abitbetterworld

[abitbetterworld]

The Rocky Horror Picture Show Theory

We all love RHPS, we’ve all seen it at least 1000 times and we all think we can do the Time Warp at parties. But there arent too many fan theories out there, and I came up with one many years ago before fan theories were even a popular thing. I thought I’d share it on here and see what people thought. 

We start at the church where Brad and Janet (Branet) are at their friends wedding. Betty and Ralph just got married and we see Janet catch the bouquet while Brad smiles. Now instantly theres something weird. Does Brad just walk round with a ring in his pocket in case his girlfriend catches a brides wedding arrangement? Was it just pure luck that he was going to propose to her on the same day she caught the flowers which were her destiny to be married next? Well, this is where my complicated theory starts. I hope you’re ready. 

At the church we see Frank (A little under dressed from what we’re used to) and Riff and Magenta in the back of the group. Its said the film makers (The god that is Richard O’Brien) wanted it to look like a tribute to American Gothic which shows up later in the movie, but I want to take it further. So many coincidental things happened, what if they weren’t ever coincidence? 

Branet were the chosen ones in this theory, for some reason Frank set his sights on them and wanted them for whatever reason. Through some kind of manipulation or weird power (I mean, they are genius aliens) they could have set it all up. Brad was to have the ring and Janet was to catch the bouquet which would mean they’d get engaged right outside the church. Once in the church, we see a plain looking Magenta and Columbia with Riff, but no Frank. 

It may seem far fetched, but we are talking about Rocky Horror where basically anything is possible, so stay with me. Eddie was some kind of lover of Franks and possibly gave him a lot of information on his uncle, Dr Scott. Its possible it was brought up that just like in a stereotypical scenario back in the days where women only took classes to meet men, that he told them of all the couples which were matched up in his uncles classroom like Branet and Betty and Ralph and they all would visit and thank him once engaged (but no one bothers to invite him to the wedding). To someone like Frank who had sex with anyone who walked through his door, this may have seemed rather fascinating to him. Transylvanians might find this idea to be the complete opposite of their own sexual relationships, and thats why Frank wanted to study the very humans Eddie told him about. 

So while they’re all in the church, Frank goes out to rig the tyre so it will blow at the right time as he knows which route they will be taking to visit their professor. Think about how he reacted when he found out about their flat?

So next up we meet Columbia, she’s fairly open about how she met Frank. He drove up to her in a pick up truck while she was tapping (Is it harder to picture a woman just tap dancing down the street or the glamorous Frank in a pick up?) and says he changed her whole outlook on life in a single stare. We don’t exactly know why Columbia was there other than she was a fan of Franks, she clearly loved him and was attracted by him, but she appeared to be spared compared to Eddie! We know Frank likes attention, but after she seemed to fall for Eddie also, was he really that interested in keeping her around? 

But the point here is we now can picture Frank in 3 different ways. In one he’s the bold lipstick wearing, corset donning, crotch thrusting beauty we all swoon over no matter who we are, then we have the Frank we saw outside of the church where he looks very plain, very ordinary, blending in with the crowd. And now we have him in a pick up truck, presumably looking more like Eddie than anyone else, trying to look a little more rough and bad boy. Did he pick Columbia up to experiment on her? Maybe this was also Eddies doing, he could have told Frank about the women that swooned for him, and Frank wanted to see if he could achieve the same effect by suiting up, remember the leather jacket we see him wear later in the film, perhaps it was his pick up truck look. 

Now we have Eddie, the main reason I believe this night happens the way it does. We don’t know how many humans Frank has lured into his mansion in the past and we don’t know what happened to them (Think of the ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK SIGN, who put it there? Possibly a past experiment who escaped?). Perhaps Frank told Eddie what he had done and it terrified the poor delivery boy who was no unable to escape (There’s an alarm on the building and savage dogs if he even tried) so instead, he accepts his fate. BUT, thats where I believe Eddie sets out to destroy Frank and take him down with him. 

We first meet Eddie when he comes crashing out of the freezer with a dramatic scar on his head and he deliberately riles up the party and pisses off Frank. Now he’s been in that freezer, he knows theres a pic axe in there, he knows his kidnapper is dangerous, surely it would make more sense for him to ride out with that and start attacking? But no, he leaves it in there knowing he’s going to anger Frank (who he already knows is a pretty psychotic person since he stole half of his brain) almost as if he was up to something.

Heres where things get really far fetched (BUT, please keep in mind we are talking about aliens and this movie is supposed to be a sci-fi) So we know that Rocky has half of Eddies brain, we know Rocky was created by Frank in the lab. I’m putting it out there that they were the same person because Rocky had Eddies mind, his thoughts, his knowledge of the past, perhaps thats why he woke up so depressed, because he was a creation by a mad man who had ruined his life. 

Rocky was in the lab and recognized Branet when he woke up, maybe from a photo he’d seen of Eddies uncle, or maybe he just knew that it was Franks plan to get them. So Eddie can see through Rockys eyes and he comes out to disturb the party, knowing Frank will likely lash out on him and Branet can see just how crazy this guy is. Eddie is not only showing them a scar across his head and that hes been locked in a freezer, but he knows Frank will grab the pic and kill him, ultimately showing them just how much danger they are in, because really, who goes out of their way to poke at the person who cut their head open and left them to freeze?. 

This is also done in front of the Transylvanians who may not approve of what he’s done, also possibly a ploy by Eddie to show them what kind of things he’s doing on earth which could expose them. I’ll get to more of that later. 

Also, think how angry Rocky looked when Eddie was indeed murdered, for a few moments he lets it get to him before getting back to being a muscled beauty, what he knows Frank has built him to be.

Now the most important part of the movie to this theory is the letter that Eddie writes to Dr Scott. 

Its easy to look at it and assume he’s simply begging for help, but lets look at this a little closer. Its written in blood, which could be a good old horror movie cliche, or it could be something we’ve missed. If it’s written in blood, its likely it was after he had already had his brain hacked in half and he was dying in the freezer. He’s already “Out of (his) head) and we know humans cant survive with half a brain, it’s possibly why he was in the freezer, some kind of old sci-fi logic that it might keep him alive for as long as possible. 

His letter was likely written to get Dr Scott to call the police, he probably hoped his uncle wouldn’t just show up at the creepy mansion where the murderous aliens live. There could be two reasons why he wants help even if he knows he won’t survive out of the freezer. The first could be to save Branet from the “evil deeds” that Eddie landed them in, or he could have wanted Rocky to be saved, the other part of him which could be spared from whatever plans Frank had, it was more likely that Rocky would survive since he was a creation rather than an average human. 

Obviously Eddie wasn’t expecting his wheelchair bound uncle to just knock on the door to the home he’d been warned about, so when Rocky saw him, things changed, he had to play the part to keep his uncle safe. We know Eddie was a bit of a shit, but perhaps things had changed him in the mansion. 

Now we are at the floor show and I’m going to be doing a bit of reaching on this one, but I think it makes some sense. 

Frank bares his soul to his humans when he talks about his life. “That delicate, satin draped frame, as it clung to her thigh, how I started to cry, cause I wanted to be dressed just the same” 

We realize this is possibly Franks true shape. He’s the way he wants to be in make-up and wearing beautiful stockings and a corset. He sings them into a trance (Remember when Columbia said a single stare changed her whole outlook?) after they’ve all just sang about “The gas that Frankies landed” and “My love for a certain dope” so it’s likely now they’re all under his spell or he’s brought them over to how he feels, showing them the light that is not caring about anything other than whats in the moment (I like this one better) and even Rocky gets involved with it all, maybe he’s falling for his love all over again. 

But then Riff and Magenta burst in and tell Frank he’s basically doomed. They conclude his mission is a failure (Perhaps studying humans) and his lifestyle is too extreme (perhaps those evil deeds Eddie warned of) and he’s now their prisoner. 

Again, it’s easy to assume that the duo simply rose up and rebelled against their mission leader, but why now? If all they needed to do was grab their gun and tell him it was over, why wait? Why be whipped and forced to serve him if it was that easy? 

Well here is where I believe the transylvanians were involved. I believe they were invited by Frank to witness his scientific discovery of human life creation, but Eddie showed them Frank was a risk, bringing in humans, murdering them, it risked exposure of their presence on Earth. It’s entirely possible that the Transylvanians were some kind of higher power of the planet and what they witnessed was dangerous to their people and before leaving, they supplied Riff with a weapon which could kill Frank and told them to return without him that night. Something perhaps Eddie had predicted. 

You see this theory is mainly based on the belief that Frank and Eddie were close, their relationship was more than we first assume. In the stage version they talk about how they had a more mental relationship, but even in the film I firmly believe we can see that they share more than just a sexual relationship. Why did Frank take half of Eddies brain? Why not the full one? Perhaps he wanted to make the very opposite of Eddie physically, but still loved Eddie enough to give him a chance to live. Maybe Frank even kept going into the freezer to talk to him because he missed him after he took half of his brain. I’ve always thought that Frank and Eddie had more to their relationship than we see. Frank loved Eddies mind so much that he put half of it into the perfect specimen of a man, and he killed Eddie so easily because he knew he had another version of him in Rocky.  

So Frank may have told Eddie about the rules of the mission, and when Eddie knew the Transylvanians were coming, he planned to make Frank break the rules, to be all over Columbia to make him jealous, knowing it would tip his lover over the edge to kill him which would make the other aliens see how deranged he was, because he knew there would be punishment for Frank. 

The reason I believe the transylvanians are not bad aliens is because Riff at the end lets the humans go. He knows they could expose him but he tells them to run anyway, and he knows he can safely return home without being scared of consequence, which is why I think they gave him the go ahead and the gun to kill Frank. 

So here’s the sad part of my theory. Eddie knew he was going to die, he hoped he could have his other half saved, he planned for Rocky to survive and probably expose the aliens. He stood back and let them kill Frank, not trying to help defend him, but he overcame with grief when he saw his loves body laid lifeless at his own doing. Maybe it was out of pure love for Frank that he ran with his body knowing he’d likely be killed too, or maybe he’d seen too much and knew he couldn’t live with it, perhaps he just didn’t feel like Eddie and didn’t want to live as half a person. Either way, in this theory, Eddie was the hero who gave his life to expose a murderer with a terrifying plan against humans, and as Rocky, he gave his life again in either love or the depression he’d felt for the whole 7 hours of his life.

A sad life for Rocky who woke up with memories of what he had seen Frank do, maybe to other humans in the mansion which Eddie witnessed. He knew he was about to see his other half murdered by the man he had been in love with when he was Eddie, and he didn’t know where his life was supposed to go once free from the mansion. In this theory, Eddie and Rocky both give their lives. Eddie gives his to put an end to Frank, and Rocky gives his possibly because he can’t live without Frank or live with what he did to him.