My Final Verdict on Monsters: The Erik & Lyle Menendez Story

 

 

In my initial review of Monsters: The Erik & Lyle Menendez story I put forth the argument that this season far more clearly was a spiritual heir to American Crime Story than Dahmer was. This would turn out to be more accurate then I know, though had I remembered recent history it shouldn’t have been.

In the penultimate episode of the season Erik is told that he has to clean the floors because “they’re expecting an MVP today.” The day in question in June 17, 1994 and Erik is cleaning when he sees the infamous white Bronco chase that The People Vs. O.J. Simpson famously showed us every side of its landmark second episode.

Now we get an angle as Simpson (who we hear but never see) is walked into the cell with the guards making it clear how much they admire him. Erik (Cooper Koch) says hello and O.J.’s actually surprised to know that they’re still in there. O.J. makes it clear that the domestic abuse charge is B.S “Nicole’s the one who beat him” he says with an arrogance we never saw from Cuba Gooding Jr. Erik tells him that he knows Robert Shapiro is on his team and points out how badly he screwed him over. The last line of the episode is telling: “You should talk about a plea.” The final episode ends with the infamous reading of the verdict in O.J.’s trial. By this point Lyle now thinks this is exactly the kind of thing they should use for their case, and by this points it’s pretty clear the only person who has any illusions about the kind of people she’s representing is Leslie Grossman herself. That she seems willing to cling to it even by the end of the trial and the final verdict says far more about her then it does about the idea that there was a miscarriage of justice; well before that point I’d realized just the kind of monsters that Erik and Lyle were.

The direct link between the two trials is no doubt one reason that Ryan Murphy decided to tell this story on Netflix instead of part of American Crime Story. The second reason is far clearer. I came away from the third episode having some doubts about culpability when it came to why Erik and Lyle committed the shocking murders of their parents. And indeed in the next two episodes Murphy and his writers lean hard into the idea that Lyle and Erik were guilty of some of the most horrific and graphic abuse possible. ‘The Hurt Man’, essentially a monologue by Lyle and certainly the episode Cooper Koch will submit for Emmy consideration, is a tour de force of television because Lyle describes it to Leslie in such graphic and detailed terms that there’s no way you can’t believe it didn’t happen. The episode is the exact halfway point of the season and it is the pinnacle of the empathy we feel for Erik and Lyle. From that point on the writers choose to take us in a completely different direction.

‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’ is the longest episode of the season, nearly an hour and five minutes. It basically tells us the love story of Jose (Javier Bardem) and Kitty (Chloe Sevigny). The first lines Sevigny says is that she hates her kids and we’re inclined to belief this episode will tell us what monsters they were. That’s not the story we get.

The episode tells us the story of Lyle and Erik from the perspective of their parents and it shows them in a very different light. At this point we’ve only seen their side of the story; now we see them in the past – and they come across as entitled, spoiled brats who are the picture of entitlement. We see Jose look aggrieved but not angry and tellingly we see Kitty trying to help her sons with their horrible script both of them acting horribly to her – and then seeing her have a seizure and the two of them just watch. This seems to lead to a change in Jose and he seems determined to take responsibility for his actions. We see him making restitution for the crimes his sons committed – and them being horrible at apologizing – we see him ending his extramarital affair and giving up smoking and drinking, and we see both he and Kitty renewing their love for each other.

The episode argues that abuse may have taken place, perhaps even some sexual, though Jose refuses to admit it. What it does reveal, however, is that both Jose and Kitty were subject to physical abuse when they were children – and in a late night phone call, Jose calls his mother demanding she apologize and she denies it. It’s not an excuse for what Jose and Kitty did if it happened (and the next episodes will start to throw into doubt) but it’s definitely an explanation.

During the next two episodes we see the first trial taking place and we also get a very clear hint that everything Lyle and Erik said was an act. We see them manipulating their friends in phone calls, constantly trying to manipulate them with letters, and perhaps more tellingly not doing a great job with their mock testimony. By this point Dominic Dunne (Nathan Lane), who never believed in their story points out his own investigation and the numerous holes in it that, tellingly, Leslie seems willing to overlook. When Lyle testifies Dunne talks to Leslie and tells him: “He’s either the victim of the most horrible abuse I’ve ever heard or a complete psychopath and what horrifies me is I can’t tell the difference.” It’s telling that by this point we’re beginning to think the latter but Leslie is still convinced of the former.

The next episode “Seismic Shifts” shows Erik back to the manic attitude, certain that there’s a movie and TV show and he wants them to cast who’s going to play him (It’s telling for Erik that with the choice of every possible movie star, he picks B-Movie action star Brian Bosworth for him.) The episode talks about both the earthquake but also how momentum is beginning to shift. Erik’s testimony is famously comes across horribly in the media. Leslie gives an impassioned and incredibly long argument to the jury and the verdict ends in a mistrial. Her reaction is “Blame the men.”

Immediately afterwards she interviews the female jurors to find out where they went wrong with the male jurors. After their finish one of them comes to her and says that the problem wasn’t with Erik and Lyle but with you. After this, things begin to deteriorate badly. First the money begins to dry up and Erik’s attorney resigns in large part because of a book that reveals all the horrible secrets about the manipulations they gave. Leslie goes to see Lyle and tells them that things are going badly. She wants to leave the case and Lyle starts to blame her for a horrible approach to the defense.

I come away from Monsters most unable to understand Leslie Grossman, played by Ari Gaynor. Despite how bad things deteriorate well before the second trial, despite everything she knows and sees with her clients, she refuses to believe in that there isn’t some mitigating factor in their actions. Perhaps she’s pot committed to it at this point, perhaps she feels her reputation is being impugned.

Much of the final episode deals with the prosecution which we didn’t see in the first trial. Carcetti, played by that brilliant talent Paul Adelstein, is remarkable as he paints a picture that fits into what we the viewer already know about Erik and Lyle and now is backed up with evidence. The episode also does much to damage what empathy we had for Grossman. Impassioned before, she comes across as something of a harpy, basically objecting at every word out of Carcetti’s mouth, constantly moving for a mistrial and eventually starting to play hangman with Erik as if she genuinely doesn’t care about appearances any more. You almost wonder if she was going to try for an appeal on the idea of inadequate council in the aftermath given that she plays it worse than any attorney I’ve seen in the most melodramatic 1990s David E. Kelley series.

The trial ends with both Lyle and Erik convicted of first-degree murder and as we see they may have only escaped the death penalty due to fate (though ironically, it is a male juror that saves them rather than a female one) That Leslie comes away from this still convinced that of all the clients she’s acquitted in her career that Erik and Lyle are the least dangerous leads to a DA saying: “Leslie. They shot their parents while they were asleep.”

The final reason why Monsters most likely airs on Netflix and not as part of American Crime Story is that, unlike any of his previous incarnations on that classic show, Murphy and his writers are very clear who the victims are and that there is no mitigation for the killers. The final scene involves that fishing trip we’ve heard talked about multiple times and a fictionalized conversation between the parents on one side and the children on the other. We see Jose and Kitty looking relaxed and genuinely happy and Lyle and Erik making it very clear what they have planned and that they feel no remorse about it. There’s none of the uncertainty we’ve seen in other episodes, none of the doubt. We’re looking at two stone cold killers.

I’m not the kind to argue about the mitigating factors in the trials of Erik and Lyle Menendez. Coming away from Monsters I come across with one impression: they’re guilty as hell and they deserve to spend the rest of their lives in prison. Even if the abuse allegations were true – and by the time Monsters is over, it’s clear the writers are leaning against it -  their actions are that of entitled, spoiled brats who will get no sympathy from me. They don’t know how lucky they are to still be alive. I’ve never been in favor of capital punishment as a deterrent but it’s hard for even the most bleeding heart liberal (Leslie Grossman types) to not think “In this case….”

As to Monsters it’s very much worthy to be a contender for Emmys in the months to come. Koch has been the early favorite but I’d argue Chavez’s work is the more remarkable. Watching his scenes being driven to the memorial of his parents and then to and from the courtroom for his murder trial six years later is terrifying because it shows a man who is delusional and insane in a way that Lyle just isn’t. Nominations will likely follow for Javier Bardem and there’s an excellent case to be made both for Gaynor and Nathan Lane, who are remarkable represented either side of the debate on the Menendez trial.

Justice was served in the Menendez case: I come away from Monsters absolutely certain of that. I know there will always be people who want to believe in mitigating factors or that there’s something redeemable in both of them. I have as little use for them as Dunne does as the trials continue. I understand that some are using Monsters to argue for early release for Erik and Lyle. Those people clearly didn’t see the series I did – or if they did believed the message Grossman was telling and not what actually happened.

My score: 5 Stars.