Norman Bates

Norman Bates is a fictional character created by American author Robert Bloch as the main antagonist in his 1959 horror novel Psycho, and later the main protagonist of the Psycho franchise. He has an alter ego, Mother, who takes the form of his abusive mother, and later victim, Norma, who in his daily life runs the Bates Motel. He was portrayed by Anthony Perkins in the 1960 film adaptation directed by Alfred Hitchcock and in three sequels. He was also portrayed by Vince Vaughn in the 1998 remake, and by Freddie Highmore in the television series Bates Motel (2013–2017). Unlike the franchise produced by Universal Studios, Norman is not the principal antagonist in Bloch's subsequent novels and is succeeded by copycat killers who assume Norman's identity after his death in Psycho II (1982), although he does return in the licensed continuation novel Psycho: Sanitarium (2016) by Chet Williamson. There is a wide-ranging assumption that the character was directly inspired by the Wisconsin murderer Ed Gein. With Psycho being optioned for film adaptation as a direct result of media attention on Gein, Bloch later revealed he was inspired more by the circumstances surrounding Gein's case—the idea that "the man next door may be a monster unsuspected even in the gossip-ridden microcosm of small-town life." Years later, when the full details of Gein's crimes were revealed, he was struck by "how closely the imaginary character I'd created resembled the real Ed Gein both in overt act and apparent motivation."