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Pazrags, thanks for the nice words, but sorry – I’m not a fiction writer. I can’t write believable dialogue, for one thing. Another thing is I would need to create a delicately-balanced suspense story – like Blatty did in the original novel – which keeps the reader wondering if it’s really Kinderman or if there are other viable suspects, or if this is another truly demonic “invasion” of Georgetown. I doubt I’m capable of pulling it off – I’ve never been to Georgetown and would surely make descriptive errors. Also I’d have to resolve Julie Kinderman’s disappearance – will she show up alive again? If she doesn’t, what will that do to the general tone of the story? Would we want Kinderman to survive if it turns out that he _did_ kill Julie and the other victims? Unlike Blatty I don’t know anything about police forensics and couldn’t really supply the necessary authentic feel. Then there is which source to follow – Blatty’s Legion novel, or the Legion film? Or an inconsistent mixing of both?
But since you asked I will send another, short, post with an idea of concluding the story: beware, it’s dark and probably a bit contrived and silly.
For Pazrags: conclusion to potential Legion sequel:
Eventually Kinderman, though evidence points to him as the killer, has neurological testing that shows that there is nothing in his brain/nervous system that would account for dissociative states or violent fugues. Either he is nuts but neuroscience cannot reveal medical reasons for it, or there are parties – human or otherwise – responsible for the new wave of homicide.
Kinderman finally begins to consult Father Paul Morning, who humbly and quietly shares his knowledge of demonic possession. These descriptions are harrowing and nearly drive Kinderman over the edge, especially as he knows that he is somehow the target of whoever is doing the murders. Morning describes the exorcism that turned his hair white overnight.
As Kinderman’s interviews with Morning continue over the weeks, he does a bit of research into Morning’s past, with a special emphasis on the hair-whitening exorcism. He finds the records on Morning rather spotty. Apparently Morning has traveled widely, never staying in one locale for very long. Not unusual for a missionary priest, yet it seems that in nearly every place Morning has been assigned, there has been demonic activity and exorcism. Eventually, Kinderman contacts several of the people Morning has exorcised in the past.
A disturbing picture emerges. Kinderman wonders why Morning is so horribly unlucky that he encounters demonic activity wherever he goes. Then it occurs to him that bad luck may have nothing to do with it. Could it be possible that Morning’s presence actually causes demons to flock to him? But why would they do this if he is such a successful exorcist? And why do the people Morning exorcized speak of him reluctantly and with visible discomfort and fear?
Finally, one of Morning’s exorcised people show up in Kinderman’s squad room. This person shows Kinderman horrible scarring dating from the exorcism. Kinderman asks, “The demon did all that?” The person replies, “No, sir. Faddah Mornin’ did it.”
Kinderman goes to Morning with this new evidence. After listening to Kinderman’s story, Morning smiles at Kinderman, saying, “This time you are going to lose.” And there, in an icy little room in Washington, D.C., William Kinderman finds himself locked in this, the final struggle in the Exorcist narrative.
Mike, thanks for the very kind words. I’m delighted that you think the story fits in the Blatty “tone”.
Merrin doesn’t have the heart attack. Karras doesn’t jump out the window. Regan MacNeil dies. A “downer” much worse than the one some people think happened, namely Karras either committing suicide or being forced out the window, “murdered” by the demon. Regan’s death would be a gaping black hole, leaving nothing but grief and terrible, terrible questions. A truly _horrific_ ending to a horror novel.
The University president is found dead, crucified in the chapel and with the mark of the Gemini carved into his flesh. The mother of the Police Club boy, who discovered that Regan spoke English in reverse, is found dead by a similar M.O. Ditto the University president’s secretary, who brought him the copy of his speech in the Legion film.
Kinderman, shocked and horrified, investigates. As the investigation proceeds, Kinderman is astonished to see all the clues pointing to … himself. Is he somehow committing these murders? Is he insane? Possessed? Is he dissociated (like Amfortas was in the novel)?
How long can he deflect the obvious conclusions – and their import? Of anyone in Georgetown, Kinderman is the single person who has the most information about The Gemini.
He is only beginning to absorb these factors when his detectives, Ryan and Stedman, are found on the canoe dock, heads turned completely around, facing backward.
And Kinderman recalls with a chill that whenever possible, The Gemini selected victims whose names began with the letter “K”. When Julie Kinderman, his daughter, mysteriously disappears in the middle of this crime wave, Kinderman must search intensively for her… and shun the realization that he may in some way be deeply connected to this, and the other, crimes.
Has Kinderman flipped? Has The Gemini, in another act of revenge, invaded Kinderman’s soul? Did The Gemini and/or the demon/Pazuzu leap from Karras into Kinderman when Kinderman shot Karras and “set him free”? Is someone in Kinderman’s own police force, possessed or not, reviving The Gemini’s crime spree?
Kinderman secretly and as discretely as possible seeks advice from the only source available: Father Paul Morning, who though mutilated and traumatized by his exorcism of Karras/The Gemini/the demon/Pazuzu, has survived, and whose wisdom and vast experience of possession may be the final hope for the haunted William F. Kinderman…
Pretty crappy, but it’s the best I could do…
I dunno – the visuals suggested that the demon cause his heart attack via reaching into his chest and ripping out his heart. Louise Fletcher, while linked into this scene, also suffers a “heart attack”.
The novel was pretty clear that Merrin’s heart gave out thru stress, not thru the demon’s action. In fact, the demon is angry that Merrin dies before the demon can kill him or morally defeat him. EX2/Heretic completely contradicts Blatty’s own scenario – just another instance of how much Boorman despised Blatty’s novel/Friedkin’s film.
Blatty implies “then and there” that Karras would have killed everyone in the house he could have killed. He tells the demon, “No! I won’t let you hurt them!” The film shows this when it frames the now-unpossessed Regan framed in Karras’s would-be-strangling hands. Then Karras tells the demon, “NO!” and jumps thru the window. Blatty apparently thought the possessed Karras capable of killing everyone in the house. Blatty has already established Karras’s great physical strength and athleticism, and knows that the reader will look at Karras as doubly-dangerous in a possessed state.
I don’t think a “detailed theory” is supplied by Blatty beyond: “regular Karras = very strong”; “possessed Karras = very strong and very dangerous”.
Blatty says that Regan had been exposed to religious ideas: 1) she had read material about possession; 2) she had desecrated the church and typed the blasphemous altar card (tho’ in a possessed or semi-possessed state); she knew that Willie and Karl were of Catholic background; she lived in predominantly Catholic Georgetown and thus presumably had seen her share of priests and nuns.
Therefore she had at least a background in understanding the meaning of the crucifix. She may well have sneaked it into her room as a protective talisman. Or, the demon, anticipating full control and the eventuality of self-rape with the crucifix, may have directed Regan to procure the cross for future use.
Actually, it is not a Bible – although it frequently references the Bible. It’s from the Roman Ritual which is found in the large red volume used in the films. Sorry but I don’t know where you could get a physical copy of it other than Googling Catholic bookstores and catalogues. Maybe if you just Googled “Roman Ritual” you could find an online text? It goes on for several pages. I think it may only exist as part of a larger body of prayers in the “red book”…
It does look inconsistent. However, the head of the language lab, a male, may have received the data from one of his workers/researchers who could have been a female, namely the black kid’s mother. Thus, the mother discovered that the tape was English in reverse, informed the language lab boss, and the boss then told Karras. It’s a stretch, but not impossible.
I don’t believe that anyone has ever been possessed by a demon. The New Testament’s portrait of possession is just that – a portrait. Most of the “possessed” in the NT are obviously mentally/neurologically afflicted. The ones that are not so obviously physically afflicted, e.g., the “Legion” demon in the Gadarene pig scene, are symbolic of the writer’s intention in identifying for the reader who Jesus was. Jesus, as God’s messianic agent, has “power on earth” to forgive sins, perform healings, teach with new authority…and to cast out demons.
Possession in Buddhism has a similar etiology, with the exception that, far from being feared and considered to be damned spirits, Buddhism customarily regards “possessing entities” as ignorant, suffering sentient beings – and seeks not so much to exorcize them as to educate them about their own Buddha-nature and their karmic status, and thus to set them on the road to Enlightenment.
Concerning modern possession cases, I have not encountered a single one in the literature that demands a supernatural explanation. The most I grant is that some cases do seem to involve paranormal events. But paranormal events do not necessarily signal a truly supernatural status.
Any number of theodicies have been created in Western religions to explain possession. The NT is clear that Jesus, whose world view seems to have been wholly mythological, saw himself as a combatant in a dualistic cosmic war between Satan’s Kingdom on the one hand, and God’s Kingdom on the other. His exorcisms were seen by him, his disciples, and the early Church, as tokens of his battle against Satan and Satan’s reign on earth. Each of Jesus’ successful exorcisms was seen as beating back Satan’s hold, and as opening a space in which God’s Kingdom’s “seed” could be planted.
The later Church seems to have held to this view: people are possessed by evil spirits because, as the Johannine Jesus said, the “Prince of this world” is always actively opposihng God and his kingdom. One of Satan’s most effective weapons in this war is the possession of people by “Satan’s spirits”. People become possession victims because of the messy state of cosmic dualism: the world is under Satan’s sway, though eventually God will re-establish his rightful sovereignty. At least that is the myth’s central claim – and its best hope.
I interpret the beginning scenes of Legion as a dream-like symbolism, most likely originating in Karras’ mind. As in dreams, time-sequencing is blurred. These scenes are probably from Karras’ point of view because this is established in his own narration, “I remember a rose, and a fall down a long flight of steps”, and the camera moving down the deserted Georgetown street is from the narrator’s point of view.
Then, having exposited the scene as an internalization of Karras, Karras himself actually appears twice. Careful observation reveals a running figure dressed in a priest’s cassock darting from left to right. Then, a few seconds later, the same priestly figure darts across the street again, this time from right to left.
Likely this represents Karras’ memory – or his interpretation – of the night of the exorcism when his body was being invaded by The Gemini-Pazuzu.
He remembers – or at least seems to think of himself – as running wildly around the MacNeil’s neighborhood. And it is certainly the MacNeil’s neighborhood, because the street that the camera is panning down leads directly to the MacNeil house on the right, with the platform of the Hitchcock Steps straight ahead.
Therefore I would similarly interpret the wind blowing through the church as Karras’ own mental metaphor for a demonic force invading a sacred space – a visual analogy for the invasion of Karras’ own saintly person by The Gemini-Pazuzu.
Since we know that Pazuzu is represented by the (southwest) wind, surely the church-wind implies Pazuzu’s presence.
This is re-iterated later in the film when a demonic force invades another sacred space – namely, Fr. Morning’s room: the bird he has been caring for suddenly dies, and the same kind of paper-blowing tempest that was earlier present in the church begins to blow through his own room. Obviously, this is the demonic/Pazuzu force manifesting itself again. Schrader uses this wind-analogy at the beginning of Dominion, where, in his confrontation with the Nazi officer, Merrin’s cassock is blown about by a sudden wind.
I think the entire “prologue” to Legion – including the church-wind – is a highly symbolical narrative meant to express Karras’ dark, confused mental state on the night of the exorcism.
We should be grateful that Boorman didn’t mix’n’match from another of his films:
= = =Regan: Let’s just see ya drop them drawers, Merrin.
Merrin: This is ridiculous.
Karras to Regan: If we want your money, we’ll take it.
Regan to Karras: Ya better get ready to do some prayin’, boy, an’ ya better pray real good.
Karras to Regan: I’ve been prayin’ all along, are ya deaf? Squeal like a hog, boy!
Demon to Karras: Ah’ve been doin’ that all along, are ya deaf?
Merrin shoots Regan through the chest with an arrow: Take that, ya toothless bastard.
Karras to Merrin: What have you done? What about the law?
Merrin to Karras: What law?
Karras to Merrin: Is this all just a game to you?
Merrin to Karras: Yeah. The biggest, most real game ever.
Kinderman, bursting into the room: Don’t you boys ever do nothin’ like this again, ya hear?
= = =… and other such atrocities.
