A Gruesome New Murder Mystery Was Just Added to Netflix

I have a fun treat for you guys this week. Netflix dropped a gruesome new thriller that’s based on a real life axe murder in rural New York. You can do one of my favorite comfort activities which is reading about the real life murder while watching the fictionalized version of that murder on TV. There’s even been a huge break in the case since the book and script for the movie were written for you to catch up on.

That movie is Things Heard & Seen, streaming on Netflix. Based on the novel All Things Cease to Appear by Elizabeth Brundage this murder mystery stars Amanda Seyfried as Catherine Clare, a woman who is axe-murdered in 1979. In a flashback to a year before the murder, Catherine and her husband George (played by James Norton) purchase their dream home in small-town New York and move from the city with their daughter Franny. Catherine is unaware the previous owners died by murder-suicide in the home. George teaches at a local college, and Catherine fixes up their new home. She hires the orphaned boys of the home’s previous owners to help her, though George suspects they resent the couple for buying their childhood home.

This looks pretty good:

Make a guess about who you think the axe murderer is going to be in our weekend open thread.

As a good elder millennial I dutifully tried my best to get into the Bret Easton Ellis written Smiley Face Killers horror movie which was added to Prime this month, but I struggled. If you’re an American Psycho fan (or a fan of Ellis’ most high-brow work: the Lindsay Lohan/James Deen erotic thriller The Canyons) you should queue it up and make our own decision.

Is The Handmaid’s Tale horror? It’s scary enough, but there’s very little gore. Season 4 premiered earlier this week on Hulu. For more creepy factor you can read about lead actress Elisabeth Moss’ sci-fi cult, Scientology, and their “Operation Snow White” where they tried to steal unfavorable files about themselves from the government. As part of investigating the operation, the FBI also uncovered Scientology’s “Operation Freakout” which was a plot to get a journalist they didn’t like committed to a psychiatric hospital. Fun fact: there are 5,000 government officials around the world confirmed to be in with Scientology.

Creepy Link Library

• Here’s all the info on the unsolved crime Things Heard & Seen is based on, plus the #rare recent developments in the 40 year old murder mystery.
• I read bonkers horrifying things every day and this is the most bonkers horrifying story I’ve read in awhile. Cassie Jo Stoddart was murdered while housesitting by two “friends” who planned the murder for weeks, claiming they were inspired by the horror movie Scream.
• The full story of Operation Snow White mentioned above.
• Shereef Johnson tells us why the Halloween remakes aren’t good.
• A very, very sad story about a 10-year-old boy in Texas whose parents punished him to death.
• Theory that Australia “doesn’t exist”.
• Another update in the ‘down the hill’ murders case. We love to see it!!!
• Do cold cases get solved in threes? We had that break in the Kristin Smart case, hopefully a good suspect in the Delphi murders, and now news from Australia that they are looking to put a 70-year old cold case to rest. The famous mystery of the Somerton Man might be solved as Australian police announced they are going to exhume the body to do DNA testing and hopefully identify the body. This case is sometimes called the tamám shud case as the man had a piece of paper in his pocket that said the Persian phrase. It means “finished”.

Happy streaming and stay spooky!