WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.859 Okay, so I want you to start by picturing two 00:00:02.859 --> 00:00:04.919 images in your head. Just hold them there for 00:00:04.919 --> 00:00:08.380 a second. Okay. On one side, you've got the absolute 00:00:08.380 --> 00:00:12.519 pinnacle of 1950s Hollywood glamour. Okay. Blonde 00:00:12.519 --> 00:00:15.539 curls, red lips, that white dress blowing up 00:00:15.539 --> 00:00:18.039 over a subway grate. You know the one. The American 00:00:18.039 --> 00:00:20.359 dream, basically, in a dress. Marilyn Monroe, 00:00:20.500 --> 00:00:23.000 no question. Exactly. Now, on the other side 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:25.179 of your mind, picture the total opposite. The 00:00:25.179 --> 00:00:29.679 gritty, terrifying... The underbelly of the late 00:00:29.679 --> 00:00:34.460 1960s. A wild eyed cult leader swastika carved 00:00:34.460 --> 00:00:37.500 into his forehead. The man who you could argue 00:00:37.500 --> 00:00:39.520 pretty much put a bullet in the head of the whole 00:00:39.520 --> 00:00:42.240 free love movement. Charles Manson. Charles Manson. 00:00:42.240 --> 00:00:44.340 Now here's the thing. Smash those two images 00:00:44.340 --> 00:00:46.380 together. What do you get? You get well you get 00:00:46.380 --> 00:00:48.380 a thesis statement. You get a brand. A brand. 00:00:48.479 --> 00:00:51.710 That's a good way to put it. You get a guy. who 00:00:51.710 --> 00:00:53.570 decided that those two figures, the ultimate 00:00:53.570 --> 00:00:55.570 sex symbol and the ultimate serial killer, are, 00:00:55.609 --> 00:00:57.570 in the eyes of the American public, kind of the 00:00:57.570 --> 00:01:00.329 same thing. You get Marilyn Manson. And that's 00:01:00.329 --> 00:01:02.670 our deep dive today. We are not just talking 00:01:02.670 --> 00:01:05.549 about a rock star who wore spooky contact lenses 00:01:05.549 --> 00:01:08.310 and ripped fishnets. No, not at all. We are looking 00:01:08.310 --> 00:01:13.530 at a figure who, for, what, 30 years, acted as 00:01:13.530 --> 00:01:15.409 a sort of heat -seeking missile for American 00:01:15.409 --> 00:01:17.750 outrage. Whatever the culture was afraid of, 00:01:17.829 --> 00:01:20.879 he became it. It is a massive story. And I'm 00:01:20.879 --> 00:01:22.640 looking at our sources here, the stack of research 00:01:22.640 --> 00:01:25.239 and the trajectory is, I mean, it's frankly exhausting 00:01:25.239 --> 00:01:27.239 to even look at. It really is. We're going from 00:01:27.239 --> 00:01:30.019 a super strict Christian school in Canton, Ohio, 00:01:30.359 --> 00:01:33.540 all the way to the absolute heights of MTV fame. 00:01:34.090 --> 00:01:35.969 Then to being the dead center of the Columbine 00:01:35.969 --> 00:01:38.189 hysteria. And then finally, finally into the 00:01:38.189 --> 00:01:39.950 courtroom, into the courtroom battles of the 00:01:39.950 --> 00:01:43.109 2020s, where that whole monster persona suddenly 00:01:43.109 --> 00:01:47.230 had very, very real and very serious legal consequences. 00:01:47.269 --> 00:01:49.469 And that is really the mission today, isn't it? 00:01:49.799 --> 00:01:51.480 When you try and figure out how Brian Warner, 00:01:51.599 --> 00:01:53.319 who was basically a nerdy journalism student, 00:01:53.599 --> 00:01:56.379 how he constructed this Marilyn Manson character, 00:01:56.680 --> 00:01:59.299 how he used it to manipulate the media, the public, 00:01:59.420 --> 00:02:02.480 everyone. And then the big question, whether 00:02:02.480 --> 00:02:05.140 in the end the character actually consumed the 00:02:05.140 --> 00:02:09.599 man. And we have to ask that hard question. When 00:02:09.599 --> 00:02:11.900 you build your entire career on being the villain, 00:02:12.060 --> 00:02:15.039 what happens when the world finally turns around 00:02:15.039 --> 00:02:17.379 and decides you actually are one? Let's start 00:02:17.379 --> 00:02:19.449 at the very beginning. Because usually when you 00:02:19.449 --> 00:02:21.370 hear about these shock rockers, you expect, you 00:02:21.370 --> 00:02:24.689 know, the cliche, a broken home, life on the 00:02:24.689 --> 00:02:27.090 streets, that kind of thing. Right. The standard 00:02:27.090 --> 00:02:29.590 tortured artist backstory. The Brian Warner's 00:02:29.590 --> 00:02:32.669 origin story is, well, it's surprisingly suburban. 00:02:32.729 --> 00:02:35.930 It is. So he was born in 1969, Canton, Ohio. 00:02:36.590 --> 00:02:39.669 Brian Hugh Warner. His background is this this 00:02:39.669 --> 00:02:44.080 mix of English, German. Irish. Yeah. Even some 00:02:44.080 --> 00:02:46.280 Sioux heritage in there. And his parents. His 00:02:46.280 --> 00:02:48.539 father, Hugh, was Catholic. His mom, Barbara, 00:02:48.659 --> 00:02:51.139 was Episcopal. But the key detail in all the 00:02:51.139 --> 00:02:52.939 early notes, the thing that really seems to have 00:02:52.939 --> 00:02:54.919 wired his brain for everything that came later, 00:02:55.020 --> 00:02:56.960 is where he went to school. Heritage Christian 00:02:56.960 --> 00:02:59.419 School. Exactly. From first to 10th grade. And 00:02:59.419 --> 00:03:00.599 you have to understand that this was not just 00:03:00.599 --> 00:03:02.300 a say your prayers before lunch kind of place. 00:03:02.439 --> 00:03:05.599 Yeah. This was deep, authoritarian, fear -based 00:03:05.599 --> 00:03:08.259 religious instruction. The whole nine yards. 00:03:08.659 --> 00:03:11.520 There's this one specific detail in their research. 00:03:11.689 --> 00:03:14.129 I just love because the irony is so thick you 00:03:14.129 --> 00:03:16.370 could cut it with a knife. It feels like it's 00:03:16.370 --> 00:03:18.189 out of a movie script. Oh, I think I know what 00:03:18.189 --> 00:03:19.810 you're talking about. The instructors there, 00:03:19.889 --> 00:03:22.330 they had a very specific curriculum when it came 00:03:22.330 --> 00:03:25.430 to music. They did. They would hold these seminars 00:03:25.430 --> 00:03:28.629 and they'd play rock music for the kids. Bands 00:03:28.629 --> 00:03:31.330 like Black Sabbath, Queen, Led Zeppelin. The 00:03:31.330 --> 00:03:34.150 classics of evil. Right. And they would analyze 00:03:34.150 --> 00:03:37.569 the lyrics with the kids line by line to show 00:03:37.569 --> 00:03:41.199 them exactly how satanic and how evil. This music 00:03:41.199 --> 00:03:43.259 was. Which, if you know anything at all about 00:03:43.259 --> 00:03:45.819 teenage psychology. It's the biggest mistake 00:03:45.819 --> 00:03:47.780 you could possibly make. It's like telling someone, 00:03:47.860 --> 00:03:50.139 whatever you do, don't think about a pink elephant. 00:03:50.280 --> 00:03:52.280 Of course. They thought they were inoculating 00:03:52.280 --> 00:03:54.680 these kids against the devil's music. But for 00:03:54.680 --> 00:03:56.900 Brian Warner, it was just a shopping list. He's 00:03:56.900 --> 00:03:59.000 just sitting there taking notes. He's sitting 00:03:59.000 --> 00:04:01.259 there listening to these forbidden sounds. And 00:04:01.259 --> 00:04:03.439 instead of being repulsed, he's thinking, wow, 00:04:03.580 --> 00:04:05.759 this sounds incredible. And if these authority 00:04:05.759 --> 00:04:08.560 figures hate it this much, it must be really 00:04:08.560 --> 00:04:12.180 powerful. So the school, in trying to demonize 00:04:12.180 --> 00:04:15.319 it, actually handed him the blueprint for his 00:04:15.319 --> 00:04:18.019 entire career. 100%. Yeah. They taught him exactly 00:04:18.019 --> 00:04:20.720 which buttons to push to make religious conservatives 00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:23.120 absolutely lose their minds. They handed him 00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:25.740 the manual. He learned early on that fear is 00:04:25.740 --> 00:04:28.040 a form of control, but it's also a form of attention. 00:04:28.279 --> 00:04:31.209 That's it. If you can terrify the authority figure, 00:04:31.430 --> 00:04:33.629 you have a strange kind of power over them. So 00:04:33.629 --> 00:04:36.050 he eventually gets picked out or he leaves. It's 00:04:36.050 --> 00:04:38.930 a bit unclear. He moves to a public school and 00:04:38.930 --> 00:04:42.490 then the whole family relocates to Fort Lauderdale, 00:04:42.490 --> 00:04:44.930 Florida. And this is a part of the timeline that 00:04:44.930 --> 00:04:47.189 I think a lot of people just skip over. He doesn't 00:04:47.189 --> 00:04:49.029 just grab a microphone and start screaming into 00:04:49.029 --> 00:04:51.250 it. He goes to college. Right. Broward Community 00:04:51.250 --> 00:04:54.050 College. Yeah. And what he majors in is crucial. 00:04:54.969 --> 00:04:57.750 Journalism. So he isn't just an angry kid with 00:04:57.750 --> 00:05:01.889 a guitar. He's an intellectual kid who is actively 00:05:01.889 --> 00:05:05.149 analyzing how the media machine works. He gets 00:05:05.149 --> 00:05:07.970 a job at a music magazine called 25th Parallel. 00:05:08.009 --> 00:05:09.689 And look at who he's interviewing. It's not, 00:05:09.709 --> 00:05:12.069 you know, the local garage bands trying to make 00:05:12.069 --> 00:05:15.189 it. No, no. He is talking to the heavy hitters 00:05:15.189 --> 00:05:17.350 of the whole industrial and alternative scene. 00:05:17.810 --> 00:05:20.329 He interviews groovy man from my life with a 00:05:20.329 --> 00:05:24.879 thrill kill cult. And then the big one. He interviews 00:05:24.879 --> 00:05:27.839 Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. I mean, that 00:05:27.839 --> 00:05:30.040 is a meeting your destiny moment if I've ever 00:05:30.040 --> 00:05:32.279 heard one. It really was. But think about the 00:05:32.279 --> 00:05:35.240 dynamic there. He's the interviewer. He is studying 00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:38.139 Reznor. He's asking questions about image, about 00:05:38.139 --> 00:05:40.779 manipulation, about how you construct a persona. 00:05:41.060 --> 00:05:42.899 He's learning the mechanics of fame from the 00:05:42.899 --> 00:05:45.379 other side of the notepad. Exactly. He's seeing 00:05:45.379 --> 00:05:47.220 that it's all a construct. It's all manufactured. 00:05:47.560 --> 00:05:50.259 And he's thinking, I can do that. So when he 00:05:50.259 --> 00:05:52.519 finally decides to start his own band in 1989, 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:55.800 Marilyn Manson and the Spooky Kids, he's already 00:05:55.800 --> 00:05:58.199 treating it like a media project, not just, you 00:05:58.199 --> 00:06:00.620 know, four guys in a room making noise. Precisely. 00:06:00.620 --> 00:06:03.079 He teams up with a guitarist named Scott Pitesky, 00:06:03.160 --> 00:06:06.800 who takes on the name Daisy Berkowitz. And there's 00:06:06.800 --> 00:06:08.660 that naming convention again. Right there from 00:06:08.660 --> 00:06:11.660 day one. Daisy Duke, the all -American sex symbol, 00:06:11.740 --> 00:06:14.860 and David Berkowitz, the son of Sam Killer. The 00:06:14.860 --> 00:06:16.899 concept was locked in from the very beginning. 00:06:17.230 --> 00:06:19.050 And the early shows they were doing in South 00:06:19.050 --> 00:06:22.550 Florida, spectacle feels like a very polite word 00:06:22.550 --> 00:06:24.589 for it. Oh, yeah. The notes mentioned things 00:06:24.589 --> 00:06:28.490 like amateur pyrotechnics, band members in lingerie. 00:06:28.769 --> 00:06:32.329 Naked women nailed to crucifixes, children locked 00:06:32.329 --> 00:06:34.769 in cages on stage. I mean, it was pure shock 00:06:34.769 --> 00:06:37.129 theater. It sounds like an absolute fever dream. 00:06:37.430 --> 00:06:39.290 It was performance art designed to completely 00:06:39.290 --> 00:06:41.610 bypass your critical brain and go straight for 00:06:41.610 --> 00:06:43.629 the gut. They wanted a reaction. Any reaction. 00:06:44.069 --> 00:06:47.110 Disgust, fear. arousal it didn't matter as long 00:06:47.110 --> 00:06:49.470 as it wasn't boredom boredom was the enemy there 00:06:49.470 --> 00:06:52.110 is one story from that era that i think just 00:06:52.110 --> 00:06:54.089 perfectly encapsulates his whole psychological 00:06:54.089 --> 00:06:57.129 approach to the audience the donkey pinata oh 00:06:57.129 --> 00:07:00.610 this is classic early manson it's so clever in 00:07:00.610 --> 00:07:04.160 its own twisted way so set the scene It's a crowded, 00:07:04.259 --> 00:07:06.959 sweaty club in Florida. He hangs a pinata over 00:07:06.959 --> 00:07:08.939 the audience, and he puts a stick on the edge 00:07:08.939 --> 00:07:10.759 of the stage. But he doesn't tell them, hey, 00:07:10.879 --> 00:07:12.519 come up and hit it. No, he does the opposite. 00:07:12.759 --> 00:07:14.639 He gets on the microphone and starts pleading 00:07:14.639 --> 00:07:16.800 with them, please don't hurt this pinata. It's 00:07:16.800 --> 00:07:18.980 innocent. Whatever you do, don't do it. Which 00:07:18.980 --> 00:07:21.019 is just daring them. It's a perverse psychology 00:07:21.019 --> 00:07:24.139 101. Of course. The crowd sees the stick, they 00:07:24.139 --> 00:07:26.779 see the pinata, and the guy on stage is telling 00:07:26.779 --> 00:07:30.250 them no. So... The mob mentality just takes over 00:07:30.250 --> 00:07:32.389 instantly. Someone grabs the stick and they just 00:07:32.389 --> 00:07:35.029 smash the thing to absolute pieces. And they're 00:07:35.029 --> 00:07:37.569 all expecting candy to fall out. And instead, 00:07:37.790 --> 00:07:41.209 they get showered with butcher shop refuse, cow 00:07:41.209 --> 00:07:45.550 brains, pig intestines, just unidentifiable organs 00:07:45.550 --> 00:07:48.089 raining down on them. And it's just repulsive. 00:07:48.370 --> 00:07:50.649 It is. But look at the lesson he's teaching them. 00:07:50.810 --> 00:07:53.810 He proved that the crowd's destructive impulse 00:07:53.810 --> 00:07:56.420 was their own. They were the ones who chose to 00:07:56.420 --> 00:07:59.220 smash it. He explicitly told them to stop. He 00:07:59.220 --> 00:08:01.639 made them complicit in their own horror. That 00:08:01.639 --> 00:08:03.720 is the Marilyn Manson experience in a nutshell. 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:05.620 I'm just holding up a mirror. You're the ones 00:08:05.620 --> 00:08:08.139 reflecting something ugly back. Clearly, that 00:08:08.139 --> 00:08:10.480 level of intelligence and that absolute willingness 00:08:10.480 --> 00:08:13.160 to cross every single line, it caught Trent Reznor's 00:08:13.160 --> 00:08:15.620 attention. Big time. Reznor signs them to his 00:08:15.620 --> 00:08:18.879 label, Nothing Records, in 1993. They drop the 00:08:18.879 --> 00:08:21.100 Spooky Kids from the name. It's just Marilyn 00:08:21.100 --> 00:08:24.379 Manson now. And we get the debut album, Portrait 00:08:24.379 --> 00:08:26.800 of an American Family. Which was a solid industrial 00:08:26.800 --> 00:08:29.740 record. It was very sample heavy, very kitschy, 00:08:29.759 --> 00:08:32.559 full of these weird audio clips from old movies. 00:08:32.779 --> 00:08:35.360 But it wasn't the big breakthrough. No, the real 00:08:35.360 --> 00:08:38.240 breakthrough comes with the remix EP that followed, 00:08:38.419 --> 00:08:42.240 Smells Like Children. And specifically, one track 00:08:42.240 --> 00:08:45.519 on that EP, the cover of the Eurythmics' Sweet 00:08:45.519 --> 00:08:48.940 Dreams, are made of this. I still remember seeing 00:08:48.940 --> 00:08:51.419 that video for the first time on MTV. It was 00:08:51.419 --> 00:08:55.000 terrifying. Manson in a tutu riding a pig, just 00:08:55.000 --> 00:08:57.740 looking like a glitch in reality. It was inescapable. 00:08:57.860 --> 00:09:01.019 And the song itself is so much slower. So much. 00:09:01.910 --> 00:09:03.909 Sludgier than the original. That was the genius 00:09:03.909 --> 00:09:06.769 of it. Yeah. He took this shiny, bouncing, 80s 00:09:06.769 --> 00:09:09.490 synth -pop hit and he stripped all the joy and 00:09:09.490 --> 00:09:12.090 gloss out of it. He just left the creepy, voyeuristic 00:09:12.090 --> 00:09:14.529 lyrics exposed. Some of them want to abuse you. 00:09:14.549 --> 00:09:16.409 Some of them want to be abused. When Annie Lennox 00:09:16.409 --> 00:09:19.149 sang it, it sounded cynical and cool. When Manson 00:09:19.149 --> 00:09:20.950 sang it, it sounded like an actual threat. And 00:09:20.950 --> 00:09:23.190 that video with that song just blew up. It put 00:09:23.190 --> 00:09:25.889 them on the map. It did. It set the stage for 00:09:25.889 --> 00:09:28.809 what many fans now call the Triptych, three albums 00:09:28.809 --> 00:09:31.309 that completely define his career and his impact. 00:09:31.789 --> 00:09:34.529 Antichrist Superstar, Mechanical Animals, and 00:09:34.529 --> 00:09:37.429 Hollywood. This is where the band moves from 00:09:37.429 --> 00:09:41.250 being a sort of cult sideshow to a genuine main 00:09:41.250 --> 00:09:43.769 event. And it starts with Antichrist Superstar 00:09:43.769 --> 00:09:47.350 in 1996, produced again by Trent Reznor. This 00:09:47.350 --> 00:09:50.529 is the boogeyman era. The music on this album... 00:09:51.009 --> 00:09:55.110 It's just oppressive. It's so dense and abrasive. 00:09:55.269 --> 00:09:58.309 It's industrial metal at its absolute peak. You've 00:09:58.309 --> 00:10:00.750 got these heavily distorted guitars, processed 00:10:00.750 --> 00:10:03.690 drums, and Manson's vocals, which we should probably 00:10:03.690 --> 00:10:05.570 talk about technically for a second. Yeah, let's 00:10:05.570 --> 00:10:07.470 dig into that because a lot of people just dismiss 00:10:07.470 --> 00:10:09.190 him as a shouter, but the notes here mention 00:10:09.190 --> 00:10:11.350 he's actually a baritone with a pretty massive 00:10:11.350 --> 00:10:14.230 range. A three octave range, yeah. He can go 00:10:14.230 --> 00:10:16.990 from a really low, grumbling vocal, what's called 00:10:16.990 --> 00:10:19.690 the fry register, all the way up to a piercing 00:10:19.690 --> 00:10:21.529 whistle register. ginger scream. He had a lot 00:10:21.529 --> 00:10:23.929 of tools in his vocal toolbox. But there's this 00:10:23.929 --> 00:10:26.190 really weird detail in the technical notes about 00:10:26.190 --> 00:10:27.870 something called the pentagram theory. Right. 00:10:27.929 --> 00:10:29.929 This sounds like pure marketing spin, but lay 00:10:29.929 --> 00:10:32.769 it on me. So the claim, and this supposedly came 00:10:32.769 --> 00:10:35.090 from a mixing engineer who worked on the album, 00:10:35.190 --> 00:10:39.070 is that Manson uses five very distinct vocal 00:10:39.070 --> 00:10:42.659 tones or textures in his singing. Okay. And if 00:10:42.659 --> 00:10:45.759 you run his isolated vocal tracks through a phrasal 00:10:45.759 --> 00:10:48.259 analyzer, the frequency spikes that show up on 00:10:48.259 --> 00:10:50.960 the screen actually form the geometric shape 00:10:50.960 --> 00:10:53.580 of a pentagram. Okay, that has to be a myth. 00:10:53.639 --> 00:10:55.399 That just sounds way too convenient to be true. 00:10:55.620 --> 00:10:57.299 It's almost certainly a studio legend that he 00:10:57.299 --> 00:11:00.639 happily encouraged. It's great marketing. Even 00:11:00.639 --> 00:11:03.179 if it isn't literally true, it speaks to how 00:11:03.179 --> 00:11:05.559 meticulously constructed the sound was. Nothing 00:11:05.559 --> 00:11:07.879 was accidental. Nothing. The distortion, the 00:11:07.879 --> 00:11:10.580 whispering, the sudden screams, it was all designed 00:11:10.580 --> 00:11:12.840 specifically to unsettle you on a subconscious 00:11:12.840 --> 00:11:15.620 level. And it absolutely worked. The album debuted 00:11:15.620 --> 00:11:17.940 at number three on the Billboard 200. It was 00:11:17.940 --> 00:11:20.740 a massive commercial hit. But the backlash was 00:11:20.740 --> 00:11:23.799 immediate and ferocious. We're not just talking 00:11:23.799 --> 00:11:25.960 about angry parents writing letters to the editor 00:11:25.960 --> 00:11:28.080 this time. We're talking about the U .S. Senate 00:11:28.080 --> 00:11:29.980 getting involved. Senator Joseph. Lieberman. 00:11:30.120 --> 00:11:33.000 He called them, and this is a direct quote, the 00:11:33.000 --> 00:11:36.000 sickest group ever promoted by a mainstream record 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:38.100 company. You had the American Family Association 00:11:38.100 --> 00:11:41.419 handing out pamphlets at their concerts, claiming 00:11:41.419 --> 00:11:44.620 the band sacrificed live animals on stage and 00:11:44.620 --> 00:11:47.639 engaged in bestiality. Total fabricates. Complete 00:11:47.639 --> 00:11:50.610 nonsense. But it brings us right back to that 00:11:50.610 --> 00:11:53.549 forbidden fruit idea from his childhood. The 00:11:53.549 --> 00:11:56.110 more the senators screamed, the more records 00:11:56.110 --> 00:11:58.409 he sold. He became the official enemy of the 00:11:58.409 --> 00:12:01.090 state, which is exactly what a disaffected teenager 00:12:01.090 --> 00:12:04.289 in 1996 wanted to listen to. He was validating 00:12:04.289 --> 00:12:06.330 all their anger and alienation. He was their 00:12:06.330 --> 00:12:09.110 champion. But then 1998 rolls around. He's the 00:12:09.110 --> 00:12:11.549 biggest, most notorious shock rocker in the world. 00:12:11.629 --> 00:12:14.529 He releases mechanical animals and people put 00:12:14.529 --> 00:12:16.590 the CD in. They're expecting more of that grinding 00:12:16.590 --> 00:12:20.360 industrial noise. Instead, they get glam rock. 00:12:20.600 --> 00:12:23.500 This was a massive, massive risk. A huge pivot. 00:12:23.659 --> 00:12:25.960 He completely traded the torn tights and the 00:12:25.960 --> 00:12:29.659 stage rot for, like, sequined jumpsuits and feathers. 00:12:29.879 --> 00:12:31.940 He became an alien. He created a whole new character, 00:12:32.100 --> 00:12:34.899 Omega, this androgynous extraterrestrial. He 00:12:34.899 --> 00:12:37.500 was channeling David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust 100%. 00:12:37.500 --> 00:12:41.159 But why? Why do that? Why mess with a formula 00:12:41.159 --> 00:12:44.159 that was so clearly working? Because he was terrified 00:12:44.159 --> 00:12:47.409 of becoming a caricature. He said it explicitly 00:12:47.409 --> 00:12:49.370 in interviews. He said, I don't want to be a 00:12:49.370 --> 00:12:51.789 cartoon monster for the rest of my life. He wanted 00:12:51.789 --> 00:12:54.049 to prove he was a musician, a songwriter, not 00:12:54.049 --> 00:12:57.529 just a scarecrow. And the music is. It's genuinely 00:12:57.529 --> 00:13:00.269 catchy. I mean, the dope show has a massive hook. 00:13:00.490 --> 00:13:03.370 It's polished. It's slick. Lyrically, it's this 00:13:03.370 --> 00:13:06.269 big critique of the drug culture and superficiality 00:13:06.269 --> 00:13:09.350 of Hollywood. But the fan base was deeply divided. 00:13:09.570 --> 00:13:12.169 I bet. A lot of the metalheads felt totally betrayed. 00:13:12.490 --> 00:13:14.769 They called him a sellout. The album debuted 00:13:14.769 --> 00:13:17.309 at number one, which was huge, but it actually 00:13:17.309 --> 00:13:20.470 sold fewer copies in the long run than Antichrist 00:13:20.470 --> 00:13:23.350 Superstar. It alienated part of his core audience. 00:13:23.649 --> 00:13:25.190 It's interesting, though, because looking back 00:13:25.190 --> 00:13:27.850 now, a lot of critics point to Mechanical Animals 00:13:27.850 --> 00:13:30.669 as his best musical work. It's aged surprisingly 00:13:30.669 --> 00:13:33.470 well. It has. It showed he had range and that 00:13:33.470 --> 00:13:35.590 there was more to him than just shock value. 00:13:35.889 --> 00:13:39.110 But that artistic evolution was it was cut short 00:13:39.110 --> 00:13:40.909 by an event that he had absolutely nothing to 00:13:40.909 --> 00:13:43.090 do with, but that ended up defining his legacy 00:13:43.090 --> 00:13:47.240 forever. Columbine, April 20th, 1999. We have 00:13:47.240 --> 00:13:48.980 to slow down here because this is the moment 00:13:48.980 --> 00:13:52.000 where the whole Marilyn Manson project stops 00:13:52.000 --> 00:13:55.000 being fun and games and performance art. This 00:13:55.000 --> 00:13:56.700 is where it gets real. The shooting happens. 00:13:56.980 --> 00:13:59.379 Two students kill 12 of their classmates and 00:13:59.379 --> 00:14:02.159 a teacher before killing themselves. And almost 00:14:02.159 --> 00:14:05.159 immediately, the news media, desperate for a 00:14:05.159 --> 00:14:07.279 simple answer, starts saying they were wearing 00:14:07.279 --> 00:14:10.519 Marilyn Manson T -shirts, which was false. Completely. 00:14:10.519 --> 00:14:13.200 They were super fans. They were obsessed with 00:14:13.200 --> 00:14:16.000 his music. Also false. The police investigation 00:14:16.000 --> 00:14:18.580 later showed that the shooters. Eric Harris and 00:14:18.580 --> 00:14:21.320 Dylan Klebold actually disliked Manson's music. 00:14:21.440 --> 00:14:24.159 They thought he was too commercial, too mainstream. 00:14:24.500 --> 00:14:26.919 They listened to German industrial bands like 00:14:26.919 --> 00:14:30.269 KMFDM and Ramstein. Right. But the truth didn't 00:14:30.269 --> 00:14:32.649 matter, not in that moment. The narrative was 00:14:32.649 --> 00:14:35.870 set in stone within hours. America needed a reason 00:14:35.870 --> 00:14:38.029 why two of its suburban kids would do this, and 00:14:38.029 --> 00:14:40.269 Marilyn Manson was the perfect, easy answer. 00:14:40.370 --> 00:14:42.909 It was a full -blown moral panic. The heat on 00:14:42.909 --> 00:14:45.149 him was intense. He had Bill O 'Reilly on Fox 00:14:45.149 --> 00:14:47.570 News. The 24 -hour news cycle was just relentless. 00:14:48.210 --> 00:14:50.029 Politicians were sending letters to his record 00:14:50.029 --> 00:14:52.970 label, Seagram, demanding they stop distributing 00:14:52.970 --> 00:14:56.789 his music. The mayor of Denver successfully petitioned 00:14:56.789 --> 00:14:59.090 to get his upcoming concert in the city canceled. 00:14:59.730 --> 00:15:02.129 And Manson says later in his book that this effectively 00:15:02.129 --> 00:15:05.210 destroyed his career. He went from being a notorious 00:15:05.210 --> 00:15:07.870 rock star to being an absolute pariah overnight. 00:15:08.009 --> 00:15:10.190 He was getting death threats. But this is also 00:15:10.190 --> 00:15:12.389 where he showed his intellect again. He didn't 00:15:12.389 --> 00:15:15.480 just hide. He fought back. He wrote an op -ed 00:15:15.480 --> 00:15:18.399 for Rolling Stone magazine. Yeah, titled Columbine, 00:15:18.399 --> 00:15:20.860 Whose Fault Is It? Exactly. I went back and read 00:15:20.860 --> 00:15:23.480 that piece for this deep dive. It is incredibly 00:15:23.480 --> 00:15:26.700 lucid and well -argued. He basically says the 00:15:26.700 --> 00:15:28.980 media is the one to blame. He pointed out the 00:15:28.980 --> 00:15:31.980 staggering hypocrisy. The news was broadcasting 00:15:31.980 --> 00:15:35.519 the shooters' faces and names 247, making them 00:15:35.519 --> 00:15:38.220 famous, giving them the exact infamy they craved. 00:15:38.299 --> 00:15:41.320 And yet they were blaming a musician for influencing 00:15:41.320 --> 00:15:43.899 violence. He argued the news was creating a culture 00:15:43.899 --> 00:15:46.340 of fear because fear sells advertisements and 00:15:46.340 --> 00:15:48.539 gets ratings. And then came the interview in 00:15:48.539 --> 00:15:51.399 Michael Moore's documentary Bowling for Columbine. 00:15:51.600 --> 00:15:54.720 That was a huge turning point for a lot of skeptics, 00:15:54.720 --> 00:15:57.360 I think. It really was. Moore sits down with 00:15:57.360 --> 00:15:59.659 him and asks him. If you were to talk to the 00:15:59.659 --> 00:16:01.659 kids at Columbine and the people in that community, 00:16:01.899 --> 00:16:04.210 what would you say to them? And Manson just pauses 00:16:04.210 --> 00:16:06.389 for a long time. And then he says, I wouldn't 00:16:06.389 --> 00:16:08.070 say a single word to them. I would listen to 00:16:08.070 --> 00:16:09.970 what they have to say. And that's what no one 00:16:09.970 --> 00:16:13.450 did. It was such a surprisingly human, empathetic 00:16:13.450 --> 00:16:16.929 response. It completely disarmed his critics. 00:16:17.190 --> 00:16:19.990 It made the protesters holding signs outside 00:16:19.990 --> 00:16:23.330 his shows look like the irrational ones. It legitimized 00:16:23.330 --> 00:16:25.789 him in a way nothing else could have. He went 00:16:25.789 --> 00:16:28.789 from being a cartoon villain to a serious spokesperson 00:16:28.789 --> 00:16:32.789 for free speech. And his response album, Holywood, 00:16:33.179 --> 00:16:35.519 was a direct result of that. It was a return 00:16:35.519 --> 00:16:39.220 to that heavy, angry sound. But the anger was 00:16:39.220 --> 00:16:42.000 focused entirely on this experience, on being 00:16:42.000 --> 00:16:44.059 the scapegoat, on being the nail that sticks 00:16:44.059 --> 00:16:46.139 out and gets hammered down. But before we move 00:16:46.139 --> 00:16:47.840 on from this, I want to touch on something else 00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:50.399 in the scapegoat file, because Columbine wasn't 00:16:50.399 --> 00:16:52.440 the only time he was blamed for a crime he had 00:16:52.440 --> 00:16:55.080 nothing to do with. No, the media developed a 00:16:55.080 --> 00:16:58.250 really ugly pattern. It was like every time a 00:16:58.250 --> 00:17:00.509 troubled teenager dressed in black did something 00:17:00.509 --> 00:17:03.149 terrible, Manson's name was the first one they 00:17:03.149 --> 00:17:05.890 reached for. There was the murder of a nun in 00:17:05.890 --> 00:17:08.829 Italy. Yes, and the Jody Jones murder in Scotland 00:17:08.829 --> 00:17:12.190 in 2003. The killer in that case, Luke Mitchell, 00:17:12.390 --> 00:17:15.250 had bought a Manson album a few days before the 00:17:15.250 --> 00:17:17.529 murder. And the tabloids just ran with it. They 00:17:17.529 --> 00:17:19.849 ran with it, implying the music made him do it, 00:17:19.869 --> 00:17:22.480 as if a CD can possess someone. And then there 00:17:22.480 --> 00:17:25.000 were school shootings in Cleveland in 2007 and 00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:27.819 again in Louisiana in 2009. And in both of those 00:17:27.819 --> 00:17:30.400 cases, the perpetrators either wore a Manson 00:17:30.400 --> 00:17:33.079 shirt or referenced him. It became this awful, 00:17:33.200 --> 00:17:35.759 self -fulfilling prophecy because the media had 00:17:35.759 --> 00:17:37.559 already labeled him the patron saint of school 00:17:37.559 --> 00:17:40.259 shooters. So troubled kids who wanted that kind 00:17:40.259 --> 00:17:42.900 of notoriety started identifying with him to 00:17:42.900 --> 00:17:45.799 fit the role. It's a tragic, vicious loop. So 00:17:45.799 --> 00:17:48.519 he survives Columbine, keeps touring, keeps making 00:17:48.519 --> 00:17:51.480 music. But as we move into the 2000s, he starts 00:17:51.480 --> 00:17:53.880 branching out. He wants to be seen as more than 00:17:53.880 --> 00:17:55.759 just a musician. He wants to be a multimedia 00:17:55.759 --> 00:17:58.319 artist. And starts painting watercolors of all 00:17:58.319 --> 00:18:00.660 things. Yeah, that's surprising. And again, you 00:18:00.660 --> 00:18:02.559 might expect him to just, you know, splash some 00:18:02.559 --> 00:18:05.039 blood on a canvas and call it a day. But he was 00:18:05.039 --> 00:18:07.480 serious about it. He actually collaborated on 00:18:07.480 --> 00:18:09.720 an exhibition with the filmmaker David Lynch. 00:18:10.140 --> 00:18:13.000 Although the notes here say his early sales strategy 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:18.190 was... Let's say unconventional. Yes. He apparently 00:18:18.190 --> 00:18:21.269 traded some of his early paintings to drug dealers. 00:18:21.730 --> 00:18:24.890 Like, here's a watercolor of a mutilated body. 00:18:24.970 --> 00:18:28.210 Can I have some cocaine? That absolutely tracks 00:18:28.210 --> 00:18:31.009 with the persona. But art critics were genuinely 00:18:31.009 --> 00:18:34.009 split on his work. Some dismissed it as just, 00:18:34.049 --> 00:18:36.089 you know, celebrity scribbles that were only 00:18:36.089 --> 00:18:38.890 valuable because of his name. But others, including 00:18:38.890 --> 00:18:41.589 critics at the New York Times, admitted there 00:18:41.589 --> 00:18:43.990 was a real aesthetic there. It was grotesque, 00:18:43.990 --> 00:18:46.230 for sure, but he had a distinct and recognizable 00:18:46.230 --> 00:18:49.009 style. And he had a name for it. He called the 00:18:49.009 --> 00:18:50.769 whole movement the Solibertarian Corporation. 00:18:51.329 --> 00:18:54.630 And the slogan was, We will sell our shadow to 00:18:54.630 --> 00:18:56.799 those who stand within it. Which is both profound 00:18:56.799 --> 00:18:59.759 and incredibly creepy. It's very consistent with 00:18:59.759 --> 00:19:02.480 his whole worldview. He's obsessed with this 00:19:02.480 --> 00:19:05.839 idea of fame as a commodity that eats you alive. 00:19:06.119 --> 00:19:09.539 That your shadow, your image, becomes more valuable 00:19:09.539 --> 00:19:11.779 than your actual self. And then there's the acting. 00:19:11.839 --> 00:19:14.400 He makes his debut in a David Lynch film, Lost 00:19:14.400 --> 00:19:17.539 Highway. A perfect fit. Lynch's surrealism and 00:19:17.539 --> 00:19:19.880 Manson's aesthetic are a match made in heaven. 00:19:20.380 --> 00:19:23.279 Or hell. But he also popped up in some surprisingly 00:19:23.279 --> 00:19:26.880 mainstream stuff. He played a white supremacist 00:19:26.880 --> 00:19:29.740 leader Ron Tully in the final season of Sons 00:19:29.740 --> 00:19:32.700 of Anarchy. He was a barber slash surgeon in 00:19:32.700 --> 00:19:34.740 the horror show Salem. He even played himself 00:19:34.740 --> 00:19:37.519 in Californication. He clearly enjoyed dipping 00:19:37.519 --> 00:19:39.480 his toe into the Hollywood machine he was always 00:19:39.480 --> 00:19:42.240 criticizing. And we can't forget the booze. He 00:19:42.240 --> 00:19:44.549 launched his own brand of absinthe. He called 00:19:44.549 --> 00:19:47.049 it Mansanth. Of course he did. Which, and this 00:19:47.049 --> 00:19:48.970 is the crazy part, actually won a gold medal 00:19:48.970 --> 00:19:51.309 at the 2008 San Francisco World Spirits Competition. 00:19:51.730 --> 00:19:54.650 It wasn't just some cheap cash grab. It was apparently 00:19:54.650 --> 00:19:57.730 a legitimately decent product. Critics initially 00:19:57.730 --> 00:20:00.289 called the taste plain, but the judges at the 00:20:00.289 --> 00:20:03.849 competition disagreed. So by the mid -2000s, 00:20:03.849 --> 00:20:06.589 he's sort of settled into this new role as an 00:20:06.589 --> 00:20:09.380 elder statesman of goth. He isn't terrifying 00:20:09.380 --> 00:20:11.700 grandmothers anymore. He's winning awards for 00:20:11.700 --> 00:20:13.900 his looker and he's dating movie stars. And those 00:20:13.900 --> 00:20:16.180 relationships are absolutely key to understanding 00:20:16.180 --> 00:20:18.940 the next and most difficult phase of his life. 00:20:19.019 --> 00:20:22.140 Right. The romances. All very high profile. First, 00:20:22.259 --> 00:20:24.380 there was Rose McGowan in the late 90s. They 00:20:24.380 --> 00:20:27.500 were engaged. That ended with them citing lifestyle 00:20:27.500 --> 00:20:29.940 differences. Then Dita Von Teese. The burlesque 00:20:29.940 --> 00:20:32.900 queen. This was arguably his aesthetic peak. 00:20:33.220 --> 00:20:35.240 The two of them together look like a living art 00:20:35.240 --> 00:20:37.640 project. They got married in a castle in Ireland 00:20:37.640 --> 00:20:41.420 in 2005. The ceremony was officiated by Alejandro 00:20:41.420 --> 00:20:43.599 Jodorowsky, the legendary avant -garde director. 00:20:43.880 --> 00:20:45.880 It was all a very high concept. But it didn't 00:20:45.880 --> 00:20:49.619 last long. Divorced in 2007. Dita cited his partying 00:20:49.619 --> 00:20:51.819 and his relationship with another woman as the 00:20:51.819 --> 00:20:54.440 reasons. And that other woman was Evan Rachel 00:20:54.440 --> 00:20:56.640 Wood. And we really need to flag the age gap 00:20:56.640 --> 00:20:58.640 here. It is significant, and it's a critical 00:20:58.640 --> 00:21:01.019 part of what comes next. When their relationship 00:21:01.019 --> 00:21:03.799 was made public in 2007, he was 38 years old. 00:21:03.859 --> 00:21:07.059 She was 19. At the time, the media mostly treated 00:21:07.059 --> 00:21:10.180 it as just another rock star dating a young actress 00:21:10.180 --> 00:21:14.079 story. It wasn't really questioned. No. But looking 00:21:14.079 --> 00:21:17.440 back now, through the lens of 2026 and the hashtag 00:21:17.440 --> 00:21:21.559 MeToo movement, that power dynamic is, it's glaring. 00:21:21.700 --> 00:21:24.019 It's impossible to ignore. Their relationship 00:21:24.019 --> 00:21:26.599 was famously tumultuous. On again, off again, 00:21:26.680 --> 00:21:29.160 they got engaged, then they broke it off. And 00:21:29.160 --> 00:21:31.279 eventually he marries a photographer named Lindsay 00:21:31.279 --> 00:21:33.720 Usage in a private ceremony during the COVID 00:21:33.720 --> 00:21:37.079 -19 pandemic in 2020. But just as it seems like 00:21:37.079 --> 00:21:39.579 he might be settling down again, the bottom completely 00:21:39.579 --> 00:21:41.819 falls out of his world. This brings us to section 00:21:41.819 --> 00:21:44.759 six of our outline. And this is by far the heaviest 00:21:44.759 --> 00:21:47.460 part of the entire story, the reckoning. Because 00:21:47.460 --> 00:21:50.279 for a very long time, Marilyn Manson seemed Teflon. 00:21:50.299 --> 00:21:52.519 He had survived the Christians, the Senate, the 00:21:52.519 --> 00:21:55.240 Columbine blame. But in February of 2021, the 00:21:55.240 --> 00:21:57.670 allegations started. And this time, they didn't 00:21:57.670 --> 00:21:59.730 come from a religious group or a concerned politician. 00:21:59.930 --> 00:22:02.210 They came from the women he had been with. Evan 00:22:02.210 --> 00:22:04.109 Rachel Wood posted a statement on her Instagram 00:22:04.109 --> 00:22:06.990 account. It was brief, but it was absolutely 00:22:06.990 --> 00:22:10.750 devastating. She named Brian Warner Marilyn Manson 00:22:10.750 --> 00:22:13.470 as the man who had horrifically abused her for 00:22:13.470 --> 00:22:16.410 years. She claims she was brainwashed and manipulated 00:22:16.410 --> 00:22:19.769 into submission. And she wasn't alone. No. Within 00:22:19.769 --> 00:22:22.130 days, four other women came forward with their 00:22:22.130 --> 00:22:25.079 own very similar stories. And eventually, the 00:22:25.079 --> 00:22:27.460 number of accusers grew to around 16 people. 00:22:27.619 --> 00:22:30.099 We need to be specific about what was being alleged 00:22:30.099 --> 00:22:33.559 here because abuse is a very broad term. The 00:22:33.559 --> 00:22:35.980 allegations were severe. We're talking about 00:22:35.980 --> 00:22:38.420 claims of sexual assault, physical violence, 00:22:38.779 --> 00:22:41.759 anti -Semitic and racist abuse, and intense psychological 00:22:41.759 --> 00:22:44.299 torture. And that detail about the room in his 00:22:44.299 --> 00:22:48.000 house. Several women described a small, soundproofed 00:22:48.000 --> 00:22:50.440 glass room in his West Hollywood home that he 00:22:50.440 --> 00:22:53.150 allegedly called the bad girl's room. The bad 00:22:53.150 --> 00:22:55.509 girl's room. And he would allegedly lock them 00:22:55.509 --> 00:22:57.630 in there for hours as a form of punishment if 00:22:57.630 --> 00:23:00.430 they misbehaved. That detail. It sounds like 00:23:00.430 --> 00:23:01.990 something straight out of one of his music videos. 00:23:02.170 --> 00:23:04.390 It's surreal. And that's the deeply disturbing 00:23:04.390 --> 00:23:07.089 part. The line between his grotesque art and 00:23:07.089 --> 00:23:09.190 his actual life seemed to have dissolved completely 00:23:09.190 --> 00:23:12.069 if these allegations were true. So how did the 00:23:12.069 --> 00:23:13.829 industry react? Because usually these things 00:23:13.829 --> 00:23:16.029 can take time to process. There's an investigation. 00:23:16.529 --> 00:23:19.180 This was instantaneous. His record label, Loma 00:23:19.180 --> 00:23:22.319 Vista, dropped him within 24 hours. His talent 00:23:22.319 --> 00:23:25.779 agency, CAA, dropped him. He was edited out of 00:23:25.779 --> 00:23:28.680 episodes of the TV shows American Gods and Creepshow 00:23:28.680 --> 00:23:31.200 that he was supposed to appear in. It was a complete 00:23:31.200 --> 00:23:34.299 and total industry blackout. Now, Manson didn't 00:23:34.299 --> 00:23:36.279 stay silent through all of this. He denied everything. 00:23:36.619 --> 00:23:39.140 Vehemently. He released a statement calling the 00:23:39.140 --> 00:23:42.759 claims horrible distortions of reality. His core 00:23:42.759 --> 00:23:45.200 defense was that his life is intentionally controversial 00:23:45.200 --> 00:23:47.920 and provocative art, but his intimate relationships 00:23:47.920 --> 00:23:50.500 were always entirely consensual with like -minded 00:23:50.500 --> 00:23:52.640 partners. And then he went on the offensive legally. 00:23:52.839 --> 00:23:55.559 He filed a defamation lawsuit against Evan Rachel 00:23:55.559 --> 00:23:59.000 Wood, and the details of that suit are, they're 00:23:59.000 --> 00:24:02.200 wild. It reads like a spy thriller. He sued Wood 00:24:02.200 --> 00:24:05.099 and another woman, an artist named Ilma Gore. 00:24:05.279 --> 00:24:07.420 He claimed that they had conspired to recruit 00:24:07.420 --> 00:24:09.420 other women to make false allegations against 00:24:09.420 --> 00:24:12.089 him. But it went further than that. It did. He 00:24:12.089 --> 00:24:14.450 alleged that they impersonated an FBI agent, 00:24:14.569 --> 00:24:17.250 writing forged letters from the bureau to make 00:24:17.250 --> 00:24:18.849 it look like he was under a federal investigation. 00:24:19.910 --> 00:24:22.089 Impersonated FBI agents. That was the claim. 00:24:22.309 --> 00:24:25.269 To pressure other women into making claims against 00:24:25.269 --> 00:24:27.990 him. He also alleged they hacked his personal 00:24:27.990 --> 00:24:30.730 accounts to manufacture evidence. He was trying 00:24:30.730 --> 00:24:33.170 to completely flip the narrative to paint himself 00:24:33.170 --> 00:24:35.509 as the victim of a coordinated malicious plot. 00:24:35.769 --> 00:24:39.089 So how did that hold up in court? Mostly it didn't. 00:24:39.319 --> 00:24:41.180 A judge threw out the most significant parts 00:24:41.180 --> 00:24:44.279 of that lawsuit under what are called anti -SLAPP 00:24:44.279 --> 00:24:47.259 statutes. Can you just quickly explain anti -SLAPP 00:24:47.259 --> 00:24:50.039 for us? It's a term we hear a lot but maybe don't 00:24:50.039 --> 00:24:53.980 fully get. Sure. SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit 00:24:53.980 --> 00:24:56.819 Against Public Participation. It's basically 00:24:56.819 --> 00:24:59.640 when a rich or powerful person sues someone with 00:24:59.640 --> 00:25:01.869 less power. like a journalist or an activist, 00:25:02.049 --> 00:25:04.130 just to shut them up or drain their bank account 00:25:04.130 --> 00:25:06.869 with legal fees, even if the lawsuit has no real 00:25:06.869 --> 00:25:09.710 merit. So anti -Cecil AP laws are there to protect 00:25:09.710 --> 00:25:12.930 free speech. Exactly. And the judge in this case 00:25:12.930 --> 00:25:15.950 ruled that Manson couldn't prove Wood's statements 00:25:15.950 --> 00:25:19.549 were made with actual malice and that the Wilder 00:25:19.549 --> 00:25:21.490 conspiracy claims just didn't have enough evidence 00:25:21.490 --> 00:25:24.009 to proceed. He was even ordered to pay her legal 00:25:24.009 --> 00:25:25.910 fees for those parts of the suit. He eventually 00:25:25.910 --> 00:25:27.910 just dropped the rest of the lawsuit in late 00:25:27.910 --> 00:25:31.400 2024. So the big defamation suit against his 00:25:31.400 --> 00:25:34.079 accusers failed. But what about the other side, 00:25:34.279 --> 00:25:37.359 the actual lawsuits against him from these women? 00:25:37.539 --> 00:25:40.180 It's a really mixed bag of legal outcomes, which 00:25:40.180 --> 00:25:42.200 is what makes the truth so hard to parse for 00:25:42.200 --> 00:25:44.299 the public. It's not a clean story. Several of 00:25:44.299 --> 00:25:46.640 the lawsuits were dismissed. Right. Ashley Morgan 00:25:46.640 --> 00:25:48.740 Smithline's suit was dismissed, and then she 00:25:48.740 --> 00:25:50.980 actually later recanted her allegations entirely. 00:25:51.700 --> 00:25:54.299 She came out and claimed that she had been manipulated 00:25:54.299 --> 00:25:57.559 by Evan Rachel Wood into lying. That was a major, 00:25:57.759 --> 00:26:00.440 major win for Manson's defense team. And the 00:26:00.440 --> 00:26:02.680 suit from his former assistant, Ashley Walters. 00:26:02.920 --> 00:26:05.720 That was a legal roller coaster. It was dismissed, 00:26:05.940 --> 00:26:07.980 then it was reinstated on appeal regarding the 00:26:07.980 --> 00:26:09.980 idea of suppressed memories, and then it was 00:26:09.980 --> 00:26:12.559 ultimately dismissed for good in December of 00:26:12.559 --> 00:26:15.920 2025. But there were settlements, too. Which 00:26:15.920 --> 00:26:19.039 is different. Very different. Esme Bianco, the 00:26:19.039 --> 00:26:21.480 actress from Game of Thrones, had sued him for 00:26:21.480 --> 00:26:24.000 sexual assault and human trafficking. She settled 00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:27.539 out of court with him in early 2023. And another 00:26:27.539 --> 00:26:30.779 lawsuit from a Jane Doe was also settled right 00:26:30.779 --> 00:26:33.019 before it was set to go to trial. And settlements 00:26:33.019 --> 00:26:35.480 are tricky. They aren't an admission of guilt. 00:26:35.660 --> 00:26:38.480 Not legally, no. But they usually involve paying 00:26:38.480 --> 00:26:40.339 a significant amount of money to make the case 00:26:40.339 --> 00:26:43.099 go away. It stops all the details from being 00:26:43.099 --> 00:26:45.109 aired publicly in a courtroom. It's a form of 00:26:45.109 --> 00:26:47.190 risk management. But the biggest question mark 00:26:47.190 --> 00:26:49.369 hanging over all of this was the criminal investigation. 00:26:49.890 --> 00:26:52.390 Absolutely. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's 00:26:52.390 --> 00:26:54.690 Department spent four years investigating him. 00:26:54.970 --> 00:26:57.289 This wasn't a civil suit about money. This was 00:26:57.289 --> 00:26:59.269 about potential jail time. And what was the result? 00:26:59.450 --> 00:27:02.289 In 2025, the investigation finally concluded 00:27:02.289 --> 00:27:06.009 and no criminal charges were filed. Why? If there 00:27:06.009 --> 00:27:08.950 were so many accusers with similar stories? The 00:27:08.950 --> 00:27:11.269 district attorney's office cited two main reasons. 00:27:11.509 --> 00:27:14.740 The first was the statute of limitations. Many 00:27:14.740 --> 00:27:16.539 of the alleged incidents happened in the late 00:27:16.539 --> 00:27:20.180 2000s or early 2010s. And legally, in California, 00:27:20.500 --> 00:27:22.900 too much time had passed to prosecute them as 00:27:22.900 --> 00:27:25.920 crimes. The clock had run out. And the second 00:27:25.920 --> 00:27:28.460 reason... Insufficient evidence. And we need 00:27:28.460 --> 00:27:30.740 to be really clear about what that means. Insufficient 00:27:30.740 --> 00:27:34.299 evidence in a criminal context does not mean 00:27:34.299 --> 00:27:36.980 it didn't happen. Correct. It is not an exoneration. 00:27:37.200 --> 00:27:39.460 It means the prosecutor looked at all the evidence 00:27:39.460 --> 00:27:41.900 they had and said, I do not believe I can prove 00:27:41.900 --> 00:27:44.480 this case beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury 00:27:44.480 --> 00:27:47.279 of 12 people. And that's a very high bar. It's 00:27:47.279 --> 00:27:50.000 the highest bar in the legal system. And in he 00:27:50.000 --> 00:27:53.150 said, she said. Cases involving past relationships, 00:27:53.509 --> 00:27:56.430 especially with a public figure known for embracing 00:27:56.430 --> 00:27:59.750 BDSM and rough sex, proving criminal non -consent 00:27:59.750 --> 00:28:03.130 years after the fact is incredibly difficult. 00:28:03.329 --> 00:28:05.849 So he avoided prison. He settled some of the 00:28:05.849 --> 00:28:08.859 civil cases. He won others by dismissal. Where 00:28:08.859 --> 00:28:11.559 does that leave him now in 2026? It leaves him 00:28:11.559 --> 00:28:13.940 in a kind of public relations limbo, but it's 00:28:13.940 --> 00:28:16.420 a limbo that he is actively trying to break out 00:28:16.420 --> 00:28:18.299 of. In the last couple of years, we've seen a 00:28:18.299 --> 00:28:20.980 very clear comeback attempt. He started releasing 00:28:20.980 --> 00:28:24.200 new music again. Yep. A song called As Sick as 00:28:24.200 --> 00:28:27.920 the Secrets Within in 2024. And another one called 00:28:27.920 --> 00:28:29.960 Raise the Red Flag. And he's back to touring. 00:28:30.099 --> 00:28:32.799 He went on a big arena tour opening for the band 00:28:32.799 --> 00:28:37.380 Five Finger Death Punch in 2024. He's headlining 00:28:37.380 --> 00:28:41.400 his own shows in Europe in 2025. It seems he 00:28:41.400 --> 00:28:43.160 signed a new record deal with a label called 00:28:43.160 --> 00:28:46.759 Nuclear Blast. He's moving forward. And he's 00:28:46.759 --> 00:28:49.039 had some support from some of his peers. Billy 00:28:49.039 --> 00:28:51.259 Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins has been a vocal 00:28:51.259 --> 00:28:55.660 supporter, and most notably Kanye West, or Ye, 00:28:55.819 --> 00:28:58.200 as he goes by now. That collaboration on the 00:28:58.200 --> 00:29:00.720 Donda albums was a huge statement. It was. It 00:29:00.720 --> 00:29:03.019 was Manson. Standing on a replica of Kanye's 00:29:03.019 --> 00:29:05.380 childhood home porch next to Kanye and the rapper 00:29:05.380 --> 00:29:07.519 Davey, who was also in the middle of a controversy. 00:29:07.799 --> 00:29:10.119 Felt like a gathering of the canceled. A deliberate 00:29:10.119 --> 00:29:13.519 provocation. For sure. Kanye seems drawn to figures 00:29:13.519 --> 00:29:15.599 who are rejected by mainstream society. It was 00:29:15.599 --> 00:29:17.759 a very visual signal that Manson wasn't going 00:29:17.759 --> 00:29:19.339 to hide. He was going to lean into the exile. 00:29:19.660 --> 00:29:21.400 So the big question is, does the audience care 00:29:21.400 --> 00:29:23.680 about any of this? Are they coming back? That 00:29:23.680 --> 00:29:25.700 is the million dollar question, isn't it? And 00:29:25.700 --> 00:29:29.380 the answer seems to be, it's divided. There is 00:29:29.380 --> 00:29:32.420 a segment of his old fan base. that truly believes 00:29:32.420 --> 00:29:35.539 it's all a conspiracy, that he's being targeted 00:29:35.539 --> 00:29:37.599 because he's a controversial man or because he's 00:29:37.599 --> 00:29:39.680 Manson. And then there's another segment that 00:29:39.680 --> 00:29:42.539 just practices the separate the art from the 00:29:42.539 --> 00:29:44.900 artist mantra. They just like the songs and they 00:29:44.900 --> 00:29:46.519 don't want to know about the man behind them. 00:29:46.559 --> 00:29:48.980 Exactly. It brings us right back to the central 00:29:48.980 --> 00:29:51.680 conflict of his entire life, doesn't it? His 00:29:51.680 --> 00:29:54.220 entire career was built on blurring the line 00:29:54.220 --> 00:29:57.059 between fantasy and reality. He told us he was 00:29:57.059 --> 00:29:59.160 the Antichrist. He told us he was a villain. 00:29:59.400 --> 00:30:01.809 And when... A significant number of people finally 00:30:01.809 --> 00:30:04.170 turned around and said, OK, we believe you. You're 00:30:04.170 --> 00:30:06.250 a bad guy. He suddenly turned around and said, 00:30:06.309 --> 00:30:08.009 wait, no, hold on. That was just a character. 00:30:08.210 --> 00:30:11.089 The real Brian Warner is a gentle, misunderstood 00:30:11.089 --> 00:30:14.369 artist. It's the ultimate boy who cried wolf, 00:30:14.529 --> 00:30:17.589 but the wolf is his own persona. It is. If you 00:30:17.589 --> 00:30:20.930 spend 30 years screaming at the world. That you 00:30:20.930 --> 00:30:23.829 are the living embodiment of evil. You can't 00:30:23.829 --> 00:30:25.609 really be surprised when people start to assume 00:30:25.609 --> 00:30:28.230 you're capable of doing evil things. It's the 00:30:28.230 --> 00:30:31.150 inherent danger of living your entire life as 00:30:31.150 --> 00:30:33.549 a performance art piece about depravity. At some 00:30:33.549 --> 00:30:37.390 point, people stop seeing the irony. So when 00:30:37.390 --> 00:30:39.609 you look at the whole timeline, from the Christian 00:30:39.609 --> 00:30:43.190 schoolboy in Ohio to the accused predator in 00:30:43.190 --> 00:30:46.069 Hollywood, what's the final takeaway? What is 00:30:46.069 --> 00:30:49.390 Marilyn Manson to American culture? I think he's 00:30:49.390 --> 00:30:51.849 a mirror. He's always been a mirror. In the 90s, 00:30:51.849 --> 00:30:54.349 the culture was gripped by a moral panic about 00:30:54.349 --> 00:30:56.750 Satanism and its effect on the youth. So he became 00:30:56.750 --> 00:30:58.950 the Antichrist. Right. In the late 90s and early 00:30:58.950 --> 00:31:01.250 2000s, we were terrified of gun violence and 00:31:01.250 --> 00:31:02.849 what was happening in our schools. So he became 00:31:02.849 --> 00:31:05.410 the scapegoat for Columbine. And in the 2020s, 00:31:05.410 --> 00:31:07.309 our culture is finally having a massive, painful 00:31:07.309 --> 00:31:10.349 reckoning with abuse, power dynamics and gender. 00:31:10.509 --> 00:31:12.490 And now he has become the face of that conversation. 00:31:12.750 --> 00:31:14.910 He just reflects our deepest fears back at us 00:31:14.910 --> 00:31:18.690 in every era. And perhaps he's a warning. A warning 00:31:18.690 --> 00:31:20.990 that if you wear a mask long enough, eventually 00:31:20.990 --> 00:31:23.789 it starts to eat into your face. You can't tell 00:31:23.789 --> 00:31:26.730 where the mask ends and you begin. We will sell 00:31:26.730 --> 00:31:29.670 our shadow to those who stand within it. That 00:31:29.670 --> 00:31:32.029 was his old slogan for his art movement. Yeah. 00:31:32.250 --> 00:31:34.029 And I think at the end of the day, he sold his 00:31:34.029 --> 00:31:36.390 shadow and eventually the bill came due. There's 00:31:36.390 --> 00:31:38.250 this one quote from Mance and I read once that 00:31:38.250 --> 00:31:41.269 I think just sums it all up so perfectly. He 00:31:41.269 --> 00:31:43.990 said he trademarked the name Marilyn Manson the 00:31:43.990 --> 00:31:46.329 same way that Walt Disney trademarked the name 00:31:46.329 --> 00:31:49.750 Mickey Mouse. It's a product. A brand name. It 00:31:49.750 --> 00:31:52.730 is. And the one lingering question that I can't 00:31:52.730 --> 00:31:55.890 shake is this. Did Brian Warner lose control 00:31:55.890 --> 00:31:58.690 of the monster he created? Or was the controversy, 00:31:58.950 --> 00:32:01.210 the pain, the lawsuits, the outrage, was that 00:32:01.210 --> 00:32:03.150 always the only product that really mattered 00:32:03.150 --> 00:32:05.049 in the first place? That is something I think 00:32:05.049 --> 00:32:06.430 the listeners are going to have to decide for 00:32:06.430 --> 00:32:09.410 themselves. A very heavy story. But a necessary 00:32:09.410 --> 00:32:12.170 deep dive, I think. Absolutely. It's a timeline 00:32:12.170 --> 00:32:14.809 of our own cultural anxieties. To you, the learner, 00:32:14.970 --> 00:32:16.910 thank you for sticking with us through this very 00:32:16.910 --> 00:32:20.630 complex and very messy history. What do you think? 00:32:20.670 --> 00:32:23.029 Is it possible to separate the art from the artist 00:32:23.029 --> 00:32:25.670 when the art itself is the artist's life? Let 00:32:25.670 --> 00:32:26.730 us know. Until next time.