A villain protagonist should be listed as one of, if not my very favourite trope when it comes to books and movies. Why? Because I believe in the imperfection of mankind. I believe that humans are innately flawed and are susceptible to doing bad things, if not sometimes, then all of the time, even though we try many times to be good. So, no the protagonist doesn’t always have to be the goody-two-shoes, never-do-wrong victim. If anything, the protagonist could be the victim but doesn’t sit still. He does bad things because of it. Not personally what I would do, but that’s why this series held its appeal for me.
YOU (2018-2024)
A psychological thriller that centres on the man, Joe Goldberg and all he’ll do for love. What lengths are you willing to go for “love?” Joe Goldberg, a smart but intense young man has a thing for beautiful and equally smart women. He becomes smitten with them starting from a little crush. But it doesn’t end there, this crush of his usually develops into what becomes cutthroat obsession, complete with aggressive stalking and everything in between.
Using the internet, social media and every other tool at his disposal, Joe goes the extra length to prove to himself that the woman he chooses is the one and he can also be the one for her. And so, he has no qualms of getting rid of all obstacles or oppositions, including people, to him being with the woman of his dreams. For Joe Goldberg, only one thing matters, being with his YOU.
My Review and Rating
This is totally me jumping the gun because I’m only half done with the series, as I'm not yet done with Seasons 3 or 4. While I’m nearly halfway through season 3, I will break this into two and only review season 1 and 2, totally disregarding what I’ve already watched in season 3.
The first thing that got to me was the choice of characters and how well they interpreted their roles. Joe is the average white man, who is handsome in a sense, but yeah pretty much regular and the type you may not even give a second glance to on a good day, which is what makes the characterization perfect because they used someone that you’d just take as a regular dude. Nothing striking. And how did he interpret his role? Perfectly. I couldn’t have asked for better. The ideal unsuspecting protagonist villain.
Joe’s first love interest in season 1, Guinivere Beck, was perfect to me. Beautiful, smart, had the right facial expressions, portrayed her role with finesse and class, even though she was annoying a lot of times. Loved her to no end and I must admit when season 1 ended, I was sure I was never going back to complete the series. Because it felt like a grave injustice to me, what happened in the end. It could have ended differently but yeah, would the series be the exceptional production it was if it gave us everything as we wanted??
Getting into season 2 and like @b0s, who convinced me to get back into the series, said, it did get better from season 2 when it came to the story telling and plot twists. I was shook out of my skin with the things that happened in this second season of YOU. Although, I must admit I didn’t quite like Joe’s love interest in this season, Love Quinn. I felt like they could have used someone else but maybe that’s just my personal bias. I didn’t like her and had even more cause to detest her in the end. But yeah, while her personality or acting did nothing for me in almost the entirety of the second season, I think I’m beginning to do well with her acting. Nothing about her sparks it for me like it did with Guinevere but again, we can’t always have what we want.
Another thing I would say I love in this series is us being allowed into the sinisterly twisted mind of Joe Goldberg. It’s supposed to be his story so it’s no surprise to anyone but they almost convinced me that there was nothing illogical about the decisions Joe was taking towards those women and everyone who came in contact with him. They almost made me feel that his serial killing was just bad luck, and had nothing to do with the fact that he was unstable and psychotic. They almost made me believe that he was just a man who sought love desperately and was unlucky when it came to it.
Did they succeed? Like I said, good people do bad things. Or maybe I’m the one who’s just been corrupted by a perfectly written dark script, who knows? And yeah, I know it's not realistic and that you can't get away with that many murders, but yeah, who cares? Give your dark imagination a chance. Lol.
Anyway, I’m hearing rumours that the last season is not as good as the others, but I’m willing to take my chances because that’s just how locked in I am with this series. So far, it’s a clean 9/10 for me. Can’t wait to get back to watching YOU.
Jhymi🖤
Thumbnail from IMDB.
