Norman Bates is a fictional character created by American author Robert Bloch as the main protagonist in his 1959 horror novel Psycho.
"[2] Both the 1959 novel, and its 1960 film adaptation explain that Norman suffered severe emotional abuse as a child at the hands of his mother, Norma, who preached to him that sexual intercourse was sinful and that all women (except herself) were whores.
[4] In Bloch's 1959 novel and the 1960 Hitchcock film, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), a young woman on the run after stealing money from her employer, checks into the motel one night.
Norman is finally caught when Marion's sister Lila (Vera Miles) and boyfriend, Sam Loomis (John Gavin), arrive at the motel looking for her.
[4][5] In Bloch's 1982 sequel to his first novel, Psycho II, Norman escapes from the psychiatric hospital by killing one of two visiting nuns and donning her habit.
[6] In Bloch's 1991 sequel to his second novel, Psycho House, Norman appears only as a novelty animatronic on display in the Bates Motel, which has been converted into a tourist attraction.
In the novel, Kyoko Kirigiri and her assistant Yui Samidare find themselves participants of the Duel Noir, with an LCD screen of Norman's image (an evolution of his animatronic form, initially mistaken for a "talking painting") uttering lines recorded in the original Norman's voice to speak on the behalf the VCC.
After explaining the game's rules, Norman leads a maid to her death via a burning gun-trap situated under his painting, before announcing that he has to leave to go find his mother.
[7][8][9] In Chet Williamson's 2016 prequel to the second novel, Psycho: Sanitarium, Dr. Felix Reed tries to bring Norman out of a catatonic state.
Sanitarium introduces Robert Newman, Norman's twin brother who was taken away at birth after the attending doctor pronounced him brain damaged.
In 1983's Psycho II, the first sequel to the original film, Norman is released from the institution twenty-two years after his arrest, seemingly cured.
However, a series of mysterious murders occurs, as well as strange appearances and messages from his mother, and Norman slowly loses his grip on sanity.
"Mother" orders Norman to kill Tracy, but in the end he destroys Spool's corpse, attempting to break free of her control.
In this film, Norman has been released from an institution, and is married to one of the hospital's psychologists, a woman named Connie (Donna Mitchell).
When his wife becomes pregnant, he lures her to his mother's house and tries to kill her, wanting to prevent another of his "cursed" line from being born into the world; the film implies that Mrs. Bates (Olivia Hussey) suffered from schizophrenia and borderline personality disorder and passed the illnesses on to her son.
He almost dies in the flames before willing himself to get out, apparently defeating his illness at long last; he is finally free of his mother's voice, which demands to be let out.
He befriends Alex West (Bud Cort), a fellow inmate who had murdered his stepfather, and wills ownership of the titular motel to him before dying of old age.
He kills his abusive father, Sam (David Cubitt), while in a dissociative state, and Norma moves them from Arizona, where he was born and raised, to White Pine Bay, Oregon, to protect him.
[14] The series also introduces his maternal half-brother, Dylan Massett (Max Thieriot) and gives him a love interest in Emma Decody (Olivia Cooke), a classmate with cystic fibrosis.
[18] While there, Norman recovers a memory of witnessing his father rape Norma in a drunken rage after she tried to leave him; it is implied that this trauma fractured his psyche.
He and his "Mother" personality live together as if there is no one else in the world, and she takes care of his problems - such as killing and disposing of a hitman sent by Romero[22] and helping him get rid of his uncle, Norma's brother Caleb (Kenny Johnson), after he discovers the truth.
[23] Norman falls for Madeline Loomis (Isabelle McNally), a lonely woman who bears an uncanny resemblance to Norma, and whose husband Sam (Austin Nichols) is cheating on her.
"Mother" becomes jealous and starts behaving erratically, at one point taking possession of Norman's mind and making him have sex with a man at a gay bar while dressed in Norma's clothes.
[24] 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.
Reportedly, when working on the film, Hitchcock decided that he wanted audiences to be able to sympathize with Norman and genuinely like the character, so he made him more of a "boy next door".
Norman Bates was portrayed by Anthony Perkins in Hitchcock's seminal 1960 film adaptation of Bloch's novel and its three sequels.
Despite being a colorized adaptation of the Hitchcock film, the version of Norman present in the comics resembles the one from Bloch's original novel: a middle-aged, overweight, balding man.
Comic artist Felipe Echevarria has explained that this was due to Perkins' refusal to allow his likeness to be replicated for the books, wanting to disassociate himself with Norman Bates.