Just when you thought "Monster" couldn't get any darker, we got "Monsters!" Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the moments from Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s shocking true-crime drama “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.”
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00:00Why did you kill your parents? Because we were afraid.
00:04Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the darkest moments from
00:08Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan's shocking true crime drama Monsters, the Lyle and Eric Menendez story.
00:14Given the disturbing real-life details of the Menendez case, viewer discretion is advised.
00:26Number 10. Lyle confronts Jose
00:29I know what's going on between you and Eric. What? What did you say?
00:32The elder Menendez brother, after having been arrested for the deaths of his parents,
00:36tearfully confesses to a childhood of unfathomable abuse.
00:40In one particularly painful moment, Lyle expresses disgust and regret at his own actions,
00:45especially with regard to how he claims to have treated his brother Eric.
00:48This is done. This is done. You understand? No more between you two.
00:54And you are never, never to touch him. Not ever.
00:58Lyle recalls a particular instance in which he confronted his father Jose
01:02and demanded that the latter put an end to Eric's abuse.
01:05While Lyle initially seems to have the upper hand,
01:08Jose flips the encounter by, as Lyle interprets it, threatening his son's lives.
01:13I mean, I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you, Lyle, because finally you are doing something.
01:18Great! That's my boy. Good! Eric made his choice. You made your choice.
01:26Number 9. Athlete's Foot
01:41It's well known by this point that Eric Menendez was an aspiring tennis champion,
01:45showing a remarkable aptitude for it, and even at times competing on a professional level.
01:50Jose Menendez exploits this in multiple ways, not only putting grinding levels of
01:55pressure on both of his sons to excel, but using it as an opportunity to subject Eric
01:59to further abuse. I remember when you were a baby,
02:04the only thing, the only thing that would make you sleep was rubbing your feet, actually.
02:10They were so tiny, tiny, tiny.
02:12In this scene, Jose, in his domineering, condescending way, forces his younger son
02:16to endure a foot massage, during which Eric turns the tables on his father by
02:20informing him that he intends to become an actor. Jose doesn't take kindly to being disobeyed,
02:26and nefariously forces his son upstairs.
02:29I'm doing modeling and acting, and I'm gonna major in theater,
02:34because I did Shakespeare, Dad, and I'm a good actor. I'm not living here.
02:38I'm going to stay in the dorms. That's what I want to do.
02:40Number 8. The Wire
02:42Total game changer. Like, my bench press has gone up by like 50 pounds.
02:46It's really improved my performance on the court.
02:49Nice!
02:49And I, uh, I started seeing this girl.
02:54While the first season of Monsters stuck pretty closely to the horror genre,
02:58the second delves more into crime drama territory.
03:01That's no more apparent than in this scene from the season's second episode,
03:05in which Eric's old friend Craig Signorelli is recruited by local police
03:08in hopes of securing a confession to Kitty and Jose's slaying.
03:12I think with a few quick rewrites, like, we could totally sell it.
03:16Yeah, maybe.
03:17And now, you know, we could, uh, we could make it more believable.
03:21In a moment that feels like it's straight out of The Sopranos,
03:23Craig attempts to goad Eric into confessing to him again,
03:26using the excuse of dusting off their joint screenplay friends.
03:30Unfortunately for the authorities, Eric doesn't bite.
03:33But not before he puts the fright of a lifetime into Craig.
03:37Because there's no way that we could have done that,
03:39especially in the way that it happened.
03:43Do you think Lyle might have?
03:44No, Lyle didn't do it.
03:46Okay, it has.
03:46I was with him the whole night.
03:48Number 7.
03:49The Last Day.
03:50Meet me at the car.
03:50I need you to be there in one minute, okay?
03:52Stay calm.
03:53A running theme throughout Monsters is the unreliability of memory,
03:57and that no matter who's telling the story at hand,
04:00the viewers should take their statements with a grain of salt.
04:02This is no less true than when Lyle is asked to recount the final day
04:06that he and his brother Eric spent with their parents.
04:08Where are you going?
04:12We're just going to the movies.
04:13Oh, no, you're not.
04:14You're not leaving this house.
04:15We just want to go to the movies.
04:17You're staying right here, and you, Eric, get upstairs.
04:20As noted earlier in the show,
04:22part of the argument that makes up the brothers' defense
04:24is the fear that their father Jose would take drastic measures
04:27if they came forward about their abuse.
04:30In Lyle's recounting, the two are stopped by Kitty and Jose
04:33before being brutally executed by them.
04:35Leslie Abramson, Eric's lawyer,
04:37quickly notes that this is not what occurred in reality.
04:41Your brother is my son and I can do whatever I want with him.
04:43Move away.
04:46Kitty attempts to find the truth.
04:48I love you, Jose.
04:52I love you.
04:54Okay.
04:55It was honestly difficult to decide between this bone-chilling scene
04:58or the one immediately before it,
05:00in which Jose's fear of STDs results in Kitty inspecting Eric for them.
05:05Ultimately, we had to go with the moment in which Kitty
05:07uncharacteristically attempts to openly communicate with Jose.
05:11I need to know what's going on with you and the boys.
05:16What do you mean?
05:19Do you have...
05:22proclivities?
05:23While it's clear that as seen in the rest of the show,
05:26Kitty wouldn't dare to betray or defy her husband,
05:29this scene depicts her mustering up the courage
05:31to take a stand against Jose's abuse.
05:33Of course, Jose, ever the master manipulator,
05:36turns the tables on Kitty, gaslighting her once again
05:39and demonstrating that twisted, deceitful behavior
05:41comes naturally to him.
05:43Oh my god, are you drunk?
05:45You must be drunk in order to ask this kind of question.
05:48Are you?
05:48Tonight? No, I'm not.
05:54No, I never do that.
06:00I'm different from most of your clients.
06:04I don't do this much.
06:07You'd be surprised.
06:08The source of the Menendez family's seemingly vast wealth,
06:12Jose Menendez, as played by Javier Bardem,
06:15frequently contrasts his difficult upbringing
06:17with that of his sons,
06:18whom he considers to be spoiled, lazy, and entitled.
06:21The elder Menendez, as described by Eric and Lyle,
06:24denies that his abuse of them
06:25is in any way related to sexuality.
06:28Instead, he compares it to Greco-Roman, quote, bonding.
06:32What do you know about ancient Rome?
06:34The Greeks, the Spartans,
06:36they created this man in different ways than we do now.
06:42In one scene, Menendez is seen closing a deal
06:45to sign Puerto Rican boy band Menudo to RCA Records.
06:48In the next, Jose celebrates by hiring a young male escort,
06:52donning winged headgear
06:54that evokes the aforementioned Greco-Romans.
06:56The tense, chilling scene gives the audience
06:58a disturbing look into what it is
07:00that makes Jose Menendez tick.
07:02Oh, bring it on!
07:04Bring it on!
07:05Yeah! Yeah!
07:07Number four, Lyle opens up to Leslie Abramson.
07:11Why didn't you tell anybody about the abuse by your father?
07:17You're telling us everything else,
07:19but you're not telling us that.
07:21If you didn't think things had gotten real up to this point,
07:24chances are they started to sink in at this point.
07:27Following a series of scenes
07:28in which the viewer is given glimpses
07:30of Jose Menendez's verbal and emotional abuse of his son Lyle,
07:34kill or be killed goes all in on the allegations
07:37that formed a substantial part
07:38of the Menendez brothers' defense.
07:40Told my cousin she was living with us,
07:44and I wanted to sleep in the basement with her
07:49so that my dad couldn't come down there.
07:51One of the most stomach-churning scenes
07:53in a series full of them
07:54is hearing about the alleged abuse
07:56that Lyle suffered cuts right to the bone,
07:59in no small part thanks to up-and-comer Nicholas Chavez's
08:02captivating, intensely lived-in performance.
08:06She couldn't even understand what I was saying.
08:10How old were you when this started?
08:12Six, I think.
08:14Number three, Lyle takes the stand.
08:16Why did you kill your parents?
08:19Because we were afraid.
08:21Lyle Menendez's testimony is hard to take,
08:23even if viewers are familiar with the details
08:26of his alleged abuse at the hands of his parents,
08:28but particularly his father Jose.
08:30What makes Lyle's time on the stand
08:32even more difficult to watch, though,
08:33is seeing his confident, braggadocious facade melt away.
08:36Once again, Nicholas Chavez shines
08:39as Lyle's over-the-top persona begins to crack,
08:41revealing the depraved depths of the behavior
08:43that Jose exposed him to.
08:45We can't help but feel sympathy for Lyle,
08:47particularly because of his climactic,
08:49tearful apology to brother Eric.
08:51Admittedly, some may feel differently about this scene,
08:54especially given the nature of Lyle's correspondences
08:57with his so-called friend, Norma Novelli.
09:04Number two, the entire fifth episode.
09:07Well, that's when I had Coach Wadlington.
09:09I was six when I started with him,
09:11and I remember it was happening around then,
09:16or, well, the massages did.
09:19How long did it take you to realize
09:21that this episode was going to be executed
09:23as a single jaw-dropping take,
09:25showcasing the mighty acting talents
09:26of Cooper Koch and Ari Grainer?
09:28In any case, it's inarguable that this creative choice
09:31produced one of the best television episodes of 2024.
09:35Well, I knew that my dad didn't like me.
09:39How do you mean?
09:40Just, he was always so mean.
09:44You know, he loved Lyle, but he didn't love me.
09:48Over 40 harrowing minutes,
09:50Leslie Abramson peels back the layers
09:52of Eric Menendez's years of hurt and trauma.
09:55The Hurt Man speaks to the show's larger themes
09:57in raw, heartbreaking fashion,
09:59contrasting the public's hunger for sordid details
10:02with the anguish of the real-life figures
10:04at the heart of the case.
10:05I can't tell what I am,
10:06and I never will be able to tell,
10:08is what I'm saying.
10:09And yeah, maybe I am a sociopath,
10:11and maybe I should have got AIDS,
10:13and maybe I'll only like it this way,
10:14because with girls, it was like,
10:16how could I even know?
10:18Before we continue,
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10:34Number 1. Executing the Plan
10:36So, it was set.
10:39And it was Sunday.
10:42So we had to do it then.
10:44The inciting incident
10:45that sets the series' wheels into motion,
10:48you might not be shocked to find
10:49this act of extreme violence atop our list.
10:52The scene in which the Menendez brothers
10:54take their parents' lives,
10:55as written by monstrous showrunners
10:57Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan,
10:58and expertly directed by Carl Franklin,
11:01is at once both gripping and appalling.
11:04Are we really going to do this?
11:11Yeah.
11:12The filmmakers depict the events
11:13of August 20th, 1989
11:15so brutally and so viscerally
11:17that you almost can't believe
11:19Netflix let them get away with it.
11:20The fallout of the brothers' infamous crime
11:22set the stage for the rest of Monsters,
11:24and cast a shadow over the nascent 90s.
11:27Okay, let's go do this right now.
11:30Which Monsters moment shocked you the most?
11:32Let us know in the comments below.
11:34We know what we have to do now.
11:37What?
11:41We have to kill him.