Bates Motel EPs Detail Finale's Killer Twist: 'There Was No Other Option' 

The following story contains massive spoilers from this week’s

Reunited and it feels so… gosh darn heartbreaking.

‘s series finale on Monday, Norman (with an assist from brother Dylan) took his own life and was promptly returned to Norma’s loving, heaven-sent arms (read full recap here). It was a fittingly tragic conclusion to the series’ wholly satisfying five-year run — but was it the ending executive producers Kerry Ehrin and Carlton Cuse always envisioned? That was the first of many burning questions I threw out at them about the closing chapter of their

TVLINE | Did you always know the series was going to end with Norman’s death?

CARLTON CUSE | Yes, literally at the very beginning. This is the strangest television series I’ve been involved with in that so much of what we talked about early on actually held up. In a lot of cases, you’re figuring it out as you’re going along — I don’t need to mention any names. Or the show organically evolves in sort of directions that you don’t expect, based on a casting change or other writers come in with other ideas. But [with Bates], we imagined it as a five-year journey ending with Norman’s death.

KERRY EHRIN | The mythology of Psycho sort of locked us into Norman’s death. If you’re telling, like, this dark, profound love story and one person dies, it’s very hard to even contemplate any other ending except that they would somehow be reunited, even if it’s next to each other in the ground. There really was no other option.

EHRIN | Norman’s never been in this for himself. He was in it for his mom. And then he was just trying to survive and recreate his mom. But once all the curtains came down and there was nowhere to go to find her anymore, of course this is what he would want. He did not want to be a person who did bad things. He did not want to be crazy. He did not want to be sedated in a mental institution. There was no option for him that made any sense.

TVLINE | Why didn’t he literally kill himself versus burdening his brother with the job?

EHRIN | He was figuring it out [as he went] during that scene. I don’t think he knew exactly what he was doing when he picked up the knife. He gets a lot of information dumped on him by Dylan in that scene that’s really startling and traumatic, and he doesn’t know how to deal with it. I think as he walks across the room [towards Dylan] he’s figuring out what he’s doing. I think he just as easily, at that last minute, could’ve cut his own throat. It was one of those very emotionally messy scenes and that’s ultimately was what came out of it.

TVLINE | When Norma “left” Norman in the woods at the end, did he cease to have a split personality?

EHRIN | What you saw was what would have happened to him when he was a little kid if he’d never created her. He basically just lost his mind. He’s like a little puppy. He’s like a little kid playing with a doll. He’s completely gone at that point. It’s heartbreaking.

TVLINE | The car ride with Norman and Alex was just hilarious.

TVLINE |  But if Norman’s technically Mother, shouldn’t he have felt some love or even lust for Alex? I half expected Norman to lean over and plant a kiss on him, even if just to further antagonize him.

EHRIN |  Mother is a creation of Norman. And he created the parts of her that he liked. He never liked that part of her [that loved Alex].

TVLINE | What was Alex’s endgame? He was going to go and retrieve Norma’s body and then do what?

EHRIN | Bury it properly and.. shot himself on top of the grave.

TVLINE | So, it would’ve been a much lighter ending for him…

TVLINE |  One thing that really struck me this season: As much as I loved Mother, I really missed Norma. Vera created two very distinct characters.

CUSE | That’s a very prescient observation. When we started making this season and were watching the [rough] cuts [come in] it felt like there was this void in the show without [Norma] there. And we didn’t actually fully expect it. I think when we thought, “Oh, well, Vera’s still going to be in the show — she’s just now playing the dead version of herself.” But it’s a different, distinct character, and there was a real sense of loss that we experienced too.

EHRIN | The heart was gone… Norma was the heart of the show. And it was devastating to have to kill her. But it’s nice that you feel her absence because it makes you feel more for Norman as he tries to fill that bottomless void of missing her. We all miss her.

TVLINE |  That was Vera playing frozen Mother at the dinner table in those final scenes, right?

TVLINE | I want to thank you for giving Dylan and Emma a happy ending.

CUSE |  The ending was so tragic. Somebody had to have a happy ending.

EHRIN | Dylan is, I’m sure, the person who made the tombstone, and given that Norman was a serial killer I think it felt like the most respectful thing was to just put his name and [date of death] as opposed to, like, “Beloved son and brother.” The real gift he gave him was putting him next to his mother.

TVLINE | Last question: Is this really the end?

CUSE | Unless we do something with Dylan and Emma’s satanic child… I think this is the end.

EHRIN | This was a story of a lost little boy. And at the end, he had to be returned to his mom. There’s no other ending for it.

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I literally jumped off the couch seeing Dylan and Emma together with their daughter at the end. I was so afraid that wasn’t going to happen. Thrilled!!!

So glad that Dylan didn’t die, and that Dylan and Emma were still together.

Bates Motel is near the top of the list of my all-time favorite shows. Congratulations to all involved on a job well done!!

I gave Dylan a 50/50 shot of making it out of this episode alive. I’m so glad it went this way.

He’s like a little puppy. He’s like a little kid playing with a doll. He’s completely gone at that point. It’s heartbreaking.

Agreed. Her saying goodbye to him in the woods like that-I was sitting here thinking, “No! No, you can’t leave him alone!” That moment, along with the ending shot of their shared grave, got me all freaking misty-eyed. Seriously, major kudos to this show, and Highmore, for managing to make Norman freaking Bates such a sympathetic, heartbreaking character to the very end. I feel for the families of those who died who won’t get much closure or answers thanks to Norman’s death (though, then again, given some of the people Norman murdered, I don’t even know if they really had anyone left to mourn them to begin with. They were about as lonely as Norman was, really).

But ultimately, I agree that this was the best way for Norman to go out, for all sorts of reasons. And I feel so much for Dylan having to make that ultimate choice to kill him. I’m very glad he managed to find happiness with Emma and his daughter, of course, but I think that seeing what became of his family, remembering what he did to Norman….that’s going to always be in the back of his mind, and that’s going to be tough for him.

I also like the mention of what would’ve happened to Romero had things gone differently in that forest. Yep. Be it by his hand or somebody else’s, he was going to die. Still didn’t make it any less upsetting to watch play out, though.

What a powerful, emotional ending to this show. Well done to the cast and crew-I’m so glad we got this show for five seasons and they could tell their full story and share their amazing talent.

The brief description of the headline had to give the major spoiler? Thanks for ruining the final episode with spoilers before it even airs.

I am not one to complain when the internet spoils something for me, but all I did was swipe left on my smartphone’s home screen in order to check the weather and in the Suggested For You section there was a TV Line article with the major spoiler/twist right in the title! I wasn’t expecting a spoiler right in the headline. Who the hell does that? Given the fate of the original Norman Bates, it ruined would I consider to be one of the most epic twists in television history.

You would think that a website named *TV* Line would know better!

Why the heck would you reveal a major spoiler in the headline? Who does that? Thanks for ruining part of the finale.

This show has been one of the best series ever, but this ending ruined the whole thing. When directors are creating a series or movie they need to learn to stick to the already presented story. Just because your calling the shot’s don’t give you the right to rewrite the story to the point of canceling out what has happened in someone else’s previous release. The directors were beyond short sighted saying this was the only possible way to end it. They could have easily wrote it to where Romero got blamed for the murders and killed allowing Norman to go free to be with his version of Norma to set up the event’s of the psycho film.

Um… your version seems really obvious and lame. I’m glad they did it their way and I really enjoyed the episodes where they created their own version of the Marion Crane story. It was fresh and fun. If they just left it with Norma and “mother” running the hotel,it wouldn’t be that satisfying. Fans want to see what happens when the delusions come to a head and they also want emotional closure. The show got to explore Norman’s psyche in more depth than the film and it was a really satisfying conclusion.

Yea, I really wasn’t invested anymore in what happened with anyone but Dylan & Emma. I honestly didn’t care about Norman or Alex, or anyone else. Despite the fact that Norman was sick, I couldn’t feel much sympathy for him anymore, he had just done too many bad things, including killing Norma. Dylan, on the other hand had been a “good guy” and a sympathetic character from the very beginning, even while he was around unsavory and bad people. He and Emma earned and deserved their happy ending, and I was truly worried about that after last week. So, I was relieved to see them get back to that by the end of the finale. Norman was a tortured soul and that moment of peace & contentment he felt as his life was slipping away was as good as it was ever going to get for him. As for the ending, I agree, there was no other option.

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