Bates Motel premiere recap: Season 5, Episode 1. When it comes to a force of nature like Norma Bates. Though often controlling, needy, and ripping people out of cars, the Norma Bates of Bates Motel was always a charmer: an eccentric woman who loved too much and spread that love around too little.

Even at her worst, she was a far cry from the degrading shrew of a Mother in Pyscho who showed up for butcher knife shower sessions anytime her son so much as shared a sandwich with a woman. Season 5 of Bates Motel is likely where we bridge that gap. Because if the final two episodes of season 4 made one thing clear, it’s that Norma Bates — superglued eyelids be damned — is quite dead. And what we know from Psycho is that her Mother persona lives on in her tragic son, Norman Bates. The first four seasons of Bates Motel made a meal (a rich, delicious, kitchen- wrecking, home- cooked meal) of laying out how that transition could have happened to a sweet co- sleeping mother/son pair like Norman and Norma Bates.

What Monday’s excellent season 5 premiere seeks to explain is why. To quote the totally credible psychologist from Psycho, “Matricide is probably the most unbearable crime of all — most unbearable to the son who commits it.” Indeed, if you killed your mother and then resurrected her in your mind only to keep her trapped in a Queen Anne prison of your own making, you’d probably need a pretty good explanation as to why you might have done such a thing. And Bates Motel wastes no time explaining how Norman can explain that his Mother is dead to outside world but very much alive to him: She faked her own death to protect her son: “So I could get away from everyone and everything that could distract me from you.”That’s right: Norman Bates is now living for two. And, shockingly, being together- alone- forever (a Batesian term if ever there was one) isn’t always the paradise Mother and Son predicted! Because she’s right there in the kitchen cooking Norman a beautiful breakfast. And you know who else is running around? Juno the Dead Dog, that furry little harbinger of Crazy.

By submitting your information you agree to receive email updates from A&E and A+E Networks. You can opt out at any time. More details: Privacy Policy. Do you like the Bates Motel TV series? Do you think it should be ending with season five? Would you have watched a sixth season or if. Bates Motel is returning for Season 5 in February, and the final season of the eerie A&E series is set to be the darkest yet. Brand new spoilers, as well as the. In the epilogue of Bates Motel, “Dream a Little Dream of Me” plays over visions of Norman’s body.

The official trailer for the series finale of Bates Motel prepares fans for the final chapter of Norman Bates’ story. It’s been a long, strange trip for Norman. Watch Online Darker Than Black Season 2.

That's how Bates Motel ended after five seasons tonight, but that's pretty much how it always had to end, didn't it? After killing Norma's widower Romero (Nestor. Bates Motel takes a look into the early years of famed "psycho" Norman Bates. Described as a mash up of Twin Peaks and Smallville, the show pulls you into the twisted.

Town. Because you know and I know and everyone but Norman knows that Norma is dead. The woman cooking him breakfast is a psychological split: Mother only exists in Norman’s mind, and there, she can coexist with him, or, when driven to, she can take over him completely. But typically, when Norman leaves the house to go manage the Bates Motel with his big boy “Manager” pin, he heads outside of this reality of his own making, out to a world where Norma Bates is still dead. The shots of Norman walking away from a beautiful meal cooked by Mother, only to reveal a wrecked kitchen left behind by Norman- acting- as- Norma are chilling, not just because of the mess, but because they’re a visual description of just how deep and false a world Norman has created for himself — er, themselves —  within the confines of the Bates property. Out in the village of White Pine Bay, however, Norman Bates seems just your average small business owner with an affinity for sports jackets.

At the new hardware store, locals greet him by name, and shop owners are charmed by him. Unfortunately, said shop owner Madeline Loomis (Loomis!) bears a striking resemblance to Norma from behind, is a Very Nice Girl, and is therefore likely doomed to meet a gruesome end. But for now, she’s very helpful to Norman in picking out paint samples that his mother would have liked — she passed about a year and a half back, you see — until Norman pulls out his wallet to discover that it’s not his wallet at all. Back at the house, Norman informs Mother that he has someone else’s wallet and doesn’t know how he got it, and Mother says she doesn’t know either and continues vacuuming sketchily.

If you were worried that the death of Norma would mean less of Queen Vera Farmiga and her bar- setting performance, look no further than this exchange: Norman: “Mother, do you ever have the feeling that you’ve had the same nightmare over and over again? But that you can’t remember it, you just remember the feeling of it?”Mother: “Nope!”Norma lives on in Mother; it’s just that Mother lives on in Norman. That means there’s a whole other layer for Vera Farmiga to sing her teeth into, but it will likely also take a few episodes for the show to lay out just who Mother is and how she’s different than Norma now that she exists solely in Norman’s psyche. NEXT: Fancy seeing you here David Davidson.

A contemporary prequel to Psycho, giving a portrayal of how Norman Bates' psyche unravels through his teenage years, and how deeply intricate his relationship with. And that’s when Chick (Ryan Hurst) walks in. The door was open. He admired Norma for standing up to him, and came to pay his respects because he heard about her death. Bates Motel has certainly had its ups and downs over the years, particularly when it tried to expand its drug subplot or the machinations of the evil, rich folks of.

Bates Motel Season 4 Finale: Death Is Not the End. There has been a lot written lately about the stakes of TV character deaths recently, because more than ever it’s been hard knowing or trusting whether they are really gone. In shows like The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, even something as crazy as Legends of Tomorrow, the mechanics of those worlds mean that death isn’t permanent, which sometimes makes it hard to really get invested in other characters’ grief. Sometimes it’s because contract negotiations are up, or there’s behind- the- scenes drama, but it’s rare that a show plans to kill off a main character deep into the show’s run as part of that series’ very fabric. One of the triumphs of a show that did do that, Bates Motel, is that even though we know the eventual outcome for Norman and Norma Bates (wonderfully played by TV Performers of the Week Freddie Highmore and Vera Farmiga), it doesn’t lessen the tension.

If anything, it heightens it. Image via A& EFor awhile now, it hasn’t been clear how closely Bates Motel would come to Psycho, and whether we would get to Norma’s death and Norman’s complete, murderous break with reality. Though it’s been teased for awhile, Season 4 (the show’s penultimate season) actually took us to a point we’ve been conditioned to dread. The death of Norma, such a hypnotic and luminous character throughout the show’s run, is something almost as inconceivable to viewers as it is to Norman himself. How can Bates go on without her? The fact is that it won’t — but, it won’t be the Norma we knew.

In a particularly chilling scene, he glues her eyelids open — revealing her pale irises of the dead — and demands that she look at him. Norma will be preserved physically, just like in Psycho, thanks to Norman’s psychosis mixed with his handiness with taxidermy, but more importantly she’ll be preserved mentally, in Norman’s mind. Will Norman now become Norma like he used to, or will she exist as a separate entity that he talks to regularly? Or both?“Norman’s” final scene seemed to suggest the latter, with his mental ghost of Norma playing piano, full of Christmas cheer. Killing off Norma before the final season was an exceptionally bold move, even if she’s still returning in the form of a spectre, because of course it’s not her. It’s Norman’s conception of her.

She won’t interact with other characters again, which, given how masterful Farmiga was at showcasing Norma’s many moods and emotions with others, is most certainly a loss. Other shows more grounded in reality than The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones have done similar things to explore grief and death, most notably HBO’s funeral home- centric series Six Feet Under. The dead routinely returned there to haunt the minds living, often in beautiful and poignant ways as characters grappled with the finality of their passing, with the show using them as a foil for the character’s current mental state. Something similar will likely be true for Bloodline, where a major character (and arguably the best character) was killed off in Season 1, but will be returning in everyone else’s memories and guilty consciences in Season 2.

Image via A& EBates Motel has certainly had its ups and downs over the years, particularly when it tried to expand its drug subplot or the machinations of the evil, rich folks of White Pine Bay. But Season 4 settled in and did away with all of that.

It cut out ancillary characters and focused back on Norman and Norma, and their closest relationships, and was much better for it. Watch House On Elm Lake Online Fandango. It even dared to diagnose Norman, but also allowed him to escape the fate of being committed, just as he was no doubt escape prosecution for murdering his mother. We know that because we know how the story ends.

And yet, Bates Motel has been an example of how fantastic a prequel series can be in creating its own world and its own stakes. Norman is not the only one affected by Norma’s death, as much as he seems to think he is by not inviting anyone to her funeral. In a heart- wrenching scene, Dylan calls Norman to talk after his blowout with Norma, but Norman doesn’t tell him about her death. Emma doesn’t know, either, and there’s certain to be fallout from all of this. Romero knows, though, and that will be key in the final season. Contrary to Norman’s portrayal of him to the investigator officer, Romero and Norma did have a relationship (albeit not a romantic one) long before their marriage. His grief, and his (correct) understanding that Norman is a killer will likely drive the new season’s tension — even though, again, we know that Norman will prevail.

The excitement, though, lies in how. Yes killing off Norma was shocking and sad, and Norman’s reaction to it was fittingly creepy and horrific, but it shows Bates Motel not just staying true to its premise, but in a way, fulfilling its destiny alongside Norman. It also shows us death is not final, but not because of a cheap trick; it’s because those around us don’t forget. And the beauty and horror of the last few episodes of Bates Motel’s fourth season, and “Norman” in particularly, illustrates that perfectly. It was unforgettable. Image via A& EImage via A& EImage via A& E.