When Norman is a teenager, his mother meets Joe Considine (Chet Rudolph in Psycho IV: The Beginning) and plans to marry.

He also speaks to himself in her voice and frequently dresses in her clothes; in his own mind, he becomes his mother in order to escape the awareness of her death and the guilt of having murdered her.

He defies her and has dinner in the motel office with Marion, who takes pity on him and gently suggests that he put his mother in a mental institution.

In the film Psycho II (unrelated to Bloch's novel of the same name), 22 years later, Norman Bates, now supposedly cured, is released from the institution and returns home.

Norman takes a job at a local diner and befriends Emma Spool (Claudia Bryar), the cook, and a waitress named Mary Samuels (Meg Tilly).

His psychiatrist, Dr. Bill Raymond (Robert Loggia), shows him Mrs. Bates' corpse and reveals to him that Mary Samuels is actually Mary Loomis, Sam Loomis' daughter, and is plotting with her mother, Lila, to drive him crazy again in order to get him recommitted; they both dress up as Norman's mother and appear through the window of her bedroom.

One month later, a reporter named Tracy Venable (Roberta Maxwell) latches on to the history of the Bates/Spool families; her research leads her to the story of a love triangle between Norman's father, John, and the Spool sisters, Norma and Emma.

He finds some hope for redemption when he meets and falls in love with a young woman named Maureen Coyle (Diana Scarwid), but "Mother" eventually wins out and kills her.

When Norman finds out that his wife, Connie (Donna Mitchell), is pregnant, he decides to kill her to prevent another of his "cursed" line from entering the world.

She then lost her mind and spent all her time staring out her bedroom window, wearing black funeral clothes while waiting for him to return.

Twenty-seven years after the events of the original film, Norman (Kurt Paul) dies of old age in the asylum, leaving his motel and house to his friend and fellow inmate, Alex West (Bud Cort).

He eventually discovers that the "haunting" is a ruse perpetrated by bank manager Tom Fuller (Gregg Henry), who is trying to scare Alex into selling him the motel so he can renovate it.

This, along with several other traumas Norman suffered as a child, results in his developing an alternate personality, "Mother", who kills anyone whom she believes poses a threat to him or gets in the way of their relationship.

[2] Her parents' names are revealed to be Ray and Francine "Frannie" Calhoun,[3] and she describes her life with them as having been unhappy; her father was an abusive alcoholic while her mother was "sedated all the time.

In the pilot episode, Norma buys a motel in the coastal town of White Pine Bay, Oregon, and moves there with Norman (Freddie Highmore) following the death of her husband Sam Bates (David Cubitt) in Arizona.

[8] In this continuity, Norma has another son, Dylan Massett (Max Thieriot), who was conceived when she was raped as a teenager by her older brother, Caleb Calhoun (Kenny Johnson).

[3] Norma used her pregnancy to escape from her troubled home life; she married her then-boyfriend, John Massett, and passed off her unborn child as his own.

The Bates' neighbor Chick Hogan (Ryan Hurst) accidentally runs Caleb over, and "Mother" helps him and Norman dispose of the body.

[15] When Norman falls for Madeline Loomis (Isabelle McNally), a lonely housewife who bears an uncanny resemblance to Norma, and whose husband Sam (Austin Nichols) is cheating on her, "Mother" becomes jealous and acts out by taking over Norman's mind and making him have sex with a man at a gay bar while dressed in Norma's clothes.

[16] Norman finally begins to suspect that "Mother" is not real, and she confirms that he created her in his mind to deal with things that he could not, such as his abusive father.

[17] When Sam's mistress Marion Crane (Rihanna) checks into the motel, Norman fears that "Mother" will kill her, and tells her to leave and never come back.

Norma Bates was played by Mitzi Koestner, Anna Dore, and Margo Epper as body doubles; and voiced by Virginia Gregg, Jeanette Nolan, and Paul Jasmin (a friend of Anthony Perkins).

Virginia Gregg, Jeanette Nolan, and Paul Jasmin voiced the corpse of Norma Bates in Hitchcock's 1960 film adaptation of Bloch's novel.

John Kassir voiced Norma's silhouette in a 1990 Oatmeal Crisp cereal commercial featuring Anthony Perkins reprising his role as Norman Bates.