.

 Murphy is correct in that there's really nothing more you can do with Bundy that hasn't already been extensively covered elsewhere. Netflix already has the 2019 film "Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile," which stars Zac Efron as Bundy, as well as the docuseries "Conversations With a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes." But even if these didn't exist, tackling Bundy's story through the highly exploitative "Monster" format would come across as wrong and insensitive. It's sensationalism in the guise of what or who the real monsters are.

In that same Variety piece, Murphy also mentioned that while he doesn't have any immediate intent to make a "Monster" season centered on Luigi Mangione, the alleged killer of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, it's in his "maybe one day" file. His comments come across as extra ghoulish given there's been no conclusive proof by the courts, but hey, maybe they'll find something worthy for television binging. The fact that Murphy has to contemplate which famous killers he wants to highlight for his Netflix paycheck, proven or otherwise, gets at the root of the issue of "Monster" as a franchise. At what point are we doing this to understand them, and at what point are we straight up lionizing the tragic events at the center of its "character studies?" The show has also come under fire in previous seasons for making the victims' families learn about its grisly and often inaccurate depictions pretty much in real time. If you reach out to more than 20 families involved with the crime and receive no word back (via Variety), then maybe that's a sign to stop doing what you're doing.

Every episode of "Monster: The Ed Gein Story" is now streaming on Netflix.