David Fincher and the serial killer as a celebrity. David Fincher y el asesino en serie como celebridad.

Abstract:

Within the current saturated panorama of the film industry,
one director stands
out for his dense filmography largely dedicated to developing stories whose protagonists face the threat of the serial killer. David
Fincher has been responsible for the
construction of a contemporary
imaginary about these infamous
characters, excessively media-friendly, who have frightened the public and caused panic within American society. In this work we propose
to dissect Fincher's works that are dedicated to delving into the phenomenon
of serial killers, the role played by the media in creating their public
image and the role of the security
forces when it comes to hunting down these terrible murderers.

Keywords: Cinema; fame; mass media; psychopaths; thrillers.

Resumen:

Dentro del saturado panorama de la industria
cinematográfica actual, un director sobresale
por su densa filmografía dedicada
en gran medida a desarrollar historias
cuyos protagonistas se enfrentan a la
amenaza del asesino
en serie. David Fincher ha sido responsable de la construcción de un imaginario contemporáneo sobre estos infames personajes, excesivamente mediáticos, que han atemorizado al público y han causado
pánico dentro de la sociedad
americana. En este trabajo nos proponemos diseccionar las obras de Fincher que se dedican
a profundizar sobre el fenómeno de los asesinos
en serie, el rol que desempeñan los medios de comunicación en la
creación de su imagen pública y el papel de las fuerzas de seguridad a la hora de dar caza a estos terribles
homicidas.

Palabras
clave: Cine; fama; medios de comunicación; psicópatas;
thrillers.

This work is under
an international license
Creative Commons Atribución-NoComercial
4.0.

Table of contents. 1. Introduction. 2. Development. 2.1 Seven. 2.2. Zodiac. 2.3. Mindhunter. 3. Conclusions.

How to cite: Finol
Benavides, L. E. (2026). David Fincher and the serial killer as a celebrity. Ñawi. Arte, Diseño, Comunicación, Vol. 10, Núm. 1, 59-73.

https://nawi.espol.edu.ec/ www.doi.org/10.37785/nw.v10n1.a2e

1.
Introduction

American director David Fincher
(Denver, 1966) has consistently explored the subject of serial killers from a deep and complex
perspective, one that probes the underlying causes and motives
behind the emergence
of these terrifying criminals in contemporary
societies. Films such as Se7en (1995),
Zodiac (2007), and, more recently,
the Netflix-produced series Mindhunter (2019) exemplify
Fincher’s interest in examining the particular conditions that give rise to these repeat murderers, the sinister and frightening strategies they deploy, and the role played by both the media and law enforcement agencies in
profiling and capturing these multiple killers.

Through his cinema, Fincher
confronts us with a central
question: What defines
a serial killer?
According to the FBI,
“a serial killer is someone who commits at least three murders over a
period of more than a month, with an emotional cooling-off period between them. The main characteristic of this typology
is the existence of a cooling-off period
and the individualization of the crimes,
in the sense that each victim can be considered separately in terms
of time and place” (Jiménez Serrano, 2014, 5). The cooling-off period can be understood as a temporal
interval during which the killer does not commit murders,
although this does not mean that they are not planning to continue doing so.
After committing the crime, the killer succeeds in satisfying the psychological
needs he was seeking to fulfill, gaining a temporary sense of power, control, and revenge. In this state, the murderer
does not immediately need to kill again, although
he may feel compelled to recreate and relive the act, often
keeping souvenirs or trophies taken from
the crime scene. Serial killers fall within the broader classification of
multiple murderers.

Drawing on the findings of
criminologist Vicente Garrido, as
presented in his book El monstruo y el asesino
en serie (The Monster and the Serial Killer), we can identify certain common
traits among individuals who exhibit a psychopathic disposition that may potentially incline them toward
committing such criminal
acts. These include,
for example: “The ability to feign a friendly
and honest personality; to manipulate and deceive; heightened narcissism, characterized
by a sense of entitlement to feel superior and to enjoy more and better things
than the rest of the world; and a
profound difficulty in experiencing the emotions that bond us affectively to
others, such as empathy, compassion, or love” (Garrido
& Latorre, 2023, 20). While it is true that most serial killers
demonstrate a psychopathic personality,
not all psychopaths are killers. Nevertheless, it is quite likely that an
individual with the characteristics mentioned
above is well equipped to violate the law and commit crimes.
Psychological profiles of serial killers
often reveal feelings
of dissatisfaction and marginalization that stem from their inability to integrate into the social
fabric. Moreover, they exhibit a need to attract attention
from the public,
law enforcement, and the media to gain fame and recognition.
Their crimes constitute an abject and perverse means of obtaining attention
through newspaper and television headlines dedicated to condemning the
atrocities perpetrated by subjects who, in some cases, regard their acts as meticulously planned and executed
works of art.

One of the distinctive qualities of Fincher’s approach to the phenomenon of serial killers is his emphasis on the role played by the media in creating
the myths that shape and immortalize these terrifying criminals. It could be argued that a symbiotic, mutually dependent
relationship exists between sensationalist journalism and the very existence of serial killers.
They reinforce each other to such a degree that,
in most cases, they maintain
direct communication

through cryptic messages
or riddles that must ultimately be deciphered by the police
and law-enforcement agencies.
By the late nineteenth century,
a press that was increasingly swift in its distribution and capable of reaching a mass audience understood that nothing captured
the public’s attention more effectively than a horrifying murder. It is during this period that sensationalist
journalism emerged.

The case of Jack the Ripper is the paradigmatic example of
the sensational crime as the epicenter of news: he is the first modern serial killer to achieve
worldwide fame. Why would someone
living in Paris or New York care that horrible
crimes are being
committed in London?
Because it is in our nature to pay attention to phenomena that,
were we to find ourselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, might turn us into the
next victims (Cancela, 2023).

The
gratification derived from the crimes
committed by serial
killers becomes even more significant when others reveal
the elaborate strategies required to carry
them out. This process generates a simultaneous sense
of fear and fascination,
ultimately elevating the serial killer to the status of an evil genius, someone
capable of killing at will without
fear of punishment. The sensationalistic treatment of these reprehensible
criminals also grants them a certain degree of celebrity, a clear symptom
of the public’s perverse admiration for the terrifying. Fincher’s cinema underscores this unfortunate celebrity aura that accompanies infamous serial killers.
It also illustrates the obstacles faced
by police officers and detectives throughout the final decades of the twentieth
century (the golden age of serial killers)
in attempting to capture them, as well as how technological advancements and a
deeper, more complex understanding of
these criminals eventually helped curb this horrifying wave of crimes.

In
this article, our primary objective
will be to analyze the manner in which Fincher
represents the phenomenon of serial killers, with the aim of identifying the fundamental
features of this theme across his work and, above all, delineating clearly and directly the complex and complementary relationships established among serial
killers, law-enforcement agencies, and the media—whose involvement contributes to constructing the figure of the serial killer as a
criminal who evokes
both fear and fascination,
and who ultimately becomes mythologized by culture as
celebrities.

2.  Development

2.1
Seven

The feature film that launched David
Fincher to fame is an aesthetically outstanding work that materializes a meticulously crafted screenplay written
by Andrew Kevin Walker (a frequent Fincher
collaborator), and is shot with the
characteristic precision of a brilliant filmmaker. Seven, or Se7en, has over
time become a contemporary classic that incorporates some of the stylistic tendencies of the late twentieth century
(influenced by the rise of the music video clip format) and reveals the enormous artistic
potential that Fincher
would develop throughout his career. The opening
credit sequence would become one of the hallmarks of the director’s
filmography, due to its capacity for both aesthetic
and thematic synthesis. This feature film appears at a historical moment in which
the subject of serial killers
resurged forcefully in Hollywood following
the resounding success
of The Silence of the Lambs (1991), directed
by Jonathan Demme and based on the eponymous best seller written by Thomas Harris.

The film follows the emergence of a
serial killer with a clear mission:
to cleanse the city’s streets of the human filth that commits
sins daily with impunity and corrupts society.
The killer’s plan consists of sacrificing seven
people, each of whom will die because
of one of the seven
deadly sins (Gluttony, Greed, Pride, Sloth,
Lust, Wrath, and Envy). According
to Holmes and DeBurger in their study on serial killers, these criminals can be classified into various groups
depending on their Modus operandi.
One of these categories corresponds to serial killers classified as
“Mission-oriented” who, according to the authors, “…do
not suffer from hallucinations, but are capable of constructing a delusional idea that they have a mission to eliminate a particular group of people
(prostitutes, drug addicts,
vagrants, etc.) and believe themselves to be saviors,
redeemers” (Jiménez Serrano, 2014, 9). John Doe, the serial killer
in Seven, fits within this typology. Moreover, “John Doe, is a generic name used to refer to unidentified individuals, representing the anonymous man who could be anyone, demonstrating that the greatest threat may
hide behind the seemingly most
harmless person” (Gómez, 2015).

To stop him, two detectives with opposing profiles attempt to
apprehend the criminal before he can complete
his plan. Detectives Mills (Brad Pitt) and Somerset
(Morgan Freeman) function
as a binary pair, opposites
that form a duality in perpetual conflict and
tension, a small-scale representation of universal dynamics staged in
conceptual terms. Early in the film,
Somerset expresses some of the pessimistic reflections that John Doe will later
elaborate upon, particularly the way
he detests the lack of empathy and solidarity among the inhabitants of this
bleak and desolate city (ravaged by
incessant rain), while recalling and discussing with his police department
superiors the horrifying atrocities recently committed by local criminals. In this
sense, Somerset appears resigned to the destructive violence human beings can unleash and
chooses to retire from his job, weighed down by a sense of weariness and resignation that prevents him from glimpsing even a ray of light
in the dark and perverse
world that surrounds him.

On
the other hand,
Mills is portrayed as a young
detective who longs
to dispense justice
and cleanse the streets of criminals, radiating
energy and determination in a fierce,
stubborn, and tireless
effort. “In terms of point of view, Seven is recognizably aligned with the two police
officers, who represent a dichotomy organized into Platonic binary
pairs; not only veteran and rookie, but also black and white, cerebral
and impulsive, and pragmatic and idealistic” (Nayman, 2021, 36). This
contrast serves to illustrate the complexity of the universe and the constant
tension that defines us as
individuals; hence the film’s appeal to the audience, which, to a certain
extent, echoes the biblical phrase:
“Let him who is without sin cast the first stone” (John 8: 1-7).

Without
a doubt, the religious element within the
film’s formal proposal is fundamental and structures the entire narrative.
Richard Dyer (2008) referred to the film as a “study of sin”. The seven deadly sins organize the
network of crimes committed by John
Doe as a form of punishment directed at the sinners who make up a decadent and putrefying society. The film’s
stylistic traits accentuate these characteristics, depicting the city as a
dehumanized, gray, filthy metropolis,
immersed in a kind of universal flood where the loneliness of its inhabitants
seems to be a common denominator (all
the protagonists feel lonely and alienated in one way or another). According to
Fincher, the number seven functions
as a symbol deeply embedded in Western
culture within the Christian
tradition and is represented through
various events.

Se7en must be viewed in terms of sin. But in itself, the title is not indicative of this. The seven deadly sins are only one among the
many sevens found in Western culture: days of creation, days of the week,
cardinal virtues, Christian sacraments, wonders
of the world, pillars of wisdom, colors of the rainbow; the Book of Revelation
contains around fifty groups of seven (including churches, candlesticks, angels,
trumpets) in its vision of the Apocalypse. Yet Se7en goes further:
the seven terraces
of Dante’s Purgatory, a reference to something Detective Somerset reads
about seven murdered children… Despite being such a stark title, Se7en
evokes all these almost cosmic resonances (Navarro, 2016, 10).

Dante
Alighieri’s Divine Comedy serves
as a key reference for John Doe’s project. In the Italian writer’s theological poem, we read the
following: “A mountain of seven circles rises on the horizon of
Purgatory, and these seven levels
correspond to each of the seven deadly sins: Lust, Gluttony, Pride, Sloth,
Greed, Wrath, and Envy” (Clarín,
2024). Therefore, the serial killer
functions as an inquisitor who strikes against
the depravity embodied
by ordinary individuals who have succumbed to their
lowest passions and carnal weaknesses. John Doe acts from a position of moral superiority, placing
himself above good and evil,
an attribute common
to psychopathic personalities. The aim of his murders is to carry out a form of
social cleansing, eliminating the “trash” that inhabits the city.
Within his psychopathy and narcissism, he perceives himself
as God’s chosen instrument tasked with executing
this project, for which he believes he deserves public recognition, as it constitutes a contribution to the improvement of the human species.
Doe also believes that the craftsmanship of his crimes reveals a talent and
skill worthy of praise, elevating him to the status of an Artist with a
capital A. The film’s
terrifying crime scenes testify to the boundless cruelty of human beings, sublimated by the complete
lack of empathy of a psychopath with delusions of celebrity.

One of the elements of Seven that immediately captured the
public’s attention was the visual force of its images. Fincher aesthetically recreates the deterioration of the
serial killer’s psyche, who, in a final crusade, seeks to consecrate himself through his Magnum Opus: a terrible, macabre, and
abject project that, although ostensibly conceived
as a sermon addressed to the decadent societies of major metropolis (in this
regard, the film adopts essential
traits of Film Noir and presents itself as Neo-Noir), ultimately reveals itself
as a succession of grotesque and abominable executions unlike anything the
detectives have seen before. The horror of his enterprise is measured by the extraordinary preparation and
anticipation required to execute it. Years
of work carried out in the shadows begin
to surface, astonishing the police forces by the perfection with which the
horrific spectacle is unfolded. The unspeakable
terror of these murders awakens a certain fascination that places the serial
killer in the realm of the criminal genius,
a sinister and malevolent mind capable of building dark and cruel
masterpieces of torture.
This fact appeals
to the sensationalistic impulse that attracts people (and especially the media), as if they required a dose of fear
to remind themselves that they are alive. This
dread directed at the serial killer stands not far from a perverse veneration of an individual who acts as a kind of God. “Perhaps the most provocative and problematic aspect of Seven is the veneration of the serial killer figure
as a modern guru with something to say about society”
(Nayman, 2021, 34).

Mills and Somerset (Figures 1 and 2)
construct a preliminary profile of the killer in which his plausible intellectualism stands out. The Paradise Lost quote by John Milton found at one of the crime scenes: “Long is the way and
hard that out of Hell leads up to light”, is evidence of this. Another
key clue that leads them toward the killer emerges from
the
books John Doe checks
out
from the public library
(among them, Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy).

This enables them to locate the killer’s
residence, although they fail in their attempt to apprehend him. However, John Doe unexpectedly turns himself in,
acknowledging the detectives’ cleverness in understanding the underlying logic that structures his plan. David
Fincher explained the following to Amy Taubin:

What captivated me in the script is the aspect of connecting
the dots. It’s a movie about connecting the dots that speaks about inhumanity. It is psychologically violent. It implies a lot, not about why he does it, but about how he does it.
It has this element of evil that is realistic, but I did not want people to say: Isn’t this the most horrendous thing you’ve ever seen in your
life? What disgusts me is the violence
you’re supposed to applaud” (Taubin, 2017).

Figure 1. Morgan Freeman listing the 7 deadly
sins.

Doe wishes to fulfill one final request before completing
his work: to speak with
Somerset and Mills, whom he admires and to whom he intends to reveal the reasons behind
his atrocious acts. John Doe’s admiration for the detectives also reveals
the killer’s need for attention. It demonstrates that his acts hold no meaning unless
there is an audience observing
his crimes in astonishment. It also exposes
the narcissism that drives the psychopath, who prides himself on capturing the media spotlight, even if doing so requires committing the most reprehensible and monstrous actions. John Doe turns himself in as part
of his scheme, which reaches its culmination with the final two victims. One of them falls prey to the killer’s envy:
Mills’s wife (played
by Gwyneth Paltrow). Upon this chilling
revelation, her husband, Detective Mills, executes John Doe (the envious one) in a fit of wrath, the final deadly sin yet to appear in the narrative, thereby completing the serial killer’s project. This ending
underscores the killer’s Machiavellian nature and provides a dark and pessimistic closure
that offers no concessions to the viewer.
Through this film, John Doe became one of the most iconic serial killers in
the history of cinema.

Figure 2. Seven’s protagonists: Morgan Freeman,
Brad Pitt and Kevin Spacey.

2.2
Zodiac

David Fincher’s sixth feature
film could be classified as a “cosmic drama”, that is, a constant
dialogue that may become eternal and
irresolvable. From a metaphysical perspective, it could also approach what some
art critics describe as works that pose unanswerable questions,
and there is nothing more terrifying than a question without an answer.
Zodiac offers a radically
different representation of the serial-killer phenomenon from that seen in Seven.
The shocking visceral
impact of the meticulously crafted
crime scenes in Seven gives way to a sparer visual
economy in Zodiac, one that is more realistic, closer to documentary cinema, and stripped
of sensationalism and graphic gore. “Seven is a movie about
a serial killer
with an idea,
validated by the macabre aesthetic proper to Fincher’s cinematic style. Zodiac, however,
was conceived as a film about the idea of serial killers,
or something even more abstract. The serial killer as
idea” (Nayman, 2021, 55).

Zodiac focuses on a real case that terrified
the San Francisco Bay Area during the 1970s and generated enormous
media impact. Fincher
experienced firsthand the fear instilled by the Zodiac
Killer, as he lived as a child
near the zone where
the infamous criminal operated. Fincher told Shawn Levy:

As a kid, I always
thought the Zodiac
had killed more people and that there
was a massive manhunt underway
to find him. It turns
out it was just two guys making
phone calls and taking notes
with Bic pens.
Even when television told us they were investigating through computer files
and comparing fingerprints, the truth is the technology did not exist
in any useful way until much later (Knapp, 2014, 118).

These statements confirm the director’s mistaken
conception of the case before
researching it in depth, perhaps
shaped by the hazy childhood memories lodged in his psyche, fed by an
overrepresentation of sensationalist and tabloid
news in the media and by a climate of latent national tension. Hence
Fincher’s emphasis on the newsroom of The San Francisco Chronicle
as a generator
of public opinion
and a fundamental vehicle for the Zodiac’s exposure. “Zodiac chose
his own name in a series of letters which,
until 1974, he sent to the newsrooms of The San Francisco Chronicle and The San
Francisco Examiner. In his messages he included four cryptograms, three of
which remain unsolved, signed with a
cross enclosed within a circle” (Cineastas del Siglo
XXI, 2016, 34). This demonstrates the criminal’s
narcissistic nature, baptizing himself as a brand or fictional character
looking for notoriety.

The fear provoked by
“Zodiac,” the killer who is among us, fuels the paranoia surrounding the
safety of a society—American society—hypersensitive to any violence
that threatens the system yet indifferent to the violence
the system itself
produces and, at the same time, skeptical
of the measures adopted by the authorities to safeguard their lives […]
The media, the film suggests, are those who feed that paranoia in collusion with the system (Cineastas del Siglo
XXI, 2016, 39).

The
motive behind Zodiac
may well have been to appear in the media.
This returns us to the idea of that perverse
dependence between the mass media and
monsters—here embodied by a serial killer, a figure enjoying
unprecedented cultural
prominence during this historical period. “Fincher is fascinated by the
notion that the Zodiac’s compulsion is
not, ultimately, to kill but to communicate with the media. That became far
more rewarding than what he had started
doing in the first place… So, he was
an attention seeker” (Knapp, 2014, 125).

All of Fincher’s suspicions are supported by the criminal’s Modus operandi. The Zodiac Killer reported his crimes by telephone, providing
the police with details of the homicides
to prove his authorship. Zodiac would confess:
“I have just committed a crime; this is what you will find at the crime scene”. He later established an epistolary relationship with the media, specifically The San Francisco Chronicle, with the
intention of amplifying and publicizing his atrocities. He also threatened to commit abominable crimes, such as murdering children
on a school bus, if his letters
were not published. The uproar caused by Zodiac was so great that Don Siegel’s 1971 police thriller
Dirty Harry, starring Clint Eastwood,
is based on his figure, telling the story of a serial killer who terrorizes San
Francisco and calls himself Scorpio. Fincher’s film recreates the moment of the film’s premiere and the reaction of Chronicle
journalists to this unusual event. The issue of the excessive
fame that Zodiac acquires as he appears in the media raises various questions among the public.
During a radio interview, a woman argues that newspapers should not publish
the Zodiac’s letters,
even if he had threatened to commit more murders. She points to the media’s ambition to sell and profit by turning
to sensationalism.

The
police do not want information about the Zodiac’s letters to be leaked, so as not to hinder
the investigation or give the criminal too much power.
But the media,
eager to exploit
the opportunity presented by publishing details
about the killer,
reveal information that provokes panic in the population. As Zodiac amasses
headlines and becomes
aware of his bargaining power, he requests to speak with a public figure on television. This demand reinforces the idea of the serial killer as a celebrity
using his status to negotiate. Nev Pierce states:
“Rarely has a multiple murderer
with so few homicides been responsible for spilling so much ink in newsrooms. The Zodiac claimed
around thirty murders,
although only around five were confirmed. This demonstrates the killer’s ability to publicize and
market himself to the media”
(Knapp, 2014, 120).

One of the key elements that have
ensured that Zodiac remains as one of the most significant serial killers in history
is directly related
to his excessive exposure in the media.
As Mark Browning
explains in his extensive study
of Fincher’s filmography, Films
That Leave Scars: “Zodiac is
about writing. What distinguishes Zodiac from other killers is not the scale
or brutality of his crimes
but the relationship he established with the police
and the press
through his letters” (Browning, 2010, 80). His image was constructed by journalists and by the collective imagination that built a myth of epic proportions, one that still resonates in American memory.
Journalist Paul Avery produced a superficial

profile of Zodiac
in one of his Chronicle articles, describing him as a latent homosexual and deducing that “...he is a subject
hungry for popularity who needs to appear in the media at all costs,
even if that means claiming responsibility for other deaths with which he had nothing to do”
(Gómez, 2015, 61).

Fincher sets up a triangle among the
three main characters in the story (Figure 3): journalist Paul Avery, who embodies the visible face of the crucial
work carried out by the press and mass media; detective David Toschi, who attempts to track down the serial
killer but lacks the necessary resources to fulfill his mission; and Robert Graysmith, a cartoonist at The San Francisco Chronicle who, driven by curiosity and
cleverness (and by his aptitude for
deciphering cryptograms), collaborates with the investigation by connecting
disparate clues and representing the citizens
“obsession” with discovering the Zodiac’s identity. His unusual ability
to interpret the murderer’s coded letters earns him praise
and turns him into a decisive actor
in understanding the killer’s intentions. The fact that this illustrator became such a relevant figure
in the case demonstrates both the insufficiency and inefficiency of police work regarding the Zodiac investigation and the public’s fixation on this figure. Graysmith
would later write Zodiac: The Full Story of the Serial Killer’s Reign of Terror in Northern California (1986), the book on which the film’s screenplay is based, and he participated actively in
the complex production of Fincher’s feature.

As
Fincher’s film progresses, we come to confirm that the protagonists’ futile
efforts to uncover
the serial killer’s identity emphasize the notion that “reality is not only
deceitful but also tremendously encoded, hidden beneath the ciphers of a psychopathic killer, concealed behind thousands
of false clues, genuine clues that are nonetheless impossible to prove, and an overdose of information that makes
it impossible to orient oneself, reconstruct, and organize the narrative of what happened” (Cineastas del Siglo XXI, 2016, 40). The impunity
enjoyed by Zodiac constitutes the essential core of the terror he instilled in American society,
leaving an indelible scar on its culture and on
an entire generation marked by a tumultuous historical period.

The film operates simultaneously on both micro and macro
levels. The depiction of the real
events surrounding the hunt for one of the most enigmatic American serial killers
of the twentieth century constantly alternates between intimacy
and omnipresence; while
it intentionally focuses
on the microscopic details of forensic investigation, it also remains
attuned to a fluid and expansive progression of
fashion, technology, politics, and pop culture over a span of twenty-five years, from 1969 to 1991 (Nayman, 2021, 52).

James Vanderbilt, Zodiac’s screenwriter, believed that the film was aesthetically closer to a documentary style and therefore more realistic, “focusing on telling the story
without artifices and without depicting violence in a frontal manner,
unlike Se7en, a film stylistically baroque
and designed to shock audiences with horrific and jarring images” (Nayman, 2021, 54). Fincher told film critic
Jonah Weiner the following: “We are trying to control where people look, so they don’t end up looking
at things that are going
to confuse them.
The simplest way to describe
directing would be: how do I get them to look where I need them to look?”
(Weiner, 2020).

Fincher
achieves a level of narrative and stylistic precision in Zodiac that strips the film of any unnecessary artifice and transforms
it into a chilling experience due to its realistic approach to the events. The
openness of the film’s ending is also devastating, different from that of Se7en, but leaving the audience with more questions than answers

and with an uncomfortable sense of unease.
The Zodiac stopped
killing and sending
letters to the press, and his long shadow eventually disappeared from the headlines, causing
the public to lose interest
in his whereabouts. However, the impact of Fincher’s film led to the reactivation of the Zodiac investigation, which had previously been dormant, as new clues and hypotheses emerged.

Figure 3. Robert Downey Jr., Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo and
John
Carroll Lynch, in Zodíac.

2.3
Mindhunter

A clear and faithful representation
of the scientific methodologies used to build serial killer profiles is found
in the series Mindhunter
(Penhall & Fincher, 2017-2019), a Netflix production that ran for two seasons and unfortunately halted further development due to the high cost of each episode and its insufficient audience impact. Fincher directed a total of seven episodes across both
seasons and was extensively involved in the show’s production. Mindhunter
plausibly depicts the early stages of the psychological
investigations that established the foundations for the study of serial killers
through in-depth interviews with real murderers
such as Edmund Kemper, David Berkowitz (the Son of Sam), and other notorious criminals
including Charles Manson and Wayne Williams, many of whom were active during the 1960s and 1970s. The FBI spearheaded this effort from what became known as the Behavioral Science Unit, with the goal of building
standardized profiles of serial killers
even before such a label
or definition formally
existed, ultimately to help
solve open cases. Previously, a murderer responsible for a series of killings
that shared similar characteristics and Modus operandi
was simply considered a multiple murderer or an offender accountable for several homicides. Authorities lacked an understanding of the motives
that drove these criminals to commit their abhorrent acts repeatedly. As a result
of the Behavioral Science Unit’s investigations, the study
of common patterns
and traits present in the personalities of serial
killers was inaugurated, leading to the first psychological profiles describing these offenders.

Robert K. Ressler, one of the most prominent
figures in developing psychological profiles of serial killers,
with a career spanning more than twenty
years in the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit, stated
the following in his book Inside the
Monster: “As part of my attempt to understand multiple murderers, in
the mid-1970s I coined the term serial killer. Prior to me coining the expression serial killer in the mid-1970s,
these crimes were referred to as killings by

strangers, to distinguish them from those in which victims
died at the hands of someone known to them, usually a family member” (Ressler, 1998, 10).

Ressler is represented in the series through the character Bill Tench, one of the show’s protagonists, who accompanies Holden Ford in the FBI’s innovative
project that would revolutionize the way serial murder investigations were approached. Ford embodies John Douglas, a
professor of Behavioral Sciences at the FBI whom the series introduces from the outset as a hostage negotiator in
extreme situations. Together, they embark on a
mission to travel across the United States teaching criminal profiling
techniques to local police departments and involving
themselves in various investigations. John Douglas authored the book Mindhunter (with Mark Olshaker), which
served as the basis for the series and recounts his experience conducting
in-depth interviews with incarcerated serial killers. The third member of the team is Wendy Carr, a fictional
counterpart to Dr. Ann Wolbert
Burgess, whose academic
perspective on psychology
provides greater depth and theoretical grounding to the investigation (Figure 4).

The
idea that agents
from the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit should interview convicted murderers inside
prison was, at the time, both revolutionary and transgressive. Although
the proposal initially
met with resistance within the Bureau,
it had a clear justification: it sought to answer the question “How does a serial killer think?”. To understand their inner logic,
it was necessary to examine
their behaviors, methods,
and motivations. This was the reasoning that guided John Douglas. “Sometimes the only way to catch them is to learn to think like them. If you want to understand the artist, you must look at the painting. We’ve examined many paintings over the years,
and we’ve talked
at length with the most talented artists” (Douglas & Olshaker, 1995, 23). This method of in-depth interviewing facilitated the work of criminal
profiling by revealing recurring behavioral patterns
across numerous confessions, an advancement that significantly narrowed the search for
serial offenders. It also helped distinguish conceptual categories such as Modus
Operandi and the killer’s signature.

Essentially, criminal profiling
consists of creating the most accurate possible physical and psychological
sketch of the person being sought for
a particular crime. Robert K. Ressler, considered the world’s foremost expert in this technique, defines profiling as the process of constructing a map of the killer’s mind. The idea is that if the investigator can manage to think like the offender
and feel what the offender
feels, they may be able to anticipate his next move and ultimately capture him. According
to Ressler, entering
the criminal’s mind makes it possible to understand, and even
predict, his subsequent actions.

Profiling is particularly effective with serial killers due
to the repetitive nature of their crimes. Repetition enables the identification of a pattern, what is
commonly known as the Modus Operandi (the
set of actions a criminal performs repeatedly
to achieve his goal). Distinct from the Modus
Operandi is the so-called “killer’s signature”, a series
of actions intended to express
the perpetrator’s psychological identity. It is a kind of mark left to
declare “I did this” (Rámila, 2010, 27).

The series depicts how the foundational concepts and methods that made a more accurate and effective approach to serial-killer investigations
possible were gradually established. This effort, both
necessary and timely, aimed to halt a worrying wave of crimes sweeping the nation. Through the protagonists’ journey, Fincher once again immerses us in a historical period he previously explored in Zodiac, highlighting the crucial role played by the media in shaping public

opinion. “The rise of serial killers is connected to the growing
complexity of our society, our interconnection through
the media, and the alienation many of us feel” (Ressler, 1998,
49).

These crimes, committed by unknown
aggressors and lacking an apparent motive, were perceived as enigmas. This absence of
a clear motive heightened public fear, leading
citizens to suspect
any stranger as a potential
murderer. “The fact that we cannot truly understand—or even explain—the phenomenon of the serial killer turns him into a myth, and the stories we tell
about him into a mythology (Danesi, 2016, 138).

Throughout the series, Holden Ford
interviews a plethora of murderers; figures wrapped in a sinister aura whose notoriety elevates
them to the status of celebrities, even within the correctional facilities where they remain
incarcerated. Among the pathetically curious phenomena experienced by
the criminals interviewed by Ford and Tench, we find a disturbing form of fan devotion: some admirers write letters and maintain regular
correspondence with several of the serial killers featured in Mindhunter. This
“fan phenomenon” illustrates once again the fascination and, at times, obsession these offenders
evoke in the public, an obsession that gradually transfers to Ford himself. As his
involvement in the Behavioral Science Unit deepens, he becomes increasingly
fixated on his interview subjects, particularly Edmund Kemper, the co-ed killer,
who during the first season becomes the central figure around which the
team’s most substantial discussions revolve.

Joe Penhall, the showrunner of Mindhunter, explained: “David and
I were fascinated by psychopathy and narcissism,
as well as personality disorders,
because we felt that there were people out there, who were
not serial killers, occupying
high political positions… I think we were on a mission
with Mindhunter to show that these people were, very
sadly, ordinary” (Nayman, 2021, 75). The
ultimate goal of these criminals is recognition, attention.

Serial killers often
seek fame and public visibility through their crimes;
anonymity is not their objective, quite the opposite. They want to be known
and perceived as superior beings. Hence their frequent communications with the media and the police,
and sometimes even self-incrimination or voluntary surrender
when a suspect is arrested
for their crimes or when media
coverage begins to fade (Jiménez Serrano, 2014).

Fincher’s influence
on Mindhunter grew steadily,
eventually leading him to sideline
Penhall and his writing team, rewriting the scripts of the second
season and imprinting the project with a more personal tone and a style aligned
with the distinctive traits of his filmography. One of the elements he emphasized most strongly was the theme of
the serial killer as celebrity and media spectacle. In the second season, we
follow the case of the Atlanta child murderer, the infamous Wayne Williams, who between 1979 and 1981 took the lives of between 20 and 30 children, although
he was ultimately convicted of killing only two adults.
“Mindhunter portrays the media circus
surrounding the investigation
into the Atlanta child murders and how it interfered with police efforts to
apprehend Williams. It also highlights political interference in public
debate and the pressures exerted
by various activist
groups seeking to protect
the African American community directly affected by the homicides”
(Nayman, 2021, 84).

Figure 4. Holt McCallany, Jonathan Groof, Anna Torv y Cameron Britton,
in Mindhunter.

David
Fincher develops in Mindhunter several
concepts first outlined in Seven and
later explored in greater depth in Zodiac.
“The serial killer
as a media rock star;
religion as the point of departure for morality and the repression of contemporary
society; the social fascination with acts that are as atrocious as they are
alluring; and the complex mechanisms
of law and the media that place sensationalist visual violence at the center of
public attention” (Rodríguez Torres,
2019). Mindhunter can be understood as a fusion
between Seven and Zodiac, and it has paved the way
for a renewed interest in serial killers, fueled by the prolific production of
documentaries and fictional works related
to this topic in recent years. Cases such as Jeffrey Dahmer, the
“Milwaukee Cannibal,” or Ted Bundy have become widely popular
narratives thanks to the success of audiovisual productions centered on their
figures. In an interview, Fincher
admitted:

I think part of the fascination with serial killers
is something we ourselves have helped promote.
In cinematic or television storytelling we always need a boogeyman;
from Michael Myers to Hannibal Lecter, we portray them as sophisticated geniuses
of evil. But in real life they are not like that. They are sad individuals, often pathetic, who have endured
terrible life experiences and committed horrific acts
(Contreras, 2017).

Professor Nicola Nixon pointed
out: “Serial killers
have come to occupy the place of classic monsters
such as Dracula, Frankenstein,
or the Wolf Man” (Garrido & Latorre, 2023, 34). One could argue that
they are their postmodern equivalents, comparable not only because of their monstrosity, which, in their case, resides
not merely in their appearance but in their morally monstrous
interiority, but also because of the fame or celebrity
status they have achieved within our culture and the
collective subconscious.

Given that mass consumption is one of the defining traits of
contemporary culture, this dynamic has extended to serial killers
just as it has to any other
celebrity. Hence, the proliferation of merchandising and murder memorabilia surrounding them: biographies, T-shirts, posters, collections of their artistic
creations or personal
belongings. Not to mention the many individuals (many of them women) who, as if they were courting rock stars, seek to correspond with them or get closer
to them (Garrido &
Latorre, 2023, 34).

3.
Conclusions

The
work of the media in relation to the phenomenon of serial killers
has been decisive
in propagating the myths that surround them. As a consequence of the sensationalist overexploitation of their crimes, public opinion has

become both scandalized and obsessed with these figures idealizing their power and reach, fearing and revering them in a dual
movement of attraction and repulsion that reveals the perverse relationship
established between killers and the public. Without
this dependence between
the media and the atrocious crimes committed by these infamous
murderers, as prime generators of news, the scope and fame of serial
killers would not be the same.

John Doe and Zodiac represent two
paradigms of the serial killer. One is the absolute macabre genius who sacrifices himself to complete
his grim project,
driven by a divine mission;
the other is the elusive,
enigmatic criminal who outwits authorities and remains in the shadows
until the end of his days. The precision with which they carry out their atrocities elevates them to an Olympus
of criminals, one of them in the fictional realm and the other in reality as a part of American History. Mindhunter complements these two visions
with the full range of serial killers who contributed to the understanding of such criminals. Together, they form a constellation of murderers who enjoy an unusual
degree of popularity, one that reveals the audience’s fanaticism for
these monsters and demonstrates the fundamental
role of the mass media in the creation of these infamous celebrities.

Fincher’s filmography, from its beginnings to his most recent works, evolves toward a deeper and more complex understanding of serial killers.
He moves from directing flashy,
baroque products to crafting thoughtful and realistic reflections in which there
are no definitive answers to the essential problems of human
existence, particularly those arising from unpredictable bursts
of gratuitous violence. Fincher transitions from the moralistic and critical attitude
of Seven to a process of thoroughly examining
the conditions under which serial killers emerge (Zodiac), identifying shared human
traits that can develop into psychopathic behaviors. The categorical judgments of Mills and Somerset regarding John Doe’s atrocities give
way to Graysmith’s obsession with understanding the criminal mind, which ultimately culminates in Holden
Ford’s sinister insight into the dark psyches of the serial killers he
interviews.

Over the years, David Fincher has become the director par excellence when it comes to serial
killer narratives. His concerns
regarding the figure of the serial murderer have found in his cinema the most effective means of expression, allowing
him to probe and excavate
the minds of the most notorious criminals
in History. In doing so, he transforms the public’s perception of them, raising
complex questions that often lack satisfactory answers
and dismantling any edifice
of certainty that might otherwise comfort the audience.

Within the dialectic generated by
serial killers’ pursuit of attention and the excessive media exposure of
their crimes, the myths surrounding these monsters are constructed, elevating
them to celebrity status. Fincher’s cinema reveals this
process in a profound and complex manner, reflecting on the underlying causes
that give rise to the mythology
surrounding these psychopaths.

References

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Films & series:

Fincher,
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Curricular Overview

Luis Eduardo Finol Benavides holds a PhD in Film
Theory and Analysis from the Complutense University of Madrid (2014), graduating with highest honors and
receiving the Extraordinary Prize for his dissertation, "Keys to the
Sinister in the Cinema of Stanley
Kubrick." He has teaching experience at the European University of Madrid
and the TAI University School of
Arts. He won the award for best young
filmmaker at the Ronda Scientific Film Biennial (2014) for the documentary
"Tintoretto: Paradise in Restoration."
He currently works as a researcher and author of scientific articles.

Statements:

•
The authors further
declare that no artificial intelligence–based tools were used in the preparation of this manuscript.