Top 5 Cultural Influences Ed Gein Had On Films And TV Shows

Monster Ed Gein – The Butcher of Plainfield’s real life crimes inspired these films, songs and TV shows...

Few real-life killers have left a cultural scar like Ed Gein.

His gruesome 1950s crimes—exhuming corpses and fashioning trophies from skin—shocked America and reshaped horror forever.

From Norman Bates to Leatherface, his legacy continues to stalk screens, songs, and our nightmares.

Norman Bates’ dark seed

Long before slashers had a name, Ed Gein’s story inspired *Psycho* (1960). Author Robert Bloch lived near Plainfield, Wisconsin, and borrowed Gein’s obsession with his mother to create Norman Bates. Alfred Hitchcock amplified it into cinematic legend, introducing the world to a polite killer with a fractured mind. The film’s success transformed horror, making Bates—and indirectly, Gein—symbols of the monster next door.

Leatherface’s mask obsession

Tobe Hooper’s *The Texas Chain Saw Massacre* (1974) took direct cues from Gein’s ghastly handiwork. Like Gein, Leatherface used masks made from human skin and crafted furniture from bones. Hooper later admitted he was fascinated by “the crimes that nobody could fully comprehend.” The result was a raw, relentless nightmare that blurred true crime and horror fiction—cementing Gein’s status as horror’s original muse.

Buffalo Bill’s creation urge

Thomas Harris drew heavily from Gein while writing *The Silence of the Lambs* (1991). Buffalo Bill’s horrifying “woman suit” echoes Gein’s own experiments with skin, stitched from the bodies of his victims. Harris also studied other killers, but it was Gein’s psychological profile—his isolation, his fixation on transformation—that gave Bill his depth. The Oscar-winning film fused real crime with chilling fiction, redefining the serial-killer genre.

In the Light of the Moon

Also known simply as *Ed Gein* (2000), this dramatized biopic stars Steve Railsback as the killer himself. Directed by Chuck Parello, it focuses less on gore and more on Gein’s psyche—his religious guilt, warped devotion to his mother, and descent into insanity. Critics noted Railsback’s unnerving performance, which humanized Gein’s terror without excusing it. The film reminds audiences that horror’s most enduring villains are often rooted in reality.

Monster: The Ed Gein Story

Netflix’s *Monster* anthology turns to Gein after dramatizing Jeffrey Dahmer, exploring how his 1957 arrest shocked post-war America. Creator Ryan Murphy called Gein “the starting point for how America mythologized the serial killer.” The series traces his rural life, his crimes, and the media frenzy that made him a household name. It also examines how the real horror came not from monsters in fiction—but from ordinary men.