5 September 2019 - I really try to give a series a chance to prove itself, but I'm abandoning 13 REASONS WHY after S3 E4. It is scrapping the barrel of all things potentially hurtful, damaging and downright dangerous in teen living. The prescriptive warnings by the cast to seek help if you are in the situations depicted in their drama do not excuse the series reinjuring those in peril for the sake of further episodes/seasons. This series no longer has a cathartic benefit. I will no longer be watching it (despite a new bright light in the cast). As I prophetically wrote in 2017 - This series has sucked the life out of its premise. I leave the series with a rating of 5 (meh) out of 10. [Teenage Drama].

I've left the previous reviews here so you can see how it fell out of my favour.

3 April 2017 - I'm just three episodes deep into this Netfilx series and I'm enjoying the characters and the suspense. This is a good premise, the acting is strong, and I can't wait to find out what happened, as we see the story from the varying points of view. Looking good - so I'm giving it a preliminary 8 (great) out of 10.

8 April 2017 - I'm sorry to say that the series didn't live up to the premise. I think it was meant to be a cautionary tale, but the writing was uneven, the characters' emotional arches poorly drawn, and some episodes were just a downright mess. The acting was good because the casting was strong. Even though the scripts were disappointing the series will resonate with those who have been shamed, bullied, emotionally or physically abused. Unfortunately, these are now adolescent realities, so people will see their experiences reflected here. But the writers sewed these components together poorly, interrupting the build of suspense, artificially inflating the emotional environment which in turn compromised the trueness of the characters and leaving the audience disappointed, or in some cases, lost (I almost quit after the very poor episode - S1 E7) and a general degradation of the quality of the series). Although there were some 7 (good) episodes, there were also 6s (fair) and even 4 (poor), so I'm giving the whole series a 5.5 (failed potential) out of 10. I'd love to see these performers again, but the series has sucked the life out of it's premise.

I binge watched the season in two nights. The suspense, the acting, and the soundtrack are awesome. But in the end, it left me wandering if this is not a romanticize suicide, an apology to suicide revenge. She is able to see why, to go one by one making people feel directly responsible for her personal unique decision of taking her own life to the point [spoiler]one of the kids shoots himself in the head out of blame[/spoiler]. And let's not talk about Clay, feeling absolutely responsible for it, suffering post traumatic syndrome, etc. I don't know, I enjoyed watching the show but the after taste is bittersweet. I don't know if I would recommend this show to a teenager, tbh.
[spoiler]Specially when it suggests that you are alone, no one will help you. She's going through deep shit and her family does not even notice, she won't try to reach them. The counselor will ignore her when reaching for help as well. And the only one who cares and asks if it's okay and worries about her is pushed away with not a single explanation.[/spoiler] Hannah is mature enough to record 13 reasons why she is going to kill herself, but not mature enough to reach her family (!!) or to, after recording the cassettes, realize killing herself will leave permanent consequences.

This was, for me, the best show of the year so far. It is for Netflix this year what _Stranger Things_ was for last year. A real surprise, far better than it looks. I watched the special, and I don't usually do that. I picked up the book and started reading it, and young adult fiction isn't a genre I usually look at. Hollywood hasn't cast it in a very nice light with things like _Twilight_; even less cringey films like _Divergent_ and _The Maze Runner_ give the YA genre a two-dimensional feel, a feel of shallowness that is easy to take in but doesn't really get inside your head much. Just a one-and-done kind of thing. And this isn't that. It's so much better. I went in thinking this was a show for middle and high school kids, and it really isn't. Especially after the 9th and 12th episodes. Not to mention the finale. Spoilers follow.

After watching — I finished it just 24 hours ago — I went back and forth on whether the suicide was justified or not. Actually for a while I thought they might pull a twist ending and reveal that she didn't actually go through with it, but made it look like she did to raise awareness. There was a program that ran in high schools in Northern California (where this takes place) where they had a guy dressed up like the Grim Reaper take the popular jocks out of school. They were put up in a resort while the rest of the school was told they died. And then they put on this play where they were killed by drunk driving. It sounds silly now, but it was serious then. And it happened at my school (Santa Rosa, Montgomery High, Class of 1998) and I was smart enough to see that it was fiction, but it still young enough for it to affect me. (Sure enough, never drank and drove. Actually don't drink anymore, so I can drive those who can't.) So I thought this series might be doing that, and that they could, and still be impactful. Spoiler: [spoiler]It's not, and the suicide is shown in the finale.[/spoiler]

As for justifications, that's harder. It's important to note here that nobody is perfect, including the adults. It's also important to note that nobody is purely good or evil. Even the one character everyone hates by the end ([spoiler]Bryce{/spoiler]), probably has some good in him. It's just outside the scope of this show to humanize him. We can guess. [spoiler]He was rich, and lived a life free of consequences. His parents were never around, and he was able to buy beer underage because he was a successful athlete and town hero. He literally stated that there was nothing wrong with raping girls. And he believed it because he had never been denied anything.[/spoiler] The big problem I have with the suicide is not that the events leading up to it did or didn't justify suicide. It's that she spent hours calmly laying out everything that was wrong, in a cool and methodical way, on those tapes, after making the decision, and yet she still did it. The planning of the tapes, the recording, setting up distribution, [spoiler]getting Tony to manage the backups and watching people,[/spoiler], I think she could have backed down. I think she was smart enough to _by that point_ and could have gotten help. No tapes, no planning? Sure. Impulse decision. After all that, though? I don't really see it.

I'd also like to get into the school counselor, Mr Porter. School counselors are psychologists only in the same sense that security guards are police officers, i.e. they're not. You could say they're failed psychologists, and maybe some are, but they may not all be. He wasn't an exceptionally bad one. He might have even been above average. I think a big difference between school counselors and psychologists are that school counselors work for the school. They aren't truly advocates for the individuals they try to help. I think he needed to go the extra mile and coach her, and tell her that she needs to declare [spoiler]that she was raped, and that she said no, and that she tried to make him stop, even if she really didn't exactly. There was no deception on her part, or seduction, the guy had raped before, and in her presence no less, and she clearly did not want to have sex, and he knew it[/spoiler]. Yes, I think he should have coached her to embellish the truth a little for the greater good, for the sake of the next victim. Would it have been dishonest? I don't think so. No more spoilers.

But I'm getting off-track. Was it a good series? In no uncertain terms, yes it was. You should absolutely watch it, and then you absolutely should reach out to a niece or a nephew or the child of a family friend and let them know that you are there for them. It doesn't really help as much coming from parents, because parents are always judging. They kind of have to. Kids need an external resource they can count on. Someone they trust won't look down on them because they tried drugs or experimented with sex. Someone who won't add to their problems. Someone who generally makes them feel better when they're down. Even popular kids need it, but the nerds, the emo kids, the losers, those kids need it especially because they have such little support from their peers. And yes it's a bit rude to use those labels, but they exist, those kids exist, and we can't let them slip through the cracks. And one photo, one tweet, one rumor can make the most popular kid in school join those unfortunate groups. And then that kid can go on fooling their parents into thinking they're still on top of the social ladder, when inside they're dying, and we see that in the show with one of the characters.

Ok, that's going to be a hard one to review.
Not because it's bad or just ok, not at all. As the little "10" in the top-left shows, I've give this show the best possible score.
No, the difficulty is in finding the right words that will explain WHY this tv show deserve such a number.
Before getting into it, I must say that I've watched every episodes, including the special where the actors and crew explain how and why they did this show (you should watch it). And I have not read the book.
As I want this review to be read by as much people as possible, I will not give any spoiler. So feel free to continue reading !
**First, the actors**, and mainly the three main characters for me, meaning Dylan Minnette (Clay), Katherine Langford (Hannah) and Kate Walsh (Olivia, Hannah's mom). Their work is just astonishing.
**Second, the pacing**. The show find the right balance between content and emptiness. Seems weird writing this. But we're dealing with a suicide, with depression, and the void it creates is one of the hardest thing to translate and the producers found a way to make you feel it at your core.
Which explains my **third point** : this show can be **overwhelming**. 13 episodes that you want to watch, but you also dread watching. There is, in each of those episodes and even more in some of them, a psychological pressure that can almost be too much to bear.
**Fourth, thriller**. 13 reasons why. 13 reasons you want to know. 13 reasons that you discover slowly, methodically, but 13 reasons that are sometimes implied a bit before they're revealed. It creates a thrill, that you're on the verge of understanding or at least zeroing on what really when on.
**Fifth, the candor** of this show. I have never watched a a show that committed to being true, to ring true to how teenagers think and feel and live. Some people will think that things aren't really like that, that they can't be and it's just so that there is a story. I was a teenager not so long ago, and I found so many truths in this show that it even felt a bit awkward. That this character could have been me. Or this one.
When TV produces so many "teenage" shows that just transform teens into adults, or teens into dumb versions of humans, watching this felt surreal. Like someone finally understood what it meant. What the struggles were and how to show them in their purest form.
**Sixth and last one, Suicide**. No one wants to talk about it. Most TV shows that depicts one, uses it as a plot excuse. A way to spice things up.
**This one does not.** This is the first thing you learn when watching. You start with the suicide and then you try to explain what when on in Hannah's life, in her head, that made her do this. And the show is clear, you can't explain suicide. You can't rationalize it. But you can try to understand the actions and thoughts that lead to it. To try and prevent that for ever happening again.
And the show is exceptional at that. Yes it depicts all the elements that lead to a suicide, but by showing them, you also teach people how to recognize signs that could point you to a person in distress. And it also shows that our actions have consequences, may those actions seems trivial at first. And to those that are in distress it also shows that there always are people caring for you. You may not see it, they may not show it, but there are there and you need to have the strength to at least reach out to them. The will help you. And if this seems too much for you, there are free hotlines that you can call at any time to at least talk. Because talking is healing.

I could continue and expand this list much more, but I'll stop there.
**Just go watch it.** Take a month of Netflix, you won't regret it.

**When everyone influence in everyone's life!**

**_SEASON 01:_**

Yeah, I'm from the walkman era. The cassettes, tape recorder, I've lived in the final days of that time enjoying all of them. I still have some old tapes saved somewhere that I've to locate them, but I've no device to place them. Anyway, when I heard about this series, how those previous technology was used to narrate a thriller drama, I was so happy. Each episode named after the how many tapes used, and its sides. Maybe the new generation won't understand that. Though the story matters, what it was focused and unfolding the truth, the message was great.

One of the top rated debut from the 2017. The Netflix usually strikes the gold, and so with this. After so many good reviews, I wanted to see it to learn what's that all about. In the end, I did not get disappointed. But it was not that great, except the message, a very important message in the present world. I thought they dragged it. The whole season. I think it should have been only half of those total episodes. So the plots would have got tighter and faster narration. That suicide scene really terrified me. It was too strong, definitely I'm against showing that to youngsters.

It was about a boy who receive a box of tapes from the dead girl. The girl who committed suicide, so she has recorded these tapes telling what made her to take this terrible decision. All those influenced in her life to her death gets the tape and finally how it all ends is the mystery told in the final episode. But before that, how the tale develops among the guys who are involved in it decides to stop this attempt. It's not that easily stopped and reasons are revealed.

Initially I thought it was one season thing, but now after the final episode, I think definitely season two is on. They have announced it as well now. Well acted and made with the production. Many actors you can point out, but Dylan Minnette and Katherine Langford topped the list. There's more to come or I'm expected in the following season than what this season has revealed. So I think I'm going like that more than this. It's too early, but there's a very little it to get wrong. I hope that's where it ends, but they could be tempted to extend the series. Anyway, a nice watch. It will remain one of the best from the streaming giant! So watch it sooner than later!

_7.5/10_