‘The Ed Gein Story’ Fact Vs. Fiction—What ‘Monster’ Gets Right And Wrong

The third installment in Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s Monster anthology series, Monster: The Ed Gein Story, delves into the life and crimes of infamous serial killer and grave robber Ed Gein (played by Charlie Hunnam).

Known as the “Butcher of Plainfield,” Gein confessed to murdering two women, Mary Hogan in 1954 and Bernice Worden in 1957. He also exhumed remains from as many as 40 graves, using the body parts in grotesque ways to create furniture, clothing, masks and even a full-body suit. Gein was unable to dig up his mother’s grave, which had been filled with cement, so he began targeting the graves of middle-aged women who resembled her.

Growing up, Gein claimed he was abused by his father, while he also suffered at the hands of his domineering Mother, Augusta Gein, who told him that women were sinful. After she died, Gein became obsessed with Nazi war criminals, then went on to commit horrendous crimes against the women of Plainfield, WI. (Learn more about the bone-chilling true story behind the serial killer below.)

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Gein was arrested and later sent to a mental hospital after being deemed unfit for trial, where he was diagnosed with schizophrenia.“Who was the monster? This poor boy who was abused his whole life then left in total isolation, suffering from undiagnosed mental illness?” lead actor Hunnam asks Tudum. “Or the legion of people who sensationalized his life for entertainment and arguably darkened the American psyche and the global psyche in the process?”

Across eight gripping episodes, the series weaves fact and fiction to tell Ed’s story. Was Adeline based on a real person? Did Ed really kill his brother, Henry? And was he actually helping the FBI catch Ted Bundy? Here’s what Monster: The Ed Gein Story gets right — and what it doesn’t.

Is Psycho And The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Based On Ed Gein?

Fact or fiction? Fact

Psycho, the novel written by Robert Bloch and later adapted into a film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, is based on Ed Gein. The serial killer also inspired Leatherface in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs, according to The New York Times.

One subplot in the series follows Alfred Hitchcock and his process of making Psycho, including how he cast rising actor Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates. At the time, Perkins was a young man grappling with his identity as a closeted gay actor in 1950s Hollywood.

Viewers also see Tobe Hooper, the director and co-writer of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and how he was inspired to create the film after hearing stories about Ed Gein as a child. The series also features Jonathan Demme’s The Silence of the Lambs, starring Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill (Golden Garnick), who dances to “Goodbye Horses” by Q Lazzarus.

Was Adeline A Real Person In Monster: The Ed Gein Story?

Fact or fiction? Fact

Ed Gein did have a long-term girlfriend named Adeline Watkins. In an interview with the Minneapolis Tribune in 1957, she told the newspaper that she had dated Gein for over 20 years. She described him as “good and kind and sweet.”

Watkins also said they regularly discussed murders in the news. “Eddie told how the murderer did wrong, what mistakes he had made. I thought it was interesting,” she added. As for their final meeting, Watkins recalled it occurred in 1955 when Gein proposed to her.

“I turned him down, but not because there was anything wrong with him. It was something wrong with me. I guess I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to live up to what he expected of me.” Even after his crimes were revealed to the public, Watkins said she still loved him.

However, two weeks after the above story was published, Watkins retracted her claims about a two-decade relationship with Gein. She told the Stevens Point Journal that the news article about their time together was “exaggerated…blown up out of proportion to its importance and containing untrue statements.”

She clarified that their romantic relationship lasted less than a year, and that during that period, Gein stopped at the Watkins home on some afternoons or evenings and the couple had attended shows at the Plainfield Theater “a few times.” Additionally, Watkins backtracked on claims she and her mother thought of Gein as “sweet.”

Did Ed Gein Kill His Brother Henry?

Fact or fiction? Unknown

In Episode 1 of Monster, Gein kills his older brother, Henry, after Henry tells him that he plans to marry his girlfriend, Ginny, and leave their domineering mother. Gein strikes Henry over the head with a piece of wood, killing him. The next day, he drags his brother’s body into the woods and stages a brush fire.

In real life, it was springtime when Henry and Ed Gein were burning marsh vegetation near their farmhouse in May 1944. The fire got out of control, and firefighters were called in to contain the blaze. Henry’s body was later found; he had sustained severe burns, and his official cause of death was listed as asphyxiation leading to heart failure, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Officials ruled out foul play at the time (although there were some marks on Henry’s body that might have been wounds).

After Ed Gein was caught, police grew suspicious about his possible involvement in his brother’s death. However, Gein never confessed to it.

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Did Ed Gein Kill Two Hunters Who Wandered On His Property?

Fact or fiction? Fiction

After Ed Gein was captured by police, the sheriff asked him if he had killed two hunters who had wandered onto his property after getting lost. Earlier in the series, the two men, Victor Travis and Raymond Burgess, are shown stumbling upon his shed, where they discover Gein and the mutilated body of one of his victims. Horrified, they run out, but Gein grabs a chainsaw and chases them into the woods.

In real life, there is no evidence that Gein had anything to do with their disappearance, and Gein’s murder with a chainsaw doesn’t fit his M.O. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre director told Interview Magazine in 2014 that he conceived the idea of using a chainsaw in the film after being in a crowded department store during the holiday season.

“This must have been in 1972 or 1973. There were thousands of people in there, and I was weaving through them to get out, and I found myself in the hardware department. I looked down and there was a rack of chain saws in front of me for sale,” Hooper said. “I said, ‘If I start the saw, those people would just part. They would get out of my way.’ That birthed the idea of the chain saw.”

Did Ed Gein Help Babysit Kids?

Fact or fiction? Fact

In Monster, Ed Gein tries babysitting after his fiancée, Adeline, suggests he practice being around children. Wanting to impress the kids, he takes them back to his house, where he scares them with his masks made out of human skin and decapitated heads. When Ed returns to the kids’ house, the parents are furious, and it’s safe to say he loses his job.

The real Ed Gein did take up odd jobs around the town to help make money, and one of them included babysitting children while their parents ran errands. However, there is no evidence that he took these children back to his home.

Did Ed Gein Kill The Babysitter, Evelyn Hartley?

Fact or Fiction? Fiction

Speaking of babysitting, in the series, after Ed is fired and replaced by the children’s babysitter, Evelyn Hartney (Addison Rae), who is recovering from polio, he becomes enraged that she took his job and proceeds to stalk and abduct her. Later, he brutally murders her with an axe in his shed.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Hartney was a real person who went missing in La Crosse County in 1954, just a few hours from Gein’s home. Gein was questioned by police about Hartney because he had visited family in La Crosse around the time of her disappearance, but he denied any involvement.

Did Ed Gein Kill A Nurse?

Fact or fiction? Fiction

In Episode 7 of Monster, there is a scene where Ed Gein kills a nurse at the mental hospital he’s confined in after being found mentally insane to stand trial. However, it’s later revealed that it was a schizophrenic episode, and the nurse was alive after all.

Gein was sent to Central State Hospital before he was transferred to Mendota Mental Health Institute in Madison, Wis, according to A&E. He died in 1984 at age 77 from complications of lung cancer.

Did Ed Gein Help Catch Ted Bundy?

Fact or fiction? Fiction

In the final episode of Monster, the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit visits Ed Gein, seeking his help in finding the Pacific Northwest Killer, who was later identified as serial killer Ted Bundy. However, this is false. There is no evidence that Ed Gein helped investigators track down Bundy’s whereabouts. Bundy was captured on Feb. 15, 1978, in Pensacola, Florida, after a local police officer stopped him for driving a stolen vehicle.

Monster: The Ed Gein Story is streaming on Netflix. Watch the official trailer below.