Terror Talk: True Crime, Serial Killers and Horror

What does a Shudder thriller about a gay couple in a too-perfect town have in common with Adam Sandler’s Halloween? Shannon and Cathy have opinions.

⚠️ Trigger warning: This episode includes brief discussions of addiction and an implied sexual assault in a film. Listener discretion is advised.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy celebrate mid-October 2020 with Spiral (the 2020 Shudder original, not the Saw film), Elvira’s Evil Bong, Tiny Tim in Blood Harvest, and Hubie Halloween. Along the way they make the clinical case for a little everyday stress and explain why it builds distress tolerance.

Covered in this episode:

• Spiral (Shudder, 2020): queer horror, gaslighting and polite prejudice
• Evil Bong (2006): Charles Band, Tommy Chong and Elvira’s Movie Macabre on Tubi
• Blood Harvest (1987): Tiny Tim as Marvelous Mervo, with Joe Bob Briggs
• Hubie Halloween and Halloweentown: family-friendly Halloween picks
• The Haunting of Bly Manor, Sleepy Hollow, Dracula (1931) and Ma
• Horror Facts with Cath: 30 Days of Night
• Coming soon in 2020: The Craft: Legacy
• Why therapists get burned out too

Clinical themes: acute stress vs. acute stress disorder, distress tolerance, addiction and avoiding feelings, therapist burnout and self-care, gaslighting, microaggressions and marginalization.

Related episodes:

• BLACK MIRROR Season 2: Two Therapists on White Bear & Be Right Back
• Michael Myers & the Halloween Franchise

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star rating. It’s the single biggest thing that helps new listeners find us.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴

🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

Could a grief app that brings back your dead partner actually help? Two therapists take on Black Mirror’s second season.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy work through Black Mirror Series 2 and the White Christmas special. Be Right Back asks what happens when grief meets AI, and whether talking to a simulation of someone you’ve lost could ever be therapeutic. White Bear turns punishment into a theme park and asks why crowds love watching someone suffer. The Waldo Moment doesn’t land for either of us. And White Christmas, the Jon Hamm episode, gives us digital copies of people in solitary and a punishment called being “blocked.”

⚠️ Full spoilers for Black Mirror Series 2 and White Christmas.

Covered in this episode:

• Be Right Back: grief, AI and playing God
• Grief work, imaginal dialogue, and why Martha never says goodbye
• White Bear: crime, punishment and the spectacle of a woman’s suffering
• The Waldo Moment, and the ending we wanted instead
• White Christmas: Jon Hamm, cookies, solitary confinement and being blocked
• Charlie Brooker’s three-story structure

Clinical concepts: complicated grief, imaginal dialogue, attachment and letting go, punishment and the bystander, wrongful conviction, isolation and psychological distress, perception and bias.

A correction: in The Waldo Moment, Gwendolyn is the Labour candidate. Waldo loses the by-election, but the epilogue shows him gone global, so the ending we wanted is partly there.

THE FULL BLACK MIRROR SERIES:

Part 1 · BLACK MIRROR Season 1: The National Anthem & The Entire History of You

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3fVLdlq9ATwt3Z2qlsOF3Y

Part 2 · BLACK MIRROR Season 2: Two Therapists on White Bear & Be Right Back

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1HdTI3Jk47dmkw34YjgG5h

Part 3 · BLACK MIRROR Season 3: Nosedive, San Junipero & Shut Up and Dance

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4tqRi86zeHtuvjbxkzHk6f

Part 4 · BLACK MIRROR Season 4: USS Callister, Hang the DJ & Black Museum

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3cIhhY1l439JcvrvEl6p3r

Part 5 · BLACK MIRROR Season 5: Striking Vipers, Smithereens & Miley Cyrus

https://open.spotify.com/episode/5RLvPHmy4pXpzCmkDKNeH3

Part 6 · BLACK MIRROR Season 6 Ranked: Joan Is Awful, Demon 79 & Beyond the Sea

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1AkzkEAIKUFe01omR0O9Yp

Part 7 · BLACK MIRROR Season 7 Ranked: Eulogy, Common People & USS Callister

https://open.spotify.com/episode/6VjjRC49tuuEcW1rgcEM7x

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

What happens to your sense of self when you wake up in your best friend’s body? Scientists tried it, then pulled a knife.

It’s Shrink Chat, our weekly horror roundup. Therapists Shannon and Cathy dig into a 2020 virtual-reality study where pairs of friends “swapped bodies.” Their personalities shifted, and their memories slipped. That leads into a frank conversation about trauma, the mind-body disconnect, and why trauma therapy has to include the body.

Then we review We Go On, a quiet Shudder film about a man so afraid of dying he offers $30,000 for proof of an afterlife. Cathy’s Horror Facts lead to a 90s Peter Jackson favourite. And we argue about whether Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth is a disaster or a delight.

Plus: our private discord book club finishes Kill River and picks Salem’s Lot, a stack of thriller recommendations, Shudder’s ghoul log, monster cereal hot takes, and a giallo series we may or may not be brave enough to do.

Covered in this episode:

• We Go On (2016)
• The Frighteners (1996): Peter Jackson, Michael J. Fox & Jeffrey Combs
• Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992)
• The Witch in the Window (2018) and The Isle (2019)
• Night of the Demons (1988) and Fright Night (1985)
• Kill River by Cameron Roubique
• Book picks: Jefferson Bass’s Body Farm series, Lawrence Sanders’ Deadly Sin novels, The Magpies by Mark Edwards
• Joe Bob Briggs, A Creepshow Animated Special, Dario Argento and giallo

Clinical concepts: sense of self and embodiment, depersonalization, trauma and somatic therapy, episodic memory, death anxiety, unresolved grief, enmeshment.

A correction: Jefferson Bass is two authors. Dr. Bill Bass is the forensic anthropologist who founded the real Body Farm, and Jon Jefferson is a journalist.

Related episodes:

• PSYCHOLOGY: Se7en, John Doe, Seven Deadly Sins & the Mandela Effect
• SHRINK CHAT: We Summon the Darkness, Freddy vs. Jason & Phantasm
• SHRINK CHAT: Host, In Search of Darkness, Tom Savini & Lucio Fulci

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

Did you see what was in the box? A lot of people swear they did. They didn’t.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy revisit David Fincher’s Se7en (1995), the rain-soaked neo-noir that kept a generation glued to the couch after the credits. They look at why a film this dark is so loved: two detectives whose worldviews trade places, a killer who believes he’s the hero of his own moral crusade, and murders you never actually see.

Then the psychology. Why do so many people remember seeing Gwyneth Paltrow’s head in the box, when Fincher never shows it? Shannon explains the Mandela effect, collective false memories and confabulation (“honest lying”). She also explains why every time you remember something, you change it.

⚠️ Full spoilers for Se7en from 4:09.

Covered in this episode:

• Se7en (1995), directed by David Fincher and written by Andrew Kevin Walker
• Brad Pitt’s Mills and Morgan Freeman’s Somerset: opposite character arcs
• John Doe and the seven deadly sins
• Howard Shore’s score and the box scene
• Why Fincher never shows the murders, or the head
• The Mandela effect and where the name came from
• Which detective is Shannon and which is Cathy

Clinical concepts: false memory, the Mandela effect, confabulation, memory reconsolidation, compartmentalization, trauma responses, moral absolutism, the killer as the hero of his own story.

Related episodes:

• DIAGNOSIS: Hannibal Lecter & Will Graham from NBC’s Hannibal
• PSYCHOLOGY: Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer & Henry Lee Lucas

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

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Is telehealth changing therapy for the better, or making it too easy to stay home? Plus a heavy metal after-party that goes very, very wrong.

It’s Shrink Chat, our weekly horror roundup. A patron’s question opens a frank conversation about doing therapy during the pandemic: telehealth versus the office, new boundary conversations, and therapist burnout. Then Cathy’s Horror Facts lead to a 1979 cult classic, and we review We Summon the Darkness, Monster Party, Harvest Lake and Freddy vs. Jason.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy talk about what gets lost through a screen, how clinicians negotiate boundaries and breaks, and why some films lean on brainwashing to take agency away from their female villains.

Covered in this episode:

• Telehealth vs in-person therapy during COVID-19
• Phantasm (1979), the Tall Man and the flying sphere
• We Summon the Darkness with Alexandra Daddario, Johnny Knoxville and Keean Johnson
• Monster Party with Robin Tunney and Julian McMahon
• Harvest Lake (2016)
• Freddy vs. Jason, Kane Hodder and the Crystal Lake Memories documentary
• Ratched with Sarah Paulson
• The Telluride Horror Show and Hail to the Deadites, the Evil Dead fan documentary
• The Friday the 13th box set and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

Clinical concepts: telehealth and therapeutic presence, clinical boundaries, therapist burnout, dependency and taking breaks from therapy, nonverbal communication, brainwashing and agency.

A correction: Kane Hodder first played Jason in Friday the 13th Part VII (1988), not Part 4 or 6, and Ken Kirzinger played Jason in Freddy vs. Jason. Monster Party is from 2018.

Related episodes:

• SHRINK CHAT: 1BR, One Dark Night, Flatliners, Slaxx & Hunted
• SHRINK CHAT: The Babysitter: Killer Queen, Fade to Black & Followed

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

Was Lori Vallow Daybell delusional, a calculating sociopath, or both, and what happens when two people share the same doomsday delusion?

⚠️ Trigger warning: This episode includes discussions of the murders of children and other deaths. Listener discretion is advised.

Since we recorded (September 2020): Lori Vallow Daybell was found incompetent to stand trial in 2021 and restored in 2022. In May 2023 an Idaho jury convicted her of murdering Tylee Ryan and JJ Vallow and conspiring to kill Tammy Daybell, and she was sentenced to life without parole. Chad Daybell was convicted of all three murders in 2024 and sentenced to death. In 2025 Lori was also convicted in Arizona of conspiring to kill Charles Vallow and Brandon Boudreaux. Alex Cox died in December 2019.

Chapters(00:00) Intro and disclaimer(01:07) Bailey Sarian’s timeline video(02:15) Casting Sheri Moon Zombie as Lori(03:38) Delusional, conning, or both?(05:36) Lori’s early life, faith and family(07:59) Attachment and risk factors(12:12) How Lori presents(13:00) The doomsday couple and apocalyptic cults(15:45) Melanie Gibb and meeting Chad(17:13) Does she know what she’s doing?(18:09) Malignant narcissism and reality(21:27) Zombies and the children(22:10) Legal insanity or sociopathy?(25:00) Folie a deux(29:30) The deaths around Lori and Chad(32:00) Insanity, venue and split trials(35:56) Final thoughts(37:40) Outro

Therapists Shannon and Cathy discuss Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell, the “doomsday couple” at the centre of the deaths of Tylee Ryan and JJ Vallow in Rexburg, Idaho. Recorded before either trial, it’s a clinical conversation about delusion, manipulation and shared belief, not a timeline of the case.

Covered in this episode:

• Lori Vallow Daybell, Chad Daybell and Alex Cox
• Tylee Ryan, JJ Vallow, Tammy Daybell and Charles Vallow
• Melanie Gibb and the Dateline interviews
• End-of-days beliefs, “zombies” and the doomsday couple
• Jim Jones, Charles Manson and apocalyptic cults
• Bailey Sarian’s timeline of the case

Clinical concepts: delusional disorder, folie a deux (shared delusion), sociopathy and antisocial traits, malignant narcissism, grandiosity, inappropriate affect, gaslighting, attachment theory, static risk and protective factors, legal insanity and competency.

Corrections: Idaho doesn’t allow an insanity defense, so the insanity verdict we predicted wasn’t possible there. And Rob Zombie’s Halloween is from 2007.

Related episodes:

• CULTS: Lori Vallow Daybell, NXIVM & the Zizians Part 3
• Extremist Beliefs of Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell - An Interview with Leah Sottile
• Sins of Our Mother - Lori Vallow Daybell

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other true crime fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

What happens when your dream apartment comes with a cult, and a sorority hazing ends in a mausoleum full of the telekinetic dead?

Chapters

(00:00) Intro: a Freddy Krueger costume

(03:47) Horror Facts with Cath: guess the film

(06:12) A Freddy Krueger Nike Air Max 95

(11:03) Fantasia Fest: Lucky, Slaxx and Hunted

(14:00) 1BR: cult horror on Netflix

(19:59) One Dark Night with Meg Tilly

(26:38) Friday the 13th franchise rewatch

(28:33) Outro

It’s Shrink Chat, our weekly horror roundup. Cathy’s Horror Facts lead to Flatliners, we react to a blood-spattered Freddy Krueger sneaker, and Cathy picks three indie horror films with strong female leads from the Fantasia Film Festival. Then we review 1BR, the 2019 cult-in-an-apartment-complex film, and the gloriously low-budget One Dark Night.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy talk about why 1BR’s cult feels so uncomfortable, how the film builds tension, and the suspension of disbelief it asks for before it turns.

Covered in this episode:

• Flatliners (1990), Kiefer Sutherland and “Today is a good day to die”
• Freddy Krueger and A Nightmare on Elm Street
• Lucky with Brea Grant, Slaxx by Elza Kephart and Hunted by Vincent Paronnaud with Lucie Debay
• 1BR (2019), directed by David Marmor, starring Nicole Brydon Bloom
• One Dark Night with Meg Tilly and Elizabeth Daily of Better Off Dead
• Friday the 13th, Jason Takes Manhattan, Jason Goes to Hell and Jason X
• Shudder, Netflix and the Fantasia Film Festival

Clinical concepts: cult psychology and coercive control, group conformity, psychological horror and tension, and somatic delusions and hallucinations.

Related episodes:

• SHRINK CHAT: The Babysitter: Killer Queen, Fade to Black & Followed
• Waco (2018) Netflix Mini Series

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror and true crime fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

Is Hannibal Lecter still a psychopath by season three, or something else entirely? And what is really wrong with Will Graham?

Hannibal (NBC, 2013 to 2015) follows the early relationship between psychiatrist Hannibal Lecter, the cannibal from Thomas Harris’s novels and The Silence of the Lambs, and FBI profiler Will Graham, a man haunted by his ability to empathize with serial killers.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy put both men on the couch: Lecter’s psychopathy, his psychology of cannibalism as love and art, and Will’s mix of empathy, encephalitis and complex trauma.

Covered in this episode:

• Hannibal the TV series, created by Bryan Fuller
• Mads Mikkelsen as Hannibal Lecter and Hugh Dancy as Will Graham
• Gillian Anderson as Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier
• Dr. Alana Bloom, Mason Verger, Dr. Frederick Chilton and the Red Dragon
• Red Dragon, The Silence of the Lambs and the Thomas Harris books
• The stag, the score and the series’ visual language
• A BBC Culture take on why the gore matters, plus Hostel by comparison

Clinical concepts: psychopathy, Freud’s drives (sex and death), psychosexual dynamics, ego and shadow, the psychology of cannibalism, the messiah complex, cognitive vs affective empathy, autism spectrum myths, anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, ruling out medical causes first, dissociation, complex trauma, trauma-informed care, social anxiety and blunted affect.

Corrections: Hannibal aired on NBC, not Netflix; it streamed on Netflix later. And Bedelia Du Maurier was created for the TV series; she isn’t in the films.

Related episodes:

• PSYCHOLOGY: The Alienist, Dakota Fanning, Luke Evans & Daniel Bruhl
• PSYCHOLOGY: Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer & Henry Lee Lucas
• PSYCHOLOGY: Mental Illness in Horror, Joker, Hereditary & The Babadook
• DIAGNOSIS: Hannibal Lecter & Will Graham from NBC’s Hannibal

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror and true crime fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴
🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk
📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls
🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

What happens when an influencer chasing 50,000 followers checks into a haunted hotel, and a lonely film obsessive starts becoming the movie monsters he loves?

⚠️ Trigger warning: This episode includes a brief description of a sexual assault scene in Re-Animator (1:38 to 3:58). Listener discretion is advised.

Chapters0:00 Intro: Baby Yoda joins the Halloween corner1:09 Falling asleep to Re-Animator4:10 Horror Facts with Cath: Child’s Play and Chucky7:14 Horror news: Neve Campbell confirmed for Scream 58:51 Did you grow up watching horror?13:43 Followed (2020): found footage review22:18 Fade to Black (1980)25:00 The Babysitter & The Babysitter: Killer Queen27:48 Lovecraft Country29:34 Outro and a shout-out to Mikey

It’s Shrink Chat, our weekly horror roundup. Cathy reveals why Chucky’s real name is Charles Lee Ray, we react to Neve Campbell returning as Sidney Prescott, and we review three films: the found footage chiller Followed, the 1980 cult classic Fade to Black, and Netflix’s The Babysitter: Killer Queen.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy take a clinical look at obsession, psychosis and emotional connection in horror, and talk about why some horror fans start as kids while others find the genre as adults.

Covered in this episode:

• Re-Animator (1985), Jeffrey Combs and the In Search of Darkness documentary
• Child’s Play (1988): the Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray name origin
• Scream 5: Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette return
• Followed (2020): DropTheMike, 50,000 followers and the Hotel Lennox. With Matthew Solomon, Sam Valentine and Caitlin Grace

• Fade to Black (1980): Dennis Christopher, Mickey Rourke, Marilyn Monroe and White Heat
• The Babysitter (2017) and The Babysitter: Killer Queen (2020), directed by McG, with Samara Weaving
• Lovecraft Country and weekly-release streaming

Clinical concepts: psychosis, delusions and hallucinations, identity fragmentation, childhood abuse and violence, social media validation, emotional connection to characters, and how early exposure shapes horror fandom.

Disclosure: we received a free screener of Followed. We were not paid for this review, and we never take paid reviews.

A correction: In Horror Facts we called Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray “three real-life serial killers.” Chucky’s name does come from those three men, but none of them was a serial killer. Oswald and Ray were assassins, and Manson was a cult leader convicted of murder conspiracy.

Related episodes:

• SHRINK CHAT: Host, In Search of Darkness, Tom Savini & Lucio Fulci
• PSYCHOLOGY: Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer & Henry Lee Lucas
• PSYCHOLOGY: Mental Illness in Horror, Joker, Hereditary & The Babadook

If you enjoyed this episode, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror and true crime fans find the show.

Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.

Until then... sleep safe. 😴🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising

What does a real serial killer look like when the movie refuses to make him a monster?

⚠️ Trigger warning: discussion of rape, child sexual abuse, violence against a child, murder and suicide attempts.

Chapters

00:00 Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and Joe Bob Briggs

03:24 Rated X for "disturbing moral tone"

06:39 Shot like a documentary

08:39 This is what a serial killer actually looks like

10:07 Why psychopaths relax watching violence

12:16 The real Henry Lee Lucas, Ottis Toole and Becky Powell

15:57 What the film changed

17:18 Watching hard films with a horror host

19:45 Trauma told like dinner conversation

21:40 Mundane, atmospheric and 16mm

23:55 The '80s parking-lot fear

24:38 Why Henry let the woman with the dog go

27:16 Spoilers: Henry and Becky's future

33:12 The suitcase ending debated

38:11 What if killing her was protecting her?

41:33 Siskel and Ebert

John McNaughton's Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, starring Michael Rooker, Tom Towles and Tracy Arnold, was shot for about $110,000, rated X for its "disturbing moral tone," and still ranks among the most disturbing films ever made. It is loosely based on Henry Lee Lucas, who confessed to hundreds of murders, and his partner Ottis Toole.

Therapists Shannon and Cathy bring a clinical lens: why the film's flat, mundane killer is more accurate than Hannibal Lecter, why a psychopath's body relaxes while watching violence, and what the ending says about attachment and control.

Covered in this episode:

- Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (John McNaughton)

- Michael Rooker, Tom Towles, Tracy Arnold

- Henry Lee Lucas, Ottis Toole and Becky Powell

- The Confession Killer (Netflix)

- Joe Bob Briggs and The Last Drive-In on Shudder

- Richard Kuklinski, Taxi Driver, Siskel and Ebert

Clinical concepts: psychopathy, autonomic arousal, childhood trauma, nature and nurture, grooming, trauma bonding, attachment, protective factors, sexual sadism.

A correction from us: Henry Lee Lucas was convicted of 11 murders, not three, and confessed to roughly 600. Much of what's known about his childhood comes from Lucas himself.

Related episodes:

- PSYCHOLOGY: Mental Illness in Horror, Joker, Hereditary & The Babadook

- SHRINK CHAT: The Babysitter: Killer Queen, Fade to Black & Followed

- DIAGNOSIS: Hannibal Lecter & Will Graham from NBC’s Hannibal

If this episode made you think, follow Terror Talk and leave us a 5-star review. It helps other horror fans find the show.

*Two licensed therapists, one forensic psychologist, one clinical LMFT, take apart the minds behind the crimes.*

Until then... sleep safe. 😴

🎧 Follow Terror Talk wherever you get your podcasts and join us on Patreon for bonus content and access to our private discord: patreon.com/terrortalk

📸 Instagram: @terrortalkpodcast | 🎥 YouTube: Terror Talk Podcast | 📘 Facebook: Terror Talk Podcast | 🎵 TikTok: @dark.psychology.girls

🎶 Music by Mannequin Uprising