I, along with almost everyone else my age, have been obsessed with the Netflix original series YOU, since its initial release in 2018. After patiently waiting a year for season 3 to be released, I am proud to announce that it was everything I had hoped for and more. Please keep in mind that this is a review of season 3, so this is your first and only warning for spoilers ahead.
The ending of season 2 was frustrating, to say the least. I have been sitting with the knowledge that Love is pregnant, Joe is already in the works of obsessing over a new lady, and they moved to a suburb, for over a year now. Needless to say, I binged season 3 the day it came out.
The season opened with the delivery of a son named Henry Forty Goldberg, much to Joe’s surprise. In my humble opinion, I think the inclusion of Forty’s name is just sentencing this child to absolute insanity, but that could be just me. Not to mention, he will have a crisis about what his actual name is because his grandma and mother call him forty, and Joe and everyone else calls him Henry. Seriously people, make up your mind.
One of the many comical things throughout this season is how dead set they are on being a normal suburban family. A reoccurring thing is marriage counseling. In earlier seasons, specifically the first one, there is also a major tie-in to counseling, through Dr. Nicky.
This idea of being normal and being the perfect family is what I believe was part of their downfall. Both Love and Joe throughout the entire season spent most of it trying to be people they simply were not.
Another parallel to the first season is the bookstore setting, or in the case of season 3, the library. This is where Joe meets his main obsession for the season, Marienne. We are definitely familiar with Joe and his obsessions, but in this season we get a chance to see Love and her obsession.
One of the things that surprised me the most in this season was Love cheating on Joe… multiple times. Even more than that, she cheated on him with the stepson of the woman she killed in the first episode, Natalie.
There was one thing I really liked about this season more than the past two. The fact that Joe and Love are living in a fear of being caught, adds a whole new dimension to the show. It’s interesting to think about how the show is structured to make you root for the clearly evil people who are doing terrible things.
For instance, when Joe and Love put Sherry and Cary Conrad in the box, it really messed with my mind. On one hand, Sherry and Cary did nothing wrong, they just were in the wrong place at the wrong time. And yet, when they are trying to escape the box, I found myself worrying about Joe and Love more than Sherry and Cary.
And I know that sounds crazy, but that is part of the reason they designed the show the way they did. It really makes you think about everything that is happening in the show, and you are almost forced to sympathize with Joe and Love because they are the protagonists.
And then don’t even get me started on the fact that now there is this cute innocent baby in the picture. I mean, these people are burying a dead body, and they thought turning the baby carrier the other way would make them good parents.
The end of season three was crazy to put it lightly. All of a sudden Marrienne knew all about how crazy Joe was, Love was dead, and Joe escaped to France. Definitely not what I had expected out of the end of the season, but again, I was not disappointed.
Now, I have to wait another year for season four, and patiently anticipate if Joe is actually going to find Marienne, or if he will find a new obsession along the way.
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