Starring: Penn Badgley, Elizabeth Lail, Shay Mitchell, John Stamos, Ambyr Childers, Ethan Cherry, Hari Nef, Mark Blum, Lou Taylor Pucci, Michael Park
YOU is about a very damaged young man who would rather desire than possess. His obsession is fueled by obtaining the unobtainable, but once this is accomplished, it is on to the next hurdle to clear. The trouble is: He is a psychopathic liar and killer who fancies himself as morally superior to his rivals, and many of his obstacles to happiness are his own doing. It's not as if he can simply keep that side of himself hidden.
What we have here is unapologetic, trashy fun; reminiscent of the nighttime soaps I would watch in the 80's, and that's a compliment. The young man, a Manhattan bookstore manager named Joe Goldberg (Badgley), begins an obsessive quest to win a fetching fledgling author named Beck (short for Guinevere Beck) the moment she enters his quaint bookstore. Beck is friendly enough, maybe even flirtatious, and he thinks they might have a chance. When she leaves, he checks social media to learn about her. He takes it a step further than most would by Googling where Beck lives and standing outside to watch her roam about her apartment in front of wide-open bay windows. When she undresses, he masturbates in the shadows, nearly getting busted by an unsuspecting woman leaving her apartment building.
Joe soon stalks, er, follows Beck around, hoping to manufacture a chance encounter with her and win her heart. Beck's sometime booty call, a sleazeball named Benji (Pucci), is seen as a threat to be discredited or disposed of. Joe does both, with the aid of a cage in the bookstore basement which looks eerily similar to the one which imprisoned Hannibal Lecter all those years. Joe, of course, indefatigably juggles his lies perilously in the air as Beck slowly falls for him.
Joe's thoughts are narrated by the intelligent, perceptive Joe throughout. What precisely goes through the mind of a guy like Joe, who thinks guys like Benji are scum for not appreciating and adoring Beck, but yet he has no qualms about lying to her and killing the friends he sees as roadblocks to winning her eternal love. Joe is appalled by his own crimes, but sees them as a necessary evil. His thoughts mostly act as self-rationalization of his deeds.
Badgley is handsome, but not too handsome; intelligent, but not a genius. He manages to make us understand Joe's motives without approving of them, and this is not an easy feat. Joe's boyish face masks great internal scars from an abusive childhood, and Badgley is the right actor for this tightrope of a role.
Beck is somewhat damaged goods herself. She does not realize her own worth, choosing to hang out with insufferable friends like Peach (Mitchell), who may or not be in love with Beck herself and uses sly putdowns to keep Beck from believing in herself. This low self-esteem makes Beck easier prey for predators like Joe and Peach, who dislike each other from the start, mostly because they are alike. Lail is a beauty, yes, but what makes Beck so hypnotically watchable is how sad, wounded, and troubled she is. We care for her and shake our heads as she makes one wrong decision after another to trust the wrong people and seal her fate.
YOU is dark, tragic material. Joe is tragic for not being able to understand what a monster he is, and for failing to understand that Beck actually loves him. Beck is tragic for not understanding that her love is wasted on Joe. What happens in between is deliciously satisfying stuff.
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