Warning: Spoilers ahead for “You” Season 5.
After some fans of Netflix’s “You” argued that the show’s big season finale left much to be desired, one of the series’ showrunners has revealed the alternate ending that didn’t make the cut.
In Season 5 of “You,” the thriller series wraps up with the murderous reign of so-called lover boy Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) coming to an end.
After killing multiple women and men, Goldberg is brought to justice after being catfished by new love interest Bronte (Madeline Brewer), who sought to have him arrested for the murders of Guinevere Beck (Elizabeth Lail) and Love Quinn (Victoria Pedretti).
In the final moments of the series, Goldberg lies locked in a prison cell alone, where he reads over yet another piece of fan mail, this time, from a woman begging to become his next victim. The gesture prompts him to pose a question to the “You” audience about whether he or society is the real issue.
Speaking with the New York Post, “You” showrunner and executive producer Michael Foley said his team didn’t determine the ending until late in the season, but they agreed Goldberg shouldn’t get away with murder.
“We came into the season knowing that we didn’t want to redeem him, that he would get his comeuppance, that he was going to face some of those whose lives he ruined,” he explained. “And most importantly, we knew he was going to be made to face himself.”
After selfishly slaying so many people, Foley said they thought death would be “too easy” for Goldberg.
“We liked putting him in a veritable cage [in prison]. We liked him not knowing the touch of a lover,” he added.
Foley said Goldberg’s accusatory final monologue was like “having the chance to have his pithy coda, and of course put [the blame] on everybody else, rather than himself.”
Elsewhere in the Post interview, fellow showrunner and executive producer Justin W. Lo opened up about alternate endings that almost came to be for Goldberg.
“We went through many different options, one of which being that he did die at the hands of Bronte,” he explained, noting it was a “very early iteration.”
Lo added: “I was even remembering a version where he was shot. And [the audience] didn’t realize that he shot until the very last episode, and then he realizes he’s a ghost.”
Read the full article here
