Latest / Mini Scroll / Baby Reindeer: Analysing The Netflix True Story of Stalking, Abuse, Love & Loneliness

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Baby Reindeer: Analysing The Netflix True Story of Stalking, Abuse, Love & Loneliness · Mini Scroll

0:00
This is a trigger warning. This episode contains
0:02
discussions of stalking, mental illness and sexual abuse.
0:06
It also contains spoilers for the Netflix series Baby
0:10
Reindeer. In 2015, twenty something year
0:13
old Donnie Dunn was bartending at a pub in London.
0:17
Donnie had moved from Scotland to pursue a career in comedy,
0:20
but things were not unfolding the way he had hoped.
0:24
A series of traumatic events over the course of several years
0:27
left Donnie alone, living with his ex girlfriend's mother and
0:31
working at the pub while his comedy career was at a
0:34
standstill. Though Donnie was down, bad
0:36
things were about to get a lot worse when a woman in her 40s
0:40
sat down at his bar. Her name was Martha and she
0:44
seemed sad. Donnie offered her a cup of tea
0:47
on the House, a seemingly harmless act of kindness because
0:51
he felt sorry for her. This harmless act of kindness
0:55
would change Donnie's life forever.
0:58
A convicted stalker, Martha became obsessed with Donnie and
1:03
relentlessly harassed him for the next three years.
1:06
Though Martha's stalking starts to destroy Donnie's life, he
1:10
also finds some twisted comfort in it.
1:14
This is the story told in Netflix's new series Baby
1:17
Reindeer. But it's also the real life
1:21
story of the series creator and star actor Richard Gad, AKA
1:26
Donnie Dunn. From Centennial World.
1:29
I'm Lauren Meissner, and this is Infinite Scroll, a podcast about
1:33
Internet culture, the creator economy and how social media is
1:36
shaping Gen. Zed, Welcome back to Infinite
1:39
Scroll, everyone. So, so many of you guys said to
1:43
me on Mini Scroll this week that you needed a baby reindeer deep
1:46
dive. So that is what I am bringing
1:49
you today. And I am bringing it to you with
1:51
my brother Nick. Say hi.
1:55
Nick has never done a podcast before, so bear with him.
1:59
But you know, he's like my little TV buddy.
2:01
We literally spend every single night binge watching TV.
2:04
So of course he watched Baby Reindeer with me.
2:07
And I was like, I just need someone to talk with this about
2:11
talk with this. No talk with talk with me.
2:15
Very experienced TV watcher, so glad I could bring my expertise.
2:19
Yes, I needed somebody to talk with me about this.
2:22
So he is here. We're going to have some.
2:25
I don't think I've actually ever had a guy on the podcast, so
2:28
this is a first. I hope I don't ruin it for all
2:30
future men. Why do men?
2:34
All right, So as always, Please remember To rate, review and
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subscribe, please sign up to our newsletter, which is called
2:40
Infinite Scroll. On Wednesdays, we send out a
2:43
commentary article about a trend, creator, drama, or news.
2:46
And on Fridays, we round up the five biggest think pieces on the
2:49
Internet from that week and also join our Geneva group, which is
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of course called Infinite Scroll, where you can chat with
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other people who are obsessed with Internet culture and
2:57
creator drama NT. And you can chat with me.
3:01
All right, I'm going to get into some reviews from this week.
3:03
So Lauren DM D Infinite Scroll Podcast on Instagram and she
3:06
said hi. I'm not sure if you'll see this
3:08
comment, but I just came across your podcast on TikTok today and
3:11
I'm hooked. I just want to let you know that
3:13
I love your videos. Keep up the good work.
3:15
Thank you, Lauren. I love that.
3:18
I'm actually so glad that the TikTok is like still going
3:21
strong, 'cause that was such a big marketing tool for us last
3:24
year. And then I feel like when
3:26
everything changed and I started Co hosting solo, it's just not
3:29
hitting the same. So I am glad that there are
3:31
still a few people tricking, trickling in from TikTok.
3:34
All right, So this is going to be a bit of a throwback, like,
3:36
this is not scripted. This is more like the episode
3:38
that I did with Crystal or like previous episodes with Jordy
3:41
where we just have a bunch of things to talk about.
3:44
So we're just going to get right into it.
3:45
So first I'm I want to talk about what Baby Reindeer is.
3:49
OK, so as I said at the top of the episode, go watch it.
3:53
If you guys want to listen to this and you do want to watch
3:55
it, if you don't have any intention of watching it, then
3:57
just be warned. Spoilers like crazy.
3:59
And it is a very dark and twisted show.
4:02
OK, so Baby Reindeer is a new Netflix series written and
4:05
starring comedian Richard Gad. The show tells Richard's story
4:09
of being relentlessly stalked by a random woman who just walked
4:11
into the pub that he worked at in his 20s.
4:14
Richard was living in London to pursue his comedy career.
4:17
Because of several things going on in his life at the time, his
4:20
self esteem was very low and though this woman was ruining
4:23
his life, he became somewhat dependent on her attention.
4:27
In the series, Richard's name is Donnie and his stalker's name is
4:31
Martha. Martha tells tall tales, she
4:34
claims to be a lawyer and always talks about this lavish life
4:37
that she leads and Donnie immediately clocks that.
4:40
A lot of this is untrue because she can't even afford the cup of
4:44
tea that he graciously gives her, and the actress who plays
4:47
Martha is Jessica Gunning. So as per netflix.com quote,
4:52
while working his shift as a bartender, Donnie shows an act
4:55
of kindness to Martha, a customer whose vulnerability is
4:59
readily apparent. But as the saying goes, no good
5:01
deed goes unpunished, and this casual encounter sparks a
5:04
suffocating obsession that threatens to wreck both of their
5:06
lives and forces Donnie to face his deeply buried trauma.
5:10
While this type of storyline might seem familiar, it's
5:13
important to remember that this isn't just a story.
5:15
It's true. Since it did come from such a
5:17
personal place. Gad consciously avoids the black
5:20
and white cliche, dense stalker narratives that have been done
5:22
before, making sure that everyone's humanity remains
5:25
intact. So the Netflix show is a loose
5:29
adaptation of Richard's award-winning play of the same
5:32
name, which he performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in
5:35
2019. It also bores elements from his
5:38
2016 One Man show called Monkey See Monkey Do, which tells his
5:42
story of sexual abuse while running on his treadmill pursued
5:45
by a gorilla. And we will get to that sexual
5:47
abuse later. OK, so let's talk about the
5:51
reception. It has just been receiving rave
5:54
reviews everywhere. Yeah, all my friends are
5:56
watching it. Everybody's talking about it.
5:58
Everyone loves it. Yeah, so it has 85% audience
6:02
rating on Rotten Tomatoes and 100% on critic reviews.
6:06
It's rated 8 out of 10 on IMDb. It is viral all over TikTok.
6:11
I have personally not seen a bad review.
6:12
Have you? No, I don't think so.
6:14
I've only heard positive things. Yeah.
6:16
And it's number one on Netflix right now in like most
6:18
countries. So why do we think that baby
6:21
reindeer is so special? Why is it so successful?
6:24
Do you have any thoughts? I mean, I think knowing that
6:27
it's a real story is a big part of it because, and I think
6:31
you're going to dive more into this later.
6:33
But in terms of like the style, it's filmed very much like a
6:37
horror movie or like a thriller or something like that, which
6:41
like the anticipation is so much worse when you know it's like
6:45
something that really happened to someone.
6:47
I feel like, which is like both dark but also captivating.
6:50
I think like it makes it that much scarier and also like makes
6:53
you want to know would happen that much more.
6:55
I think part of it is that it's so difficult to dislike this
6:59
show because it is real, like it's so authentic, it's so self
7:04
aware that it's almost impossible to criticize the plot
7:08
because it's based on it's it's not even just based on a true
7:10
story like at the beginning it literally says this is a true
7:12
story and we will get into the things that are true versus not
7:15
in the show, but so much of it is true.
7:19
So I think any criticism of the story itself has already been
7:23
addressed by Richard in his writing of the story.
7:26
It explores such difficult themes in such a nuanced way.
7:30
It does such a great job of humanizing both Donny and Martha
7:34
and everyone in the show except for that one evil man who we'll
7:37
talk about in a bit. But Richard told Radio Times
7:40
quote, when I was getting stalked, I saw someone who was
7:43
unwell, needed help, was quite vulnerable.
7:46
Stalking is a mental illness and it comes from a sort of fantasy
7:49
addiction of some kind. This idea that this person is
7:52
the answer to all your problems, so you'll hear only what you
7:55
want to hear and disregard the rest.
7:57
And I feel like the fact that he is giving interviews, I mean he
8:00
was giving interviews similar to this back in 2019 when his play
8:03
premiered at Edinburgh Fringe, Fringe.
8:06
Fringe. But the way that he talks about
8:12
his experience being stalked back then and up to now with the
8:15
new series, it's so empathetic to Martha.
8:20
He's so sympathetic to Martha and you can tell that he's
8:22
really worked through that experience and has come up the
8:25
other side understanding, I suppose, a little bit of where
8:28
she was coming from. He's talked about it in like
8:31
interviews that I've seen where he says he feels like she's
8:33
someone who the system failed. And so he felt like, yeah, a lot
8:36
of sympathy for her, like she got left behind.
8:39
It's a cycle, you know, of trauma.
8:42
So then in terms of stylistic choices, like you said, it is
8:46
paced so well, it's kind of like a horror movie, Shannon Keating
8:50
for Vulture wrote. Baby Reindeer is shot and scored
8:53
like a horror movie with disconcerting, unflattering
8:55
close-ups and off kilter angles, which is like perfect.
8:59
And that's what makes it so eerie and unsettling to watch,
9:03
especially episode 4. Yeah, I think like, especially
9:06
early on too, like in the bar scenes, I feel like they did a
9:09
lot of shots from like Martha's perspective looking at Richard
9:14
like kind of like zoomed in his face from.
9:16
Like. From like the front of the bar
9:18
and like vice versa. Like him above.
9:21
Like looking at her when she's sitting there.
9:23
Like laughing with her. Like Diet Coke that she never
9:27
drank. Literally, yeah.
9:29
And the pacing is really good and it's really captivating.
9:32
Even though it's like so dark and twisted.
9:33
It's also kind of funny. Yeah, for sure.
9:36
There's lots of funny moments, like when his dad says good luck
9:39
with the transsexual, when he's on, when he's on the train.
9:43
Yeah. But I think that this
9:45
juxtaposition really mirrors, like what is going on in
9:49
Donnie's psyche between this dark trauma that we'll get into
9:52
in a minute that he has dealt with versus like what he's
9:54
experiencing with Martha. For me, one of the funniest
9:57
parts of the whole show was Martha's emails.
10:01
Oh yeah, for for sure. That's like.
10:03
I think that's such a big part of what made the show iconic.
10:06
Yeah, and those are real emails, apparently.
10:08
Yeah, they're All of the emails seen in the show are allegedly
10:12
sent from the real the real Martha.
10:14
Yeah, she would send hundreds of stream of conscious emails to
10:18
Donnie every day. And they were all filled with
10:20
like, grammatical and spelling errors.
10:23
And it was almost like she was just typing them as fast as she
10:26
was thinking, which I assume is why there was like spelling
10:29
errors and stuff. All of them would sign off with
10:32
some iteration of sent from my iPhone because she was trying to
10:35
like, uphold this facade that she had more money than she did
10:39
or she was more like, well, to do.
10:41
She was like a lawyer and she was like the right hand man of
10:46
like some big politicians. I can't remember.
10:48
Specifically remember her Facebook and she'd.
10:51
Photoshopped. All these photos, but like the
10:55
best part was when you would read these emails on screen and
10:58
they would say something from my iPhone and then they would start
11:00
to like. As things progressed and she got
11:03
more and more, I suppose like desperate for his attention and
11:06
love. They would say like sent from
11:09
iPhone and then it would just say like iPhone, iPhone, and
11:12
then sometimes iPhone will be spelling iPhone.
11:14
It was so good. And it is like, it's it's an
11:20
unsettling show because you're watching it and you're finding
11:23
things funny. Like now we're sitting up here
11:25
laughing but like it's also so sad and so dark.
11:28
And I think Richard's done a good job of balancing that in
11:32
the press that he has done. Like he is aware that he's
11:36
making an entertaining show, but he's so, like I said before,
11:39
sympathetic to Martha. So I think everything that we're
11:42
saying we're laughing too is like with that as well.
11:44
Like that air as well, OK? And then I think the final thing
11:47
that makes Baby Reindeer so special is the narrative
11:49
element, like the fact that we are basically Inside Donnies
11:53
head with his own POV the whole time.
11:55
I think Richard was so willing to fully open himself up for
12:00
this narration. Like he's just so raw and honest
12:03
that it's almost unnerving and it kind of makes you question
12:07
his psyche. But it's like also refreshing to
12:10
hear someone be so self aware. You get like such a deep look
12:14
inside of his head, but at the same time, like in doing so,
12:18
realize that he's like very unwell in many ways, especially
12:21
like early on in the story, having like nervous anticipation
12:24
while you're like from his point of view about what even he's
12:26
going to do. You know what I mean?
12:28
Like what unhinged choices he's going to make?
12:31
Yes. Like those first three episodes,
12:34
you kind of are questioning, like, why is he entertaining
12:36
Martha? What does he get out of this?
12:40
What is going on with his internal psyche to make him be
12:44
OK with this? I mean, he's cracking like
12:47
sexual jokes. Like, I know he's kind of doing
12:50
it to appease the guys at work, but he's like feeding into it a
12:53
little bit with the people in his life and to her.
12:56
And then you're kind of like, what is going on?
12:58
Why would he do this? And then episode 4 happens.
13:02
Yeah, I think like early on in the show, like the first three
13:06
episodes of, as we've been discussing, like, you just
13:09
assume it's based on like the gender roles, this older woman
13:14
stalking this like younger fit man.
13:17
You just assume he's not taking it seriously because there's no
13:20
LIKE. Physical threat.
13:21
Physical threat? Exactly.
13:22
So yes, Episode 4 is where things start to click into place
13:26
and the show opens with him going to the police.
13:28
And so you think, OK, he's reporting like every single
13:32
thing that has happened. And then you find out that's not
13:35
the case. And you're like, why has he not
13:38
been reporting the extent of what Martha's been doing to him?
13:41
Why did it take him six months to report this?
13:44
What is going on? And then we are transported
13:47
years back to Donnie's life at the Edinburgh.
13:52
I can't say that Fringe Fringe Festival where he meets a
13:56
director named Darian. So Darian takes a liking to
14:00
Donnie's cheesy style of comedy and convinces him that he will
14:04
be a star so long as they work together.
14:07
Donnie starts spending more and more time at Darian's house,
14:10
quote UN quote, working on his career.
14:13
And this is where Darian grooms Donnie by getting him to
14:16
experiment with increasingly harder drugs during these
14:20
working sessions. And then he when they're when
14:22
they come down and Donnie goes home.
14:24
He'll send him all these, like crazy rewrites to do when he's
14:27
up at all hours, like trying to do all this unpaid work,
14:30
essentially for Darian. So while Donnie is all, you
14:35
know, messed up on drugs at Darian's house, Darian starts
14:39
sexually abusing him. Donnie is aware that this is
14:42
happening, so we see him wake up with Darian's hands down his
14:45
pants a few different times, but he keeps going back because he
14:49
is just so enraptured with Darian's promises, presumably.
14:53
I think he speaks to it like a bit in the show when he's having
14:56
his like breakdown on stage where he like trauma dumps.
15:01
I think he talks about like he's just doing it for the reason,
15:04
you know, he's doing all of it, like to get big in comedy, get
15:07
famous. I think if you have ambitions to
15:10
be somebody in the public eye or to be especially a comedian
15:14
where basically your whole job is to be validated, right, is to
15:18
get people to laugh and clap at you.
15:20
I can imagine that you have that fame bug.
15:23
So to have somebody who is high up in the industry that you look
15:26
up to, who's successful, who is giving that to you, who's
15:29
clapping for you and saying I believe in you, you're going to
15:33
be successful when we're going to do this together, it would be
15:35
intoxicating. So Shannon Keating writes for
15:38
Vulture quote. Donnie is trapped both by
15:40
Martha's real time surveillance and the emotional after effects
15:43
of Darien's abuse in that strange red room.
15:47
Donnie's narration is more important than ever in episode 4
15:51
because it helps the audience understand the complexities of
15:54
this dynamic and why he keeps going back.
15:57
He is very open about the mistakes that he's made
15:59
throughout the situations with Darian and Martha.
16:02
That's not something we see depicted very often in media.
16:05
And for me, though I can't relate to the experiences that
16:09
he's had, it was relatable to me that he was going through
16:14
something so horrific, so traumatic, where he was so
16:18
clearly the victim and he was still looking for the reasons
16:22
why he wasn't. And Crystal and I were talking
16:24
about this the other day because I don't remember what I was
16:27
saying to her. But I was like, but it was
16:28
probably my fault. And she was like, Lauren, this
16:31
is the millennial curse. We were raised by boomers where
16:35
nothing was their fault. And we have swung so far back
16:38
the other way, where millennials are always searching for to make
16:42
sure that we have our own, like, accountability and
16:44
responsibility. And we're always trying to take
16:45
responsibility for stuff that has happened to us, that it's
16:48
like almost going too far. And I I kind of saw a little bit
16:52
of that and him not necessarily with Martha, because I think he
16:55
did a good job of explaining where he was with that, but with
16:59
the Darian stuff, I just think he didn't cut himself enough
17:03
slack. It's just from a narrative
17:05
standpoint, when you're in your own mind, right?
17:07
You're like all you're just thinking about the just
17:09
different decisions you could have made.
17:11
Yeah, true you. Know what I mean?
17:12
So I think, like, from an outsider perspective,
17:15
absolutely. I don't think anyone should
17:17
blame Darian. I hope no one's blaming.
17:19
Darian. Donnie.
17:21
Oh, go back in time, please. That's OK.
17:25
We know what you meant. We will blame Darian.
17:28
Please blame Darian. No, I don't think anyone like,
17:32
should or would really blame Donnie like for what happened to
17:35
him. But I think when you're dealing
17:37
with trauma and you're trying to like you know, re evaluate what
17:41
happened and even like what you could change for the future
17:44
potentially like, you end up assigning a lot of blame to
17:47
yourself. This show shows the complexities
17:50
of trauma really well, and I think it's quite common for
17:55
someone who has been abused to go back to their abuser.
17:58
Yeah, Like, I think as we'll see later, like it's very easy to
18:02
fall back into like the same role you had when you're with
18:07
like in a similar situation in a similar setting.
18:09
Like, I think like all humans fill a certain role in a given
18:14
situation. And that's like quite fluid.
18:17
Donnie, was the helpless understudy being, like propped
18:22
up emotionally by this or career wise by this, like more powerful
18:26
man. So it's just like an easy role
18:28
to fill. Yeah, so, Richard told Radio
18:30
Times Quote, A lot of abuse happens in power dynamics, work
18:33
dynamics, relationship dynamics, all of those kinds of things.
18:37
I hadn't really seen the psychological complexity of it
18:39
too often on television, and I really wanted to show the
18:42
perniciousness of the grooming cycle just as much as the abuse
18:45
cycle. Abuse survivors can feel just as
18:47
much shame about the idea of feeling duped or the idea of
18:50
feeling manipulated. One of the things that was left
18:53
with me after everything was, God, I just feel so stupid.
18:56
I think being so honest, not just about the assault but how
18:59
it got to that point, I hope will provide comfort for people
19:02
who are maybe going through the same thing.
19:04
So we wanted to touch on kind of the gender roles here.
19:08
You mentioned it a little bit before about how seeing a man
19:13
get stalked by a woman is maybe not as common or it's not
19:17
something like when you hear the word stalker, like, I mean, at
19:19
least I think a man. But I think when it relates to
19:22
Episode 4 and the sexual abuse that Richard endured or Donnie
19:26
endured in the show, it's unique in that it represents male
19:30
sexual violence in such an acclaimed and mainstream piece
19:34
of media. And it's exactly what, you know,
19:36
Richard said in that quote that I just read that he hoped it
19:39
would achieve. Because I think it has achieved
19:41
that. And I mean, I'm assuming or I'm
19:44
sure that a lot of the fears that men have if they have been
19:47
sexually assaulted is that they won't be believed or they'll be
19:50
looked at as less of a man or they'll be looked at like it's
19:53
not serious, you probably enjoyed it or whatever.
19:56
I presume is typically the response that a man would fear
20:00
that they would get. So just to depict this so, like
20:04
it was so jarring to watch, it was so difficult to watch.
20:07
They did such a good job at showing how.
20:10
How dark and seedy and fearful and just horrific that
20:16
experience would have been, I can imagine would be healing for
20:19
a lot of people, not just men, but like trauma survivors in
20:22
general, sexual assault survivors in general.
20:24
And I was watching a YouTube video where it was a man
20:27
speaking about this show about baby reindeer.
20:31
And he was saying I hope that this doesn't get Co opted by us
20:34
by men as like a story about a man's sexual assault like this
20:37
should be representative of all sexual assault.
20:40
But I do think we see so little when it comes to men in media.
20:43
So I think there's like a place for both.
20:45
That is fair. I understand where he's coming
20:47
from like not to Co opt it. I think like the main way in
20:49
which that would be used would be like, what about ISM?
20:52
If people were like, talking about sexual assault against
20:54
women, people were like baby reindeer.
20:57
Remember baby reindeer? Remember baby reindeer?
21:00
But I think just like with anything, as we're realizing in
21:03
society, I think increasing over the years, like representation
21:06
matters. It is a very good thing for male
21:10
survivors of sexual assault to see a man deal with that and
21:14
then receive like, overwhelming support.
21:17
Yeah, you know what I mean? Because then they know.
21:19
They know like, oh, me too. Sorry, not in the hashtag, me
21:22
too sense. But like, a little girl sees a
21:25
woman become an astronaut. Like that gives them that, makes
21:28
them realize it's a potential path for them.
21:30
Yeah. Yeah.
21:31
A man who's a survivor of sexual assault can see like the
21:34
reception that Richard received and realized like, oh, that's
21:37
like a potential path for me as well, like to open up about it
21:39
and receive support. Yeah, and hopefully this show
21:42
becoming so famous is a good gateway for other men like who
21:48
are watching it to see this can happen to us and like we need to
21:51
support our friends, we need to support the boys.
21:54
Yeah, and I guess like, it can also maybe help, like men
21:58
empathize with women who have experienced sexual assault as
22:00
well, because they can see like someone in their shoes.
22:03
Yeah, they did such a good job of depicting it, which is
22:06
obviously very tragic, but it was very, very well done.
22:09
So I guess when it comes to the stalking though, like sticking
22:12
with the gender role discussion at the moment, do you think that
22:16
her being a woman plays a bigger role in him seeing it as like
22:21
harmless at first? Is that why he kind of like
22:24
leans into it? Or is it because he has been
22:27
through which we discover in episode four, such a violent
22:30
abuse that his tolerance for abuse is completely skewed now?
22:35
Yeah, I think like it's mostly the latter, which I think we've
22:39
discussed a bit off podcast. But basically, like my
22:42
impression at the beginning of the show was he's not taking it
22:46
seriously, in large part because she's an older woman.
22:50
But I think, yeah, once you watch episode 4, that's when,
22:53
like, things really click into place because you realize like,
22:56
and I think he says it himself a bit when he goes to like.
22:59
When he finally does go to report her to the police, the
23:01
irony of reporting her and not Darien is not lost on him.
23:05
So like, I think he has a hard time viewing what Martha did is
23:09
like particularly serious or that bad when he has been, as
23:13
you said, like victimized so terribly by Darian, like the
23:16
magnitudes don't line up at all. So it's like it seems trivial in
23:19
comparison. So, like, why would he make a
23:21
big deal out of this and not do something about Darian?
23:25
And Donnie, self-awareness throughout being groomed and
23:27
abused has led to a lot of dialogue online about the
23:31
realities of abuse, complex trauma, and what constitutes a
23:35
quote UN quote, victim. The show explores concepts of
23:39
victimhood throughout, especially in the character of
23:42
Terry, his girlfriend, played by trans actress Nava Mao, who
23:46
almost reflects his inner monologue back to him in real
23:50
life. So he tells us, the audience,
23:53
I'm feeding into this. I'm doing this because you know,
23:57
I like the attention or whatever.
23:58
He's telling us this. I'm not a victim.
24:00
And then she's telling him when they're fighting, you're not a
24:02
victim. And she also confronts him for
24:04
not reporting the worst details to the police about what Martha
24:08
has done. So I feel like she's the voice
24:10
of reason to the audience, but also in his life, and she's like
24:14
reflecting this self-awareness back to him.
24:16
I can agree with that. But I think like on one hand he
24:20
is using like the fact that he's a victim almost as an excuse at
24:24
times saying why he's not dealing with things to Terry.
24:27
But on the other hand, like he is a victim.
24:29
I think it's just a great indication of the fact that like
24:31
Richard writes it, so like not black and white, it's not clear
24:34
where like the lines of victim or enabler begin and end.
24:38
Yeah, and that's what Richard said in an interview.
24:41
I didn't write down the quote, but he was saying that's what he
24:45
thinks has made the show so successful, is that it is
24:47
controversial because there is that blurry line of like, where
24:53
does this begin and where does it end?
24:55
And I think it was really brave of Netflix and Richard to
24:59
explore the story from this more like nuanced perspective.
25:02
And in an interview with the Guardian from four years ago,
25:05
actually about the play that the show was based off of, Richard
25:08
said he would not have been able to make the art piece that he
25:11
had until he had accepted his role role in the stalking
25:15
relationship with Martha. So he said, quote, I hadn't
25:17
quite grasped it yet. If I'd rushed it a year ago, it
25:20
would have just been a victim narrative and everyone would
25:23
have come out saying, oh, you're so brave and well done for doing
25:26
this. It would be unfair to say she
25:28
was an awful person and I was a victim.
25:30
That just didn't feel true. And then he further elaborated
25:34
on this accountability to British GQ earlier this month.
25:37
He said, quote, we live in a time where everyone's trying to
25:40
be perfect. It's interesting when someone
25:42
holds their hands up and says, I made some mistakes.
25:45
There was a version of the show I was going to do in 2019 that
25:48
made me look good, where I offered her a cup of tea and oh,
25:51
what was me? But that felt disingenuous.
25:54
And the second you start to write art from a place where
25:56
you're lying, I don't think the arts going to be any good.
26:00
So all of this leads back to why Donnie did not report Martha to
26:03
the police sooner, and when he finally did, why he didn't
26:06
report the most horrible things that she'd actually done.
26:09
And to what you said before in the show, he says, quote, I
26:12
couldn't stand the irony of reporting her but not him.
26:15
As in Darien, there was always a sense that she was ill, she
26:18
couldn't help it while he was a pernicious, manipulative
26:21
groomer. To admit to her was to admit to
26:22
him. And I hadn't admitted him to
26:24
anybody yet. And we were saying before like
26:27
this show, it's hard to analyze because it really is just the
26:31
telling of this man's trauma story and just it they just give
26:36
it to us so rotten, so real on, you know, this platter
26:40
basically, and we take it. And that's kind of the point.
26:44
I wanted to talk about how I think the binge ability of the
26:47
way like Netflix releases generally releases their
26:50
content. Like the fact that this was
26:51
released all at once, like played to the shows favor, the
26:55
fact that he kind of came off almost like a horror movie or
26:58
like a thriller movie was a big strength to me.
27:01
I was captivated, like anticipating the whole time.
27:03
I'm sure that he wrote it like that.
27:05
And it is like almost having the first act of a play.
27:08
And then if you want to take that intermission after season,
27:11
not season four, episode 4, which we did, we watched the
27:14
first four in one night and then watch the next three and you can
27:18
kind of digest it. You get an answer as to what's
27:21
kind of going on in the first three episodes when you watch
27:24
episode 4. And then you can watch the back
27:27
half in a totally different light, as if it's like the
27:29
second act of a play. It it is, but that's the thing.
27:32
It was a play like he's actually like a playwright.
27:34
So it makes sense that he wrote it like that.
27:37
I agree. It was very impactful.
27:38
I wouldn't have been as powerful, I think, if it was
27:43
released week to week. Also, I want to say, like how
27:45
good Jessica Gunning did as Martha.
27:48
She was so believable, I never thought about her in terms of
27:53
the actor at all. Whenever I was watching Martha,
27:56
whenever Jessica Gunning was on the screen portraying Martha, I
28:00
just thought of her as Martha. Yeah, she did such a good job
28:04
portraying in some ways a relatable or maybe not
28:07
relatable, Sympathetic, sympathetic, but deeply unwell
28:12
person. I agree with that.
28:14
There was a few moments throughout the series where I
28:16
would watch her and I would have to remind myself that she wasn't
28:20
the actual stalker, like because it was obviously actually
28:23
richer, like actually Donnie. But I had to remind myself that
28:27
he was not playing opposite the person that this actually was,
28:31
but it was so believable and he did such a good job as well,
28:34
like he was such an incredible actor.
28:37
I just can't believe that he was able to portray his own trauma
28:41
like that and relive it like that for the show.
28:44
Between like Jessica's performance and like the writing
28:46
in the second-half of the show, everywhere Richard went I was
28:50
like feeling dread that Martha would be there.
28:53
I was just like, oh God, is she going to be here?
28:55
Like in every scene? Like just.
28:57
Like waiting for her to pop up. But they also did a good job of
29:01
us, at least for me. Like feeling comforted by Martha
29:04
too. Like I also enjoyed her
29:07
presence, which was fucked up. And like they did such a good
29:09
job of us understanding as the audience what Johnny would have
29:13
been feeling where it's like that mix of dread and also like
29:16
comfort and anticipation and kind of wanting to see her.
29:18
So that kind of leads us to the ending, because there are a lot
29:23
of questions about the ending and theories about the ending.
29:27
So for a refresher of the series ends with Martha being convicted
29:30
and Johnny going to Darian's house to presumably confront
29:33
him. But they end up having a chat
29:35
and Darian offers Donnie a job. Donnie accepts.
29:39
He leaves and is very upset, so he actually starts listening to
29:42
Martha's voicemails while he walks through the streets of
29:45
London. He goes into a pub, orders a
29:48
drink at the bar by himself and listens to a voicemail where
29:51
Martha explains why she calls him Baby reindeer because when
29:55
she was little she had a stuffed animal of a baby reindeer that
29:57
gave her comfort while her parents fought, She says Donnie
30:01
looks like that baby reindeer, so it ends with Donnie not
30:05
having his wallet, and the bartender is giving him the
30:08
drink on the House because he's crying and upset as he listens
30:11
to this voicemail, and it's like a complete mirror of what
30:15
happened between him and Martha. So the final frame is Donnie
30:19
teary eyed, looking at the bartender, almost horrified.
30:22
And I feel like it's that exact, that last look that he gives the
30:26
bartender that has drawn so many questions about like, what that
30:30
meant. There's so many people that are
30:31
like, oh, now he's going to get obsessed with the bartender like
30:34
Martha did. Other people saying that they've
30:36
realized that he's it's it's his moment of realization that
30:40
anyone could end up in Marthas position with the right quote,
30:43
UN quote, unfortunate circumstances, which I think is
30:46
probably closer to what it is. I don't think it's insinuating
30:49
he's about to start stalking the bartender.
30:51
That would be crazy though, if they came up with a season 2 and
30:54
it was Donny stalking the bartender.
30:56
They were like twist. It kept going.
30:58
Or he was just like they abandoned the fact that it was a
31:00
real story and now it's just like a a cycle of trauma where
31:04
one person stalks In the end of the second season, that
31:06
bartender stalks another. Bartender.
31:08
Literally. What do you think?
31:10
That ending. Means.
31:10
I mean, yeah, I think the latter for sure.
31:13
Like that he he's coming to the realization that, like, he's in
31:17
a position that Martha was in and like how easy it would be
31:21
to, like, grasp on to like any little act of kindness.
31:25
I think Richard said that in an interview that you quoted
31:28
earlier or something like that. People who are stalking people
31:30
are like viewing it as something like much greater than it is.
31:33
Like, it's often like that person is the solution to my
31:36
problems. Like if I'm with them or when
31:38
I'm with them, they interpret them to be together.
31:41
Like it solves everything. Yeah, I think also it's Donnie
31:47
realizing that now Martha is his baby reindeer.
31:52
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, like, I think him
31:55
listening to why Martha calls him baby reindeer and therefore
31:59
becomes obsessed with him because he reminds her of this
32:02
comfort that she had as a child. And in his time of vulnerability
32:07
and upset and need after he leaves Darian's house and, you
32:10
know, is presumably upset about how the interaction went and
32:13
ended up going back to his abuser and kind of having like a
32:17
cordial conversation with him and accepting a job from him.
32:20
His way to soothe himself was to listen to Martha as his comfort.
32:26
And then I think sitting there in that bar, he just saw himself
32:29
and Martha like, just mirrored back to each other.
32:33
Yeah, I think like the first theory.
32:36
It's fun like. He's going to start stalking
32:38
him. People are having fun with it,
32:39
but like, I don't think it really matters what happens
32:42
after that. Like, I think it's about like, I
32:45
think the ending is like the most sympathetic, although I
32:47
think it's like fairly sympathetic to Martha through
32:49
it. But I think the ending is like
32:50
the most sympathetic point to Martha, Like it's not just his
32:53
realization, right? It's like showing us the viewer.
32:56
Why she is the way she is? This could happen to anyone.
32:58
We've seen what Donnie went through and we're like, that's
33:03
so fucked up. Like we totally get why he is
33:06
messed up, right? We don't see anything about like
33:08
Martha's past or anything like that.
33:10
We just see like a stalker and we're like you.
33:13
Gross. Like crazy.
33:15
Crazy, but there's like a story to it.
33:17
Richard has said in interviews that the real Martha is real
33:20
stalker. He viewed them as like failed by
33:22
the system, you know, like they fell through the cracks of
33:25
society. It's just showing the cycle of
33:26
trauma continuing, right? I wonder if the voicemails that
33:30
we listened to her leave him in the show are real.
33:33
Like, I understand they're not obviously her own voice.
33:36
That's a good point. But I wonder if that baby
33:39
reindeer story is real, or if Richard put it into the
33:44
narrative because he is trying like he so deeply understands
33:49
where Martha was coming from. His actual stalker, I mean.
33:52
And he wanted us to not leave the show angry at her, feeling a
33:58
certain type of way about her, like if he wanted us to be
34:00
empathetic towards her as well. That's a good point.
34:02
I hadn't thought about if that voicemail is actually true.
34:05
I obviously don't think that he listened to that specific
34:08
voicemail. I mean, I guess it's possible,
34:10
but I don't think like narrative wise it's like so perfect.
34:14
Like, I don't really quiet, but whether or not that voicemail
34:18
happened, like it gets the point across.
34:21
Yeah, I've seen some criticism of the ending.
34:23
I will say that's kind of the one thing that people have
34:25
criticized, because everything else kind of is either true or
34:29
it makes sense to the plot. Martha's stalking had to end
34:32
somehow for the show to wrap up, so her being convicted, even
34:36
though it's unclear she's convicted in real life, that was
34:39
a good plot device. But the ending?
34:41
I've seen some people say it was just like a little bit too
34:43
cheesy, like it was just too on the nose.
34:45
I think it finalizes like the message of the whole show to see
34:47
yourself fall back into that role of a victim when you're as
34:51
soon as you're like confronted with like that similar
34:54
situation. I think like must be so well,
34:56
traumatizing probably makes you relive the trauma, like feel
34:58
like have it all come back up again.
35:00
He wants to show explicitly that trauma that he then re
35:04
experiences like is what leads people to do the things that
35:08
Martha did. Yeah.
35:09
OK. So let's talk about reality
35:10
versus Netflix. So what was real and what was
35:14
not. This is definitely not a
35:15
comprehensive list, but these are just kind of the things that
35:18
I felt were important to note. Interesting to note that kind of
35:22
stuff. So the first is that of course
35:24
we know that the show is based on Richard's real life
35:27
experience with a woman who stalked him for years, though in
35:30
the series he reports her and she goes to jail.
35:33
That part is not confirmed. Richard has said that he is not
35:37
worried about her coming back though.
35:39
Yeah, which I think has led to a lot of speculation that she's
35:42
passed away. Yeah, I've heard that too.
35:44
Not like anything confirmed, but just questions of like if he's
35:48
so sure about this and he's put out this series and she's not in
35:52
jail, why is he certain she won't come back?
35:54
Yeah, especially since, and I think maybe it touches on it
35:58
later, but he talked about how it was not that cut and dry in
36:01
real life, like I think when he was about to premiere the 2019
36:04
show for the Edinburgh Fringe. Festival.
36:08
Fringe, not Fringe. I think any interviews leading
36:11
up to that, He said It had only recently resolved, which would
36:14
make the timeline much longer. I've also seen certain articles
36:18
saying like he was stalked on and off for 10 years, which we
36:22
don't know the exact timeline, but that would mean like up to
36:25
at least like probably 2022 if that's true.
36:27
Yeah, I heard, he said 10 years to the He said the better part
36:30
of 10 years in an interview that I was reading.
36:33
As we mentioned, all the emails shown in the series are real
36:35
emails he received from his stalker over the course of the
36:38
years. She sent him more than 41,000
36:41
emails, voicemails totaling 350 hours, multiple social media
36:46
messages and 106 pages of letters wild.
36:51
Yeah, I mean it makes sense now why there were so many typos in
36:55
her emails, right? Like, you can't, you can't be
36:58
spell checking. I mean, but shouldn't she just
37:00
have spell checking? Well regardless, you can't be
37:02
spell checking that many emails like and being able to send them
37:06
all off you. Know Yeah, you can't send
37:07
hundreds of emails a day with, like, perfect grammar.
37:10
Truly stream of consciousness. Yes.
37:12
OK, so Martha's e-mail in the show.
37:14
This is some interesting tea. So Martha's e-mail in the show
37:18
is MA 481516 2342@yahoo.com. The number sequence in Martha's
37:28
e-mail is not random, however, some Internet sleuths have
37:32
discovered that it is. The cursed numbers quote UN
37:36
quote from the show. Lost.
37:38
So I guess Harley and Lost. I didn't watch Lost and neither
37:40
did you. Did you?
37:41
No, I feel like we're just like a little bit too young.
37:44
Like I remember mom and dad watching it.
37:46
Yeah, I do. I do remember dad watching it.
37:48
I think, like, it came on too late for us.
37:50
I would only catch it like, I don't know if that's even true
37:53
though. At least the beginning.
37:54
I think we were too young for. And by then you, like, kind of
37:56
missed the boat. Yeah, yeah.
37:57
So Harley and lost. He played this sequence of
38:00
numbers in the lottery and he won.
38:02
But ever since his life went downhill and so he believes that
38:05
this sequence of numbers specifically are cursed.
38:09
So this has led to questions like why would he have chosen
38:13
those numbers for her e-mail? Was the real life Martha
38:16
obsessed with the show lost? Is Richard Gad obsessed with
38:20
lost? Is he saying that since he met
38:22
Martha his life went downhill? Another really rogue Internet
38:26
theory is that the real life Darien actually worked on the
38:30
show Lost. I don't believe that.
38:31
I think that's too obvious. Probably, Yeah.
38:34
I mean, I don't know. I feel like, I don't know.
38:36
I feel like it's probably more that he, like he was a fan of
38:39
the show Lost, like Richard Gadd is a fan of the show Lost.
38:41
And ever since Martha came into his life, his life went
38:44
downhill. Yeah, I could see that being
38:46
like a fun Easter egg. I think.
38:47
Like I, it's also entirely possible that Martha had her
38:51
e-mail be that. You think that was her real
38:53
e-mail? No.
38:54
No, that had included those numbers.
38:55
No, I think that's too obvious because he's been.
38:58
He's just, it's gone on this huge press tour that he's
39:01
changed so much about Martha. There's no way we'd ever find
39:03
her. Although we do kind of know
39:05
that's not totally true. Yeah, I don't think he changed
39:07
that much, to be honest. I mean, he might have, but
39:10
people have found a woman who is very similar to Martha.
39:13
We're not going to say her name because we don't want to like,
39:15
you know, dox anyone. But people think they know who
39:17
the real Martha is and there are a lot of similarities if it is
39:22
true. So he really didn't change that
39:24
much. Yeah, although now he is very
39:27
publicly asking people to please not look for the individuals
39:31
from the show. Especially because there is a
39:32
man who, like the Internet has decided, as far as I know, with
39:37
no proof that he is Darian. And I can only imagine that
39:42
would be pretty awful if you were not Darian and you were
39:45
being accused of being Darian, like Darian is the worst.
39:48
He's like literally the number one villain of the show, another
39:52
kind of reality versus Netflix. Thing is, Terry was a real
39:55
person. She was a real trans woman that
39:57
Richard was seeing at the time. He said quote, it was very
40:01
important to have Terry be the voice of reason in the show.
40:04
I mean she was the voice of reason in my life at that point
40:06
as well. Not that I listened to her as
40:08
much as I should have. I thought that was cute.
40:10
Terry was my favorite. She's the break up star for
40:13
sure. Terry was the best, yeah, I
40:15
think. She was such a comforting
40:16
presence. Like every time she was on the
40:18
on the screen, I was like, oh thank.
40:19
God, it was so hopeful. When she was there.
40:21
You were like, wow, Richard's life.
40:23
Or, sorry, Donnie, I guess Donnie.
40:25
Either way, Donnie's life might not be so bad.
40:27
Like if he's with Terry, like it could be good.
40:30
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's like he talked
40:32
about when he did the YouTube video, which wasn't real, or he
40:36
didn't do a YouTube video, Sorry.
40:37
When he, like trauma, dumped onto an audience at like a
40:39
comedy competition, it went viral, he said.
40:41
Like he hated himself more than he loved her.
40:46
Which is? Like very sad and also like kind
40:48
of relatable again to like just to like that millennial curse
40:52
you were talking about. Like you and Crystal were
40:53
talking about. Like I have not dealt with
40:56
trauma like Richard has to that extent, but that part is just
41:00
like very relatable I think to most people.
41:03
Probably everyone has some self hatred and has like sabotage
41:06
themselves or like good things in their life due to that self
41:08
hatred. I can't speak to his exact
41:10
experiences, but if you're in a place like him where he felt
41:13
like he couldn't love, he couldn't connect with people.
41:15
If you remember, there's a point in the show where he's like
41:17
dating a bunch of different people.
41:19
After he had tried in a very unsuccessful way to deal with
41:23
his trauma, we're not tried to deal with it, but maybe just
41:25
like indulged, I'm not sure. But he basically like, started
41:30
hooking up with tons of people and stuff like that.
41:32
Then after that, he began trying to date again and he said like,
41:36
he couldn't connect to people. He didn't feel like he could
41:39
relate until he met Terry, yeah, but up until that point.
41:43
Very roundabout way of saying this, but he was not feeling any
41:45
like super strong emotions in his life.
41:47
Going through the motions, not connecting emotionally with
41:50
people. Numb.
41:51
Yeah, numb. Thank you.
41:52
That's a perfect word. Like, he was very numb.
41:54
So I think like self hatred is a strong emotion sometimes.
41:57
It's good to feel any strong emotion.
41:59
So the final, like Netflix versus reality thing that I
42:02
wanted to touch on is that there was no trauma dump about Darian
42:06
and Martha on stage. And as you mentioned, no one's
42:09
suing viral video. But there were two moments that
42:12
did inspire this in his real life.
42:14
So in 2011 he went on an unscripted rant during a stand
42:18
up segment about the struggles of comedy and during the
42:22
technical rehearsal before the 1st performance of his one man
42:25
show, Monkey See Monkey Doo, which as I mentioned at the top
42:28
was about his sexual abuse. He said that he was cracking up
42:32
because it was going so badly and the producer asked him what
42:35
do you want from this man? And Richard turned to him with
42:38
tears in his eyes and he said I just want to make it out alive.
42:42
And then Richard did receive amazing reviews, amazing
42:46
reception from this one man show, which is kind of similar
42:50
parallels to the reception that he had from the viral video.
42:53
Like his career started to take off, and that's essentially what
42:55
happened after 2019 Fringe Festival.
42:57
Yeah, and just realizing that telling people about his trauma,
43:00
like they were accepting of it and like it was like a weight
43:02
lifted off his shoulders, I think.
43:04
OK, so the couple repercussions of the show to end off, we
43:09
already touched on this a little bit, but like, there's so many
43:11
theories as to who the real Martha and the real Darian are.
43:14
We won't go into the theories on Martha because he has not
43:17
publicly mentioned any names. But Richard did post something
43:22
about director Sean Foley on his Instagram Stories yesterday, and
43:25
that's the man that you were talking about before.
43:28
So he wrote, hi everyone. People I love, have worked with
43:31
and admire, including Sean Foley, are unfairly getting
43:35
caught up in speculation. Please don't speculate on who
43:38
any of the real people, the real life people could be.
43:40
That's not the point of our show.
43:42
Lots of love, Richard. So Sean was like pretty high up
43:44
in the kind of theater art world, and he stepped down from
43:47
his position around the same time allegedly that the show
43:50
came out or was, you know? Or was it now?
43:53
Yeah, like announce. Like he could.
43:55
No one knows. Yeah.
43:56
So people were like, oh, it's got to be him.
43:59
So yes, they have asked continually, Please don't
44:02
speculate. I mean unsurprising.
44:05
That's the number one thing that people care about is like who
44:08
these people are. But I also understand what he's
44:10
saying. Like that's not what the story
44:11
is about. And I've seen a lot of criticism
44:13
of people think he's kind of done Martha dirty because they
44:18
think that he hasn't actually covered up a lot of the details
44:21
and that it's like pretty easy to find her, even though he
44:23
painted her in the sympathetic light.
44:25
It's like if you really had the sympathy for her, why would you
44:27
make the show? And it's like, well, my opinion
44:30
is he's allowed to tell a story. Knowing what has happened now, I
44:33
think like it may have been a misstep to use the real emails.
44:38
And some of the real references like there are.
44:41
Not emails specifically, but the references like.
44:43
Yes, there are things that they referenced in the show that
44:47
people have found online of like this woman that they think is
44:50
her tweeting about them or messaging about them.
44:52
So it's like, well, it's lining up.
44:55
Do we think that this series is a continuation of him being
44:58
wrapped up in Martha still? Because that is another kind of
45:02
piece of criticism I've seen is, you know, is this just another
45:05
way for him to stay attached to her?
45:08
Maybe. I feel it's not a fair criticism
45:10
of, like his morality, someone dealing with their trauma.
45:14
You're criticizing like how well someone's dealing with their
45:16
trauma or whatever. Like, not anyone's place.
45:18
Like. Whatever.
45:20
Who cares? Yeah, that's fair enough for
45:22
sure. And I mean, it's done more good.
45:24
It's done so much good that I think it's like you said, it's
45:27
not really anyone's place to police where he's at with his
45:32
relationship with Martha in the whole.
45:33
Situation. Even if they're like, wow,
45:35
Richard, your relationship with Martha is still so unhealthy.
45:38
He's like, yeah, I'm fucked up. Like what?
45:42
What do you want from me? My life was very traumatic.
45:45
OK, so would we recommend it? Absolutely.
45:48
If you're a fan of thrillers, psychological shows, horror.
45:56
Drama. Black comedy.
45:58
It's totally worth it. I think.
45:59
Like, it's a great show. It's no housewives, but it'll
46:02
do. No, it can't.
46:05
You know it can't compete with the real drama of the Salt Lake
46:10
City Housewives. Exactly, Queens.
46:13
All right, guys. Well, thank you so much for
46:15
listening to Infinite Scroll. I hope that this was at least
46:19
somewhat interesting and fun. I haven't done like a deep dive
46:22
into a show or a movie or a series in so long so might be a
46:27
little bit rusty, but hopefully it was good.
46:30
Please remember to rate, review and subscribe.
46:31
It helps me so much it makes my day when I read your reviews and
46:35
it helps me grow and I will talk to you guys next week.
46:39
Bye, bye.