Psycho: The Lost Tapes of Ed Gein

Not sure if it was because the programme was designed for the US market and their constant ad breaks, or 'dumbed down' for viewers with a short attention span; but there is too much repetition from one episode to another? Also the so-called 'experts' leave a lot to be desired. The 'horror film expert's' comments about Texas Chainsaw Massacre are laughable. What are those podcast guys on it for? The producers really must have been desperate for contributors. It could easily have been covered in two episodes. More use of the original footage and the audio tapes, less of the stupid contributors. Interesting concept, but poorly executed.

Had to put a small review after two episodes as I can't understand the low rating. If you like true crime then this is a good watch. They're not telling you anything we don't already know as such, it's just much more detailed and a 'deep dive into Geins crimes, mindset and family history. Also the impact on this quiet backwater town in Wisconsin which is forever known as 'Geinsville'. You also get to hear Geins voice for first time which is interesting. Anyway so far so good for me.

*edit* now watched all 4 episodes and it did dip slightly. The first episode remains the best one by far. That been said its still worth your time and a broad take on both him, his crimes and the impact the crimes made on cinema.

Just finished Psych: Ed Gein's Lost Tapes, and I feel like I need a refund on my time. This four-part monstrosity could've easily been condensed into a single episode, but instead, they decided to drag it out like a toddler refusing to leave a playground. Each episode is an agonizingly slow, repetitive mess that offers absolutely no new insights or value to anyone even mildly familiar with Ed Gein.

Let's start with the crime scene photos-because, trust me, the show won't let you forget them. They ran the same three or four photos on loop so many times it felt like a bad PowerPoint presentation. I'm convinced they ran out of pictures halfway through production, panicked, and just said, "Let's show them again. They won't notice." Spoiler alert: I noticed.

Then we get to the "experts" and commentators, who are somehow even worse than the editing. They brought in three podcasters who contribute absolutely nothing. Nothing! These people just sit there cracking dumb, immature jokes over a serious topic, like they're recording an edgy middle-school podcast. It's borderline disrespectful, and every time they opened their mouths, I could feel my brain cells dying.

As for the so-called "professionals," they must've found them at the last minute because most of them were completely unqualified. Maybe three people were actually worth listening to-they knew Ed Gein personally and had some genuine insight. The rest were a mix of weirdos who seemed more like Gein fanboys than experts. Instead of explaining his psychology, they spent their screen time either fangirling or making excuses for him like they were trying to write his Tinder bio.

The audio recordings, which are supposed to be the big selling point of this whole thing, are a mixed bag. Yes, it's creepy and interesting to hear Ed Gein's voice, but the recordings are hard to hear, and I'm 90% sure they botched the closed captions. And if that wasn't bad enough, they kept replaying the same clips while mixing up the audio, so it sounded like he was answering completely different questions. It's like they were trying to gaslight the audience into thinking it was new content.

Final verdict: This show is a disaster. If you're morbidly curious about Ed Gein's voice, you can maybe justify watching it, but even then, you're better off finding the audio somewhere else. Between the repeated footage, terrible commentators, questionable "experts," and botched audio, it's a total waste of time. 3/10, and that's being generous. Go watch a YouTube video or read Wikipedia instead.

First off, the three podcasters in this are really, really annoying, laughing and joking around about Ed Gein's murders and laughing about the victims...

Let's just all admit that podcasting is not a genuine form of media when clowns like this are included in a documentary that has actual experts, from people in the town to the author of what's the quintessential Ed Gein biography...

Why these podcaster clowns are included is a mystery, but it's probably because the filmmakers felt that most young people can relate to young jokers, or something...

As for the titular interview tapes: they take about ten lines from Gein and try making a four-part doc with them, and that's a tall order...

With horror-movie music and a few shots making Gein look formidable, it's really the case of taking who's more a backwoods Barney Fife type than a Norman Bates or Buffalo Bill and making a contrived terrorizing study, which doesn't gel here at all...

However it's not a terrible documentary as you do learn some things about Gein... but learning/educating audiences isn't what passes for documentaries anymore...

For True Crime, books are always the best bet because there aren't any repetitive facts, opinions, speculations or photos, and best yet, no annoyingly childish podcasters.

Like a lot of these shocking docu-series, you realize the producers do all they can to stre-e-e-e-etch 90 minutes worth of material into four hours, and it really dilutes the finished product. The premise is a bit shaky, in that we're never told why these "lost tapes" have never been heard, not even by Gein's biographers. We're just supposed to accept that they are unearthed treasures. The tapes are somewhat interesting but anticlimactic because Gein doesn't have much to say. We hear from a few experts, a few interesting people who actually knew Ed Gein, a good cross section of contributors, and three sophomoric podcasters who, I guess are there for color but seem to think the whole topic is one big joke and end up dumbing down the documentary significantly. All the while, we see the same stock footage and hear the same audio clips over and over, even within the same episode. If all that superfluous filler had been trimmed it could have been an interesting and tight project. Not bad overall, but way too long.