The Incel Killer: Elliot Rodger and the Isla Vista Attack

Hollywood on the Outside, Something Else Brewing Inside

Elliot Rodger grew up in a world that looked, from the outside, like privilege wrapped in prestige. Born in London, he was the son of Peter Rodger, a filmmaker who would go on to work on major Hollywood projects, and Lin Chin, a Malaysian Chinese nurse who transitioned into on-set medical work after meeting Peter.

His early life was a split-screen. By day, he went to private schools in the UK. By night, he was tagging along to movie premieres and hanging out on the fringes of Hollywood’s inner circle. When he was five, the family relocated to Los Angeles, and that divide—between the life he had and the life he wanted—started to stretch even wider.

Not long after the move, his parents divorced. Elliot and his younger sister split time between two households, bouncing back and forth on a weekly schedule. Then Peter remarried—this time to a Moroccan-born French actress named Soumaya Akaaboune.

Elliot hated her. He hated what she represented. But he hated school even more.

Back in LA, Elliot wasn’t the interesting kid with international ties and a famous last name anymore. Everyone had a famous last name. Every other student was the child of someone important. Where they were outgoing, he was withdrawn. Social interactions overwhelmed him. He barely spoke in class, whispering answers when called on. He didn’t want to play with the other kids. Even stuff like birthday parties or Disneyland—events most kids beg for—sent him spiraling into tears.

There was something off. But no one really knew just how off things were going to get.

A Diagnosis, Some Bleach, and the Beginning of the Spiral

By the time Elliot was nine, his mom had filed paperwork asking for more child support. The reason? She said Elliot was autistic and needed extra help—both in school and at home. His dad wasn’t exactly on board. He didn’t fully buy the diagnosis, but he did admit that Elliot was… different.

Elliot agreed with that part, at least. But instead of focusing on things like social skills or anxiety, he zeroed in on what he thought was really holding him back—his height, his weight, and his race. He believed people didn’t want to be around him because he was short, skinny, and mixed-race. So, he did what any deeply insecure kid soaking in LA culture might do: he dyed his hair blonde, picked up a skateboard, and started trying to look like the boys he thought people liked.

For a while, it worked. He made a few friends. He tried to blend in. But nothing clicked in a lasting way. His worldview stayed narrow. He still didn’t understand how people worked. And the loneliness just kept growing.

Things got even weirder when his mom started dating George Lucas. Yeah, that George Lucas. Suddenly Elliot was brushing shoulders with Hollywood royalty, going to premieres, and playing the role of a bright, connected kid from a privileged life. But behind closed doors, he spent most of his time holed up in online forums.

That was the only space he felt even a little bit understood.

But when puberty hit, Elliot’s focus shifted. Friends didn’t matter as much anymore—he became obsessed with losing his virginity. The problem was, he didn’t know how to talk to girls. Not really. And online forums weren’t helping.

Still, he believed there was a formula. He had seen it a million times in Hollywood. If you’re rich and successful, women show up. Period.

So he gave his mom a task: marry someone wealthy, so Elliot could finally have the life he believed he deserved.

Lin refused.

Elliot dropped therapy, dropped his meds, and enrolled at Los Angeles Pierce College. Not because he was passionate about school, but because it gave him somewhere to be. A distraction.

That didn’t last long either. He quickly started blaming the happy couples around him for making it impossible to concentrate. Love, sex, smiling people—everywhere he looked, they reminded him of what he didn’t have.

And resentment was starting to turn into something darker.

The Obsession That Became a War

By his late teens, Elliot had exactly one friend left—his childhood best friend, who, at that point, was really more of a benchmark. The only comfort Elliot claimed to have was that this friend was also a virgin. That was it. That was the bond.

But where his friend tried to work on himself, Elliot just stewed in blame. He decided the problem wasn’t him—it was everyone else. Women, mostly. And the world for not giving him what he felt entitled to. He told his friend that one day he’d get revenge.

That’s when the friendship ended.

Trying to course-correct, Elliot’s parents got together on one thing: helping him start over in Santa Barbara. The idea was that college, roommates, and new surroundings might help him develop some basic social skills.

It didn’t.

Roommates came and went. One called him a “ticking time bomb.” Others just left. And Elliot started talking openly about something he called his “Day of Retribution.” The plan? Target couples and women. Make them pay.

But first, he needed money. He started buying lottery tickets. His logic was deeply unwell but weirdly consistent. If he won, he’d use the money to attract women. And if that didn’t work, he’d fund his revenge.

When yet another lottery ticket came up short in the summer of 2012, Elliot took a different route. He went to a shooting range and started practicing.

By Halloween 2013, he picked that night to launch his plan—until he realized police patrols would be heavier. He pushed the date again. And again. Always circling, waiting for something to change.

He thought maybe sex could fix it. That if he could just sleep with someone, the rage would go away. So in July 2013, he went to a party. Got drunk. Told himself this was it.

It wasn’t.

He didn’t talk to anyone. Instead, he insulted people, climbed onto a ledge, and pretended to shoot partygoers with his fingers. Then he tried to push several women off the ledge. Unsurprisingly, he got shoved off instead.

He broke his ankle but was too drunk to realize it. Got kicked out of the party, stumbled into the wrong house trying to get back in, and was beaten up by the homeowners who thought he was breaking in. The bruises, the swollen eye—those became part of his origin story.

In his mind, the world had made him suffer, and it owed him blood.

A Grudge, a Lease, and a Murder Plan

His roommates, Weihan “David” Wang and Cheng Yuan “James” Hong, were already frustrated. David had reported him for blasting music late at night. Things escalated when Elliot filed a formal complaint—over stolen candles.

Yes, candles.

Turns out David had taken them in retaliation. Elliot had borrowed some of his cooking equipment and never returned it, so David decided to hold the candles hostage until he got his stuff back.

Instead of resolving it, Elliot called the police. Held David under a citizen’s arrest until they showed up. David got arrested for petty theft.

At that point, Elliot went full escalation mode. He demanded management evict both roommates. They didn’t respond. Mostly because they’d already found a new place and were counting down the weeks.

But Elliot wasn’t done with them.

The Manifesto, the Plan, the Killings

In April 2014, Elliot uploaded 22 videos to YouTube. He talked about his loneliness. His virginity. His confusion about why women didn’t like him. He listed his credentials like a sad LinkedIn bio: good car, expensive clothes, decent face. Still nothing.

The problem, he said, must be them.

And then came the manifesto.

A 137-page document titled My Twisted World, where he laid out his worldview. Women, he said, were a “plague.” The freedom to choose their partners had ruined everything. He proposed rounding them up into camps and giving “civilized men” control over reproduction.

It was rage dressed up as ideology.

Then came the plan.

Step one: Kill his stepmother and half-brother at his dad’s house, then steal their SUV. Step two: Return to Isla Vista and kill his two roommates. Step three: Start what he called a “War on Women,” targeting sororities—specifically Alpha Phi—and shooting as many people as possible before dying in a final shootout.

But Elliot didn’t wait.

He started early by skipping to part two of step one. He murdered his roommates by stabbing them to death in their apartment.

Next, he drove to the Alpha Phi house but couldn’t get in. So he opened fire on three women outside the Delta Delta Delta house instead, killing two.

From there, he drove through Isla Vista, randomly shooting pedestrians, eventually exchanging gunfire with police before turning the gun on himself.

In the end, six people were murdered. Fourteen others were injured. Elliot Rodger was dead.