'Bates Motel': The Season Finale Went Psycho in a Great Way

“You need help,” said Norma to Norman on the oh-so-intimate season finale of Bates Motel on Monday night. Or did Norman say that to Norma? Honestly, these two — they’re such a close couple, it’s like they complete each other’s sentences, or speak the same words! They’re incorrigible, these two psychos!

WARNING: SPOILERS FOLLOW FOR THE BATES MOTEL SEASON FINALE.

All season long, Bates Motel had been moving closer and closer to the kind of delirious psychosis that characterized Alfred Hitchcock’s tightly controlled Psycho (1960). Increasingly, Norman has been disassociating his personality — fracturing it; letting little cracks open up — to allow Norma into his mind. A few weeks ago, he scared the hell out of brother Dylan by whipping up the morning eggs-and-coffee wearing Norma’s bathrobe, chattering away as Norma would. Really, it was enough to put a sensible person off his feed.

This week, Norma pulled a clothing switcheroo, dressing in a man-tailored suit and necktie to visit a mental institution as she considered having Norman committed. But, quoted a price of between $20,000 and $40,000 a month, even a skull-breaking negotiator like Norma was left briefly speechless.

Related: ‘Bates Motel’ Postmortem: Producer Talks Norman’s Future, the Series’ Happiest Moment Ever

The hour pushed a few important Psycho buttons. At one point, mother and son struggle over a suitcase and Norma falls down the stairs, the same stairs private eye Milton Arbogast took a tumble on in Psycho. A bit later, Bradley Martin is killed by a Norman who becomes Norma — with the switch of a cut and a camera angle, Freddie Highmore transformed into Vera Farmiga, and after the bloody deed was done, Norman uttered — nay, wailed — a line from Psycho: “Mother, what have you done?”

But Bates Motel long ago established itself as no mere Psycho prequel. Thanks in particular to the writing of producer Kerry Ehrin — who has given the Norma-Norman exchanges throughout this season a remarkable range of drama, comedy, grave emotion, and wild craziness — the show has reached a peak of rich nuttiness that is nevertheless moving.

I loved the way the finale concluded, with Norma (all thoughts of committing Norman to the loony bin banished) drawing Norman ever-closer, physically and psychically: “You would have died out there in the world — I would have died.”
When she asked Norman to commit himself to staying with her, he said, “I do,” and it was like the completion of a wedding vow.

As the Ronettes’s “Be My Baby” rose up over the closing credits, we knew that these two are inseparable in their insanity, and still loose in the world. Great way to wrap up a terrific season.