A new season of Netflix’s true-crime anthology has provoked a sharp viewer reaction within minutes of its opening, with posts across social platforms saying the first episode of Monster: The Ed Gein Story includes a bizarre sexual sequence that left some audiences “needing therapy.” The eight-episode dramatization, which premiered on October 3, focuses on the Wisconsin murderer and grave-robber whose crimes influenced screen villains from Psycho’s Norman Bates to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s Leatherface. Early clips and episode descriptions triggered a wave of comments after viewers encountered an explicit introduction to the title character, played by Charlie Hunnam, in the first five minutes.
Reactions that gathered pace over the weekend centred on the opener’s depiction of Hunnam’s Gein masturbating while wearing women’s underwear with a belt around his neck, followed moments later by a scene in which an adult Gein appears naked as his mother reads from scripture. “I need therapy after the first 5 minutes,” one viewer wrote in a Reddit discussion highlighted by entertainment sites as the sequence circulated in short clips and descriptions. Others posting soon after release called the staging “a bizarre watch” and questioned the decision to front-load the season with sexual imagery that is then threaded through the hour in flashbacks involving Gein’s relationship to his mother.
Debate over the scene quickly split into two tracks: complaints that it was gratuitous and historically dubious, and a smaller chorus arguing that the provocation made sense in a series about repression and compulsion. “Ryan Murphy is kryptonite to true facts,” one commenter wrote in a thread discussing the first hours; another said they struggled to continue after two episodes because the pacing was “random and confusing.” A different user, however, praised the execution and said the interweaving with Psycho’s mythology worked. Those polarised reactions mirrored the pattern of previous Monster instalments, which often drew large initial audiences alongside arguments about tone.
Netflix lists Monster: The Ed Gein Story as an eight-part drama created by Ian Brennan, with Hunnam in the lead and Laurie Metcalf as Augusta Gein. The streamer’s page and companion materials credit additional principal cast including Suzanna Son and Tom Hollander, and set the release on October 3. Tudum, Netflix’s editorial site, trails the season as an origins study of a figure whose crimes and afterlife in popular culture helped shape modern horror, and publishes background explainers, cast notes and an “ending explained” feature.