As previously reported, A&E’s wholly unnecessary Psycho prequel The Bates Motel promises to explore the early years of Norman Bates, chronicling the myriad ways in which his relationship with his mother turned unhealthy long before he started dressing in her clothes and screaming at her bones, and offering solutions to the mysteries of Norman’s fractured psyche that have not already been hinted at through several sequels, or spelled out directly in Psycho IV: The Beginning, which already told this story. The show—billed as a six-episode “event” with the hope it will lead to future seasons—has been described as “a cross between Twin Peaks and Smallville,” possibly in the sense that it will similarly drag out an origin story for as long as humanly possible, then fall apart into various goofy subplots after it exhausts its central storyline. (“Who will win the Ms. Bates Motel Contest?”) Fittingly, the network has hired Lost showrunner Cartlon Cuse to executive produce, who will bring in all his applicable experience in flashbacks and stalling, as well as working on a series where the more something is explained the less interesting it becomes. And yes, in this case, some of these people are really going to be dead the whole time.
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