Warning: This article contains spoilers forThe Watcher.
Moving is a drag.
Getting letters from a stalker the moment you settle into your new home, however, is pure hell.
Dissecting the true story behind ‘The Watcher.'.Netflix (2); Julio Cortez/AP/Shutterstock
Did someone calling themself “The Watcher” really torment a New Jersey family?
There wouldn’t be the TV series without this foundational true crime story.
Are creepy neighbors Jasper and Pearl based on real people?
Mia Farrow and Terry Kinney in ‘The Watcher’.Netflix
Yes, but thankfully only the first part.
“He wasn’t facing his house he was facing the Broadduses.'”
Was Pearl’s Westfield Preservation Society real?
Margo Martindale and Richard Kind as Mo and Mitch in ‘The Watcher’.Netflix
to voicing distaste over the thought of the new houses having displeasing front-facing garages.
What about Theodora Birch?
Did a cancer-stricken private investigator assist in the search?
The Westfield Preservation Society in ‘The Watcher’.Netflix
Country clubs and zero-dressing salads occupied no real space in the Broadduses story.
Was the John Graff murder sequence inspired by a real story?
Between the slayings, John calmly eats a sandwich and washes it down with a glass of milk.
Noma Dumezweni as Theodora Birch in ‘The Watcher’.Netflix
List went on the run, and wasn’t captured until an episode ofAmerica’s Most Wantedchronicled his crimes.
Clark turned out to be List, who’d built a new life for himself in the Virginia suburbs.
He wasarrested in 1989, convicted and sentenced to five life terms in prison.
Jennifer Coolidge in ‘The Watcher’.ERIC LIEBOWITZ/NETFLIX
He died in 2008 as a result of complications from pneumonia.
The finale: Did they ever find the real Watcher, and what happened to the house?
Murphy’s series finishes with a chilling title card noting that “The Watcher case remains unsolved.”
‘The Watcher’ episode 3 murder sequence involving John Graff (Joe Montello) is based on the real John List family murders of 1971.Netflix; Bettmann/Getty
While the seven-episode show is a work of fiction loosely based on real events, that part is true.
The person or people sending letters to the Broaddus family was never caught.
“That was our biggest hurdle: Trying to get over that stigma.
See the real house from ‘The Watcher’.Netflix; Julio Cortez/AP/Shutterstock
The piece ends with a quote from the fourth letter: “You are despised by the house.
And The Watcher won” both works pay tribute to this sentiment, albeit in different ways.
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