American Psycho Part 2

Part 2! Part 2! If you have not listened to Part 1, don't start here!

In its essence, what does it mean to strive for perfection? You must be flawless, fearless of the competition who think they're standing in your way. But no one is truly more in the way than yourself. Where material possessions and consumption are the real consumers of your monotonous life. How are you supposed to survive in such a pristine world? And that’s when the perfect veneer surrounding Patrick Bateman's life begins to crack. When the undertones of his true intentions begin to seep into his perfect life. What are you to do when the thoughts become to much? 

Transcript

American Psycho Part 2

Gabby Browne: [00:00:00] This podcast is an association with Spotlight Studios, a family of podcasts driven to create unique, one of a kind content. If you have any interest in learning more, please visit spotlightstudiospodcast. com Welcome back to our October Thriller episode of American Psycho directed by the one and only Mary Herron.

If you're just tuning in now and haven't heard us discuss old Patti Bateman, go back. Tune back. Part one was last week's episode. If you're caught up, let's continue on this wild elevator ride to corporate insanity. I mean,

Jonathan VanSickle: I guess I'm a pretty sick guy. 

Gabby Browne: Oh, Patrick. Patrick. Patrick. Patrick. What 

Jonathan VanSickle: is Patrick? Been 

Aaron Couser: up to since the last time we've ran into him. Three. I killed Bethany, 

Gabby Browne: my old girlfriend with a nail gun, some homeless people, maybe five or 10. Um, an n 

Aaron Couser: y U girl I'm in, in Central Park, I 

Gabby Browne: left her in a parking lot behind some donut shop.[00:01:00] 

Some boy's on a deep spiral. Currently he's starting 

Jonathan VanSickle: to just indulge in his deepest, darkest fantasies. Starting to go to some, some weird places. Paul Allen. 

Gabby Browne: I killed Paul Allen with an axe in the face. His body is dissolving in a bathtub in Hell's Kitchen. Connections of separation are just slowly getting closer and closer.

Aaron Couser: I mean at first he was just showering all the time and scrubbing his face, but now it's uh... 

Gabby Browne: He's uh, having to scrub the floors. Just had to kill a lot of people! And, um, I'm not 

Aaron Couser: sure 

Gabby Browne: I'm gonna get away with it 

Aaron Couser: this time. 

Gabby Browne: What is he gonna do now? How's he gonna get rid of that body in that high end apartment?

We're about to find out. Lord Almighty.

Patrick drags Paul Allen's body [00:02:00] out in a duffel bag, and there's a trail of blood being left behind throughout the lobby. Of course, the doorman just looks right past it. It's just something to clean 

Jonathan VanSickle: up later. He sees Lewis. 

Aaron Couser: Outside, he recognizes Patrick, and he's putting the body in the taxi cab. 

Gabby Browne: It's literally here in a taxi cab.

A bloody body in a taxi cab. And he's talking about, Oh my god, what, is that a designer? What designer bag is that? And he just totally overlooked all the blood that was seeping onto the sidewalk. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Louis? Once again, this is a perfect example of these elite yuppies in this world. They're not concerned about the actual atrocities, it's the materialism, you know, because you could look at that overnight bag with whatever it is in it and you could say two things.

You could say, why the hell is this guy dragging this bloody bag? Or you could say, Oh my God, where did you get that overnight? That is fabulous. Cause that's where these people's concerns are. It's not on the everyday, it's not on the tangible things, it's on the material and the 

Gabby Browne: [00:03:00] status. And the choice that they make to overlook what those atrocities are.

Like literally physically right in front of your eyes and choosing not to focus on 

Aaron Couser: that. An interesting part of how it was filmed is when he's dragging the body down in, in the lobby. You see the trail of blood, but then there's another shot where there isn't a trail of blood. For the audience, you have to make a decision.

Was this really a body in here or was this something else? That's done deliberately to make the audience think for themselves. 

Gabby Browne: Anytime Patrick is upset, I, I have to laugh at him. Like, he's always just like, in such pain and discomfort when someone has something better than him. Because Paul's apartment overlooks Central Park.

He's dying on the inside. Like, this can't possibly be the thing. He starts packing up an old suitcase for Paul and leaves the fake voice message. Hi, 

Aaron Couser: this is Paul. 

Gabby Browne: I've been called away to London for a few days. [00:04:00] Meredith, I'll call you when I get back. Hasta la vista, baby. Of course, they all freaking sound like that.

God. Yeah, I know. They all sound like this. Like they're trying to sell you something. No thank you. But leaves a voicemail saying he's going to London. 

Aaron Couser: Setting up his alibi. Alibi. Kind of 

Gabby Browne: like Le Samurai. I feel like he's doing a lot worse job about it. I think like, I literally, I know, I literally will say, I know I said it in my intro.

Patrick Bateman is dumb. He's so, he's so dumb in his decision making in every sense of the way. It's just his elitism that he thinks he'll get away with it all. No, bad things don't happen to me, you know. I make bad things happen. Lady in red is dancing with me. Is that this He's in the office with his headphones in, getting in the zone, this end time zone, [00:05:00] after having his murder mental breakdown in Paul Allen's Central Park apartment.

He needs to get focused again. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Go 

Aaron Couser: to his kind of safe, his safe space in a way. Yeah. With his headphones and his music. Gene is back. Uh 

Jonathan VanSickle: huh. 

Aaron Couser: Looking a little different. A little more revealing. Slightly. 

Gabby Browne: Not totally. Yeah. No, no, no. She's business profesh. She's business profesh. She says there's a Detective Donald Kimball here to see him and he's like, I'm not, I'm not 

Jonathan VanSickle: here right now.

I'm not here. Once again. Once 

Gabby Browne: again. I'm at lunch. I'm at lunch. 

Aaron Couser: But she's like, that's 1030. 

Gabby Browne: You'll know you're not at lunch, 

Jonathan VanSickle: Patrick. And I think he sees you. Hi, I'm Donald 

Gabby Browne: Kimball. It's also Willem Dafoe, so if I saw that man standing outside of my office space, I would be shaking in my boots. 

Aaron Couser: Kimball's a pretty nice guy, he's just trying to get to the bottom of what happened to Paul 

Gabby Browne: Allen.

Yeah, he's been hired by Paul's lady, Meredith, to figure out where he's at. [00:06:00] Cause he just went missing out of nowhere. I 

Aaron Couser: love when he first walks in though. Patrick is, he pretends he's on a phone call making business 

Gabby Browne: deals. No, he's not making business deals. He's telling someone he's like, how to be a corporate scumbag.

No, no. He's talking about his. suit. He's telling, he's telling someone where to go about, Oh yeah, you need to go to this place and ask for this tailor and this designer suit. Well, blah, blah, blah. It's all about looks right now. And it's like, Oh, so he's 

Aaron Couser: trying to like intimidate the detective when he walks in.

Gabby Browne: Yeah. But also show I'm kind of a good guy. You know, I'm helping out my buddy. I'm a personable thing. You know, right when he 

Aaron Couser: walks in, he quickly shovels all these magazines. And his Walkman. I think it is porn. He keeps trying to like, you know, distract Kimball by ordering him a little Pellegrino, a little water, asking him if he wants fruit, what kind of fruit he wants on there.

You know, trying to break up the conversation to confuse him. 

Jonathan VanSickle: What do you guys think in this moment? Does the detective think that he's guilty? Not guilty? Just trying to gather [00:07:00] information? I truly 

Gabby Browne: think he's just trying to gather information. But it's kind 

Jonathan VanSickle: of hard to read, yeah? Yeah. It's really hard to read.

It's intentionally 

Gabby Browne: hard to read. Because at this point, we have seen the demon behind the mask of what Patrick really is. We are supposed to be feeling his exact same emotions. This is the first time he has, like, a little bit, a twinge of fear. Hmm, someone's already looking into Paul Allen's disappearance?

This is not a part of the plan. 

Aaron Couser: Your address? American Gardens Building, West 81st Street. 

Gabby Browne: Nice. Very nice. 

Aaron Couser: Thanks. You see how excited that makes 

Gabby Browne: him? He's acknowledging my wealth and my nice apartment, and now that I went to Harvard and Harvard Business School, and of course Paul did the whole Yale thing.

Jonathan VanSickle: He's like, what do you mean 

Aaron Couser: by Yale thing? I believe it's... He wants to paint Paul as a cocaine 

Jonathan VanSickle: user. 

Gabby Browne: Yeah. He wants to, yeah. Oh, everyone in this frickin group is a cocaine user. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Willem Dafoe actually did three different [00:08:00] takes every time he had a scene with Christian Bale. Oh. They did one take where he thought he was innocent.

They did one take where he thought he was guilty. And one take where he was unsure and just trying to gather information. And then the director took all those takes. spliced them up and put them however they saw fit to purposely confuse and kind of lead the audience astray. That's 

Gabby Browne: beautiful. I thought that was thank you.

Mary. Thank you 

Jonathan VanSickle: Because I really felt that as I was watching through it It's like you're trying you're trying so hard to latch on to this person's facial expression the things they're saying it's brilliantly done They 

Gabby Browne: did such a good job of allowing the audience to feel that constant confusion of not knowing who to trust or, or what someone's intentions really 

Jonathan VanSickle: are.

Aaron Couser: They cast 

Jonathan VanSickle: Willem because he is a 

Aaron Couser: scary guy. He looks as crazy as Patrick sometimes, just the way he's looking and, you know, digging for 

Gabby Browne: information. Is it that man's eyes? The mountain eyes. Intense. He built. I love Willem Dafoe. He built. Love him. 

Aaron Couser: I hope I'm not being cross [00:09:00] examined here. Do you feel like that?

No, 

Jonathan VanSickle: not really. And he asked him about his alibi. To which Patrick is a little off on. He's not exactly sure, he says he was out with dinner with someone, and, uh, it's, it's, the details are a little 

Aaron Couser: foggy. Patrick was telling Kimball that he thought Paul Allen went to London. You know, um, a guy named Stephen Hughes said he saw Paul Allen in London.

But he was actually mistaken. 

Jonathan VanSickle: The detective tells him, well, why don't you... Get back to me on that, 

Gabby Browne: I'll buy it. Like, figure that out, and he's like, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll need to think about that because I have, uh, lunch reservations. I gotta get moving now. He always picks a restaurant that's way uptown, far away from him, so he has to get moving.

Patrick,

Aaron Couser: doing his crunches, but he's watching, um, this, uh, Chainsaw Massacre movie. Just in the background. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Exactly, he's not even watching it. Like, this is [00:10:00] something, like, pornography, horror films. Boy 

Gabby Browne: is just listening to women being tortured for fun. He has had another little flub in his life so now he needs to immediately take that out on someone else.

So let's go pick up a sex worker. Oh, a blonde though. Yeah, definitely a blonde. Blondes are the women of the movie. It's just how it is. Except for Elizabeth later, like. Blondes are what Patrick wants. Every woman in his life that he wants or can't have or has is blonde. 

Aaron Couser: Because this must be a gold money 

Gabby Browne: status.

And it's also the women in his life that he's trying to take his anger out on. It's Evelyn. It's Jean. It's... It's all of these other women that have done him wrong. These are the women he wants to, like, replace, kill, basically. 

Jonathan VanSickle: I think it also has to do with his fascination with Donald Trump. In this era, Donald Trump would be the ultimate alpha of this 

Gabby Browne: world.

Yeah. True. And he's surrounded by blonde 

Jonathan VanSickle: women. Exactly. 

Aaron Couser: The [00:11:00] blonde, she's kind of apprehensive about 

Gabby Browne: going. Yeah, he's picking her up in a limo and he has a tux, like what, why do you want me? She's 

Jonathan VanSickle: clearly looking over to her pimp or something like, is this okay? And then... What does he do? He coerces her with more money.

Gabby Browne: Yeah, always more money. There's always more money where he comes from. 

Aaron Couser: That gets her in, entices her to come into the 

Gabby Browne: limo. And we actually don't even know her name. He says, 

Aaron Couser: My name's Paul Allen. You got that? You're Christy. You're to respond only to 

Gabby Browne: Christy. We're going to play pretend tonight. 

Aaron Couser: He's, he's in charge.

He's in control. He immediately calls for another, another female. Another lady. To join them. Yeah. But it has to be blonde. 

Gabby Browne: She has to be blonde. It's so important that she's blonde. It has to be. 

Aaron Couser: I really can't stress blonde enough. Blonde. But unfortunately, she was not totally 

Jonathan VanSickle: blonde. 

Gabby Browne: I put all cat, where is it?

Not quite blonde.[00:12:00] 

Christy takes a bath. Uh, and he, he tells her to wash herself, and he's just a weirdo. God, he's just such a weirdo. He just is assuming that, you know, I picked you up off the streets, you're dirty. Like, that's, that's his wealthy mentality there. I'm giving you an opportunity right now, Christy. 

Jonathan VanSickle: As he's going through that scene, he mentions many times how expensive that glass of Chardonnay is.

That 

Gabby Browne: Chardonnay that you're not drinking, Christy, is very expensive. The next girl comes in who is not quite blonde and he says, well, I guess we're going to call you Sabrina. He is not excited about Sabrina though. Don't you want to know what I do? No. No, not really. Nobody really seems to care about the Pierce and Pierce of it all.

Jonathan VanSickle: Well, and see, this is the dichotomy between these women who are, as we said before, kind of on the lower end of the status side. When he's around his friends or introduced to someone new, he's Pierce and Pierce. You can tell. It [00:13:00] impresses people. They recognize that status and what it means. You have a really nice place 

Gabby Browne: here, Paul.

Jonathan VanSickle: Christy 

Aaron Couser: asks, like, how much did you pay for this place? That's none of your business. But he wants to make sure they know it's not 

Gabby Browne: cheap. Yeah, it's not cheap. The fact that you even asked that question just shows that you're not from our world. You don't ask about the price tag on something. You should know this already because you're from the area.

You have these apartments. This is the same career space you run in. Real money 

Aaron Couser: talk is not on the table here. Mm. He keeps insisting that they drink the Chardonnay and he gets ready to play Phil Collins new album, Duke. 

Gabby Browne: Physical touch is an undisputed masterpiece. He basically 

Aaron Couser: summons them to the bedroom.

Gabby Browne: Into a sexual situation. The true infatuation that this... This type of man expects all women to have for him, but it's all fake and forced and truly terrifying. But he can't even see that because of how much he thinks he's in control of the [00:14:00] situation and just truly doesn't care about the mental state of the women he's around.

He's literally talking about Phil Collins and he's like, Sabrina, eat Christie's ass. Like what are you doing? Don't just stare at it, eat it.

Jonathan VanSickle: Phil 

Aaron Couser: Collins works best within the confines of the group. Than as a solo artist. And I stress the word, 

Jonathan VanSickle: Artist. 

Gabby Browne: Jesus Christ, this is not what I signed up for. And this is, like, before true consent stuff started happening for, like, recording. If someone brought out a videotape recorder, you would be more apt to not, because the internet is such a huge thing, and during that time period, I'm sure those tapes would just be for old Patrick, you know?

Aaron Couser: He does play this song from Phil Collins Susudio. It's one of his favorite songs. Personal favorite. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Personal. As we're talking about Genesis and Phil Collins, he's talking about, you know, Genesis was too intellectual, too artsy. The way he addresses the problems of abusive [00:15:00] political authority, the way that he talks about the commercial and more satisfying success of Phil Collins, it's another one of these where he's essentially talking about himself.

In becoming more professional, in conforming, in coloring within the lines, you can find success. Artistry and intellectualism as a downfall. As he's telling them to dance and, uh, 

Gabby Browne: eat. Eat butts. Eat some butts. For some reason, Patrick's not super involved in what is happening in the threesome. He's a little bit more preoccupied with himself.

Aaron Couser: He likes to flex and look himself in the mirror. 

Gabby Browne: Literally so. Stares at himself. I can't imagine, like, the narcissism behind that. If Patrick could do the do with himself, he would do it. Imagine that videotape. 

Aaron Couser: They fall asleep for the night. One of the ladies accidentally touches his arm. I mean, he, like, slaps her arm away and is like, Touch the watch.

Which shows his materialism and, Yeah. I think in the book it's [00:16:00] Rolex, but Rolex did not want their name associated with a serial killer. One of the ladies asks if they can go now, but Patrick says we're not quite done yet. Pays them at the door. 

Gabby Browne: Both girls are like traumatized, bruised, and cut, and bleeding, and they need to get the hell out of there right now.

This is sad. Can't get out of there quick enough, truthfully. Pretty sinister. Can't imagine putting myself in that situation just to survive. That's so hard. Right, 

Aaron Couser: because they could have left, but they wanted that last bit of cash. They've 

Gabby Browne: done it enough so far. Might as well just finish it out. And it's just a job, you know?

It's different. Terrible. Just a job.

Aaron Couser: Just say hypothetically, okay, what if they have a good personality? 

Jonathan VanSickle: All I know, there are no girls 

Aaron Couser: with good personalities. It's cocktail 

Jonathan VanSickle: time. 

Gabby Browne: Yep, [00:17:00] once again. For the boys. So they don't do any work and all they do is go to restaurants. The true hobbies of the elite. Happy hour. Happy hour. 

Aaron Couser: This is where we kind of get their...

A group mentality idea of what they think females are like. 

Gabby Browne: There are no girls with personalities. No, there are. Just no attractive ones. Yeah, no attractive ones. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you know 

Jonathan VanSickle: what Ed Gein said about women? 

Gabby Browne: He quotes serial killers like they're presidents. 

Aaron Couser: And he gets really upset if people don't know what he's talking about.

They don't relate to it. He gets flustered by that. You must think that they're on 

Gabby Browne: to something. These are the people I'm relating to. Shouldn't everyone else that has a similar mentality as me feel this way as well? Don't you guys all think about, like, what her head would look like on a stick? Well, and the way he says it.

Because 

Jonathan VanSickle: I do. It's just the way he says it, too. He's, like, going through the first part talking about, Oh, well, first I want to take them out for drinks, treat them really nice, you know, get to know them. And then, I think what their head would look like on a stick! And he's like cracking up and [00:18:00] all, everybody in the group you can tell is like, What the hell is going on here?

Gabby Browne: Yeah, we should probably not, uh, be, be quoting Ed Gein right now, Mr. Bateman. He's 

Aaron Couser: taking it to a totally different level. Maybe he wouldn't be talking this way before, but as he said, he's starting to let things Crack. The mask is starting to slip. The mask is beginning to slip. So maybe he's saying things socially that are a little strange.

Weep a 

Jonathan VanSickle: wobbly. Well, and he also, you know, we also know that he wants to be caught. He really does. 

Aaron Couser: And we gotta think, when this movie was filmed in the, like, the 80s, there was no, like, internet. You can't really do that 

Gabby Browne: anymore. No, it's not even close. of the same. This is the anonymousness you currently don't have in our society.

Like literally I left my keys in the Uber and my phone texted me to say, your air tags are not near you anymore. That's kind of the 

Aaron Couser: fascination with these movies too. It was just right before the internet. So it was right before that, like kind of shift in information, group 

Gabby Browne: [00:19:00] mentality. This movie came out in 2000, but the seventies and eighties were the time of serial killers.

The term hadn't even been coined yet until the 70s and the FBI, the Mindhunter people, they coined the phrase serial killer after they like talked to Ed Kemper. Yeah, he killed a lot of people too. This is the time period where everyone had like a very severe fascination with serial killers. What was behind the mentality of a serial killer?

Hi guys. 

Jonathan VanSickle: I want to get your opinion on something. 

Gabby Browne: Thank God Lewis interrupts this very awkward scenario to show. His new business card. Oh, wow. 

Jonathan VanSickle: It is gold letters. 

Gabby Browne: Patrick is losing his shit right now. This is true aneurysm behavior. This is the first time you see him snap at anyone that is not a woman in this movie.

This is the first time he snaps at one of his friends. He cannot allow Lewis to have a better business card than [00:20:00] him. Even Lewis. Yeah, so he follows him into the bathroom, puts his gloves, 

Aaron Couser: black leather gloves on, puts his black gloved hands over Louis's neck and Louis turns around a little startled at first, but then 

Gabby Browne: starts kissing his hand.

Oh Patrick I knew you would I knew you'd always wanted to do this. I knew you I knew you had feelings for me I saw how you were looking at me. I saw how you've been looking at me. No, baby, that's bloodlust, not lust lust. Do

Aaron Couser: you feel like how Patrick responded to this, that maybe he did kind of like Lewis? 

Gabby Browne: There's just like so much self hatred that you see Patrick Bateman have that like, I don't even know. I'm sure his sexuality could be pretty fluid, truthfully, just because he has no identification with anything. He's just like truly a fake person.

I was 

Jonathan VanSickle: about to say, I think he hates himself is the biggest thing here. And I think that's also very evident in this scene. In the bathroom, and the revelation [00:21:00] that this man is a homosexual, I think it's both of them posited about a situation. And in that moment, Patrick just doesn't even know how to react to it.

He literally 

Gabby Browne: has to wash his hands with his gloves still on his 

Jonathan VanSickle: fingers. He's completely thrown off and just like... Out of his element, in that moment. Where are 

Gabby Browne: you going? 

Jonathan VanSickle: I've gotta return some videotapes. 

Gabby Browne: You just tried to go come on to me? Time to go return some videotapes. Pat's outta there. 

Aaron Couser: Kimball's back.

Gabby Browne: That's not what I've got. What? That's not the information I've received. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Yes. He's 

Aaron Couser: got, he's got some more questions. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Mm hmm. Well, and he's asking Gene about Patrick's appointment book. Yeah. Obviously still chasing that alibi. Mm hmm. 

Aaron Couser: Kimball just needs to get it squared away where Patrick was on the day that Paul disappeared.

Gabby Browne: He was. He's returning some videotapes, and uh, oh, yes, and he had a date with Veronica C. Not even a full last name, [00:22:00] just Veronica C. That's 

Aaron Couser: not lining up with Kimball's notes here. When's the last time you saw Paul Allen? It's been a long day, he's not sure, let's reschedule, let's plan a lunch date, and we'll square all our information down.

Kimball is still on the trail. 

Gabby Browne: Willem pulls out a little CD, and he's like, Ah, I just picked this up. Huey Lewis and the News? Heard of it? 

Aaron Couser: That must make Patrick think Kimball knows. Don't really like singers. He definitely has a suspicion now that Kimball is on his 

Gabby Browne: tail. It's just too weird. It's just too much.

Too much of a coincidence. Too much of a coincidence. It's the little fate esque things that make Patrick, like, Question himself when in all actuality, you know, he may be in the clear. He may be in the clear, but you know, probably not.

[00:23:00] Courtney's bedroom is super cute. She's got stuffed animals on her bed. I am probably going to be Courtney ask when I'm older, less drugs, probably. Love the space 

Aaron Couser: court. They enjoy a nice intimate time. What are their plans going to be for that night? Got to be seen. Cause if you're 

Gabby Browne: not in public, then what are you doing?

People can't see you spending your money, so do you actually have any money? He doesn't want to make plans with her. Mm mm. I really think it's from the moment that he had with Lewis in the bathroom, too. It really, like, set him off his rocker in that sense of maybe I don't want to be around Courtney as much as I thought I used to.

Maybe 

Aaron Couser: that's why he has sex with her immediately, too, just to show himself that he doesn't have those feelings. He 

Gabby Browne: has to have some type of primal thing for him, like whether it's murder or sex, like to the bare bones of what his drive is giving him. You're gonna marry Lewis, isn't that special? He's already said, like, you've made your decision.

frickin business card, didn't you? [00:24:00] 

Jonathan VanSickle: Never knew you smoked. You never noticed. I think what this scene really shows and especially in this is it's that he's really leaving that lifestyle that he had built up behind the going to dinners. He's starting to leave his whole routine behind for this bloodlust that he's found.

Cause now not only has he killed Paul Allen, he's been extremely violent with these other two women. And we're just starting to see that grow and it starts to take more precedence in his life. As opposed to keeping up this fake persona of, you know, being a Wall Street mogul, cheating and taking women out on the town.

I think this is him realizing, he's like, you know what? This is what's important to me. The facade starts falling by the wayside. It doesn't, it's not as important to him anymore. The thing that's important to him is killing and satisfying that 

Gabby Browne: bloodlust. And he even said that earlier, that Courtney is the most disposable of all the women in his life.

Like he can get rid of her. And it is him ending this relationship. And he's about to end his relationship with Evelyn too. He's cutting off all of his relationships. Courtney says, if I don't see you by Easter, have a nice [00:25:00] one. And he walks out. Courtney's just a hollow 

Aaron Couser: vessel, 

Gabby Browne: really at that point. They're all hollow vessels, I guess.

Mm hmm. In different ways. Do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do 

Jonathan VanSickle: do do do do. 

Aaron Couser: They're in a line here at the club in the bathroom. Timothy and Patrick are talking about viruses, which is very interesting because they're a virus in society as is. Once they head into the stall The 

Gabby Browne: cocaine comes out and they're talking and Timothy's over there like, God, the steroids are affecting my cocaine use.

And some guy interrupts them to be like, Will you guys quiet down? I'm doing drugs in here. Jeez, McCrees, they're all on something. They can't live their normal lives without being just hammed up. Well, 

Jonathan VanSickle: and I think their discussion, too, about the virus and other things like that, that's just another one of those things.

It's like they're trying to show the world that they're interested in and that they care about. It's all bullshit. And I feel like every part of this movie where something real isn't happening, we're talking about the Sikhs or Ronald Reagan. [00:26:00] These are all just buzzword topics that really have no substance.

And I feel like the times when Patrick does try to break through that kind of wall and say something that is about his character, is about how he really feels, it gets ignored. So what do you do? I'm into, uh, murders and executions 

Aaron Couser: mostly. 

Gabby Browne: Yep, or misinterpreted. Well, most guys I know who work in mergers and acquisitions really don't like it.

They're all surrounded by a group of beautiful, bleached blonde women, the only rule, the only rule in the club. They are hearing what they want to hear, or maybe Patrick is saying his intentions of what he really means and what they're hearing because Patrick really seems to be the one that is the crazy guy here.

Aaron Couser: And maybe before Patrick wouldn't slip like that, I think internally he just doesn't care anymore and he wants to be caught, feel something authentic. And he 

Gabby Browne: goes home with a model that evening. You think I'm dumb. You think all models are dumb. No. [00:27:00] That's okay. I don't mind. There's something sweet 

Jonathan VanSickle: about you.

When 

Aaron Couser: he kills Paul with the axe, you never see the physical act of it. And the same aspect is he's got that lock of that blonde hair the next day. Yeah, that 

Gabby Browne: he's just twirling in his fingers. Like, you know that he did something to her. And that's what I love about what they chose to do with this movie, Mary Herron and Guinevere.

The violence doesn't need to be seen in order for it to be insinuated. We can all tell that some very violent acts have been performed by Patrick Bateman in this movie, but we don't need to make it Saw esque gore in order to understand that. It's, once again, them thinking that we're smart enough to figure it out, and that's the best part about movies.

Jonathan VanSickle: Gene 

Aaron Couser: comes in. At first Patrick doesn't care. 

Jonathan VanSickle: He's working on that 

Gabby Browne: crossword. Do you need any help? No, he doesn't need help, and he asks her, Do you want to go to dinner? Anywhere you want. And she goes, [00:28:00] What about Dorsia?

Of course she wants to go to Dorsia. Everyone wants to go to Dorsia. And he calls up the host. It's just so funny. And he's just like, yeah, uh, uh, reservation for Friday. Two people. No, we are totally booked. There is no space for you. All right. Absolutely. We'll see you then. And Jean's like, you didn't even give them your name.

He's like, they know me. They know me like, oh my God, whatever. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Did you guys notice how he changes his reservation every time he tries to make it to, he's like maybe eight. And then they're like, no. Maybe 8. 30? No. And then this time he calls, he's like, 2 at 9? And they're like, nope. 

Gabby Browne: Just keep going later and then maybe you'll be able to get in someday.

And then he tells her she needs to change. And meet at his house. For the date tonight, yeah. Meet at his, his apartment. Patrick, it's so elegant. What a wonderful 

Aaron Couser: view. She's got that formal, nice dress 

Gabby Browne: on. Yeah, she's looking saucy. This is the most casual he's [00:29:00] seen her in. The most revealing too. She's very 

Aaron Couser: impressed by his physique and how he looks.

It's amazing. He's feeding into that ego. He loves it. Yeah, he wants to bring someone who's probably not used to this lifestyle 

Gabby Browne: or... Yeah, this is... like someone who is enough in his world that she can identify, Oh, this is what real money looks like. She can associate that, Oh, Pearson Pierce is an impressive place to work.

This isn't so socially disconnected that she doesn't understand any of the power dynamics behind it. You know, whereas a lot of the sex workers he was talking to before didn't care about his symbol or his. where he worked or what that meant for them. This is the only person that he truly has a soft spot for.

He even talks about his willpower with her. And her willpower and not wanting to tempt their willpower together. He's not good at controlling his. He's like talking to her in probably the most honest way that he's talked to anyone throughout the movie. I guess 

Aaron Couser: you could say I just want to have a meaningful relationship with someone 

Gabby Browne: [00:30:00] special.

But of course he's playing with some knives while he 

Jonathan VanSickle: does it. He's really, once again, expressing to someone, he's like, I have a problem 

Gabby Browne: with my willpower. Even if it's a metaphor, you know exactly what he's insinuating. Pulls out some 

Aaron Couser: duct tape and talks about Ted Bundy's dog named Lassie, and she has no idea who Ted is again is very Disappointing to him takes the tape back and puts it right back in a way I think he was thinking about murdering her but changed his mind 

Gabby Browne: She's kind of talking during this part about what she wants to do with her life and like her potential and her goals in life.

Jonathan VanSickle: The second time he is almost decided to kill her is with a, you know, with a nail gun, like right behind her head, finger on the trigger. He's gonna pop it. But then his fiance calls 

Gabby Browne: and she's like, Hey there naughty boy, I know you're here. Big time CEO. And he's like, yes. 

Jonathan VanSickle: The shame comes in [00:31:00] and the shame that they both have in that moment and that he has as he's telling her, he's like, no, you should, you really should leave.

Aaron Couser: Do 

Jonathan VanSickle: you want me to stay, but then she's like, I always seem to attract men who aren't available. In that moment, when that phone call comes through, He has a change of heart. Just for 

Gabby Browne: Jean specifically, as she's leaving, she reminds Patrick about the lunch reservation that Reese said on the voicemail. Don't forget you have a lunch date tomorrow with Donald Kimball at Smith Walensky's.

Aaron Couser: That's why she's a good 

Gabby Browne: secretary. Yep, he's cheated. She's too reliable.

Aaron Couser: This is where you really think Kimball has got Mr. Bateman's number. Any new thoughts about 

Gabby Browne: what you did? Paul had dinner with Marcus that night. That's what, that's what the Daily [00:32:00] Planner said, but Marcus denied having dinner with Paul. Where were you that night? Oh, 

Aaron Couser: where was Marcus? 

Jonathan VanSickle: He wasn't with Paul Allen.

He starts sweating. His goose is being 

Gabby Browne: cooked now. Yeah, and he's just like, uh... Well, Marcus said he was with a bunch of people. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Craig McDermott, Frederick Dibble, Harry Newman, 

Gabby Browne: George 

Jonathan VanSickle: Butner, and... 

Gabby Browne: Including you, Patrick. You said you were there. Oh, oh yeah, I must have had dinner with Veronica on another night. I, well, I was there.

Marcus was your literal alibi. The guy you were impersonating, you dingus. He 

Jonathan VanSickle: just cannot 

Aaron Couser: get caught. He's getting out of this jam. He's off the hook. The police are no longer on his trail. Personally, I think the guy went a little nuts, 

Gabby Browne: so, split town for a while. Maybe he did go to London, besides 

Jonathan VanSickle: saying drink and whatever.

I think that's the scene that most takes you on a ride emotionally as the audience. You really can't tell where Kimball is coming from, if he has the information, if he has the drop on him, if he thinks he's guilty, if he thinks [00:33:00] he's innocent. And I think that's really where the brilliance of the way they shot it came in.

You are kept guessing. I mean, you have this whole journey invested on Bateman, and then when it comes down to it, you're just as lost and afraid as he is. It's a really cool moment that I think speaks to the directing ability. I mean, to think 

Gabby Browne: that one of his friends killed 

Jonathan VanSickle: him for no reason whatsoever 

Gabby Browne: would be too ridiculous.

Jonathan VanSickle: Isn't that right, Patrick? 

Aaron Couser: Now unhinged.

Come in the limo and talk to me for a minute. This 

Jonathan VanSickle: won't be anything like last time. 

Gabby Browne: He goes back to Christy. I had to go to the ER last time. They're thinking I should sue because I might have to have surgery because of what you did to me. But at every step, 

Jonathan VanSickle: he's offering 

Gabby Browne: money. He writes a check initially and she runs out of the car.

He just has a wad of cash that he's just hanging out the [00:34:00] window whistling at her like she's a fucking dog. I hate it. Hate you, Patrick. 

Aaron Couser: He's gonna give half now and he promises that it will not be like it was 

Jonathan VanSickle: last time. Nope. 

Gabby Browne: He promises. He's just such a misogynistic freak. He thinks he can get anything he 

Jonathan VanSickle: wants.

But I think it's really, it's more of a statement on the money. It is the money, but it's still It's crazy the way that these people act and the things that they will put themselves through for 

Gabby Browne: money. The misogyny being intertwined in that type of money. Yes. So both together, another woman will be there.

Elizabeth is going to be joining us tonight. Oh god, we met at um, oh god, at the Kentucky Derby in 85. They're not at Bateman's apartment this time, they are at Paul Allen's apartment overlooking Central 

Jonathan VanSickle: Park. To which she comments immediately, This is much better than your last place. Yeah, 

Gabby Browne: you can just see the little shiver go up his spine of being like, I can't wait to kill you later.

Ha ha [00:35:00] ha. New girl Elizabeth. She's, she's talkative. Yeah, she's super talkative. You're comfortable. You can tell that she's from this world. Christy, do you have Summer in the Hamptons? Um, she's talking about the Kentucky Derby and how they met. He says that Christy is his cousin. Oh, okay. How do you know her?

She's my, uh, c cousin. From France. From France, yeah. Elizabeth calls her drug dealer and says she's at Paul Allen's 

Jonathan VanSickle: apartment. I think the Paul Allen thing could almost be attributed to Paul Allen himself. mistaken identity and the two stories that are being told, which I think comes to light later, is that he's trying to set up Paul Allen at the same time as Paul Allen is still living this life in his place with these different women.

He kind of lets it happen. Good, good. Let a drug dealer know that there are some mischievous women asking for cocaine at 

Gabby Browne: four in the morning at Paul Allen's place. Yep, that's true too. 

Jonathan VanSickle: He loves Whitney. He loves Whitney. He talks about her solo album having four number one hits. He goes on to talk about himself a little bit through one of Whitney's songs.[00:36:00] 

The Greatest Love of All is one of the best, most powerful songs ever written about self preservation. Its universal message crosses all boundaries and instills one with the hope that it's not too late to better ourselves. He says it's impossible in this world we live in to empathize with others. We can always empathize with ourselves.

Once again, we just see this exposition dump of how he really feels about himself and humanity. The connection to music, to these artists, is his connection with the world. And that's pretty much all he has at this point. And you see 

Aaron Couser: him putting the actual drug in the chardonnay this time. 

Gabby Browne: Patrick's like, ah, Kristy, you're not drinking your wine.

Aaron Couser: He wants to make sure that you have. Pretty nice good gulps out of that wine. Absolutely. 

Gabby Browne: And it loosens them up. Yep, ladies are making out. They're just kissing, cousins. 

Aaron Couser: I would just like to say, get it on. 

Jonathan VanSickle: What's wrong with that?[00:37:00] 

Gabby Browne: The women aren't really listening to him though. They're just mostly perplexed that he even owns a Whitney Houston album in general. They do the business. The sexy times. Christy sneaks out of bed while he is still being intimate with Elizabeth. And it starts! You look over to the sheets. It says this red quid starts to seep through these sheets.

Elizabeth's screams of pleasure are now turning to screams of horror. Christy knows she needs to get out of there. She's going from room to room. She's going from apartment to apartment, literally banging on every single door she sees. Please. Someone help me. There is Patrick Bateman standing at the end of the hall in his sneakies and nothing else with a chainsaw just covered in blood, giggling, smiling like a true American psycho.

Aaron Couser: Nobody's coming to the rescue. There's no neighbors, uh, opening the door, trying to see what the [00:38:00] commotion is. They just allow this, uh... Murderous chainsaw massacre to happen. 

Gabby Browne: Overlooking certain things just to not get dirt on your name per se by association. 

Jonathan VanSickle: It's the same situation with all his friends, all his co workers, all his colleagues.

When you're too involved in yourself and what you have going on on the inside, you can't See what's happening in the real world. And I think the scene of her banging on the doors in a chainsaw screaming down the apartment hallway embodies that almost to a cartoonish level. Yeah, right. We've seen subtle hints of this, the whole movie.

And now to see her screaming with a bloody naked man running down the hallway, it's like, okay, this is cartoonish now. Yeah. This is ridiculous. No one gives a fuck about anyone except themselves and their own agenda. And it's, it's stated, there's 

Gabby Browne: literally bodies hanging in the closet like. Dexter style like from a like a mannequin.

It's insane. You are truly dispelling your disbelief to see into Patrick Bateman's psychosis. And 

Aaron Couser: it's just the manner of how he finished the kill by dropping this chainsaw [00:39:00] 

Jonathan VanSickle: down these 

Gabby Browne: stairs. Literally landing straight in her back like Jeez McCree. As a cartoon 

Jonathan VanSickle: of us. It harkens back to, you know, whenever he was doing his crunches earlier in the movie.

He's got Texas Chainsaw in the background, and like, the sound of that scene with him doing the crunches to the sound of this scene running down the hall is so similar and just perfectly represents Patrick Bateman as a character, cause amongst the chaos, the noise, the screaming, the blood, he is his best.

And he is happy, and he is living his fullest, you know, his fullest life in that moment. This is, 

Gabby Browne: yep, this is what his life has... This has come to, this is his peak happiness.

He was so amazed by that perfect kill shot that he can't stop fantasizing over it to the point that he gets crayons at the restaurant he's at with Evelyn and starts drawing on the tablecloths. I'm sure it's a seafood restaurant because it looked like they had paper cloths over the tables. Boy has his [00:40:00] crayons, and he is drawing poor Christy's dead body with a chainsaw sticking out of it.

Jonathan VanSickle: Well, and this is the second infamous scene with his then fiancé. Mm hmm. Where you can just see the disconnect and the disinterest they almost have in each other, because I think as she's discussing friends, vacations they had, she's commenting to one of her friends, Oh, I love that, that jewelry. She's not even paying attention to what he's saying.

Yeah, he literally But he's telling her. It's over. Evelyn, it's all... Over. 

Gabby Browne: I need to gauge in homicidal behavior. I need to do it. I need to do 

Jonathan VanSickle: it. And she goes, oh, what was that? What was that, darling? What did you say? I'm sorry. Like, there's no love, no anything in this 

Gabby Browne: relationship. No one is actively ever in the moment, unless Patrick is killing someone.

Evelyn's not there. No one's there. Everyone's gone. Evelyn is with her friend over there right now while her and Patrick are having this conversation. She can't even hear homicidal behavior. I'm breaking up with you, Evelyn. For real. And she's like, what? No, but your friends are my friends and [00:41:00] my friends are your friends.

You can have them all. That's how she knows that he is serious. All of our social networking. Those are the people we're seen with. Those are the people we're with every day. How are you going to do this without us being together? She 

Jonathan VanSickle: says it won't work. It won't work. It won't work. 

Gabby Browne: It just won't work.

That's not gonna work for our lives. Your friends are my friends. We can't do this. Like, this is the same social circle. And then he just says, Evelyn, you just aren't terribly important to me. And she just 

Aaron Couser: cannot handle that. 

Gabby Browne: She's having a scene in this restaurant and crying. But as soon as Patrick's out of sight, she stops.

Everything is performative. Everything needs to be a show. Did you guys hear? Patrick broke up with Evelyn at that crab restaurant. And everyone's talking about it. And she was crying. And I was there. And someone else was there. We all. This is the story that they get to tell everyone else in that social circle.

He did it in front of people, like, it was purposed. Yeah, like, everything is for the show of it all. I [00:42:00] have to return some videotapes. Videotapes do you have, Christian Bale? Too many. Too many.

Jonathan VanSickle: Now things are getting a little crazy. 

Gabby Browne: There are so many parts of this movie that you're just like, is this real? Is this a dream? Patrick's at an ATM asks him to feed him a stray cat. There's a little kitty cat right there just mewing at Patrick's feet. I think 

Jonathan VanSickle: that's the most blatant example of what this movie's overall theme is.

In order to get money, this machine wants to be fed something innocent, harmless, that's not doing anything to you. Not only is he willingly obliging, he's like, Fuck yeah, give me that cat! In people's lust for power and money, the things that they do and what it Him killing, I don't think, is necessarily a reflection of that.

I think it's a reflection of the humanity that is lost whenever you get into this kind of world and [00:43:00] you get into this kind of situation of unthinkable amounts of power through your wealth. Who tries 

Gabby Browne: to stop him but an old lady? Like, literally, we're talking about more innocents here and he... He shoots the old lady for trying to stop him from killing the cat and feeding it to the ATM.

Kill the 

Aaron Couser: moral voice, destroy it, and continue your 

Gabby Browne: madness. And immediately, police sirens. They're here. They're coming for you ASAP, Patrick. They heard those gunshots. And he's 

Aaron Couser: being... Hunted down now. Goes from building to building. Shoots that poor, innocent guy. 

Gabby Browne: Security guard dude. Security guy. And then he just immediately goes into another building.

They look exactly the same. Is this a maze? Is this really what just happened? Speaking to 

Jonathan VanSickle: those moments, I think right before that when he actually has the shootout with the police. Now we are against the police. Like, something has changed. And then we get to the point where this escalates and he shoots one of their cars and it explodes.

Yeah. Like, it's a massive explosion and you as the audience goes, Wait, that can't be right. And then you see [00:44:00] Patrick look at the gun like, What the hell? Trying to do the math on it. Everything starts kind of Lipping in these five to ten minutes and you start thinking about the rest of the film and things that happened or maybe they didn't happen.

This is a point where you realize not only is this person certifiably insane, we can't take anything they say as real or as true. Like this is where the questions... And everything comes together and you start really, really putting together the 

Gabby Browne: bigger picture. Yeah, the true, like how, how deep, far into psychosis he was, like throughout the movie.

It's really just crazy. It's 

Jonathan VanSickle: the whole office situation where he gets confused with the buildings too. And I think that's another mistaken identity point where it's just like, all these buildings are the same. All the security guards are the same. He just happens to go into the wrong one first. Pop, pop.

Killed, killed, until he finds his right 

Gabby Browne: office, his building, 

Jonathan VanSickle: which looks identical to 

Aaron Couser: every other building. 

Gabby Browne: He's feeling truly trapped. 

Aaron Couser: Yeah, they know exactly where he's at. They're shining their light [00:45:00] through the window. Only thing he could think of is just to call his lawyer. Howard! It's Bateman, 

Gabby Browne: Patrick Bateman.

You're my lawyer, so I think you should know I've killed a lot of people. Some homeless people, maybe 5 or 10. Maybe 20, maybe 40. He doesn't even know how many people he's actually killed. I killed Bethany, my old girlfriend, with a nail gun. He even confesses that he cooked and tried to eat some people's brains.

And I tried to cook a little. He just doesn't think he's gonna get away with it this time. He's totally trapped and in this state of true paranoia. End of his rope. End of his rope. Like, the candle has been burned at both ends and they're meeting in the middle right now. Right at this office. I I guess I'm a pretty 

Aaron Couser: sick 

Gabby Browne: guy.

Yeah, he knows. Ha ha ha ha! Guess you don't have to kill a lot of people! He wants people to know too. This is his most himself that he ever is and this... This is the job he's [00:46:00] proud of. This is his favorite work. This is, you know, his masterpiece. This is his true profession. Not this stockbroker BS. It 

Aaron Couser: takes a special kind of person To 

Gabby Browne: quench his thirst.

Jonathan VanSickle: Yeah. He's at the end. There's, where do we go from here? What's about to happen? And, as this movie often does, it flips you on your head again. I'm 

Gabby Browne: not 

Aaron Couser: sure 

Gabby Browne: I'm going to get away with it 

Aaron Couser: this time. I meet you up at Harry's bar. So, you know, keep your eyes open.

Gabby Browne: We don't know what happened with the helicopters. We don't know what happened with the police, but he's home somehow. 

Aaron Couser: He's not just home. He's back in his 

Gabby Browne: routine. Routine. He's back in it. His routine has 

Aaron Couser: not changed. Even though he had this manic episode, he's putting his mask back on. 

Gabby Browne: He has to pretend at least for a [00:47:00] little while longer, at least while he's in public.

It seems like he's probably going to need to be doing some cleaning up at Paul Allen's apartment after the, uh, several murders, bloodied bodies in the closet, all that fun stuff that we saw happen the night before. Can I help you? 

Jonathan VanSickle: I'm looking for 

Gabby Browne: Paul Allen's place. As he enters the apartment, he notices it's unlocked, which is very surprising.

It's being refurnished or redone. He makes his way to the closet to see no bodies hanging where he left those murdered women. It's all cleaned up. It's every, yeah, it looks pristine again. And a realtor comes over to him and, Are you my two o'clock? And he's like, no. She seems very skeptical of him or even afraid of him.

You 

Aaron Couser: don't know for sure if she knows that there were bodies in there and they had to clean them up because there's no way she's going to be able to resell this apartment if they know murders [00:48:00] happened here. 

Gabby Browne: Exactly. This is literally an apartment above Central Park. People don't care if someone died there.

People don't care if a bad thing happened there. It'd probably be more coveted because of that action. There's some people that seek out freaky people like that. I want to know what happened here. Don't make any trouble, please. I suggest you 

Jonathan VanSickle: go. I think these real estate agents, uh, once again, they're willing to overlook some heinous things because at the end of the day, that's a prime piece of real estate.

It's literally one of the most And that's why she says, you need to stop asking questions. Like, I think it'd be best if you leave. Like, she knows, I think she knows what he's implying towards you. Yeah, I think so too. Absolutely. But at the same time, like I said, this movie is all about business and chasing the dollar.

So I think she said, she's like, you know what, uh, they obviously saw the things that were in there, but at the end of the day, it needs to get back 

Gabby Browne: on the market. That 

Jonathan VanSickle: was, that was the main concern, not what are all these bodies doing in here. We need to turn this thing around and get someone in it immediately.

When [00:49:00] 

Aaron Couser: Christie was running around the apartment, it was a total murder. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Yeah. And now it's clean. I think I've killed 20, maybe 40 people, and he doesn't even know. That really illustrates just the blur between reality and this man's mind at this point. He can't even keep it straight himself. 

Aaron Couser: That's where the ambiguity comes in.

Is it a dream? Is it real? You know, back and forth. Another, another example of you have to make a decision.

Gabby Browne: He has to call Jean at the office to let her know he is not going to be in to work today because he is spy rolling.

Patrick Bateman's office. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Jean! 

Gabby Browne: I need help. Patrick, is that you? Calls her up, and as he's doing that, he downs the rest of his pills. He says he is not coming in. He's bawling, freaking out. And Jean is like, Patrick, are you okay? And he's like, why do you sound so fucking sad? And it's like, oh my. God, like, [00:50:00] truly, he, he's absolutely lost it.

He doesn't even know what his own reality is anymore, and I think he thought he had a better grip on it before now. Because even in that semblance from the night before to this morning, I think he thought he had a better hold on himself because he was able to do his initial routine. It was a new day. It was a start to figuring everything out.

And now that he doesn't have control, and once again it was a woman, a realtor that put him in that position, that she's the one that knows the secret. That's where he, he just doesn't know what to do anymore. 

Aaron Couser: Jean is now very concerned about Patrick. So she wants to do her own little miniature investigation, go through his cupboard, 

Jonathan VanSickle: or his office desk.

And finds his 

Aaron Couser: daily planner. 

Gabby Browne: Well, he has like, what, one meeting a week, it looks like, before that? He's not doing shit, like, truthfully. He does not, his job is nothing. He does nothing. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Well, I think that's how it begins, and it [00:51:00] shows really the evolution of this path. At first, it's a meeting here, a dinner there, then there's one scribble maybe in the corner, and then she turns another page, more scribbles, more, until the entire, his entire week is consumed with this bloodlust, and this hate, and this killing.

Uh, so yeah, I think it really shows. through the weeks, how this has evolved to the point where he has no control over it anymore. It's 

Gabby Browne: just like a constant, like, ticking at the back of his head. He has to have it. He has to have it. He's a true addict in that sense. Patrick's out to lunch with all the usual bros.

Happy hour, of course, and they're trying to figure out where they're gonna go that night because Patrick is not going anywhere without a reservation. Well, 

Jonathan VanSickle: and not only that, his friends mentioned too, they're like, you know what, I'm not even hungry, I just want a reservation somewhere. And that's another thing with the whole status of this thing, it's like, they don't even care about eating the food.

Aaron Couser: I'm not going somewhere where I'm going to be turned away. 

Gabby Browne: Yeah, I'm not, I'm, Patrick is, has been rejected enough right now and he will take [00:52:00] no more rejection. He just wants things to be easy currently. 

Aaron Couser: The guys are kind of noticing that he's a little off today. He sees his lawyer from across the room and excuses himself.

He obviously knows that Harold has heard his confession. Wants to see his reaction to it. Jesus, yes, that was 

Gabby Browne: hilarious. That was 

Jonathan VanSickle: you, wasn't it? As he begins talking to Harold, once again he is misidentified as someone else. Yep. Again, his own lawyer has no idea who he is. And 

Gabby Browne: he's like, oh my god, that was so funny, what a funny voicemail, murdering people, ah ha ha ha.

In this moment, he even says, oh yeah, Patrick Bateman, he's He was like, that's 

Jonathan VanSickle: how I knew it was a 

Gabby Browne: gag. That's how I knew it was a gag. Like, Patrick Vaillouin's such a loser, he would never do that. I'm Patrick Bateman, don't you recognize me? You're my own lawyer. He literally admits to saying,

The lawyer's so [00:53:00] freaking confused. He's like, what are you talking about, dude? He looks concerned, confused. He's like, I just had dinner with Paul Allen in London ten days ago. Paul Allen isn't dead. Destroys. 

Aaron Couser: It's Patrick's mentality. What is real anymore? Or is 

Jonathan VanSickle: it his affluence and wealth that essentially buys off the lawyer?

Way that actor 

Aaron Couser: played the lawyer. He said it kind of 

Jonathan VanSickle: knowingly, didn't he? Maybe he knows about 

Aaron Couser: it, maybe he doesn't. The 

Jonathan VanSickle: ambiguity of it, yeah, 

Aaron Couser: it's beautiful. Keeps it going. Excuse me. I really must be going 

Jonathan VanSickle: now.

Gabby Browne: Ronald Reagan's talking on the TV. 

Jonathan VanSickle: And how, how symbolic is that? Honestly, I mean, Reagan in that time of the 80s, the power of the American economy, feel how you will about Reagan, but undoubtedly, I believe he put the economy ahead of the American people for a long time. One of the big things that once again, they're trying to tell with this [00:54:00] story.

Is that the rise of Wall Street, the rise of this money, economic mentality? They don't think about the people like you and I are, and they don't think about the people like you and I, Gabby. I mean, it's not it's not even that we're in their subconscious. It's that they're just. Going one place and that place 

Gabby Browne: is up.

And for me also, it's the war on drugs in the sense that the war on drugs is, was really truly only for the poor. That it didn't affect the cocaine users in the clubs, you know? It was affecting the, the people who were getting sold crack on the streets, you know? Just so different in that sense. What a pointed little blip there on the television.

Of course they still need some reservations. They have to have reservations somewhere. 

Jonathan VanSickle: But inside doesn't matter. 

Gabby Browne: Patrick has officially accepted either his full delusion or his full I got away with it. He just doesn't care anymore at this point and he's gonna stop trying to figure it out. He's just gonna go with the flow.

It looked like they were all drinking wine [00:55:00] and one of Patrick's friends says I need to sleep. scotch. And immediately Patrick just starts drinking a scotch. It came out of nowhere. We don't know where that's, it was definitely wasn't on the table before then, but it's like the insinuation of Patrick's getting what he wants now.

As long as he goes with the flow, everything is going to be fine. It will always, always work out for him. You see 

Aaron Couser: behind him, there's like a no exit sign. The director said that this scene was formed from the play No Exit. 

Gabby Browne: Yeah. A French play. French play where it's basically... We did that at K State. They're in hell, right?

Mm hmm. They're in, yeah, what you may think of like purgatory or hell. 

Jonathan VanSickle: Yeah. When we start the novel with what words? Abandon all hope ye who enter here, which is Dante's Inferno. This is his hell and he talks in that last inner monologue about all I can feel is this pain and all I want to do is inflict it on others.

The pain of trying to confess, to try to be heard, to screaming out for someone to Pay attention to him to give his, his words credence and for him, this is his hell being [00:56:00] all powerful, being able to do whatever you want with getting away. I mean, it's, it's just that lack of self that he has this whole movie pushing to the point that he does to try to learn something about himself, to try to have some sort of identity to doing all these heinous.

things and even after that, there's no learning. There is no growth. There's no catharsis. 

Gabby Browne: He'll never be held accountable and he'll never be crowned as an achievement. It's purgatory. Yeah, it's purgatory. But he wanted to be infamous as well. Talking about Ed Gein and Ted Bunny, those were his role models.

That's what he looked up to. He wanted to be the epitomal serial killer someday. He wanted people to be inspired to do acts that he did. He wanted everyone to know about dropping it. Chainsaw down nine floors and landing perfectly in a girl's back. I did it, Garth.

Jonathan VanSickle: Patrick Bateman. 

Aaron Couser: But no one would know about those serial killers unless they were caught. We all really think he wanted to be caught. Even when he's [00:57:00] calling Harold at the end, it's almost like he's... He's getting a monkey off his back, and he's relieved. He's happy. He's boulders on his 

Gabby Browne: shoulders. He's ready to get him off.

Aaron Couser: He's crying, but he's happy and laughing at the same time because he thinks that this is his grand 

Gabby Browne: capture. And what a grand capture it was being chased into your... office building by helicopters surrounding you. You exploded an entire police car. That's the man right there. Even in his spiraling downfall, like what a way to go out.

Patrick was like, uh, yes, this is it for me. Honestly, even now the next day, I think he was like, I must be pristine for talking to my lawyer. And if anything else happens, everyone's eyes are going to be on me today. And that never happened. Nope. Never happened. No one's eyes are on you. Literally got called a dork at the very end of the movie.

Again, this is the second time you've been called a dork to your face when you're someone else is talking about you thinking you're someone else. You're not special. Your identity will never mean anything. You're just a [00:58:00] Marcus. Yep, you're just a Marcus, dude. 

Jonathan VanSickle: The end.

Gabby Browne: All of our resources will be found in the show notes or on the website. Please check them out if you have any questions.

Stay tuned for next week's episode, The Green Room. It's our first time doing this guys, so stay tuned for even more American Psycho fun.