Clickbait

Grade: A-

Clickbait – an 8 episode Netflix miniseries – certainly knows how to keep you watching. The action and plot points ramp up at the end of each installment, and will give the viewer a taste of what it means to bingewatch.

I will give you the plot that we see immediately from trailers and descriptions on IMDb. Some reviewers have revealed more. Oakland, CA family man Nick is kidnapped one morning, and shows up soon after in a viral video, beaten up and bloodied, holding signs that say “I abuse women,” “I killed a woman,” and “at 5 million views I die.” Each episode is devoted to a different character, and titled accordingly (The Sister, The Wife, The Reporter, The Brother, etc.).

Zoe Kazan (Elia Kazan’s granddaughter) is a force of nature in her role as Nick’s troubled and high-strung sister. She is the star of the first episode, and arguably the star of the series. Other notable turns come from Phoenix Raei as the honest, straight-laced, consummate nice man who is assigned to be an investigator on the case, Jessica Collins as a woman from Nick’s past who comes forward, and Betty Gabriel as Nick’s long-suffering wife – among many others. The only name from the cast I recognized was Adrian Grenier, who I remember from Cecil B. DeMented in 2000, and starring opposite Melissa Joan Hart in a romcom in the 90s. He plays Nick, in a performance all the more impressive when you realize flashbacks are the main way we get to know him.

Clickbait utilizes a fun way of showing us what people are reading/typing in texts or emails. The screen is projected off to the side of our screen as we watch – hologram-style. It’s an effective through-line. At one point, I was driving myself crazy by rewinding several times and trying to hit pause at the second I needed to, so I could read the text of an email – only to have it appear later, prominently and conveniently. I enjoyed a scene where one character texts another, and awaits a response while we see those 3 dots appear that let us know the other person is typing. Then suddenly the 3 dots are gone, and the first person is left to wonder “What were they starting to say, and why did they change their mind?!” There’s a convention in the movies where the major plot point is all anybody’s talking about, and literally all that’s ever on the news. And people turn their TVs on at the most perfect moments, on the right channel, with the news on, talking about the plot. Clickbait can easily sidestep this, as it takes place in the present day where everybody has smartphones and can pull up the top story whenever they want.

For its flaws and quibbles, Clickbait is an absorbing series filled with thrills and actors who keep us engaged and work well with each other. Sometimes it feels too obvious that the filmmakers are letting us know how woke they are by checking off as many Current Issue Boxes as possible, with lines like “Why haven’t I gotten that promotion? Is it because I’m Muslim?” (“Hey look at this, guys! We’re talking about race!”) Or when a gay couple kiss each other for too long, just to make sure we get it. I don’t mind seeing men make out, but the guys in Clickbait live together and call each other “babe” – why not leave it at that? Other diversity stuff throughout the series works better.

I am rating Clickbait with the higher of the two grades I was debating between. 6 out of the first 7 episodes definitely deserve the high grade. [I wasn’t crazy about the one devoted to the reporter. I understand why it was there, but he was just shallow and slimy.] Episode 8 reveals the person behind everything – who directly and indirectly set all of this in motion. It seems to be a random character we don’t see much of previously, thrown in at the home stretch for shock value. The person we’re supposed to think it is right up until then would have made more sense, and answered every question better. Also, don’t trust all the flashbacks you see. They don’t play completely fair with us. However, I wholeheartedly recommend Clickbait. It it as thrilling a TV series as I’ve ever seen, and will keep you watching, guessing, and talking.

Grade: A-