Four Reasons Why You Need to Watch Netflix's 'Baby Reindeer'

Sometimes a show comes along and it just explodes in a way nobody saw coming. Netflix's Baby Reindeer is exactly that show. For a show to go viral like Baby Reindeer has, you would expect it to have some big celebrity—it doesn't—or perhaps a story connected to something bigger happening in the world—it also doesn't have that—instead Baby Reindeer is that perfect example of a show that finds that sweet spot between a great story and even greater performances.

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Baby Reindeer is about a young British comic, Donny (played by Richard Gadd), living in London and dealing with an obsessive stalker and his own trauma from a sexual assault. It's based on Gadd's Fringe Festival award-winning one man show called Monkey See Monkey Do, which recounted Gadd's true story of the stalking. His stalker, Martha Scott, is played brilliantly by Jessica Gunning. (The name of the series stems from a nickname Martha calls Donny throughout the stalking ordeal.)

It starts off with Martha randomly walking into a bar Donny works at. She has no money and Donny offers her a drink on the house out of pity. This little gesture leads to years of stalking by Martha, with her popping up at his shows, following him, and an endless parade of emails, social media interactions, and calls, not to mention her assault on other people in his life.

Gadd's story also recounts an experience he had with another more successful writer. This writer promised him work, but their interactions quickly turned into drug use and a sexual assault. In the series we learn Gadd's initial response to Martha was influenced by how he was attempting to handle the trauma of this sexual assault.

The series has gone viral since it was released on April 11th. This has naturally led to online speculation about Gadd's story, particularly the real people behind the characters of Martha and the writer who sexually assaulted Gadd. But Gadd cautioned fans on a recent Instagram story from getting too lost in the details.

"Please don't speculate on who any of the real-life people could be. That's not the point of our show. Lots of love, Richard."

He previously told Forbes that names were changed but that the story is "100 percent emotionally true."

"We were very aware that some characters in it are vulnerable people, so you don't want to make their lives more difficult. So you have to change things to protect yourself and protect other people," Gadd said.

Here are four reasons why you need to watch Baby Reindeer.

Jennifer Gunning's Portrayal of Martha Scott

What Gunning does with this character should be studied. On the page she's terrifying, and rightfully so, she's ruining a man's life. But Gunning is somehow able to not only show Martha's insanity, but also her humor, and dare I say her humanity. You're able to both be scared of Martha while also feeling bad for her. That's not an easy task for an actor, but Gunning did it and did it well.

Gunning is a British actress largely unknown stateside. In the United Kingdom she's appeared in such projects as the film Pride, miniseries' like What Remains and White Heat, and the sitcom Back. But after Baby Reindeer, something tells me we're going to be seeing a lot more of her.

Richard Gadd's Emotional Rollercoaster

Imagine you're an actor and you're tasked with playing yourself about probably the worst period of your life? Like, it doesn't get more meta than that.

But Gadd takes us on an unforgettable journey that is made all the more real because we're literally looking at the man it happened to. Even though it's very scripted, on some level it also feels like a scripted documentary, where we're just watching this man's tragedy unfold before us. The vulnerability Gadd had to possess to not only show his very real fear of Martha, but also his own emotional response to the trauma of his sexual assault and his own reckoning with his identity and sexuality. I've honestly never seen anything like it before on TV or in film.

Nava Mau as Gadd's Girlfriend 'Teri'

Part of what makes Gadd's story so interesting is how layered it is. While the focus of the story is very much on the stalking he endured from Martha, it's also about his own identity. Over the course of the series we see Gadd's Donny go on a journey trying to figure out feelings about his sexuality he's long avoided. That's where Teri comes in.

On a journey to move on from his sexual assault, Donny meets Teri, played by Nava Mau. Teri is a trans woman and his relationship with her is on one hand the most honest he's been with himself while also somehow being deceitful. (I told you, this show has layers.) You see, Donny is so weighed down by the pressures of masculinity and shame that he hides Teri from the rest of his life and even doesn't reveal his own name to her until long after they start dating. Teri attempts to be there for him, right down to suffering a horrible and shocking assault at the hands of Martha, but even his layers are seemingly too much for her.

And Mau is perfectly adept at handling the nuances of a character like Teri. Mau, an award-winning actress, previously wrote and starred in the short film Waking Hour, which was inspired by her own experience as a trans woman in a relationship with a cisgendered man.

The Episode With the Parents

There's a moment in episode six of Baby Reindeer that literally changed me. Like, I still haven't recovered.

Martha's stalking has reached a point where she's now terrorizing other people in Donny's life, namely his parents. So Donny leaves London to visit his parents in Scotland to explain what he's been dealing with.

The scene starts with Donny's dad angrily yelling at Martha on the phone. (He gleefully answers all her calls to give her a piece of his mind.) After the call, Donny lays out the stalking. He then explains that he's on a journey of self-discovery regarding his sexuality. Through tears, he eventually gets to telling them about the sexual assault he endured.

While this is happening, Donny's mother is more than accepting and loving, but his father sits there quietly, saying nothing. Just as Donny talks about his sexual assault, Donny's dad starts to say he understands. He mentions the Catholic church of his childhood. The camera pans back and forth between Donny and his father, and even though the words aren't spoken, you know exactly what his father is referring to. The two stand up and embrace.

When I tell you I lost it watching this scene, describing what I experienced as "losing it" is almost an understatement. Buckets of tears. And in that moment we needed that from this story, because so much of what we had seen up until that moment is trauma after trauma. We needed the release only the unconditional love of a parent can offer, and in some way, through the amazing writing of this show, you somehow are left feeling that hug between Donny and his dad. It becomes real. And that ladies and gentlemen, is the mark of a perfect show.

Can you tell I liked this show? Let me know what you thought about it. I'm HAlanScott on everything. And subscribe to the Parting Shot podcast and my newsletter For the Culture for all your entertainment news and celebrity interviews.