DADDY!!
What is the work?[]
Longlegs is a 2024 supernatural horror film written and directed by Oz Perkins about an FBI agent named Lee Harker who is put on the case of the infamous serial killer "Longlegs" who is classified as a family annihilator. Longlegs can best be considered Silence of the Lambs if it had a demonic angle to it since this is by no means a normal case.
Who is Longlegs? What has he done?[]
Played entertainingly by the legendary Nicholas Cage, Dale Ferdinand Cobble, otherwise known as Longlegs, is the main antagonist of the film. Longlegs is a total enigma with only a few middling things about him like him being a Devil worshiper and a dollmaker. His modus operandi is family annihilation: he would create a doll and place a mysterious metallic ball in their heads and give them to unsuspecting parents. When the daughter, who is often always around 9-years-old, opens it, the doll influences the father into killing their spouse and children.
It always happens around the 14th of the month that the daughter was born with the murders happening around six days before the birthday or after. Together, it creates a symbol, an upside down triangle with one date noticeably being missing. Of those victims who survived the Longlegs killings was Carrie Anne Camera who was not at home at the time, and was in a catatonic state in a mental institution which she happened to awake from when Lee discovers her doll at the old abandoned farmhouse.
Years ago, the protagonist FBI agent Lee Harker actually met Longlegs when he arrived to her home and later tied up and threatened her mother Ruth when she refused his gift. In desperation, Ruth works as an accomplice and would distribute the dolls to different families in return for Longlegs agreeing to spare her daughter. Also as a result of this, Lee lost her memories of what exactly happened on her 9th birthday.
With each murder, there would be a message left written in demonic text. When decoded, it reveals to have been sent by Longlegs. However with every murder scene, there are no signs of any break-ins or outside influence. Eventually, Lee Harker orders him to be tracked down and taken to custody when she realizes that she took a picture of Longlegs. While in prison, Longlegs insinuates that Lee's mother knew more than she let on and bashes his skull into the table numerous times until he died. However, this all appeared to be part of the plan for the serial killer...
After Ruth murders Lee's co-FBI agent, she rushes to Agent Carter's house after she received a phone call from "the Man Downstairs" reminding her that she was invited to attend his daughter Ruby's birthday. But it's too late; Carter, despite trying to fight the influence of the doll off, he succumbs to it and he and his wife go into the kitchen to "cut the cake."
Carter returns now with his murderous sights on his daughter forcing Lee to shoot him to death. Her mother tries to kill Ruby herself only to chew the same bullet. She goes to shoot the doll next but surprise, surprise... out of bullets. She tells Ruby they had to leave... but Lee gets frozen there as she stares at the doll. The film ends with a triumphant Longlegs laughing in presumably a hellish version of the interrogation room proudly declaring "hail Satan!" and blowing a kiss at the camera. Cheeky bastard.
Freudian Excuse? Mitigating factors?[]
Longlegs, for lack of a better word, is weird. He is a childishly giddy freak of a man who screams and sings at random times and, when he was being apprehended by the authorities who tell him to put his hands up, he does a little dance. That being said, he is a clever and very effective serial killer who appears to largely do what he does out of sadistic glee at worshiping Satan and committing acts of evil with some implication (at least in how Ruth operated) that Longlegs is also motivated by saving his own soul... even though he seemed pretty chill with the idea that his soul would be bound to Hell once he was done doing everything he wanted.
Really the only "excuse" you could say he has, which doesn't even matter in the grand scheme of things is that he seemed to be hurt by how other people react around him because, let's face it, guy's not winning anyone over because of how he looks to where he gets offended when a teenage cashier makes it clear that he had been to the gas station numerous times. But he does not even bother trying to act normal anyway and lacks empathy for anyone else. Oddly the one time he drops the whimsical attitude is when Ruth rejects the doll... it is one of the only documented times he is truly pissed and violates his M.O. when he tries to directly kill her.
Heinous standard[]
As the main antagonist, he sets it. He is a prolific family annihilator who uses satanic means of killing his victims. He corrupts Ruth into becoming his accomplice by using her daughter as the bargaining chip.
Ruth herself does not count due to only becoming his accomplice in order to protect her daughter, and the Devil himself I could see probably getting proposed. After thinking about it, there might be enough to say that the Man Downstairs counts.