Better than the Book: Wasting My Life Away with Exceptional TV Shows

You know how people always complain that the movie is never as good as the book?

Lately, it seems like the TV adaptations of books are actually damn good. There are a few shows I’ve been watching recently that give themselves a lot more room for detail when they span several more hours than a movie.

I just finished watching the show 13 Reasons Why. I read and really loved the book in middle school, but that was seven or so years ago and I basically forgot what happened when the show was advertised on Netflix last week.

The book and show have a pretty dark premise: 17-year-old high schooler Hannah Baker commits suicide but leaves behind a set of cassette tapes detailing 13 traumatic events (caused by specific people) that led her to kill herself. The tapes are passed along to all 13 contributors, and the show starts with the tapes being passed to the protagonist, Clay.

My dad mentioned how he had to watch the first episode for a seminar at work discussing suicide prevention, and he mentioned a critique to me that many critics had back when the book was released in 2010: People don’t kill themselves for specific reasons. They kill themselves because they’re dealing with issues of mental health already and have an unexplainable, horrible feeling constantly gnawing at them.

To blame 13 people for a suicide may miss the point of the mental health issues Hannah, or others considering suicide, face. Eventually, however, bullying, false rumors, and violence can take a deep toll on the self-worth of someone like Hannah suffering from depression and PTSD.  

This is where the show does a better job than the book: because it spans 13 episodes, there is more room to flesh out who Hannah is and actually empathize with several antagonists who never intentionally meant any harm. (There are a few other antagonists that did mean harm, however, and some of it is illegal and inexcusable.) It gets a little slow in the middle, since a few characters don’t need full episodes to tell their stories, but the pace picks up near the end.

The show relies on Clay’s flashbacks, hallucinations, and present-day experiences to paint a more complete and realistic picture of who these people are and why they did the things they did. Hannah says that people have no idea what others are going through, but the show suggests that Hannah also didn’t entirely understand other people’s problems, either. The show also gives more depth to our main character, Clay, who feels more desperately the guilt of doing nothing at all.

While the show has the typical jock and cheerleader stereotypes, it also paints a very mysterious portrait of high school and relies on the secret world of adolescence that no adult can dare to comprehend. Yet there’s also something very familiar about this setting, too.

The show isn’t all dark, all the time, however : There’s an incredible, nostalgic soundtrack filled with covers of 80s songs and current indie songs, including one of my favorites, “The Night We Met” by Lord Huron. There are also many sweet and innocent moments hidden among the pain, many people (especially adults) that care deeply about Hannah, and a pair of star-crossed lovers that may give reference to the 80s love and angst of Say Anything, the Breakfast Club, and Sixteen Candles. After all, the story uses cassette tapes as its method of communication.

But suicide isn’t a romantic tragedy, and the show makes that clear. It doesn’t shy away from visualizing the realities of sexual assault and Hannah’s death. There’s a lot of messed up stuff these characters have to deal with, especially set within the pettiness of high school, but in Hannah’s case, it can become very real and very traumatic.

The show isn’t as gripping or has the same shock-value as other shows I’m into like Game of Thrones or Westworld or House of Cards. Yet it made me nostalgic for high school and those people in my life for all the blissful, right reasons. That, to me, is why it’s worth watching. Although at first glance 13 Reasons Why has a bit of an unrealistic premise, the show makes the story a lot more authentic than most of the other shows I watch. Instead of further objectifying Hannah, the people that come in and out of her life, and the things that happen to her, it forces us to care. A-

Other binge-worthy shows I’ve been watching lately (and you should totally watch too!):

The Man in the High Castle

Basic Info: Currently on its second season (ten episodes per season) on Amazon, based on the book The Man in the High Castle by Phillip K. Dick

Premise: The premise is kind of mind-boggling: Imagine America in 1962 if the Axis powers had won World War II. The Nazis control the east coast, the Japanese control the “Pacific States” (west coast), and there’s a neutral buffer zone in the middle. Julianna, who lives in San Francisco, finds new hope when she discovers films that seem to show an alternate world. She’s determined to find the person who guards them, the Man in the High Castle, but so is the Reich. 

Best Aspect(s): This premise is insane! The implications of the story get more twisted as the science fiction aspect unfolds, especially as you continue watching through season two and realize just how damn good of a job this story does to project what the world would look like if Hitler controlled it. My favorite character is Obergruppenfuhrer John Smith, an American Nazi who controls the American regime; Smith portrays a fantastic and complex role of making difficult decisions in a world that isn’t forgiving.

How It Could Improve: After being spoiled by the budget and production glamour of shows like Game of Thrones, it’s sometimes difficult to watch a CGI version of the world the show created–but that’s a very picky critique. Additionally, the show is sometimes a little ambitious and attempts to cover and solve more topics and sci fi mysteries than it knows how to handle. THAT BEING SAID, you need to watch this show. 

Big Little Lies

Basic Info: 7-episode miniseries from HBO based off the book Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty

Premise: Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman, Shailene Woodley, Zoe Kravitz, and Laura Dern star as the mothers of “Big Little Lies,” a story about secrets and broken relationships in the beautiful coastal town of Monterey, California. The show begins with the the premise that someone’s dead–but you don’t know who’s dead or who killed them. The story is set both before the murder so that we learn to understand what led up to it, and in the present through interviews with other gossiping parents. You soon realize everyone had a motivation for murder.   

Best Aspect(s): Nicole Kidman should win an Emmy for her portrayal of Celeste, a wife with a successful husband and beautiful children who’s hiding a dark secret of violence underneath all that perfection. In fact, the most outstanding but poignant aspect of the show is how these women deal with the emotional and physical aftermath of violence as an everyday part of their lives.

How It Could Improve: At times, the show can feel a bit too romantic. The jaw-dropping scenery, the multi-million dollar cliffside mansions, the glamorous scene of the crime…but it’s also a disappointing world, because for all their progressive career-mommy talk, the show can still feel like a very white, gender-role fantasy of 1950s America. Jane’s lower-middle-class character makes the show more relatable, but there are points when I get annoyed with myself for being caught up in the petty gossip, too. THAT BEING SAID, for all the women this show has attracted, men should be equally interested, and take equally as seriously the traumatizing violence many women endure.

Girls

Basic Info: It may not be based off a book, but this show is amazing and deserves to be on this list. Currently on its sixth and final season (ten-ish episodes per season) on HBO, Girls is created and written by Lena Dunham and produced by Judd Apatow.

Premise: Aspiring writer Hannah and her three friends Marnie, Shoshanna, and Jessa navigate 20-somethings life in New York City. This half hour comedy reveals the awkwardness and truth between what you expect life to be and what it really is. 

Best Aspect(s): Hannah is basically just a version of Lena Dunham, who freely and unabashedly makes fun of herself. She recognizes and capitalizes on the complete awkwardness that is life. Additionally, The guys in this show are actually way more interesting and developed than the girls. Ray, the sarcastic Gen-Xer who hangs with the caricatured millennials and whose goal is to create the ultimate anti-hipster coffee shop, is usually my favorite. This season’s Elijah, however, Hannah’s gay ex-boyfriend who gave her HPV in season 1 and is by this point her roommate and best friend, is taking over as my favorite.

How It Could Improve: The seemingly never-ending entitlement and complete lack of self awareness of the girls, especially Marnie and Hannah. But I guess that’s the point, right? The glamour of New York City white-girl living in your 20s and trying to get your shit together is overshadowed by the fact that people are bitches and life is hard. Let’s just hope they figure it out before the show ends, because these girls do not “adult” very well. THAT BEING SAID, watch out for several knockout episodes sprinkled throughout the seasons, particularly the episodes that focus on one central character. 

Happy viewing!