13 Reasons Why | Season 3

13 Reasons Why (season 3) Never Watch
REVIEW:

It’s not god-awful!

We’re all, most definitely, living in an alternate timeline.
A timeline where Kraft makes Stovetop Stuffing (not Stouffer’s).
… And a timeline where Game of Thrones season 8 was (almost) less watchable than 13 Reasons Why season 3.

Don’t get me wrong, I still hate 13 Reasons Why.
And there is A LOT to hate this season.

Let’s step back a bit …

Season 1 and season 2 were both at the top of my ‘Worst Television’ lists in each respective years they aired.
However, season 3, is…
Not god-awful.

It’s a slow burn ..

with far too many episodes than necessary,
but the finale is … Satisfying.

It’s actually, ALMOST, worth watching, if you can stomach slogging through all the hours that seemingly go nowhere (or in circles).
In actuality it feels like a more grown up Riverdale, or a dumbed down Brick.

If you haven’t seen ‘Brick‘, stop what you’re doing and go watch that.
You will not be disappointed.

With that said, hopefully, for the love of god, Netflix calls it a wrap and cancels this show.
We don’t need to see these characters grow up, a la ‘Saved By The Bell Go To College‘.
No thank you.

Besides, Euphoria is taking up the mantle of ridiculous high-school teen dramas portraying students that engage in too much sex and drugs to be remotely realistic.
And it’s, quite frankly, the better show (but not by much).

13 Reasons Why Season 3 SPOILERS Ahead

Let’s touch upon the first point for a second.
There is A LOT to hate.
Instead of focusing on a small handful of taboo issues,
this season touches on so many that it becomes laughably hard to keep track.

Let’s list some…

• Steroid usage by jocks
• Normalizing cocaine usage as being ‘typical’ for high school students…
• ICE deportation
• Rape survivors performing a West Baptist Church style protest demonstration during a funeral
• Constantly disposing of guns.
• Rapists and school-shooters seeking redemption
• Rape survivors unifying to be heard
• Sex, sex, kinky violent sex, and more sex.
• Teen pregnancy
• Divorce, and an absentee father with a separate double life
• Abortion
• Anger issues stemming from certain individuals being unable to accept their sexuality
• And of course, murder.

Did I miss any? Probably…

The point is, the show takes itself so seriously in its subject matter
that it becomes a joke.
Alex becoming a temperamental dope-fiend mid-season was the final straw for me.
.. And when ICE deported Tony’s family I literally burst out laughing.

… And I’m fine with that.

Contrasted with the prior seasons where the cringe-levels were off the scale with the shock value of subject matter, this was a nice shift.

… Or maybe it wasn’t a shift at all, and we’re all living in this alternate timeline where Trump is president and nothing means anything anymore as we’re all too desensitized to everything to realize that this is not normal.

In both cases, the only thing to do is laugh at the absurdity of it all.
And in this, there is an unfathomable amount of absurdity to laugh at.

The show is ‘good‘ precisely because it is enjoyable to hate-watch.
Anyone that is taking it seriously should seek serious mental help.

Additionally, there is a plot twist that is a bit hard to predict until the last episode.
Prior to that ‘twist’, I was putting this show on the ‘hated’ list.
And yes, that is to say, the ONLY redeeming aspects of this show, are the plot twist,
and that, they have toned down their subject matter this season and gone with two redemption plot lines.
Which I can get behind.