Boy meets girl. Boy stalks girl. Boy kills everyone girl’s close to. Boy and girl live happily ever after? You sort of hope so.
Thus is the twisted logic of romance in the Lifetime television series You, now streaming on Netflix. Adapted from the novel by Caroline Kepnes, You exploits the manipulative tropes of the rom-com genre to make you root for love against all your better instincts and even your morality. It’s a guilty pleasure par excellence because you feel guilty the whole time.
The boy is Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley), and we spend much of the season in his head, privy to his internal dialogue, his blinkered reasoning, his endearing desperation. Rather than turning from his crimes in revulsion and siding with the karmic tide of retribution surely awaiting him, the show keeps the viewers firmly in Joe’s demented little corner, peppering his character with just enough redemptive acts of genuine kindness to rationalize our feelings of affection for this one sick puppy.
The show is no less seductive for not being particularly sly. Like the generous use of soft-focus You employs in its cinematography, the moral background is blurred, while the amorous object is the only thing clearly in-frame. The show is so blatant in its approach, and so charming in its deviousness, ethical fortitude seems merely collateral damage to the overall…
