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This interrupted ending of ‘Psycho’ is made even scarier when you see what Apple TV recommends to watch next

Poke Reporter. Updated September 28th, 2024

The age of streaming has transformed our television-viewing experience. Sometimes in good ways, sometimes in bad ways.

Firmly in the ‘bad ways’ category – very, very, very bad – is the habit of streamers interrupting the very end of a movie or show, or the end credits entirely, with recommendations for what to watch next.

And this week, we got a real classic of the genre. Twitter/X user @VHSdude went viral after sharing his experience of watching Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho on Apple TV. At the very end, just as Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) is speaking to himself about not harming a fly and murder victim Marion Crane’s (Janet Leigh) car is being pulled from the swamp, the screen shrinks to display ads for two US sitcoms.

The fact that one of the sitcoms is The Big Bang Theory just seems to exacerbate the cultural vandalism taking place. Shrinking the screen means you also lose the blink-and-miss-it dissolve of Norman’s face and his mother’s skull in the last seconds.

But aside from anything else, surely it’s just bad algorithmic work to recommend two shiny, happy-clappy sitcoms after watching the most famous horror movie ever made? Or is it meant as counter-programming after the scares and tensions of the Hitchcock classic? Who knows!

People had thoughts, as you’d expect.

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