One of my favorite pastimes is watching crime-related shows, such as “You,” “Criminal Minds,” “Law and Order: SVU” and “Hannibal.” All amazing TV series with talented actors and storytelling, but we have a problem.
Actors are the backbone to portraying a character and story. There can be a great story, but a bad actor ruins it. The same can be said about great actors and bad scripts. However, actors are not meant to create a sexy version of the criminal.
Whether it’s a TV series based on real life or a fictional world, murderers, stalkers and rapists are never attractive. Ross Lynch and Penn Badgley are attractive, but their iconic roles as Jeffrey Dahmer and Joe Goldberg, respectively, are not. Even the actors themselves hold disdain for their characters.
We can’t lead ourselves to believe that if Joe would simply find the right person that he would be happy — because he’s a f—ing murderer.
Penn Badgley, Vanity Fair
If the actors can’t sympathize with their characters, how can we?
Furthermore, while it’s important to find actors and actresses that can properly portray the roles, it’s even more important to understand that conventional attractiveness doesn’t excuse their crimes. Even if the person — real or fictional — was attractive to their peers, their actions cannot be excused.
The trend of good-looking actors has led to the romanticization of real-life criminals. For example, Cameron Herrin was convicted of vehicular manslaughter after he killed a woman and her child. As of right now, there are people claiming he should be released because he is “too cute” to be sentenced to 24 years in prison. In another case, there are groups of people who find Jeffrey Dahmer attractive and sympathize with him because they find that he wanted “closeness” and “love.”
I hate to burst the bubble, but these people are criminals. They have committed crimes and some of them, if given the chance, would kill you. It’s not an I-would-kill-for-you situation — it’s an I-would-kill-you situation. While I love true crime as much as the next guy, there needs to be a distinction that criminals shouldn’t be romanticized.
Unfortunately, I can’t find a solution to stop this. It’s possible to lay blame on casting directors or the producers, but they can’t be fully to blame. We need to recognize that, while it’s acceptable to see Zac Efron playing Ted Bundy, it doesn’t give us an excuse to say the criminal Efron is portraying is suddenly attractive and capable of love. Quite honestly, Bundy is the least attractive man I’ve ever seen and his crimes speak for themselves.
However, we as a society need to unlearn our own obsession with true crime to understand that, though the crimes are horrific, we can’t glamorize the past and need to stick to the facts — not the ideals we want to project onto a case.