![]() You is a whole amusement park's worth of rides to watch, leaning into and subverting cliches to make the viewer, go along for the ride as well as hopefully pause to question it all, and your own part in the system of cultural romantic expectations, in a way that is pitch-perfect for the era. (But seriously, it’s so fun to pretend this is what happened to Dan after Gossip Girl.) Throughout the season, we are forced to face the worst aspects of our culture’s obsession with traditional gender roles and masculine authority writ large and soapily fantastical. And her strengths as a writer/showrunner are on vivid display in the story of Beck and Dan Humphries - uh, sorry, Joe. As showrunner on Syfy’s equally-as-subversive series, The Magicians, Gamble is a master craftsman of big, campy stories with outrageous consequences, grounded in excellent writing and pinpoint plotting. That will come as no surprise to TV viewers who know the name of its executive producer, Sera Gamble. Beck exhibits the same contradictions men and women all see or exhibit, to some extent or another, when it comes to love - and it’s what gets her snared in Joe’s insanely well-set, and often incredibly lucky, trap. She doesn’t have many boundaries, but she's earnest and well-intentioned and doesn’t seem like a bad person, either. She says she’s independent, but her rich friends pay for everything, and she wants a man to rescue her. She wants the world to hand her things she feels entitled to, rather than really try. She’s a bit careless, selfish, and lets men use her (often to her advantage). Beck, like most everyone else on this show, is pretty quickly revealed be sort of insufferable. And yes, they mean that Salinger, but more on her later. She’s got a fantastic apartment (university housing has gotten luxe) with no curtains, a teachers assistant gig, and a bunch of rich friends to help her escape consequences - including her well-heeled bestie, Peach Salinger (Shay Mitchell). ![]() Beck, as she’s called, is a free-spirited part-time yoga teacher who lives in the 30 Rock-described “bubble,” where attractive people just seem to have everything go their way. Play The new apple of his eye? Aspiring, coquettish writer Guinevere Beck (Elizabeth Lail), the personification of what every ideal girl’s “supposed” to be. He just wants someone to see him and love him, particularly after being rejected by the love of his life, Candace. He knows he’s a good guy, he’s a protector. Joe is a good white boy with a hard childhood who was raised by - we later learn - a real manipulative SOB. His is the story of pain and obsession and toxic masculinity (which, for context, as noted by, "is derived from studies that focus on violent behavior perpetrated by men, and-this is key-is designed to describe not masculinity itself, but a form of gendered behavior that results when expectations of 'what it means to be a man' go wrong" Y'know, like murdering people who are interested in the object of your affection). Enter: Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley), our Nice Guy With Issues protagonist. The series plays with extremes, upending the way we look at relationships and modern dating. You is a horrifying love letter to all those romantic ideals and expectations that have permeated our society, for both men and women. ![]() The formally-on-Lifetime, now-on-Netflix (and renewed for a Season 2!) series based on the Caroline Kepnes novel of the same name, is so insane, you’re bound to be riveted and engaged, if nothing else. ![]()
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