There’s a reason why people are so enchanted⏤and disturbed⏤by Netflix’s You. The thrilling series is about a young man who pursues love by any means necessary, even if it means killing someone who gets in the way of his romantic relationships. In the first season of the show, Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) is in a relationship with Guinevere Beck and it seems like they’re on the right track for a while, at least she ends up locked up in a clear glass cage only to meet an even more shocking fate.
Warning: Spoilers for You lie ahead. Please proceed with caution if you have yet to watch the first three seasons of the show.
In season two, Joe falls in love with a woman named Love Quinn, who ends up being even more mentally disturbed than he is. The only reason he doesn’t murder her is because she reveals to him that she’s carrying his child. Season three is filled with many more problems as the twisted couple relocates to an affluent California neighborhood and attempts to make a fresh start. Instead of enjoying said fresh start, the list of people who wind up dead continues to grow.
If you enjoyed the first three seasons of You and can’t wait for season four, you’re in luck. There are plenty of other shows out there that contain a similar vibe, giving you a wealth of options to choose from if you’re on the hunt for your next creepy binge.
Maid
There is an extremely volatile and abusive relationship on display in the Netflix original series Maid. The show focuses on a single young mom named Alex who takes her daughter and tries to escape a dangerous situation. The father of her child is a man who consistently loses his temper when he drinks alcohol, and since Alex doesn’t have an education or any work experience, she lands a housecleaning job to make ends meet. Along the way, she overcomes homelessness and deals with plenty of adversity. The toxic relationships depicted in You have also occasionally gotten physical, making it a natural follow-up to You.
Dexter
A character like Dexter is completely comparable to Joe Goldberg since both have bone-chilling hobbies and laundry lists of people they’ve killed. They both keep a little souvenir after each murder as well. Dexter is a bona fide serial killer with an insatiable thirst to end lives, but he follows an ethical code in order to stay in line. Goldberg, on the other hand, only kills people in fits of passion or rage when it comes to protecting his romantic relationships.
Dead to Me
One thing Dead to Me and You have in common is the fact that hiding the murders of different people takes place in both shows. Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini play women who are connected by a deadly hit-and-run accident. Judy feels lost in life because her husband has chosen to end their marriage and she finds herself in a world of trouble after accidentally killing someone in a car crash. The person she happens to kill is Jen’s husband. Judy then attempts to strike up a friendship with Jen in order to make amends for her mistake, making Dead to Me a compelling dramedy with as many laughs as gasps. Joe Goldberg is similar to Judy in that he knows when he’s done something wrong and tries to be a good person to make up for it. Alas, the good never seems to outweigh the evil.
Clickbait
Clickbait is a Netflix original series about a man who’s been kidnapped and murdered even though his family believes there’s no way he could have done anything wrong. A case of mistaken identity gets him caught up in an irreversible situation that hints to the fact that he may not have been so innocent after all. There are so many instances of characters getting kidnapped and killed in You that it shouldn’t be surprising to see it compared to Clickbait, which similarly features bad characters doing even worse things.
Cruel Summer
Cruel Summer is another interesting show to watch that sheds a lot of light on the kidnapping narrative. In the Freeform drama, a popular teenage girl ends up locked up in the basement of her high school principal’s home. By the time she’s finally able to escape, the dorky girl on campus has somehow taken over the popular girl’s life and has been started dating her boyfriend. This show is comparable to You since it’s heavily focused on a dark and twisted romance that ends in death as well as a twist that you very well might not see coming.
Gossip Girl
Joe Goldberg is very much like the character of Dan Humphrey on Gossip Girl. Interestingly enough, Penn Badgley is the handsome actor who has taken on both roles. Humphrey is obviously a lot tamer than Goldberg despite the fact that he uses his online blog to cyberstalk the girl of his dreams, post gossip tidbits about her online, and generally harass all the popular students at his prep school. In You, Goldberg isn’t gentle at all. He tries to make good decisions, but his passion ultimately makes the final calls in every situation.
Dare Me
Dare Me is a dark cheerleader show about a group of rebellious girls who are a part of the high school cheer squad. Even though You doesn’t include any feisty cheerleaders, it doesn’t mean that the two shows don’t have a lot in common. Toxic relationships that have no business existing in the first place occur in both shows from beginning to end.
Good Girls
Committing crimes and getting away with them is the main premise of Good Girls, which means that it’s super similar to You. In Good Girls, three women who are strapped for cash turn to a life of crime in order to fund their lifestyles. One robbery ends up changing their lives forever, as they get caught up in a situation with dangerous gang members who won’t let them move on.
How to Get Away with Murder
For some reason, Joe Goldberg is constantly able to get away with murder in every season of You. That’s why the show is so similar to How to Get Away with Murder. In both shows, the main characters kill others yet somehow don’t end up facing any prison time whatsoever (yet, anyway). They’re always miraculously able to cover up their tracks, and as the title of the Viola Davis-led drama hints, this show aims to show you how.
Pretty Little Liars
Pretty Little Liars and You have a lot in common when it comes to stalking people, harassing them, and trying to gain control and power over them. In You, Joe Goldberg does this to the handful of women he falls in love with, and relentlessly at that. In Pretty Little Liars, an anonymous online bully does the same thing to a group of teenage girls, resulting in seasons upon seasons of mind games that result in shocking twists and turns that have even led to a new PLL reboot.
Basically, if you can’t get enough of Joe Goldberg’s creepy antics, then any of these shows are sure to hold you over until You’s season four takes us on a romp through a completely different location than the show’s first three seasons⏤something we’re très excited for.
