I know everyone’s gotten on the You train but to be fair, I did watch the show when it was on Lifetime (pre-Netflix). So for obvious reasons, I feel like a bit of an OG fan. The day after Christmas, Netflix dropped the second season of You. So obviously, I started binge-watching it as soon as I possibly could. Overall, Joe’s attempt at reinventing himself is admirable but his dark side’s never really gone. No matter how hard he tries.
A Quick Recap
This season starts with Joe on the run from Candace. To Los Angeles no less, a city he hates. He works hard to law low and be a better person. But then he falls in love. With a girl named Love. He then meets her twin brother, Forty, a recovering addict and aspiring filmmaker. But he’s having trouble writing his next script so he gets Joe to help. The only problem is he wants to write a script based off Beck’s book (as in Joe’s dead ex-girlfriend, Beck).
After Candace finds Joe again, she exposes Joe for lying about who he is and tries to reveal more but Joe convinces Love and Forty that she’s just a crazy ex-girlfriend. Joe and Love break up but Forty still wants to work with him for his script. Meanwhile, Joe’s neighbor, Ellie, who’s also an aspiring filmmaker (I mean, it is Los Angeles) befriends a famous comedian, Henderson. Unfortunately, Joe finds out that Hendy has a thing for underage girls via Ellie’s older sister, Delilah, who was also Henderson’s past victim.
Henderson
Joe goes into savior mode (as I’m calling it) again and plans to expose Henderson on camera in his not-so-secret basement. Unfortunately, Hendy starts talking about how he was a victim of abuse. Then, Joe accidentally kills him when he attempts to escape so he stages it like a suicide. Just like he did with Peach last season.
While Joe and Love are broken up, he hooks up with Delilah. Eventually, she figures out that Joe killed Henderson. So, he locks her in a cage that’s identical to Mooney’s from last season. He initially built it to lock the real Will Bettleheim but let him go after a few weeks.
Finding out the Truth
After a long night of being drugged by Forty, Joe tries to figure out what happened the night before. Apparently, he said something about having blood on his hands and he’s worried he killed someone. He goes to his cage to find Delilah’s dead body. Candace eventually catches up to him and locks Joe inside the cage with the body. Love also finds them but kills Candace after Candace tells her who Joe really is.
Turns out that Love actually killed Delilah. Delilah begged her to let her out but Love’s actually much more like Joe than we all initially thought. While Joe’s in the cage, however, he drops the hidden key outside as he now feels he deserves to be locked up. Then, after Love tells Joe who she really is, he wants out. After Joe’s been trapped for a couple days with Delilah’s body, he convinces Love that it’s time to clean her out. Joe attempts to escape and kill Love but then she tells him that she’s pregnant.
Forty Finds Out
Meanwhile, Forty figures out that Dr. Nicky (Beck’s therapist from last season) didn’t kill Beck, Joe did. He confronts Love and she tells him that she’s pregnant. Forty holds a gun to Joe’s head but in a twist ending, a cop shows up at the last minute and kills Forty. Then, the show skips forward a couple months (I figure) as Joe and a very pregnant Love living a domestic life. The last shot is of Joe sneaking a peek of their new neighbor and we can only assume that means that this vicious cycle is just going to start again next season.
Final Thoughts
Overall, Joe’s attempt at trying to reinvent himself is admirable. However, he obviously hasn’t changed as much he was hoping. Getting some glimpses of what Joe’s childhood was, as it gives a good ideas as to why he is the way he is now.
The twist at the end of this season was such a great one! I had no reason to ever suspect that she was actually just like Joe. But I will say, I did like Delilah so seeing her get killed was unfortunate. Also, poor Ellie is far gone and living off of Joe’s money but I would think that she’s going to eventually investigate from afar. Although Forty is a pretty clear stereotype of people trying to make it in LA, it’s interesting that he’s the one who not only figures it all out but is the most sane main character in the end (in addition to Delilah and Ellie).
How the Season Ends
Unfortunately, however, it means that injustice prevails once again. Joe and Love go scot-free while the innocent either end up dead (Forty, Delilah, and Candace) or on the run (Ellie). For season three, I hope that Joe finally faces at least some consequences. This pattern of Joe constantly getting away with murder and manipulation in the name of love will start to get too repetitive and it’ll be interesting to see how or if he would defend himself.
WhatSamWatches 