Synopsis:
You is based on the series of books by Caroline Kepnes. The first season follows Joe Goldberg, a bookstore manager in New York, who meets Guinevere Beck, an aspiring writer, and becomes immediately infatuated with her. To feed his dangerous obsession, he turns to social media to keep tabs on her, and ensure that nothing and no one gets in the way of their being together.
Showrunners: Greg Berlanti, Sera Gamble and Leslie Morgenstein
Adapted from: You book series by Caroline Kepnes
Starring: Penn Badgley, Elizabeth Lail
My Edition:
My Thoughts:
I decided that I should do this review after boldly proclaiming a few weeks ago in my review of the first book in the series that I liked the show better. So, be prepared for me to do a review of season 2 at whatever point I get to reading book 2 as well. Fair warning.
I didn’t know going into this that it was a Lifetime joint, but nothing in the world has ever made more sense. This is 100% pure, unfettered Lifetimesploitation. But it didn’t stay with them. It is now a Netflix series (season 2 is made by them). It’s bonkerballs. There’s so much drama, stalking, murder, and general insane shenanigans you won’t know what to do with yourself. But.
But.
Don’t get me wrong – in spite of all that, it’s fucking scary. Penn Badgley is TERRIFYING as Joe. This is the first thing I’ve ever seen him in, and I’m worried it has tainted him in my eyes forever. Watching as he goes from 0-6,000 mph in his feelings for Beck in, like, under a day is unnerving. And the lengths that he will go to in order to “neutralize” (uh, ya know) anyone who gets in his way? I shudder to think about it.
It seems like the showrunners decided to remove most of the victim-blamey shit (a solid choice), and just focus on how unhinged Joe is instead. Season One of You feels like a rapid descent into madness and murder that you are unfortunately riding along with. Except you get to leave at the end. And you don’t have to live inside Joe’s head the whole time like you do in the books. You get about a 50/50 split on time in Joe’s head, and time as a 3rd party observer. It’s good. It feels necessary. The book is crushing. The show is just scary. And here there is never a doubt that Joe is the villain. Although I just came across an article on Medium refers to him as “deeply relatable” which made me want to vomit a lot. I want to believe the author meant well, but I found the whole article really disturbing, so I won’t be linking it here.
Beck is still not the most likeable character, but at least the show never left me wondering if they (the people making the show) thought she might have in some small way deserved Joe. I know I mentioned feeling that way about the book (I talk about that in more detail in that review).
