Let’s talk about the biggest question that American Psycho leaves us with:
Did Patrick Bateman actually kill anyone? Or was it all in his head? This is the debate that refuses to die. The film never gives us a straight answer, and that’s exactly why people are still obsessed with it.
Here’s the thing: the last twenty minutes are pure chaos. Bateman goes on a killing spree, shoots at cops, blows up a police car, confesses everything to his lawyer… and then? Nothing happens. No consequences. No arrests. Paul Allen is apparently alive. His lawyer laughs in his face.
What the hell just happened?
Some people think it means none of the murders were real, that Bateman, desperate for power in a world that ignores him, imagined everything just to feel like he had control. Maybe he wanted to be a monster so badly that he convinced himself he was one.
But then there’s another possibility.
What if Bateman did kill all those people… and nobody cared?
Think about it. This is a world where no one listens, no one remembers names, no one pays attention to anything unless it affects them personally. The people around Bateman are so self-absorbed, so detached from reality, that they literally don’t register that a serial killer is walking among them.
And that? That’s even scarier than the idea of it being in his head.
Bateman lives in a society that values appearances over morality.
But the second he tries to confess his crimes, when he wants to be seen for who he truly is, nobody listens.
He tells his lawyer everything, and the guy just laughs it off. Why? Because in this world, image is more real than truth.
This is the film’s darkest idea:
It doesn’t matter if you do horrible things, as long as you play the part of someone successful.
And if that doesn’t sound terrifying, look around. We still live in a world where wealth and power can erase even the worst sins. Where monsters wear expensive suits and shake hands with politicians.
American Psycho is fiction, but is it really?