The Family: The Baekelands

The Issues: Drunken, attention-seeking socialite and former would-be actress struggles with the fact that her already-too-close-for-comfort son is gay, and so sets out to lure him back to the ladyflesh in the most direct and dysfunctional manner possible.

Understandably, this messes said son up quite badly. And, with a sickening inevitability, he eventually messes her up quite badly - well, to death, actually - in return.

Would Therapy Help? The difficulty here seems to be deciding which form of therapy to shove these nutcases into first. Sex counsellor, marriage guidance counsellor, career counsellor...which one would you actually turn to in a misguided maelstrom of this magnitude?

Either way, you'd be unlikely to change a great deal; the son of the real-life family on which the story is based was released from Broadmoor some eight years after the killing, only to seriously injure his gran in a similar knife attack almost immediately.