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Over the past few weeks, I’ve dissected three major horror-movie types: the vampire, the zombie and the Thing Without a Name. This week I thought I’d take a little detour and examine a real monster using the same rubric as I’ve been developing here. (Not that he’s really my “favorite,” mind you; having a “favorite” serial killer is pretty gross.) For some reason I’ve found myself thinking a bit about John Wayne Gacy — due largely to the fact, I think, that I’ve had Sufjan Stevens’ Come on Feel the Illinoise stuck on repeat in my car. The haunting track “John Wayne Gacy, Jr.” is an apt introduction to today’s topic, via an unauthorized (an unexpectedly affecting) music video for it:
For those of you unfamiliar with the basic facts of his case, Gacy summed it up himself once when he told a friend, in a kind of half-confession: “”I do a lot of rotten, horrible things, but I do a lot of good things too.” Those “good things” included dressed up like a clown (”Pogo”) to entertain kids in hospitals, throwing huge block parties in his Chicago neighborhood, chairing a local Street Lighting District and serving on his local Democratic Committee. Before moving to Chicago, he managed a KFC in Waterloo Iowa. Here’s an incredible — mundane, but creepy — interview conducted with Gacy at his restaurant:
But if the “good things” were many, the “rotten, horrible things” were far more numerous: between 1976-1978 he raped and murdered 33 young men and buried them in a crawl space beneath his house, making him at the time of his 1979 arrest one of the most prolific American serial killers to date.
So what kind of monster does this make him?
The vampire
In classical terms, the vampire is a perfect gentleman whose fatal flaw is a horrible addiction — to blood. That unfortunate trait makes the vampire an archetypal serial killer, forced to plot his killings, execute them under cover of night and always come back for more. So too Gacy, who seemed to his neighbors like such a model citizen, but was actually a ghoul in disguise, unable to curb unspeakable urges.
The Thing Without a Name
The most easily-recognizable Thing Without a Name is probably Pennywise the Clown from Stephen King’s It, who, let’s face it, is modeled after Gacy. It is a shape-shifting entity who appears as a clown to children and young boys in order to lure and kill them; Gacy in effect shifted shapes every time he peeled off his clown mask. In Silence of the Lambs, there’s a scene where someone asks Clarice about Hannibal Lecter: “What is he, a vampire or something?” She responds: “They don’t have a name for what he is.” So too with Gacy: all you can do is list his symptoms and his crimes; there’s no one word for what he was.
Above left: Gacy as “Pogo.” Right: Tim Curry as “Pennywise.”
The Werewolf
Another way of talking about his “shape-shifting” is the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde story — to many, Gacy was the ever-pleasant Dr. Jekyll; to others, especially those he picked up hitchhiking, he was the horrible Mr. Hyde. The classic werewolf trope.
Perhaps this is why Gacy, of all serial killers, has so pervaded pop culture — besides the songs, books and films made about him, there are also the paintings he created himself while in prison. Collected by some for their novelty value (and purchased by others just to destroy them), filmmaker John Waters owns one, which he says hangs in his guest bedroom “so people don’t stay too long.” Despite Gacy’s crudeness, their creepiness is undeniable:
“Handprint and Clowns”
“Mickey”
“Clown and Skull”
*shivers*
In my hometown of Kenosha, WI several friends had his initials in the foundations of their homes. Creepy.
posted by Amanda on 3-25-2008 at 12:14 pm
I think that it’s just fascinating. Jason, I really gotta give you kudos on the segue (if that is what any of the other stories were even intended to be). Looking at the true monsters that pop up in history really makes the fake monsters look kind of silly. I especially liked drawing similarities about the fact and the fiction of the monsters that you have examined. It seems to shed some light on the inspiration that the people who made up the ficticious characters may have been running with when they were created.
I’ve been thinking about this ongoing thread over the past couple of weeks I and was trying to think of what really bound all of the different monsters together and it seems that, for the most part, all of the monsters have religious undertones and most likely have religious origins (undoubtedly for the vampires (sons of cain) and the zombies (hell is full and all)). The serial killer on the other hand throws a screw in this in that it’s real. Which makes it even more frightening.
It might be interesting to dig into this a little bit deeper. Either the serial killer avenue or the origin stories. Either way it looks good so far.
posted by Gary on 3-25-2008 at 12:38 pm
One more thing. My girlfriend absolutely hates John Wayne Gacy, Jr. by Sufjan Stevens. She thinks it’s disturbing. It might be the whole “he took off all their clothes for them, he put a cough on their lips, quiet hand, quiet kiss.” Personally, I think that it may decorate the situation a bit, but it’s just such a beautiful song.
posted by Gary on 3-25-2008 at 12:48 pm
I live in the suburbs of Chicago. When i was in high school, my High school sociology teacher told us she sold Gacy the limes that he used to attempt to disolve the bodies of those boys. She worked at a local market that was near his house, and was required to testify in his trial. She always said he was the nicest guy, throwing big parties in the neighborhood and always talking the the neighborhood kids. Nothing creeps me out more than knowing things like that happen right outside your front door.
posted by Dayna on 3-25-2008 at 1:27 pm
um…gary….you’re sort of creeping me out.
posted by Tommy on 3-25-2008 at 2:31 pm
This is a great addition for your monsters. It brings to mind the movie 8MM with Nicholas Cage. At the end the “killer” says he did it “because I like it.” That has got to be the creepiest part of real evil.
posted by Gregory on 3-26-2008 at 2:21 am
Help, I can’t get the music video or the interview to open. I have tried right clicking and left clicking on the box, but…nothing. What do I need to do?
posted by Catherine on 3-26-2008 at 8:09 am
What kind of monster would you categorize Gacy? The worst kind - because he’s the real deal…Vampires are scary because we imagine them…but when your neighbor is a serial killer, there’s nothing more frightening than that…hiding under your covers won’t save you from that kind of monster…
What have we learned from Gacy and other serial killers? Never give your kid the middle name of ‘Wayne’…
posted by donner on 3-26-2008 at 9:10 am
I found some informal Wayne-related middle name serial killer confirmation…(click my name to go to the website…
posted by donner on 3-26-2008 at 9:14 am
one of my fav. singer/freakshow gg allin was really good friends with him, they wrote letters(while he was in prison)and were just big fans of each other and gacy did a couple of paintings of him. i always thought was cool, in a weird sick way. but hey both of them were in their on sick world.
posted by meta on 3-26-2008 at 3:10 pm
one of my fav. singer/freakshow gg allin was really good friends with him, they wrote letters(while he was in prison)and were just big fans of each other and gacy did a couple of paintings of him. i always thought was cool, in a weird sick way. but hey both of them were in their on sick world.
posted by meta on 3-26-2008 at 3:11 pm
1) At the beginning of the music video it says Fresno Police Department presents. …I live in Fresno. Alright, just a little disturbing.
2) It’s good that you took a chance to bring in a real monster into this segment. As disturbing as it is. I’m on my speech and debate team at my high school, and I do an event called Thematic Interpretation, basically taking selected cuttings of books, songs, plays, poems, stories, whatever, and weaving them together into a 10 minute piece to convey a theme
…My theme is monsters, called “Not Just Make Believe”. The intro into mine goes like this: “When we are children, monsters hide in the closet, under the bed, in the dark shadowy corners of our room. But as we get older, the monsters grow with us. The line between fantasy and fact begins to wave, then fade, as we realize monsters aren’t just make believe, but perhaps more terrifyingly, created by us in our image.” Then I go into my pieces, which include a children’s book about a boy who hears a voice saying I’m going to eat you, and he looks everywhere, finding a bogeyman, a sea serpant, a werewolf and a ghost, not fazed by them, until finding his little sister - the monster eating the cookie. I also have the actual confession of Aileen Wuornos (it’s creepy.), a cutting from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and a cutting from Frankenstein, with the song The Boogie Monster by Gnarls Barkley woven in.
Anyway, the point of that was basically to say that it is frightening how the scariest monsters are the ones that look just like you and me.
Keep on truckin’ with this segment.
posted by Cat on 3-26-2008 at 10:45 pm