In the end of March Netflix released a TV adaptation of Jay Asher’s 13 Reasons Why. The show represents the book so well but I feel that actually putting a face to the characters makes the story even more heart wrenching. The show is centered around Hannah Baker and what drove her to commit suicide (do not worry, this is not a spoiler because this is how they begin the story). Before Hannah kills herself, she records tapes detailing the 13 reasons why she decided to take her life. She then sends these tapes to the people she mentions on the tapes, and who played a part in her decision.
We pick up the story when Clay, Hannah’s classmate and coworker starts to listen to the tapes. He is constantly haunted by flashbacks of Hannah and what happened to her. The tension builds as we wait to hear Clay’s tape and what he did to Hannah. The more he listens to the tapes, the less sane he seems. Initially I thought the show was going to sugar coat and make what Hannah was feeling seem diluted but luckily it does not. The show really shows how something that may seem so small in the other characters’ lives could really effect Hannah. Some people see this as her being overdramatic but she was feeling lonely and was losing friends. The deeper into the series you get, the more difficult it is to watch. The show deals with difficult and often not talked about topics like bullying, depression, rape, victim blaming, and suicide. For me, some of the hardest things to watch was Hannah slowly becoming alienated, her parents seeking answers to no avail, and Clay’s dreams and reality mixing.
While some viewers think that it is ridiculous that Hannah made the tapes, I see it as her form of a suicide note. However, I can understand why people don’t like that she planned out and thought about her decision, since a majority of suicides can happen without an explanation. The show also dives into the butterfly effect, which Hannah mentions it on multiple occasions. The butterfly effect is the idea that each decision in a person’s life changes their path. One example of this when Hannah talks about not having gone to a party and how it would have effected certain events if she had.
Overall, I now consider 13 Reasons Why one of my favorite shows on Netflix. I watched all the episodes in two days and plan on watching them all again soon. I suggest that everyone take the time to watch the show, and learn about some of the important issues that our society often pushes under the rug.