Were you happy with the finale?
I think it was a beautifully written end to the show. I think (showrunners) Kerry Ehrin and Carlton Cuse were so smart to refer back to the pilot and bring things full circle. It felt very satisfying and hopefully and a little heartbreaking, too. Tucker (Gates) our main director deserves so much credit. He brought so much creatively and stylistically to the show from the very beginning.
Norma and Norman did get reunited, if not in life then at least in death.
Yes, they’re reunited. I don’t know whether it’s a happy end or a sad end. In some ways, it does feel like the fitting end to a love story between Norma and Norman. They couldn’t be in life but they finally are in death. But at the same time I think it’s especially sad when you see in that last scene, Dylan stating all the things he’d dreamed of and wished had come true, that he wanted them all to be a family. He’d wanted Norma to be able to meet his kids. It’s sad because all three of them, all had this shared dream and desire. They were all fighting so hard for it and all trying to do this best to get there, but they weren’t able to achieve it. I think the line that really stood out to me was, if you really believe hard enough, you can make it that way, that Norman says to Dylan. It seemed to sum up not only Norman’s attitude but Norma’s too back in the time that she was alive. The idea that the two of them together by dint of loving each other so much, by fighting as hard as they possibly could and committing entirely to their dreams and desires, it would be OK and things would turn out all right. That’s what we’re all kind of taught to hope for as we grow up in life, this idea that we can do anything if you put your mind to it. But unfortunately the flip side to our romantic ending is that dreams aren’t always enough.
I think it was a beautifully written end to the show. I think (showrunners) Kerry Ehrin and Carlton Cuse were so smart to refer back to the pilot and bring things full circle. It felt very satisfying and hopefully and a little heartbreaking, too. Tucker (Gates) our main director deserves so much credit. He brought so much creatively and stylistically to the show from the very beginning.
Norma and Norman did get reunited, if not in life then at least in death.
Yes, they’re reunited. I don’t know whether it’s a happy end or a sad end. In some ways, it does feel like the fitting end to a love story between Norma and Norman. They couldn’t be in life but they finally are in death. But at the same time I think it’s especially sad when you see in that last scene, Dylan stating all the things he’d dreamed of and wished had come true, that he wanted them all to be a family. He’d wanted Norma to be able to meet his kids. It’s sad because all three of them, all had this shared dream and desire. They were all fighting so hard for it and all trying to do this best to get there, but they weren’t able to achieve it. I think the line that really stood out to me was, if you really believe hard enough, you can make it that way, that Norman says to Dylan. It seemed to sum up not only Norman’s attitude but Norma’s too back in the time that she was alive. The idea that the two of them together by dint of loving each other so much, by fighting as hard as they possibly could and committing entirely to their dreams and desires, it would be OK and things would turn out all right. That’s what we’re all kind of taught to hope for as we grow up in life, this idea that we can do anything if you put your mind to it. But unfortunately the flip side to our romantic ending is that dreams aren’t always enough.
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Were you going for an Of Mice and Men vibe?
Ehrin: Yes. That’s dead on. That was definitely an inspiration in early discussions. The idea of a mercy killing that was also heartbreaking.
Cuse: There’s a poignancy in Norman having a brief moment of clarity that gives him perspective. If you think of the distorted mental state Norman is in when he invites Dylan to come to dinner and has Norma kind of propped up on the table, there was a real poignancy in having Norman realize that all avenues were closed to him. He doesn’t want to go to a mental institute, he can’t exist in this world, he’s in a degrading mental state. There was no other solution for him.
Ehrin: Yes. That’s dead on. That was definitely an inspiration in early discussions. The idea of a mercy killing that was also heartbreaking.
Cuse: There’s a poignancy in Norman having a brief moment of clarity that gives him perspective. If you think of the distorted mental state Norman is in when he invites Dylan to come to dinner and has Norma kind of propped up on the table, there was a real poignancy in having Norman realize that all avenues were closed to him. He doesn’t want to go to a mental institute, he can’t exist in this world, he’s in a degrading mental state. There was no other solution for him.
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There’s a beautiful monologue at the end of The Glass Menagerie where Tom, a young man with a crippled sister and an abusive mother, has left home because his mother is unwilling to change and he cannot help his sister in that environment. So he leaves and tries to live his life: He travels all over trying to forget his sister, trying to put her out of his mind…
I realize now that Norma was a conduit wherein I could quietly express my own insecurities and chart my own growth; as a writer and a showrunner, but mostly as a human being. So much of what I was experiencing taking on a job I had never done before wound up subconsciously threading itself into Norma’s story: a woman who didn’t know what she was doing taking on a new life, finding out it wasn’t what she expected, taking it by the balls regardless and giving it her all, come hell or high water. When Norma died, it felt like the Phoenix: like my old self was gone and a new, stronger and more confident self had emerged.
I realize now that Norma was a conduit wherein I could quietly express my own insecurities and chart my own growth; as a writer and a showrunner, but mostly as a human being. So much of what I was experiencing taking on a job I had never done before wound up subconsciously threading itself into Norma’s story: a woman who didn’t know what she was doing taking on a new life, finding out it wasn’t what she expected, taking it by the balls regardless and giving it her all, come hell or high water. When Norma died, it felt like the Phoenix: like my old self was gone and a new, stronger and more confident self had emerged.
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“Episode 10 is Norman at his most deluded,” star Freddie Highmore tells EW. “It’s a Norman that’s gone by the very end. He knows deep down that there’s nothing else, that it’s either this or nothing, which has a romantic quality to it — that it’s ‘I’m going to be living with my mother, either in life or in death.’ But at the same time, it’s incredibly deluded and insane.”
In the finale, fans watched as Norman killed Romero, an act that forced him to admit that maybe he did kill his mother. And from that moment onward, Norman fully immersed himself in a fictional reality where he and his mother had just moved to town and all was well. “I think what’s beautiful about the end scene with Dylan is that we realize Norman deep down is aware of the performance of everything that he’s doing,” Highmore says. “When forced to confront the reality in front of him, he is able to see it. So it’s purely this part of him that’s longing for something else, wishing that it could be different. I think the biggest line to me was when he says to Dylan at the end, ‘If you believe hard enough, you can make it that way.’ That seemed to sum both Norman and Norma up to me, [the belief] that purely by sheer force of will and by love and by believing in one another, things can be possible.”
In the finale, fans watched as Norman killed Romero, an act that forced him to admit that maybe he did kill his mother. And from that moment onward, Norman fully immersed himself in a fictional reality where he and his mother had just moved to town and all was well. “I think what’s beautiful about the end scene with Dylan is that we realize Norman deep down is aware of the performance of everything that he’s doing,” Highmore says. “When forced to confront the reality in front of him, he is able to see it. So it’s purely this part of him that’s longing for something else, wishing that it could be different. I think the biggest line to me was when he says to Dylan at the end, ‘If you believe hard enough, you can make it that way.’ That seemed to sum both Norman and Norma up to me, [the belief] that purely by sheer force of will and by love and by believing in one another, things can be possible.”
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What is it that ultimately wakes Norman up and forces Mother to leave?
That moment of resetting comes out of Romero’s last words to him. When Norman shoots him, that really shocks Norman into this realization that he’s been shifting ownership and putting himself to one side of his brain. He’s been ignoring Norman for the majority of the season. So that moment awakens a certain amount of truth for him and it’s too much to handle. When he reappears in what is one of my favorite acts, he wakes up and he’s lying next to dead Romero and dead Norma, but he’s happy thinking that he’s back in the time of the pilot. The way that Tucker Gates, who deserves so much credit for everything he’s brought to the show visually and stylistically from the very beginning, played it out it came together epically. But it also makes me laugh. I know it isn’t a comedy but at those times I feel like it is; Norman’s just talking to himself, his dead mother next to him. It’s all too much. But there are brilliant shots of him talking to his mother in the back of Chick’s (Ryan Hurst) car as he’s driving to the house, saying it’s just so crazy.
That moment of resetting comes out of Romero’s last words to him. When Norman shoots him, that really shocks Norman into this realization that he’s been shifting ownership and putting himself to one side of his brain. He’s been ignoring Norman for the majority of the season. So that moment awakens a certain amount of truth for him and it’s too much to handle. When he reappears in what is one of my favorite acts, he wakes up and he’s lying next to dead Romero and dead Norma, but he’s happy thinking that he’s back in the time of the pilot. The way that Tucker Gates, who deserves so much credit for everything he’s brought to the show visually and stylistically from the very beginning, played it out it came together epically. But it also makes me laugh. I know it isn’t a comedy but at those times I feel like it is; Norman’s just talking to himself, his dead mother next to him. It’s all too much. But there are brilliant shots of him talking to his mother in the back of Chick’s (Ryan Hurst) car as he’s driving to the house, saying it’s just so crazy.
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Ehrin admits that “Hitchcock films lend themselves to expansion on television because so much of them is left out in the way that they’re structured. If you think about Jimmy Stewart’s character in Vertigo, there’s some crazy stuff going on. It’s valuable to mine the expansions if you have the right people doing them; it’s about digging into the characters and all these things that Hitchcock doesn’t give a lot of time to (in his movies).”
Says Cuse firmly, “I have no plans to redo any Hitchcock movies. Bates Motel was a singular event, and the way this project evolved, it wasn’t meant to become a larger franchise.”
Says Cuse firmly, “I have no plans to redo any Hitchcock movies. Bates Motel was a singular event, and the way this project evolved, it wasn’t meant to become a larger franchise.”
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IGN: In Emma's final moments with Norman, from last week's "Visiting Hours," did she wind up forgiving him at all?
Ehrin: When she saw him, he wasn't really there. The person she was talking to was this other incarnation. And in some ways too, this helped her realize how f***ed up and mentally gone Norman really was. At the same time, looking into the face of someone who at one time was her close friend, I think the combination of all those things changed her in that moment. It allowed her to have more sympathy for him, and to remember the person in him who was lost.
I think the hardest relationships in a way -- and this is taking the murder aspect out of it, which is a whole different horrifying thing -- but I think sometimes the death of a parent you are not close to is much harder than the death of a parent you were close to because you know that you can't ever find that thing you wanted with them. That's so much of what she was experiencing. Her anger is not only the injustice of her mother being murdered, which is awful, but also the anger at her mother for f***ing up and not being present in her life.
Ehrin: When she saw him, he wasn't really there. The person she was talking to was this other incarnation. And in some ways too, this helped her realize how f***ed up and mentally gone Norman really was. At the same time, looking into the face of someone who at one time was her close friend, I think the combination of all those things changed her in that moment. It allowed her to have more sympathy for him, and to remember the person in him who was lost.
I think the hardest relationships in a way -- and this is taking the murder aspect out of it, which is a whole different horrifying thing -- but I think sometimes the death of a parent you are not close to is much harder than the death of a parent you were close to because you know that you can't ever find that thing you wanted with them. That's so much of what she was experiencing. Her anger is not only the injustice of her mother being murdered, which is awful, but also the anger at her mother for f***ing up and not being present in her life.
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