Because “Bates Motel” is essentially a modern day prequel to Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, the ending of Norman Bates’ story is a foregone conclusion. One day, Norman will commit a murder that he can’t cover up and it will expose his secrets to the world.
In the meantime, “Bates Motel” is one of A&E’s most popular scripted series with no end date in sight. However, “Bates Motel” executive producer Carlton Cuse feels that the series has a limited life span and he would like to start planning for the end.
While appearing at the Austin Television Festival alongside “Bates Motel” executive producer Kerry Ehrin (via Variety), Cuse said “I feel like we don’t want to do a literal version of what is in [Psycho], because that would feel anticlimactic. The specifics of exactly what happens to them, we have some ideas that I think are good, but it’ll be part of the unique world of our story.”
Cuse added that “this is not a show that should run for 10 years. We feel like this year, we’ll have a pretty good sense of when it’s gonna end … a couple more seasons after that, perhaps? I would hope that we could work that out with Universal and A&E and tell the audience exactly how much longer is left.”
Related: Bates Motel Season 2 Finale Review & Recap
However, Ehrin appeared to be more open to exploring the events of Psycho when “Bates Motel” nears its conclusion. ““It’s gonna be really fun,” said Ehrin. “When you think of Psycho you see it all from this one point of view, [which is not] from Norman’s … What is Anthony Perkins doing in that house? What was he thinking was going on in there? It’s such a rich, fascinating world that will be super fun to dig into when the time comes.”
Ehrin also teased a romance between Norma Bates (Vera Farmiga) and Sheriff Romero (Nestor Carbonell) which may be explored in the third season. “I certainly would advocate for it,” related Ehrin. “We love them; Romero’s an awesome character and they’re very interesting as a couple because they’re so similar – they’re both control freaks, that should be really fun and explosive… There’s a lot of stuff to work with there.”
“Bates Motel” Season 3 will return to A&E in 2015.
