Headscratchers / The Exorcist

2016 Series

• How is it that Father Marcus wasn't arrested, or ar the very least questioned at length after killing Brother Simon so publicly? It wasn't immediately clear to the average person that Simon was there to kill the pope. He had no weapon. You'd think that CPD, the pope's security, and federal investigators would at least interrogate him.
  • Since Christian-type demons are real, awe can assume that God and angels exist in this universe too. Thus, I propose that the Pope received a divine revelation of Marcus's motive, and pardoned him based on that.

1973 Film

• How does Pazuzu turn Regan's head all the way around backwards without killing her? It seems like it would break her spinal cord.
  • Pazuzu has demonstrated the ability to cause others to see what it wants them to see. Much of what Pazuzu does to seemingly harm Regan could be illusionary in nature.
  • The illusionary theory seems to be true, given the Exorcist Head has only been fatal in the series.
• Why does Regan get all deformed and hideous the longer she is possessed? I always figured it was her body (and likely her soul as well) trying to "fight off" the possession in the same way you fight off a bacterial infection.
  • A demon is a deformed and hideous thing. Perhaps it wanted to make the place feel more like home and gradually reshaped her body into something more to his liking.
• If Regan doesn't remember anything that happened during her possession why does she burst out crying as soon as she's free, rather than just sitting there looking baffled?
  • If you were Regan, would you WANT to have to own up to anything that you did, even if you WERE possessed? She probably lied and said she couldn’t remember anything, and her mother was more than happy to go along with the lie in order to preserve her daughters’ innocence.
    • In The Heretic, it's a bit clearer that she's been keeping her memories to herself not out of guilt but a wish to protect her mother. In the book, she knows what's going on while she's possessed; she sends a "help me" message via dermography. Once freed, she really doesn't remember anything until she meets Fr. Dyer and his clerical collar brings to mind a "sudden remembrance of forgotten concern", whereupon she embraces him. She knows something happened and that guys with collars like that helped her.
  • It's later said that she had no memory, but it's possible she did the moments after she was freed, perhaps like waking from a nightmare that you soon forget. But also, her body has been severely damaged, and the first thing she sees is a crazed possessed priest standing over her who then jumps out the window.
• So what was the desecration of the statue all about? Who did that?
  • The book makes it clearer that it was the demon operating through her. He used her clay and paint, as Kinderman confirms, and the fingerprints on the typed altar card are hers. There's some very subtle clues all the way through as Kinderman figures out what's going on.
• So, why did the "holy" water hurt Pazuzu if it was just plain old tap water? Is the water considered holy since a priest was using it?
  • The water didn't hurt Pazuzu. He just acted like it did, and only after being told it was holy water, in order to make Father Karras doubt that Regan was truly possessed. Karras himself says he doesn't believe it because the reaction occurred after he lied about it being holy water, which would psychologically indicate that Regan reacted according to a delusion or belief—and because a real demon wouldn't react to fake holy water. This was, in truth, the real demon playing along to deny Karras the proof that Regan required an exorcism. He continues to toe the line with a thin plausible deniability later by refusing to repeat telekinetic tricks so they may be passed as not his doing and pretending not to know foreign languages while teasing that he knows more. Once a priest becomes involved, Pazuzu shifts to taunting and withholding actionable proof that could get Regan exorcised, all while flaunting his demonic powers in any way he can.
• When Fr Karras begins playing the recordings in reverse and Pazuzu is roaring for Merrin, why is this also not relayed to Karras' superiors when he's asking for an exorcism to be considered? It seems a pretty big red flag that Pazuzu is trying to create a final showdown with the old priest.

1971 Book

• Why is Father Karras seemingly discounting phenomena such as telepathy or telekinesis as not significant or even very interesting? They may or may not count as formal criteria for determining demonic possession according to the Church regulations but things like moving objects by will alone or reading people's minds are definitely unnatural or at the very least extremely unusual, which, one assumes, would strongly point towards something stranger happening to Regan than the symptoms of an undiagnosed mental disorder.
  • Karras is aware of research pointing toward telepathy and telekinesis as unusual but natural phenomena. He knows of Jung's accounts of mental patients displaying clairvoyance and telepathy. He needs clearly supernatural phenomena to convince himself, and then the bishop, that this isn't just "extreme hysteria". The backwards-talking tape is the key.