Basically the show is about a girl who kills herself and makes 13 tapes about it, each containing a reason why she killed herself, each targeted at a specific person. The internet seems to have blown up over it, saying how important it is that bullying is stopped and how dangerous the consequences are. However, whilst this message is important, I don't think it was portrayed very well by the show, the only kind of bullying Hannah was receiving was being objectified by the boys.
Don't even get me started on the main character, Hannah. I could not stand this attention seeking drama queen. Who makes tapes blaming people for their suicide, so those people can then be haunted by the guilt forever? She even drives another person to suicide with her actions. Everything is about her; she never considers how anyone else feels. For example, putting Clay on the tapes even though he did nothing wrong. She tells him to leave, so he leaves...and that makes him an awful person??? She's the terrible person, I mean her kind-of-friend got raped and she did nothing although she was in the same room. The least she could have done is have called the police afterwards. So many of her problems are of her own doing. Almost everyone in the tapes did not deserve to be on there. For example, Justin. He shows Bryce this picture of Hannah that Bryce sends round, thus getting her labeled 'easy'. First of all, the picture was literally just a bad mug of her flashing a tiny bit of underwear. Big deal. I'm in high school and pictures like this are posted on Snapchat everyday and everybody forgets it 5 seconds after they've seen it, it's not like it was a nude or anything. Second of all it was Bryce that sent the picture, not Justin, so surely he is to blame. Thirdly, why does Justin have a second tape? Because he didn't try hard enough to save Jessica from Bryce? News flash Hannah; neither did you!
Next, Clay. He started off okay, before turning into some crazy justice warrior, taking Courtney to the grave and whatnot. Also I'm pretty sure hallucinating Hannah everywhere is not normal and he should probably see somebody about it. All the time whilst he's having flashbacks and staring off into space he must look so dumb, it's a wonder nobody notices.
Tony. What even. We never get an explanation as to why he was chosen by Hannah to take care of the tapes, other than he was the only nice boy in the whole school, which is convenient. Why does he not hand in the tapes to the police anyway? There are only 3 people who could get in actual trouble for what they did, so it's not like he needs to protect Clay or anything.
Just stuff that bugged me: Justin suggesting they kill Clay. How on earth would this help. Justin didn't even do anything wrong anyway. Clay gets handed pills by his mum and we found out he used to take them. I assume they were anti-depressants? However this is skimmed over and never returned to because the only person with mental health issues is Hannah obviously and we can't let anyone else be more troubled than her. This could have been a great character development point but was sadly wasted. Clay's attitude to Courtney coming out. He says it's the 21st century and nobody will care that she's gay, and I hate how wrong this is. LGBT kids are as relentlessly bullied as ever, just in more subtle ways than they used to be. One of my best friends came out and her life has been hell since. Clay is shaming the kids that are still too afraid to come out, but they have genuine reason to be afraid, and nobody should be told they are a coward for choosing the safer option, especially now Donald Trump is president. Also the fact that Hannah just tells everyone on the tapes Courtney is gay is so disrespectful and rude to Courtney, showing once again that Hannah is selfish and doesn't care about anyone else. Another thing I think the show was wrong to do is present self-harm as it does. The cafe girl says that self-harm is the brave option, stronger than suicide. Why would you send this message?!? Obviously ultimately suicide is worse, but saying that self-harm is brave is going to convince more kids to cut and was phrased so badly, making it sound positive. Just what we need, more kids self-harming, thanks for that. The fact that there's going to be a second season shows they just want to draw out the drama. It's not about the message, it's about the money, which is a shame. Why would the stalker guy mention the tapes to the authorities? He's one of the only people who actually did something illegal. One of the students says to Clay that they know everything, for example his nightmares. How do they know??? This was never mentioned on the tapes! There are too many similar plot holes to list so I'm just going to wrap this up here as my word count is reaching the max.
OK so onto the good points? There was a nice diverse cast and the acting was pretty good. The plot would have been better if it wasn't sooo slow paced. Raising awareness of teen bullying and suicide is always good I guess, yet I wonder how long it will be before somebody actually makes tapes then kills themselves after this show. I wouldn't be surprised if it happens.
So basically it's not all it's made out to be and all the characters seem to have a borderline personality disorder, but hey, if you want see what all the hype is about then if you can ignore the stupid characters then go ahead.
Don't even get me started on the main character, Hannah. I could not stand this attention seeking drama queen. Who makes tapes blaming people for their suicide, so those people can then be haunted by the guilt forever? She even drives another person to suicide with her actions. Everything is about her; she never considers how anyone else feels. For example, putting Clay on the tapes even though he did nothing wrong. She tells him to leave, so he leaves...and that makes him an awful person??? She's the terrible person, I mean her kind-of-friend got raped and she did nothing although she was in the same room. The least she could have done is have called the police afterwards. So many of her problems are of her own doing. Almost everyone in the tapes did not deserve to be on there. For example, Justin. He shows Bryce this picture of Hannah that Bryce sends round, thus getting her labeled 'easy'. First of all, the picture was literally just a bad mug of her flashing a tiny bit of underwear. Big deal. I'm in high school and pictures like this are posted on Snapchat everyday and everybody forgets it 5 seconds after they've seen it, it's not like it was a nude or anything. Second of all it was Bryce that sent the picture, not Justin, so surely he is to blame. Thirdly, why does Justin have a second tape? Because he didn't try hard enough to save Jessica from Bryce? News flash Hannah; neither did you!
Next, Clay. He started off okay, before turning into some crazy justice warrior, taking Courtney to the grave and whatnot. Also I'm pretty sure hallucinating Hannah everywhere is not normal and he should probably see somebody about it. All the time whilst he's having flashbacks and staring off into space he must look so dumb, it's a wonder nobody notices.
Tony. What even. We never get an explanation as to why he was chosen by Hannah to take care of the tapes, other than he was the only nice boy in the whole school, which is convenient. Why does he not hand in the tapes to the police anyway? There are only 3 people who could get in actual trouble for what they did, so it's not like he needs to protect Clay or anything.
Just stuff that bugged me: Justin suggesting they kill Clay. How on earth would this help. Justin didn't even do anything wrong anyway. Clay gets handed pills by his mum and we found out he used to take them. I assume they were anti-depressants? However this is skimmed over and never returned to because the only person with mental health issues is Hannah obviously and we can't let anyone else be more troubled than her. This could have been a great character development point but was sadly wasted. Clay's attitude to Courtney coming out. He says it's the 21st century and nobody will care that she's gay, and I hate how wrong this is. LGBT kids are as relentlessly bullied as ever, just in more subtle ways than they used to be. One of my best friends came out and her life has been hell since. Clay is shaming the kids that are still too afraid to come out, but they have genuine reason to be afraid, and nobody should be told they are a coward for choosing the safer option, especially now Donald Trump is president. Also the fact that Hannah just tells everyone on the tapes Courtney is gay is so disrespectful and rude to Courtney, showing once again that Hannah is selfish and doesn't care about anyone else. Another thing I think the show was wrong to do is present self-harm as it does. The cafe girl says that self-harm is the brave option, stronger than suicide. Why would you send this message?!? Obviously ultimately suicide is worse, but saying that self-harm is brave is going to convince more kids to cut and was phrased so badly, making it sound positive. Just what we need, more kids self-harming, thanks for that. The fact that there's going to be a second season shows they just want to draw out the drama. It's not about the message, it's about the money, which is a shame. Why would the stalker guy mention the tapes to the authorities? He's one of the only people who actually did something illegal. One of the students says to Clay that they know everything, for example his nightmares. How do they know??? This was never mentioned on the tapes! There are too many similar plot holes to list so I'm just going to wrap this up here as my word count is reaching the max.
OK so onto the good points? There was a nice diverse cast and the acting was pretty good. The plot would have been better if it wasn't sooo slow paced. Raising awareness of teen bullying and suicide is always good I guess, yet I wonder how long it will be before somebody actually makes tapes then kills themselves after this show. I wouldn't be surprised if it happens.
So basically it's not all it's made out to be and all the characters seem to have a borderline personality disorder, but hey, if you want see what all the hype is about then if you can ignore the stupid characters then go ahead.