How Netflix's You completely missed the mark with its abysmal ending

The psychological thriller was an instant binge-watch hit, simultaneously opening up everyone's eyes to the realities of toxic relationships, the horrors of social media stalking and the damaging tropes of romanticising manipulative men and their behaviour.

It was the series that many chose to hate watch or simply unapologetically revel in, waiting to see what was next in Joe Goldberg's murderous quest.

He's fathered a child, gotten married twice, moved to London, killed a mountain of people (mainly women), but alas, You has reached its anticipated curtain call – and what a disappointing end it is.

The series has faced backlash, divided opinion and troubling 'stan culture' since it landed on our screens back in 2018, bringing into question just why some viewers seem to side with Joe (Penn Badgley), despite proving time and time again that he really just is a cold-blooded killer.

Speaking only for myself here, part of the intrigue and drive of watching the show was very much centred around just who will be the person to take him down.

An infuriatingly charming representation of the outdated ideas around being a white knight, Joe has always been a psychopath in my eyes. While some may have called him an anti-hero for his past murders of some truly terrible people, I was more fixated on who would bandy together to take this murderer down.

Hell, that's the reason why Love Quinn (Victoria Pedretti) proved herself to be a worthy opponent of Joe's and continues to be a character that fans wanted to return to haunt him.

So, like many others also assumed, season 5 would be the fitting final chapter in a long-spanning tale. It seemed intent on finishing off Joe's story and was teased as being centred around the sweet act of revenge.

In reality, the final season is almost entirely unnecessary, and is just approximately 10 hours of time that I won't ever get back. As a longtime fan of the show and its ability to handle the aforementioned topics, I don't relish saying such things, but closing the chapter of a hit series in such a lacklustre way warrants its fair share of disappointment.

While there's plenty to be said for the long and winding dialogue, uneven pacing and random inclusion of subplots, You season 5 ultimately failed to honour its best characters.

This season sees the introduction of Bronte, a seemingly wild and free young playwright who has found solace in Mooney's, the bookshop that Joe and Kate (Charlotte Ritchie) have now bought as a passion project of Joe's.

However, since moving back to New York, the shelves of rare and secondhand books remain untouched as Joe doesn't quite know what to do with this special segment of his past.

Sneaking in through a back window, Bronte has seemingly been borrowing books for some time, and has even resorted to sleeping there. But you know what the drill is by now, and pretty much from their first meeting, you can guess where it's going to go: Joe develops an unhealthy obsession with her and the pair become romantically involved. Except this time, it's different – or so Joe thinks.

Where Kate has made it obvious that she can't live with the reality of Joe's murderous ways, Bronte seems to have accepted Joe wholeheartedly. That is until it becomes clear she's part of a Reddit group of online vigilantes – that includes Dr Nicky's own son Clayton (Tom Francis) – who are seeking justice for season 1's Guinevere Beck (Elizabeth Lail) and Dr Nicky (John Stamos).

Bronte has essentially been deployed to woo Joe and get him to confess to murdering Beck. Except she's gone rogue and off the books, forging her own plan and falling in love with him in the process.

Oh, the course of true love never did run smooth, did it?

Kate knows about her husband's affair and, in the penultimate episode, confronts Bronte over her actions of continuing to form a relationship with not only a married man, but a complete psychopath. Kate doesn't mince her words and knows that Bronte thinks she is the smartest of Joe's victims thus far, with Bronte clearly exhibiting some kind of superiority complex over her close bond with Joe.

It's a dance that all of Joe's loves have done in the past, including Kate herself, who lifted Joe to the highest of highs and allowed him to leech off of her wealth and fame.

But it's the surprise return of Marienne (Tati Gabrielle) that finally kicks Bronte into gear, forcing her to admit that she's been hiding herself away in this newfound persona rather than her real identity of Louise Flannery.

Much like the final season itself, I spend too long concerned with Bronte here, though. While it's not the battle of Joe's victims, to have Bronte be one of the final voices of the series when you have Kate (who is surprisingly alive and well), Marienne and Nadia (Amy Leigh Hickman) just feels like a completely wasted opportunity.

That penultimate episode felt like the punch-in-the-air moment many have been waiting for, with Joe locked in his own cage and left to face these three incredibly smart women. While Kate certainly has her own deeply questionable moral flaws, she essentially put her money where her mouth is, remained committed to being good and getting rid of Joe.

So, to have the lasting notes of the series dedicated much to Bronte will leave many a fan feeling cheated. While she may be the object of Joe's attention this season, as a character, Bronte is not only immediately suspicious and unsubtle but, really, just rather annoying.

Her obsession with referring to herself as Beck's friend when Beck was just her teacher's assistant at university is a grating detail that won't be lost on a lot of viewers.

Let's also keep it very real: if Louise/Bronte was an actual friend of Beck's, Joe would have certainly found out everything about her back in season 1. He may have escalated in his abuse and violence over the years, but Joe remains a dab hand at social media stalking.

The final season of You was also the most opportune time to bring back characters, if only for a flashback. Sure, we get the somewhat pleasing TikTok inclusion of various past acquaintances of Joe's, but to not include the likes of Love or Ellie (Jenna Ortega) in these final episodes just feels like the showrunners underestimated the fans' attachment to past characters.

We're told in a whirlwind final few minutes that Joe has had a messy trial and multiple convictions thrown his way, but where are our satisfying shots of said court proceedings? Where are the voices of Joe's victims and survivors?

The show isn't afraid of clipping in brief flashbacks to past seasons, so a final scene of an investigative whiteboard with all of Joe's victims would have not only underlined the extent of Joe's crimes, but also paid homage to the fact that, in reality, so many victims and survivors often get left out of the narrative.

The final episodes did achieve what we've all been waiting for – calling Joe out as the misogynistic abuser and killer he is. But it's not as much of a major mic drop moment as the series makes it out to be, especially if the very people whose lives have been ravaged or impacted by Joe don't get a final chance to reel off their own Joe-like monologue or report on their own lives.

What was once quite a fun series was essentially bogged down in trying to overtly frame Joe as the murderous abuser we've always known him to be, a fact that has never escaped most of its viewers.

Really, You's fifth and final season could've been a chance to serve Joe his just desserts, champion its best characters and see justice prevail. What it ended up being was 10 drawn-out episodes that will now cement You as that show that had one of the most anticlimactic ends in TV history.

You season 5 is now streaming on Netflix – sign up for Netflix from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.

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