Prodigal Son: Martin Whitly’s 10 Creepiest Quotes

Debuting in September 2019 on Fox, Prodigal Son is an intriguing crime drama series centered around Malcolm Bright, the son of a notorious serial killer who discovered his father’s dirty deeds as a child and turned him in. Now an adult, he has decided to pursue a career as a skilled profiler while still haunted by his father, incidents he has presumably suppressed, and thoughts that his father might have been grooming him to take over. Dr. Martin Whitly, played brilliantly by Michael Sheen, is now incarcerated in an asylum yet still has a mental hold on Malcolm, who visits him often, sometimes for personal reasons and other times for help on cases.

Clever, cunning, manipulative, and thoroughly disturbing, some of the things Dr. Whitly has said will make the hairs on the back of your neck stand to attention. Here are 10 of his creepiest quotes.

10 Malcolm: “How is this for secrets? You were going to kill me.” Martin: “OK, that one’s on me. But come on, it’s water under the bridge.”

Dr. Whitly is so nonchalant about the fact that he killed at least 23 women, you’d think he was simply having a conversation about what he had for dinner that night. In this instance, Malcolm disturbingly discovered that, as a child, his father once took him to the family cabin in the woods with a friend (his murderous protegee) in order to kill Malcolm because he was starting to remember things.

Yet he acts as though this was no big deal and Malcolm should get over it and move past that seemingly small truth. Er, ok.

9 “The diameter of the restraint is three inches. The width of your hand is five inches. So all you have to do is make the width of your hand three inches. That’s just math.”

We often forget that while Dr. Whitly is a calculating killer, he was also a skilled surgeon. In fact, he even received the serial killer name The Surgeon because of his medical background as well as the skilled ways in which he killed and sometimes even dismembered his victims.

When Malcolm calls him as he’s handcuffed and chained in a dark room, Dr. Whitly helps his son through escaping by casually suggesting that if he just broke his own thumb, he could slide his hand through.

8 “What else did you try to do to replace me? I smelled my wife’s perfume on that cheap coat. You’re not worthy of a woman like her. She must have felt sorry for you or angry at me.”

Detective Gil Arroyo is the officer who went to the Whitly home on suspicions when Malcolm, then a young boy, warned him that his father would kill him. After Dr. Whitly’s arrest and incarceration, Gil became like a father figure to Malcolm, indebted to the boy for saving his life.

He also became a close confidant and friend to Malcolm’s mother Jessica Whitly. Clearly, Dr. Whitly thinks there’s more going on between these two as evidenced by this jealous comment.

7 Malcolm: “If you were going to kill me right now, how would you do it?” Martin: “Geez, son. What a morbid thought. I’m afraid my options are a tad restricted.”

In an intense stand-off conversation in Dr. Whitly’s cell, Malcolm asks him this morbid question. How would he kill him if he had the chance to do it right at that moment?

Dr. Whitly’s reply is casual and calm as he raises his hands to show the restraints, shrugs, and implies that his usual methods wouldn’t work because he’s slightly incapacitated at the moment. Any normal individual would, of course, answer by saying they would never murder their own child. But Dr. Whitly is far from normal.

6 “You know there is a point where you can pierce the heart and not affect a single coronary artery…”

Another reminder that Dr. Whitly didn’t just take many lives, he also saved many, he shows a young Malcolm how you could presumably stab someone right near the heart and not kill them and reiterates this advice to the now-adult Malcolm. It’s all about the position and plunging the knife or another sharp object into the perfect spot.

He also uses the opportunity to boast about his prowess as a surgeon, saying “…if you miss the target, the heart will fail and no surgeon, not even me, can save you then. It’s like threading the eye of a needle.” This also suggests he might have practiced this on a victim or two.

5 “I never hurt a patient on purpose. I follow the Hippocratic Oath to the letter, albeit with one small asterisk.”

Interestingly, while Dr. Whitly killed many women, potentially more than was even discovered, he swears he never once hurt a patient he was tasked to save. It would make sense given his narcissistic nature. He would never let someone die on the table because it would suggest he wasn’t a good surgeon.

The small asterisk he refers to, of course, is the fact that while the Hippocratic Oath discusses the ethical standards medical professionals must uphold, he didn’t really follow those ethics during his personal time.

4 “Well, as much as it pains me to say this, I don’t think I’m allowed a conjugal visit right now. I’m a bit on thin ice when it comes to privileges.”

When Jessica came to visit Dr. Whitly for one reason or another, whether it was to urge him not to see her son or daughter anymore or plead with him to tell her the truth about something, he would always crack jokes as soon as he saw her.

Acting as though nothing had happened and he was simply locked up for no good reason, he’d suggest his ex-wife was coming by for a conjugal visit. Naturally, she’d wince and cringe at the very thought of it.

3 “My boy, I made you.”

While Malcolm struggles with what his father did, he also struggles with the idea that he might deep down have been part of more than he remembers as a child. Indeed, Malcolm has hallucinated or had dark dreams after which he has awakened and came close to hurting someone, or himself.

He decided to pursue profiling to better understand the minds of serial killers and stop them from causing more harm. But with these five words, Dr. Whitly can make him question everything.

2 “If John has him he’s dead. He’s dead.”

John was Dr. Whitly’s protegee during his murdering spree, a deeply disturbed man who Dr. Whitly molded him to become a skilled killer. John often went with him on his camping or cabin trips where they murdered and/or disposed of women together.

When John kidnapped Malcolm and Gil notified Dr. Whitly that this happened, he immediately believed that there was no way that his son would still be alive. If he knew John like he did, and taught him well, John would not have any mercy.

1 “You’re very good at your job, sweetheart. Your mother and I couldn’t be prouder. But have you ever saved someone’s life?”

Dr. Whitly’s daughter Ainsley was just a baby when he was arrested for being a serial killer so she didn’t really get to know her father. Now an adult, she is an ambitious TV news reporter who makes contact with her father, mostly for her own selfish reasons to try and boost her career.

He speaks to her as though he had a hand in raising her, praising her accomplishments while also diminishing them by suggesting that what she does is nothing compared to what he used to do, even if he was murdering people on the side.

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