Hulu’s The Patient streams its penultimate episode, “Auschwitz,” and sets up an intense and surprising twist at the end. Sam has decided to get to the root of his problems and resolve his murderous tendencies once and for all.
Sam decides to kill his father to stop himself from killing anyone ever again. The serial killer gets the idea from another serial killer, precisely Edward Kemper, a real mass murderer active in the 60s and 70s.
In this episode, Dr. Strauss evokes the words of Viktor Frankl, the father of logotherapy who wrote a book titled “Man’s Search for Meaning.” He explains to Sam that the patient needs to find meaningful relationships in life to keep him from obsessing over his raging murderous obsessions.
Upon Strauss’ advice, Sam invites Mary over, but it’s clear after an awkward brunch that the ship has sailed. Strauss points out that subduing of these emotions and his father’s memories have pushed Sam to snap at the most trivial of criticisms.
With that, Sam has a lightbulb moment. He explains how like Edmund Kemper, who killed girls repeatedly imagining he was killing his mother, he needed to kill his father to stop the murders. Before Strauss can stop him, Sam exits the house.
The connection Sam makes between Edmund Kemper and himself is interesting because that may mean after he kills his father, he’ll come clean to the world, just like Kemper. Or maybe not, since he has tried to hide now for so long.
A point to be noted is that Sam is still trying to find the “simple” way out of his condition, which shows that though he may have made some progress in developing empathy, he still has a long way to go.
The Patient will return on Hulu with its final episode next Tuesday.
About The Patient
The Patient is an American psychological thriller limited series created by Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg for FX on Hulu. Premiering on August 30, 2022, the series consists of ten episodes.
Therapist Dr. Strauss is kidnapped and imprisoned by his patient Sam who needs him to find a therapeutical solution to help him stop his homicidal tendencies.
The mini-series stars Domhnall Gleeson, Steve Carell, Linda Emond, Andrew Leeds, Laura Niemi, and David Alan Grier. The thriller series streams on Hulu, with weekly episodes on Tuesday.
Source: HULU
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