Thoughts on Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story

*I haven’t written anything in a while, so please enjoy my quickly written and very train of thought review of this series.*

Lyle and Erik Menendez were failed yet again, in a mini-series with a fantastic cast but a disturbingly fetishistic dramatization of their tragedy.

Let’s get the one major positive of the show out of the way: the acting. I think the performances from Javier Bardem, Chloe Sevigny, Cooper Koch, and Nicholas Chavez are just excellent. They did what they could with the scripts that were given and made it work. Newcomers Koch and Chavez are phenomenal to see on screen. I thought that Chloe Sevigny and Javier Bardem were incredible. They were the main draw for me, and I was not disappointed with them.

Now onto the rest of it. I am a bit of a true crime enjoyer, and went into the show already having a decent knowledge of the case as well as my own convictions as to whether justice was served. There’s no need for me to go into detail on my stance: I think true justice would be resurrecting Jose and Kitty just to shoot them again. You won’t find sympathy for sexual abusers from me even if I understand the gravity of what Lyle and Erik did.

For anyone that is familiar with the case, Ryan Murphy committed a deep injustice to both Lyle and Erik in the portrayal of the crime. From the first episode onward, the “vibes” were awful. It’s truly despicable to me how heavy handed Murphy was with the incest subtext between the brothers - the lip kissing, seductive dancing, caressing, and bedroom stares between Lyle and Erik made my stomach churn, and surely if the men themselves were to watch they’d be mortified. The shower scene? Yeah, this is just some guy’s fetish project. Never, in both my watching of their trial and subsequent interviews, was it ever indicated that their relationship was anything more than a close brotherly bond.

The fetishistic shots of Lyle and Erik sprawled out in their underwear was just more evidence to me that Ryan Murphy has some weird gay hybristophilliac tendency he’s exercising in this work. It all feels very perverse. Sexualizing both the individuals and the relationship they share for dramatic purpose is a particularly nasty act when those in question are victims of Child Sexual Abuse (CSA).

This is a story based on real life, with real people who did not experience what is being portrayed at all. Not only is this just blatantly misrepresenting these real life victims of CSA, it contributes to harmful myths on how decades of CSA can affect a person. It’s extremely problematic to perpetuate the myth that long term CSA can so drastically alter one’s sexual orientation or cause sexual deviance in adulthood.

For sure in the case of Jose Menendez, there exists the theory that he himself was a victim of molestation by his mother. There are shakily substantiated claims of generational CSA in both Kitty and Jose’s childhoods. However, this is a story about Lyle and Erik, and there is zero indication of sexual deviance or incestous relations on their end - so why perpetuate that there is?

The fetishistic and highly sexually charged portrayal of the Menendez Brothers is truly appalling. One of the more notable scenes in the show is one where Erik is speaking about a same-sex sexual experience he had previously had to his defense attorney. This is just another element of Ryan Murphy’s hybristophiliac gay fan fiction. Erik Menendez has never identified himself as gay. All that exists is the accusation of homosexuality by the prosecution (during the notoriously progressive and accepting 80s) as being a source of conflict between him and his father. To pursue this angle, the proscecution heavily scrutinized a period of sexual experimentation that Erik had had at 16. Erik’s abuse made him question his sexuality, but given the way the boys were portrayed I don’t think this is a good-faith depiction of that dimension of his trauma. I think this is another angle of fetishization from Murphy.

This is an extremely bizarre narrative that Murphy has chosen as an opportunity to queerbait (incestbait!?) with, and I can’t understand why. Queerbaiting real-life CSA victims is legitimately insane. The story is interesting on its own merit, without any fictionalization of the sexual identities or proclivities of the characters.

Also, how the abuser Jose Menendez is portrayed is so sexually charged at times that I’m not even sure what is trying to be communicated. Episode 6 has a stand-out scene -- not in a good way -- of Jose buying the time of a male prostitute and having a costumed sexual encounter with him. I think the way that this scene was shot was very inappropriate in terms of intended effect.

Was this scene meant to showcase the bizarrely deviant sexual identity of the character? If so, why shoot a low-lit scene of a consensual BDSM-adjacent encounter between two adult men? This is very strange to me given the litany of accusations against Jose to choose to depict. Why create a fictional encounter between him and some muscular twink? Wouldn’t it have made more sense, and better illustrated his…proclivities, to have dramatized other pedophilic accusations that were levied against him? Like the cousins who witnessed Jose’s rape of the boys? His showcasing of child pornography to dinner guests? The naked, highly sexualized photos of both preschool-aged Lyle and Erik that were found in his possession? His molestation and rape of the Menudo band members? His repeated attempts to hire underage sex workers? Come on Ryan Murphy, you weird little freak!!

The choices in what to dramatize and how is questionable to me.

Had this story had the same exact cast, with a different writer/director, it would have been a really great opportunity for the public to revisit the Menendez case. I, for one, think that their continued imprisonment is such a clear and obvious miscarriage of justice. There’s absolutely no question that they killed their parents (obviously) but let’s be serious: given the circumstances of their crime, are they likely to reoffend?

Call me naive, but I think not.

When it comes to the tired claim of them being spoiled brats who killed for money, it’s such all-or-nothing reasoning. First off, the grand jury refused to indict on the charge of financial gain. Breaking news: Rich kids with dead parents continue the lifestyle they were previously afforded. Kitty and Jose lived so lavishly anyway, why would the brothers need to kill for money? Secondly, they can be spoiled, entitled young men, and also be victims of long-term sexual abuse. Why pretend those are incompatible realities? Does wealth preclude child abuse? I hate the idea that you have to be a perfect victim to be worthy of sympathy. I truly question the depiction of Lyle as this entitled, spoiled psychopath in a way that possibly casts doubt onto his claims of abuse, particularly in contrast to his perfect victim brother.

Lyle and Erik having finally had the abuse they endured come out to the public were met with ridicule and mockery (SNL karma will come for you!!!). Now decades later, just when the tides were seemingly turning for their public perception, they have this nasty, untruthful portrayal of them hit the mainstream. Heavily fetishized, totally fictionalized, just vapid entertainment. I pray that we as a public may one day relitigate our stance on their guilt. Instead, all Ryan Murphy has succeeded in doing was adding an angle of perversity to the shameful legacy of how the media treats male sexual abuse victims.