Horror Extreme Movie Catalog

Psycho III (1986) effectively turns 'Psycho' into its own franchise, but few (if any) horror franchises can claim to have every film in the series be both quality AND actually competently continuing the personification of its character(s) (in this case, Norman Bates obviously, who changes very dynamically as the sequels go on), as opposed to merely rehashing the same 'slasher' plot like the Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street series.

It should be noted that you should have seen both Psycho AND Psycho II before watching this, as the plot is a direct continuation from Psycho II (and Psycho II from Psycho, obviously). Though not as good as Psycho II (and few sequels could be), it is still a fantastic flick, scary and haunting. Highly recommended.

Psycho 3 was lousy and I agree that Psycho III was the weakest Psycho installment of them all and that Psycho II seemed to be where the Psycho installments stopped being good.

As a matter of fact, Psycho III seemed foremost like a repeat or a reliving of how the original Psycho was since Norman Bates(Tony Perkins) was just simply reliving his days as a schizophrenic posing as both himself and his dead mother killing customers at the Bates Motel again like he did in the original Psycho, except Psycho III was a lot less heart pounding, a lot less suspenseful, a lot less mysterious, and a lot less genuine, which is what made PSYCHO 3 lag big time, but Psycho I and II were a lot more superb and Anthony Perkins did a much better job at playing Norman Bates in those 2 Psychos, but didn't do so hot in Psycho 3.

Therefore, the Psycho sequels seemed to have started losing their touch when it hit Psycho III, since it wasn't as mysterious or as blood curdling as the first two Psycho installations. So the film makers should've done a better job at making Psycho III, because it's not worth the buy, unlike the original PSYCHO and PSYCHO II.

In addition to that, Psycho 3 was not the most shocking of them all, even though it said so on the advertisements. it was Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho I that was the most shocking of them all as well as the original and still the best to this very day, even though I liked Psycho 2 the best out of the whole Psycho series.

I also suspect that Psycho 3's reason for not being that great and for not being as genuine or a significant as the first 2 was perhaps due to the fact that Tony Perkins had directed Psycho III as well as being the main character in this movie, but I honestly don't think that Tony Perkins did nearly as much of a good job at directing this movie as opposed to directors Richard Franklin(Psycho 2) and Alfred Hitchcock(Psycho I).

In addition to why Psycho 3 wasn't as good as the first 2 Psycho's; the music score done by Carter Burwell wasn't as good nor as creepy nor as intriguing as the music scoring done by Jerry Goldsmith in Psycho II and the music scoring done in Psycho I, although Carter Burwell's music scoring isn't too shabby in general, but Jerry Goldsmith is one of my favorite music composers when it comes to movies.