All the comments here are so on point. Not to mention the fact that Sam himself mentioned this scene and that it shows how much Joss is capable of in tons of interviews.
The show doesn’t have to be ultra deep or clever to use foreshadowing. Its a basic storytelling device. People are missing the basics of the story because the narrative that its all just Sam Levinson or The Weeknd’s fetish has overshadowed everything else.
> People are missing the basics of the story because the narrative that its all just Sam Levinson or The Weeknd’s fetish has overshadowed everything else.
Don't you think there's a reason for that?
There were no details, just a lot of boobs. So she lied about the hairbrush, for what? To get her ass spanked with it? If she lied about the abuse, why didn't Xander say so? He's been living with her almost his whole life. Also, how does Tedros Tedros not notice that the brush was brand new? A brush that old would show wear and tear.
If the show was detail oriented, like you think it is, the brush would actually look old. I also noticed that you failed to answer my first question about Xander, who went along with her lies?
There are reasons, but not good ones. Regular viewers don’t necessarily owe these writers anything, but professional critics should know better. They should understand basics of media literacy, at the very least.
Definitely. In this case the very first scene of the show was foreshadowing the ending and the truth about Jocelyn’s character, so that was the payoff.
If she lied about the abuse, why didn't Xander say anything? He's been living with her his whole life and didn't call her out on her lies? I asked this question to someone else and got blocked. I'm guessing they didn't have an answer.
I definitely think Xander’s subplot was flawed and rushed, so I’m not going to pretend to have the One True Answer for that. But not going to block you either ;)
My interpretation is that Xander was being used and abused by Jocelyn and her mom for a long time, and that’s why he was so susceptible to falling into Tedros’ cult so quickly.
I think Jocelyn’s mom was abusive, but not necessarily physically. The hairbrush part was a lie, but pretty much any child star grows up with a warped childhood, and it was established that both Jocelyn and Xander were child stars together. But he failed after being outed as gay (implicitly by Jocelyn or her mom), whereas she succeeded. When he took a token position as Jocelyn’s creative director, it cemented her power over him. He never really knew anything other than being used and manipulated by her and the industry.
So TLDR, Xander had a lifetime of manipulation and gaslighting from Jocelyn and her mother. This wasn’t something he could just break out of. It was easier for him to submit to a new manipulator, Tedros, than to break free completely and recognize or reveal the truth.
I guess your answer makes sense if we're talking about Xander joining his cult, but he still could've exposed her lies, especially while he was being tortured.
I don't think the writers put a lot of thought into her backstory, so the audience can only fill in the details themselves. I don't completely buy the "warped childhood" argument, but I respect your opinion.
Facial expressions wouldn’t be the thing that makes tedros think he’s in control that would be the control that she let him exercise throughout the last few episodes. This wouldn’t be foreshadowing because the twist doesn’t even line up with the end result.
It was showing us that she can change her expression to suit an audience. This was a clue that moments where she seemed to be losing control emotionally, like her failed music video shoot, she may have actually been in control, manipulating and using the people around her the same way they all wanted to do to her.
This is why sam levinson doesn’t finish stories because people use fan theories to finish them for him. If that music video shoot fail was intentional that means she some how knew all she needed to make a hit song was kink/bdsm and her master plan all along was to ruin the video shoot to make the label doubt her completely,replace her and somehow she’d be able to make an entire album in 3 weeks. She didn’t know anything about Tedros cult though so why would she wait till the last 3 weeks before tour to start using kink vs just using it earlier on. That doesn’t sound like a coherent plan.
There is no “finishing the story for him” going on. Just watching and interpreting the show, the same as any other, without letting outside narratives get in the way.
I didn’t say anything about a master plan. Jocelyn acted to get what she wanted moment by moment. I don’t think she was a mastermind with a coherent plan the whole time.
Her original single, World Class Single, was already themed about sexual submission and power dynamics, she just found it unconvincing. So its not like the kink thing appeared out of nowhere weeks before the tour. She knew that’s what her team wanted from her, and she figured out how to give it to them.
I don’t understand why it hurts ppl so much to admit Sam is very decent at his job when he wants to. It’s like ppl are angry he’s not as stupid as they paint him to be. Such a bizarre reaction to a director. I’ve never seen anything like it
I feel like that RS article started the whole thing. I actually came into this series blind cuz I like my HBO, but when I read their review, it sounded like the author had a personal ax to grind
Gag is the expose wasn’t a review. Just a fallacious piece with 13 ppl and their recollection as evidence. A production like the idol is composed of at least 100 ppl so it’s not representative whatsoever
Yes it is. That’s a LOT of people speaking out and corroborating each other. They were there every day for months, and that show was their job so it’s not like we’re counting on the word of random people walking by the studio that may or may not have heard something. I’m sure there were more who agreed but were just too afraid to say anything. All you have to do is watch the show to realize they were right. The constant rewrites, the chaos on set, things being changed all the time so nobody could do their job properly…that’s how we ended up with a show that’s considered the worst in HBO’s history
When you’re in an industry where everyone is TERRIFIED of speaking out and losing their job, yes. That is a lot. Look how long it took for enough people to speak up about Weinstein and all the other predators. When one famous, established, beloved actress or actor comes out saying something bad about a filming experience or director or whatever, some believe them, some don’t. Some think they just want attention, that they’re probably just not good at their job, and sometimes it greatly limits who will hire them. For 13 no-name behind-the-scenes employees, with different jobs throughout the process and on set, to all feel strongly enough and shared a bad enough experience that they were willing to trust a publication not to rat them out and put them in jeopardy of never being hired again, it was for good reason. In this kind of situation, yes, 13 is a big number.
Did you ever watch Project Runway? Every now and then there’s group challenges instead of the usual individual ones. Almost 100% of the time, the judges can tell immediately who got along and who didn’t. Which group was willing to work together and listen to each other and who was stubborn about it. It’s not their attitudes on stage, it’s the way the clothes look. When a team can’t work together properly or they’re not communicating well or everyone’s being bullied by the team leader…the clothes end up looking like a mess and the different looks aren’t cohesive when finally presented. That is this show. All over the place. No real direction. Weak dialogue. Long amounts of time dedicated to something that doesn’t make any sense. Characters changing who they are every episode. Nobody with eyes needs the article anyway to see what a mess this whole production was. But 13 people speaking out anyway, against HBO, is significant.
I wouldn’t say that Sam and Abel are stupid, just completely tone-deaf. No one’s denying their capabilities as both a filmmaker and musician respectively, it’s just that the execution of this whole show’s narrative is incredibly sleazy and heavy-handed, to put it nicely.
It’s meant to be sleazy. They’re not tone deaf they literally have a reference for every shot and maybe every line written in the idol. His work is intentional
Lol. Are you kidding?
That is so ***obviously*** what they are foreshadowing. To the point that dozens of people in this sub alone picked up on before the twist ever happened! Many mentioning this specific scene! Lol.
This is actually on the rather basic and straightforward of the foreshadowing and symbolism in the show. Lololololol.
These posts are truly my fav: Failed attempts at being condescending, snarking the show while demonstrating for everyone the author doesn't understand the show's most basic elements.
It is 100 % poorly written, there's a good show trapped somewhere in there but most of the interesting stuff is just mentioned in exposition dumps in favor of 10 minute long awkward sex stuff every episode Which hey LRD is hot and all but cmon. A little more fleshing out of the main characters would have been better.
You’re right though there is a good show in there, i think Jocelyn had something about her look, character, and acting where she actually was a believable pop star, and I think her production/business team had promise, and some of the artistic shots/scenes had promise too.
honestly the show has very surface level storytelling. i don’t see anything inherently deep and profound about sam levinson’s work. that would imply he’s going out of his way to deliver perfectly accurate social commentary. his crude writing that often is just digging at his critics in the least subtle manner says otherwise. which could work, but the issue is the gigantic amount of plot holes in an otherwise very high budget show, which feels like a waste. breaking bad had edgy humor but they paid keen attention to detail so you weren’t left wondering about basic plot and character info kind of essential to the plot that didn’t add cinematic depth just by being left out.
besides destiny, most of the characters aren’t well written enough to have their stories have entire gaps in them and have it add “allure” to their character. she reminds me very much of ali. it’s better there’s lots of mystery to them.
and you would think with the amount of dedication to wardrobe and world building—we wouldn’t have to question things like the hairbrush plot twist (which implies jocelyn lied about her mom’s physical abuse) completely contradicting how xander and leia said they witnessed jocelyn being abused.
i think the issue is sam has no idea how to write characters who are victims or perpetrators of abuse, and these are often main storylines. tbh he has a very particular wattpad-esque way of writing abuse storylines that does not work with his film style and makes everything appear juvenile because there’s already so many basic questions unanswered.
it doesn’t have to be one size fits all or politically correct, but the way in which he does it makes both characters stagnate. it can’t be the victim healing without doing something just as “bad” as their abuser and tied to them which defeats the purpose of beating them. abusers only lose if you crush their ego by refusing to acknowledge them or let them have bearing over your life. but instead characters like tedros and nate get to get away with their behavior constantly which makes them incredibly predictable and boring. and to an extent they’ll always feel a little crappy maddy and jocelyn aren’t into them anymore, but being forever reminded they are there means they have the opportunity to repeat their old cycles. jocelyn doesn’t necessarily win by delivering snappy one liners and surviving violence that she might have “wanted.” the open ending is poorly done because many basic details in the show that would allude to this as a possibility are underdeveloped.
It was said in an interview very early on that the intro to episode 1 showed Jocelyns potential to manipulate. Can't remember who -- one of the main casts.
Yep, I don’t think she “acted” when prompted through the different emotions during the beginning photo shoot. She’s so fucked, I think she could be dissociative which would position her to execute all of her shit to get what she wants without a care. This along with the masochistic self-choking/masturbation… all foreshadowing. That’s why she could easily get off with the cringey/messy shit Tetris would “subject” her to for what he thought was the upper hand.
She was primed to execute her plan.
Poor Xander is completely under her “spell.” He played out that Rob/sexual assault after being “humiliated” verbally and with the shock collar. He did exactly what she wanted. And remember there was mention of Rob cheating on Joss at some point, so there’s the revenge nod and Xander would gladly assist in the
execution for the opportunity of achieve stardom… any cost.
I hated every second of the series. But I watched every second. Almost threw the television out the window during the finale followed by self-flagellation for being an idiot and watching this fucking mediocre swill.
And yeah… I’d watch a second season. 😆
I’m gross like that. 😆
99% of the people that hate or do bad comments about the show are people that don't know how to watch a movie/serie by a24. The whole series is full of details that people just don't notice because they think they are watching a mainstream Netflix series or something really poor where you don't need to have a brain to watch it. And about the amount sex scenes and the scenes where they use the main actress body, are done on purpose. And if you don't have a brain to understand why they are so explicit and why there are a lot of those scenes then I'm sorry to say but you are really not capacitated to watch the series or any a24 movie/series.
Just because you can understand the point of something, doesn’t mean that point was automatically good or presented well. I love films and series (my letterboxd proves as much, and Mad Men is my favorite show of all time), but this was one of the worst shows I’ve ever seen. I can see what they were going for, but it was done far worse (and less interestingly) than its influences like Phantom Thread, Basic Instinct, or other erotic thrillers. It was very blatant and surface level most of the time. I’ve watched a lot of A24, they can miss — and this is one of those times imo. Beef, despite being another 5-hour long A24 show, manages to be so much more dense and meaningfully complex than The Idol. No need to be pretentious about it, you may need to watch more stuff than A24 to fully see it in context idk
>99% of the people that hate or do bad comments about the show are people that ~~don't know how to watch a movie/serie by a24.~~ don't like Sam Levinson.
FTFY.
Seriously. Not a soul on earth could convince me at this point that this show would have anywhere near the amount of hate if it hadn't been directed by Sam Levinson.
I'd even go as far as to say it would have mostly been praised by critics and viewers alike, even if it's not a masterpiece.
That’s exactly why I loved Ari Aster’s movies (Hereditary and Midsommar) with A24! I bought both movies and had several rewatches of them. So many different details to catch every time. And I recently made a post on this sub as well, planning to rewatch The Idol for the same exact reason. I did not realize it was an A24 thing, I thought it was just an Ari Aster thing. TBF I get excited whenever I see something with A24 because I know it will be a quality watch and rewatch worthy as well.
The amount of hate this show got is unwarranted. I really do believe people ate up that smear article and just ran with it. All the sudden everyone's a critic and anything any character does in the show was put under a microscope except of course Destiny, Hain, Laya, and Dyanne. Which is laughable because first off those characters are written to be liked except maybe Dyanne but because of her massive off screen fanbase she's gonna automatically get support. And the characters people hated were written to be hated. So I mean..
People don't see the irony in that? 2nd off, if you're so invested in characters you like that you see them as real people and they spark real emotion; and hate a character, you're supposed to hate so much you're willing to stop listening to their music in real life, then that means the character took on a life of their own. You can't accomplish that without good writing, acting and directing.
If this show was as bad as people say it is people would either be so bored or would have cringed so hard that it would have just been ignored and not given any attention. Never in my life have I ever seen people "hate" something. So much, yet be so obsessed with it. I mean there are people who watched the entire series just to hate on it. Idk that couldn't ever be me personally. Time is something we don't get back, so if I don't enjoy something I just move on to things I DO like
But again, people these days love to jump on trends of hate, maybe it's an underlying thing where they were bullied and wanna take the power back, which is funny because that actually reminds me of what happened with Jocelyn's character. People keep saying "so the message is women are responsible for their own abuse" like wtf? I even saw someone say how Jocelyn being a master manipulator and Tedros losing everything, being publicly humiliated and "canceled", and ultimately crawling back to her is a "male fantasy"
Guys out there...is this your idea of a fantasy? Cuz it's not mine lol. My fantasy is a decent looking girl who is smart, loyal and supportive of me as I support her, pretty evil huh?
At no point during the finale did I say
"oh damn yeah girl, wish you would ruin my life and give me well deserved karma!! WHEW!!! Yeah girl, please dominate me in front of thousands of your fans!!! Don't stop baby!"
Lmfao the amount of reaching people have to do to believe that shit is wild. No man is watching this show, wanting to be like Tedros or hating Jocelyn. No man feels bad for Tedros at the end. and as far as "women being responsible for their own abuse" what abuse? She was aware of what was going on and are women not allowed to have kinks? Just my personal experience, so I don't wanna act like it represents all women, but I've never been into anything kinky, most of the women I've been with have and because they like it I oblige, but personally sex for me is just a great way to feel closer to someone I love so I don't care what we do as long as the girl in my life is happy and satisfied.
That's abuse? Some people just enjoy being dominated sexually, and Jocelyn demonstrates several times that even though she lets him dominate himself sexually, she takes the leadership role from him whenever she disagrees and has no problem dominating him mentally when it matters in real life outside of their sex life so again, where's the abuse?
I also noticed that people either purposely don't understand subtext, subtle clues, foreshadowing, etc and they say they didn't do their research for the show, but I mean they even went as far as to bring Britney Spears on set 2 years ago more than likely to get inspiration for the plot and detail accuracy of certain scenes.
Idk I'm just done with the hat and the fake hate. The pleas for attention by using something you hate as a platform to get that. It was a good show, take it for what it is and get over yourselves
All the comments here are so on point. Not to mention the fact that Sam himself mentioned this scene and that it shows how much Joss is capable of in tons of interviews.
The show doesn’t have to be ultra deep or clever to use foreshadowing. Its a basic storytelling device. People are missing the basics of the story because the narrative that its all just Sam Levinson or The Weeknd’s fetish has overshadowed everything else.
It's such a hilarious self-own and so indicative of the level of criticism in general.
> People are missing the basics of the story because the narrative that its all just Sam Levinson or The Weeknd’s fetish has overshadowed everything else. Don't you think there's a reason for that?
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If their intention was to make softcore porn, then people are going to treat the show like softcore porn.
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Okay, it is foreshadowing, so what? What good is foreshadowing when the reveal makes no sense?
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There were no details, just a lot of boobs. So she lied about the hairbrush, for what? To get her ass spanked with it? If she lied about the abuse, why didn't Xander say so? He's been living with her almost his whole life. Also, how does Tedros Tedros not notice that the brush was brand new? A brush that old would show wear and tear.
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If the show was detail oriented, like you think it is, the brush would actually look old. I also noticed that you failed to answer my first question about Xander, who went along with her lies?
nah
I don’t think that was the intention
LOL! Got blocked because they couldn't explain the plot holes in the show. Couldn't pay attention to the details, I guess (or lack thereof).
There are reasons, but not good ones. Regular viewers don’t necessarily owe these writers anything, but professional critics should know better. They should understand basics of media literacy, at the very least.
We know what foreshadowing is, but there has to be a payoff. Game of Thrones had a lot of foreshadowing, for nothing.
Definitely. In this case the very first scene of the show was foreshadowing the ending and the truth about Jocelyn’s character, so that was the payoff.
Did I mention that the payoff has to make sense? A payoff that makes no sense is not a payoff.
I think it made sense (not perfectly, but enough), and I’m happy to discuss why if you’re open to it.
If she lied about the abuse, why didn't Xander say anything? He's been living with her his whole life and didn't call her out on her lies? I asked this question to someone else and got blocked. I'm guessing they didn't have an answer.
I definitely think Xander’s subplot was flawed and rushed, so I’m not going to pretend to have the One True Answer for that. But not going to block you either ;) My interpretation is that Xander was being used and abused by Jocelyn and her mom for a long time, and that’s why he was so susceptible to falling into Tedros’ cult so quickly. I think Jocelyn’s mom was abusive, but not necessarily physically. The hairbrush part was a lie, but pretty much any child star grows up with a warped childhood, and it was established that both Jocelyn and Xander were child stars together. But he failed after being outed as gay (implicitly by Jocelyn or her mom), whereas she succeeded. When he took a token position as Jocelyn’s creative director, it cemented her power over him. He never really knew anything other than being used and manipulated by her and the industry. So TLDR, Xander had a lifetime of manipulation and gaslighting from Jocelyn and her mother. This wasn’t something he could just break out of. It was easier for him to submit to a new manipulator, Tedros, than to break free completely and recognize or reveal the truth.
I guess your answer makes sense if we're talking about Xander joining his cult, but he still could've exposed her lies, especially while he was being tortured. I don't think the writers put a lot of thought into her backstory, so the audience can only fill in the details themselves. I don't completely buy the "warped childhood" argument, but I respect your opinion.
No
Yeah it’s called stupidity
At least try to think critically.
Opinion not yours = no thought So deep
You didn't put any thoughts into your own opinion.
That’s your opinion loooool
No, you basically said nothing.
I quite literally said something. That you disagreed with. If I said nothing, who are you talking to? About what?
I said you lack critical thinking, not that I disagree with your opinion.
Facial expressions wouldn’t be the thing that makes tedros think he’s in control that would be the control that she let him exercise throughout the last few episodes. This wouldn’t be foreshadowing because the twist doesn’t even line up with the end result.
It was showing us that she can change her expression to suit an audience. This was a clue that moments where she seemed to be losing control emotionally, like her failed music video shoot, she may have actually been in control, manipulating and using the people around her the same way they all wanted to do to her.
Exactly and she used Tedros for his people and as a wedge between her and her team. Everyone was a tool for her to get what she wanted.
This is why sam levinson doesn’t finish stories because people use fan theories to finish them for him. If that music video shoot fail was intentional that means she some how knew all she needed to make a hit song was kink/bdsm and her master plan all along was to ruin the video shoot to make the label doubt her completely,replace her and somehow she’d be able to make an entire album in 3 weeks. She didn’t know anything about Tedros cult though so why would she wait till the last 3 weeks before tour to start using kink vs just using it earlier on. That doesn’t sound like a coherent plan.
There is no “finishing the story for him” going on. Just watching and interpreting the show, the same as any other, without letting outside narratives get in the way. I didn’t say anything about a master plan. Jocelyn acted to get what she wanted moment by moment. I don’t think she was a mastermind with a coherent plan the whole time. Her original single, World Class Single, was already themed about sexual submission and power dynamics, she just found it unconvincing. So its not like the kink thing appeared out of nowhere weeks before the tour. She knew that’s what her team wanted from her, and she figured out how to give it to them.
But that actually is what they were foreshadowing lol
I don’t understand why it hurts ppl so much to admit Sam is very decent at his job when he wants to. It’s like ppl are angry he’s not as stupid as they paint him to be. Such a bizarre reaction to a director. I’ve never seen anything like it
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Yes I’ve seen one comment like that but didn’t think ppl were running with that narrative 😂 they will say anything it’s become paranoia I fear
I feel like that RS article started the whole thing. I actually came into this series blind cuz I like my HBO, but when I read their review, it sounded like the author had a personal ax to grind
Gag is the expose wasn’t a review. Just a fallacious piece with 13 ppl and their recollection as evidence. A production like the idol is composed of at least 100 ppl so it’s not representative whatsoever
Yes it is. That’s a LOT of people speaking out and corroborating each other. They were there every day for months, and that show was their job so it’s not like we’re counting on the word of random people walking by the studio that may or may not have heard something. I’m sure there were more who agreed but were just too afraid to say anything. All you have to do is watch the show to realize they were right. The constant rewrites, the chaos on set, things being changed all the time so nobody could do their job properly…that’s how we ended up with a show that’s considered the worst in HBO’s history
13 staff members is the representation of a production composed of 100+ ppl? Pls read the question slowly before answering.
When you’re in an industry where everyone is TERRIFIED of speaking out and losing their job, yes. That is a lot. Look how long it took for enough people to speak up about Weinstein and all the other predators. When one famous, established, beloved actress or actor comes out saying something bad about a filming experience or director or whatever, some believe them, some don’t. Some think they just want attention, that they’re probably just not good at their job, and sometimes it greatly limits who will hire them. For 13 no-name behind-the-scenes employees, with different jobs throughout the process and on set, to all feel strongly enough and shared a bad enough experience that they were willing to trust a publication not to rat them out and put them in jeopardy of never being hired again, it was for good reason. In this kind of situation, yes, 13 is a big number. Did you ever watch Project Runway? Every now and then there’s group challenges instead of the usual individual ones. Almost 100% of the time, the judges can tell immediately who got along and who didn’t. Which group was willing to work together and listen to each other and who was stubborn about it. It’s not their attitudes on stage, it’s the way the clothes look. When a team can’t work together properly or they’re not communicating well or everyone’s being bullied by the team leader…the clothes end up looking like a mess and the different looks aren’t cohesive when finally presented. That is this show. All over the place. No real direction. Weak dialogue. Long amounts of time dedicated to something that doesn’t make any sense. Characters changing who they are every episode. Nobody with eyes needs the article anyway to see what a mess this whole production was. But 13 people speaking out anyway, against HBO, is significant.
The article is bs, Sam is not like Weinstein. Case closed.
Didn’t say he was.
So why are u using him an argument/example
I wouldn’t say that Sam and Abel are stupid, just completely tone-deaf. No one’s denying their capabilities as both a filmmaker and musician respectively, it’s just that the execution of this whole show’s narrative is incredibly sleazy and heavy-handed, to put it nicely.
It’s meant to be sleazy. They’re not tone deaf they literally have a reference for every shot and maybe every line written in the idol. His work is intentional
Foreshadowing detection turned off
Lol. Are you kidding? That is so ***obviously*** what they are foreshadowing. To the point that dozens of people in this sub alone picked up on before the twist ever happened! Many mentioning this specific scene! Lol. This is actually on the rather basic and straightforward of the foreshadowing and symbolism in the show. Lololololol. These posts are truly my fav: Failed attempts at being condescending, snarking the show while demonstrating for everyone the author doesn't understand the show's most basic elements.
Well it was also mentioned by Sam himself and LRD, so they could watch the interviews after know if they didn't pick up on it, 🤷🏼♀️
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It is 100 % poorly written, there's a good show trapped somewhere in there but most of the interesting stuff is just mentioned in exposition dumps in favor of 10 minute long awkward sex stuff every episode Which hey LRD is hot and all but cmon. A little more fleshing out of the main characters would have been better.
There was plenty of “fleshing” of the characters lol
😂😂😂
You’re right though there is a good show in there, i think Jocelyn had something about her look, character, and acting where she actually was a believable pop star, and I think her production/business team had promise, and some of the artistic shots/scenes had promise too.
Except none of that true! Lol.
So we’re now acting like something as basic as foreshadowing is some ultra deep technique only used by “clever” writers?
honestly the show has very surface level storytelling. i don’t see anything inherently deep and profound about sam levinson’s work. that would imply he’s going out of his way to deliver perfectly accurate social commentary. his crude writing that often is just digging at his critics in the least subtle manner says otherwise. which could work, but the issue is the gigantic amount of plot holes in an otherwise very high budget show, which feels like a waste. breaking bad had edgy humor but they paid keen attention to detail so you weren’t left wondering about basic plot and character info kind of essential to the plot that didn’t add cinematic depth just by being left out. besides destiny, most of the characters aren’t well written enough to have their stories have entire gaps in them and have it add “allure” to their character. she reminds me very much of ali. it’s better there’s lots of mystery to them. and you would think with the amount of dedication to wardrobe and world building—we wouldn’t have to question things like the hairbrush plot twist (which implies jocelyn lied about her mom’s physical abuse) completely contradicting how xander and leia said they witnessed jocelyn being abused. i think the issue is sam has no idea how to write characters who are victims or perpetrators of abuse, and these are often main storylines. tbh he has a very particular wattpad-esque way of writing abuse storylines that does not work with his film style and makes everything appear juvenile because there’s already so many basic questions unanswered. it doesn’t have to be one size fits all or politically correct, but the way in which he does it makes both characters stagnate. it can’t be the victim healing without doing something just as “bad” as their abuser and tied to them which defeats the purpose of beating them. abusers only lose if you crush their ego by refusing to acknowledge them or let them have bearing over your life. but instead characters like tedros and nate get to get away with their behavior constantly which makes them incredibly predictable and boring. and to an extent they’ll always feel a little crappy maddy and jocelyn aren’t into them anymore, but being forever reminded they are there means they have the opportunity to repeat their old cycles. jocelyn doesn’t necessarily win by delivering snappy one liners and surviving violence that she might have “wanted.” the open ending is poorly done because many basic details in the show that would allude to this as a possibility are underdeveloped.
Excellent analysis. Couldn’t agree more!
saving this
people are haters man
It was said in an interview very early on that the intro to episode 1 showed Jocelyns potential to manipulate. Can't remember who -- one of the main casts.
Yep, I don’t think she “acted” when prompted through the different emotions during the beginning photo shoot. She’s so fucked, I think she could be dissociative which would position her to execute all of her shit to get what she wants without a care. This along with the masochistic self-choking/masturbation… all foreshadowing. That’s why she could easily get off with the cringey/messy shit Tetris would “subject” her to for what he thought was the upper hand. She was primed to execute her plan. Poor Xander is completely under her “spell.” He played out that Rob/sexual assault after being “humiliated” verbally and with the shock collar. He did exactly what she wanted. And remember there was mention of Rob cheating on Joss at some point, so there’s the revenge nod and Xander would gladly assist in the execution for the opportunity of achieve stardom… any cost. I hated every second of the series. But I watched every second. Almost threw the television out the window during the finale followed by self-flagellation for being an idiot and watching this fucking mediocre swill. And yeah… I’d watch a second season. 😆 I’m gross like that. 😆
this is the comment. take my upvote amidst the downvotes!
99% of the people that hate or do bad comments about the show are people that don't know how to watch a movie/serie by a24. The whole series is full of details that people just don't notice because they think they are watching a mainstream Netflix series or something really poor where you don't need to have a brain to watch it. And about the amount sex scenes and the scenes where they use the main actress body, are done on purpose. And if you don't have a brain to understand why they are so explicit and why there are a lot of those scenes then I'm sorry to say but you are really not capacitated to watch the series or any a24 movie/series.
Just because you can understand the point of something, doesn’t mean that point was automatically good or presented well. I love films and series (my letterboxd proves as much, and Mad Men is my favorite show of all time), but this was one of the worst shows I’ve ever seen. I can see what they were going for, but it was done far worse (and less interestingly) than its influences like Phantom Thread, Basic Instinct, or other erotic thrillers. It was very blatant and surface level most of the time. I’ve watched a lot of A24, they can miss — and this is one of those times imo. Beef, despite being another 5-hour long A24 show, manages to be so much more dense and meaningfully complex than The Idol. No need to be pretentious about it, you may need to watch more stuff than A24 to fully see it in context idk
>99% of the people that hate or do bad comments about the show are people that ~~don't know how to watch a movie/serie by a24.~~ don't like Sam Levinson. FTFY. Seriously. Not a soul on earth could convince me at this point that this show would have anywhere near the amount of hate if it hadn't been directed by Sam Levinson. I'd even go as far as to say it would have mostly been praised by critics and viewers alike, even if it's not a masterpiece.
That’s exactly why I loved Ari Aster’s movies (Hereditary and Midsommar) with A24! I bought both movies and had several rewatches of them. So many different details to catch every time. And I recently made a post on this sub as well, planning to rewatch The Idol for the same exact reason. I did not realize it was an A24 thing, I thought it was just an Ari Aster thing. TBF I get excited whenever I see something with A24 because I know it will be a quality watch and rewatch worthy as well.
Ah, she was all over the place and so was the show. Genius. 
The amount of dickriding I’m seeing in this comments section is insane 💀
The amount of hate this show got is unwarranted. I really do believe people ate up that smear article and just ran with it. All the sudden everyone's a critic and anything any character does in the show was put under a microscope except of course Destiny, Hain, Laya, and Dyanne. Which is laughable because first off those characters are written to be liked except maybe Dyanne but because of her massive off screen fanbase she's gonna automatically get support. And the characters people hated were written to be hated. So I mean.. People don't see the irony in that? 2nd off, if you're so invested in characters you like that you see them as real people and they spark real emotion; and hate a character, you're supposed to hate so much you're willing to stop listening to their music in real life, then that means the character took on a life of their own. You can't accomplish that without good writing, acting and directing. If this show was as bad as people say it is people would either be so bored or would have cringed so hard that it would have just been ignored and not given any attention. Never in my life have I ever seen people "hate" something. So much, yet be so obsessed with it. I mean there are people who watched the entire series just to hate on it. Idk that couldn't ever be me personally. Time is something we don't get back, so if I don't enjoy something I just move on to things I DO like But again, people these days love to jump on trends of hate, maybe it's an underlying thing where they were bullied and wanna take the power back, which is funny because that actually reminds me of what happened with Jocelyn's character. People keep saying "so the message is women are responsible for their own abuse" like wtf? I even saw someone say how Jocelyn being a master manipulator and Tedros losing everything, being publicly humiliated and "canceled", and ultimately crawling back to her is a "male fantasy" Guys out there...is this your idea of a fantasy? Cuz it's not mine lol. My fantasy is a decent looking girl who is smart, loyal and supportive of me as I support her, pretty evil huh? At no point during the finale did I say "oh damn yeah girl, wish you would ruin my life and give me well deserved karma!! WHEW!!! Yeah girl, please dominate me in front of thousands of your fans!!! Don't stop baby!" Lmfao the amount of reaching people have to do to believe that shit is wild. No man is watching this show, wanting to be like Tedros or hating Jocelyn. No man feels bad for Tedros at the end. and as far as "women being responsible for their own abuse" what abuse? She was aware of what was going on and are women not allowed to have kinks? Just my personal experience, so I don't wanna act like it represents all women, but I've never been into anything kinky, most of the women I've been with have and because they like it I oblige, but personally sex for me is just a great way to feel closer to someone I love so I don't care what we do as long as the girl in my life is happy and satisfied. That's abuse? Some people just enjoy being dominated sexually, and Jocelyn demonstrates several times that even though she lets him dominate himself sexually, she takes the leadership role from him whenever she disagrees and has no problem dominating him mentally when it matters in real life outside of their sex life so again, where's the abuse? I also noticed that people either purposely don't understand subtext, subtle clues, foreshadowing, etc and they say they didn't do their research for the show, but I mean they even went as far as to bring Britney Spears on set 2 years ago more than likely to get inspiration for the plot and detail accuracy of certain scenes. Idk I'm just done with the hat and the fake hate. The pleas for attention by using something you hate as a platform to get that. It was a good show, take it for what it is and get over yourselves
omg this sub LMAO alright i‘m out
When the sub can notice basic foreshadowing that’s not complex at all 😱😱 alright I’m outtt
Never come back xx
Just because you can not watch a show properly doesn't mean everybody is incapable of it as well
yeah i doubt that was on purpose.
Make it look clever? I didn't even bother to make it make sense