It’s 2am and I’m transfixed. I’m watching Ryan Murphy’s Monsters: The Ed Gein Story , a Netflix profile of one of the most grotesque killers of all time. Gein’s story is stranger than fiction — and it’s shaped much of our pop-culture nightmare: Psycho , The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Silence of the Lambs . All of them borrow from his brutal legacy.

Murphy’s series has everyone online arguing about accuracy, but that’s not what’s keeping me glued. It’s the paradox — that the most depraved murderer on record could also seem like a gentle, confused man. We find ourselves sympathising with him. The monster becomes human, and somehow, we can’t look away.

My adrenaline feels electric. What I’m seeing is repulsive, unethical, and grim — but I can’t turn it off. I try, but my heart

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