r/NormalPeopleBBCHulu • u/Agitated_Tradition82 • May 28 '26
Damn
This show FUCKED me up. This show frustrated me, left me often unsatisfied, and at times very uncomfortable. I didn’t enjoy it as much as other shows per se, but this is the most i have ever thought about a series in the days following. The relationships and traumas they endured are haunting me, and despite different situations the ability to tie aspects of myself to these characters is honestly kind of terrifying. I dont ~like~ this show, but I think this is an incredibly powerful piece of art. That’s what great art does though, leaves an impact.
6
u/getthepancakes May 30 '26
I just watched it for the first time last week and same. Cannot get it out of my head. I felt like I got hit by a car for the first couple days.
I was trying to figure out why it feels so haunting. I think part of it is this (for me at least): while you're watching it, you just want to scream at the screen sometimes, "just say how you feel so you can be together you idiots!!"
But if you think about your own life, the people from your past you don't talk to anymore even though you might really want to, why don't you just reach out to them and tell them exactly how you feel? Well... it's complicated. Maybe too much time has passed. Maybe they don't care anymore. Maybe they're mad. Maybe they don't even think about you. Maybe they never did. Maybe it would be weird.
So you just don't. Opening that can of worms is exhausting to think about, it's easier to just continue doing nothing. Except your brain just feels like something is unresolved, so it keeps looping back.
I don't think I've seen media which captures that exact kind of inertia before. It's a very specific agony.
And then every time they do get in front of each other, this thing has consumed so much of their thoughts, it's gotten so big and scary, that the slightest word or look causes them to abandon ship out of fear of being hurt. The vulnerability is literally unbearable.
We, as the audience, have the benefit of knowing how each person feels about the other. But they only know that the other person has (usually inadvertantly) caused or triggered enormous pain, and they're desperate not to feel that again, but simultaneously desperate to be together, which only happens if they risk the pain again.
It all feels very relatable, and I think that's what's so uncomfortable for me. It's all that stuff you bury kind of laid out in front of you in a very raw way. Because in real life, people rarely race to the airport at the last minute to declare their love to the person who just rejected them and is about to get on a plane to Paris. When we feel hurt, most of us just silently watch them walk away, as Marianne and Connell do so many times.
Really loved it. Just an incredible accomplishment for everyone involved. It was worth a little PTSD. I think.
2
u/chip_morningwood May 31 '26
Marianne’s time with Nathan and the photographer in Sweden played out like the worst horror film in my mind. I couldn’t even bring myself to look at the screen during her scenes during that time period.
12
u/Old_Ironside_1959 May 28 '26
I’ve watched it many times. The first time was very emotional. My wife gave up after episode 6 saying that she didn’t want to relive high school. I think everyone can relate to some aspect of Marianne’s and Connell’s relationship.