To its credit, Psycho II doesn’t take the easy and obvious path it could’ve taken. Norman doesn’t escape a mental institution and start killing people. He doesn’t get released and start killing people. He doesn’t even kill anyone until the last few moments of the film. For all intents and purposes, Norman starts off Psycho II a victor, not for being freed by the law but for being free from the mental shackles that ruined his life. Despite all he’s done, like murdering Marion Crane, the Norman of Psycho II is the Norman that was so easy to like in Psycho when divorced from the mental illness that plagued him, a mild-mannered, awkward, but ultimately decent guy at heart.
In essence, Psycho II dares us to root for this former murderer, for his rehabilitation to stick so that he can get on with his life, something that most slasher sequels simply don’t do. We don’t go to see a Friday the 13th movie to see Jason have second thoughts, put down his machete and start atoning for his sins, or an Elm Street film to watch Freddy change his ways and start giving people happy dreams. As much as we expect to see a movie called Psycho II have its titular nutcase have a mental breakdown and start stacking up bodies left and right as fast as possible, the sequel instead subverts that expectation by making us genuinely root for Norman to stay on the straight and narrow, even if there’s a little voice in the back of our heads waiting to cheer if and when the snap comes and he stumbles from the path.
That said, when Lila petitions to keep Norman locked up, arguing that the system would rather protect criminals than its victims, it’s hard not to sympathize with her. As likable as Norman may be, he still committed murders nonetheless, and the possibility of relapse is something to worry about no matter how sane he may present. The film takes strides to present both opinions of Norman’s second chance, wisely leaving it up to the audience to make up our own mind even if it does lean heavily into evolving Norman into a sympathetic, tragic figure as it rolls along.
To that end, Perkins does fantastic work here. When he finally returns home, ascending the steps towards his long-abandoned abode, he does so slowly and nervously, scared of what the house represents even as it seems to be sucking him right back into its pull, and once he has Mary come to the house, he asks her to stay, afraid to be alone. Everywhere he turns, he’s haunted by his past, whether it’s in instinctively reaching for the key to Room #1 at the motel when getting Mary a room or his hesitation after finding a knife in a kitchen drawer. Late in the film, he tells Mary that he can’t remember the good memories about his mother before breaking down crying, and with the house being all he has, one filled with nothing but bad memories, it feels as though Norman is trapped, hurtling towards a monstrous fate he simply can’t avoid.