YMMV / 13 Reasons Why

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In the Book:

• Anti-Climax Boss: As in the series, there is a lot of emphasis on Clay being on Hannah's suicide tape. When it finally comes time for The Reveal...even Hannah admits Clay doesn't belong on the tapes.
• Broken Base: There was debate over the book's handling of suicide before the series came out, but with the show's release and controversy the novel fell back under scrutiny. Some feel it handled the subject matter better than the series with the issue of suicide not subject to what those critics feel was the more exploitative direction of the show. Others feel that the book had the same problems the show had with regards to how it presented suicide in a way that they felt romanticized it. A third group viewed the series as the better handling of the story with characters expanded upon more and the tragedy given a stronger focus.
• Fanon: A lot of fans assumed Hannah to be a blonde, due to the girl on the cover being blonde. Her hair colour is never mentioned in the book. Katherine Langford and Selena Gomez (who was in talks to play Hannah when the book was first up for adaptation) are both brunettes.
• Harsher in Hindsight: All the book's talk about how sexual harassment is bad can come across as disingenuous nowadays since Jay Asher was accused of sexual harassment in 2018 and dropped by his publisher, though he continues to deny the accusations.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: In the book, Clay listens to the tapes in one night — you might say 'binge watching' them. The book ends up getting adapted into a Netflix series — which is synonymous with people binge watching TV shows. What's more is that in the series, Clay drags them out over a number of weeks rather than listening to them in one go.
• Ho Yay: Invoked by Hannah and a friend at one point in order to bait a peeping tom into a situation where they could catch him. It left Hannah no less emotionally broken than right after she'd found out that she would even be hounded in the one place where she felt safe — her bedroom.
• Periphery Demographic: This book was remarkably popular amongst teenagers who'd admitted to not being avid readers, and people who in general were not young adult fiction fans.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Some people feel this way about Hannah. A lot of readers felt like the tapes Hannah sent out were cruel and spiteful. She potentially ruined those people's lives by implying that they were the reasons she killed herself. While some are understandable, like Bryce Walker, most of the others come off as trivial to adults, and then there is the case of Clay himself, who had his sanity pushed to the breaking point and beyond before he ultimately found out by Hannah's own admission he actually didn't do anything wrong, and was merely included simply to tie the story together. In a nutshell, Hannah straight up subjected her most loyal friend to mental torment simply out of narrative convenience. This may be part of the book's main Aesop: you should really be careful about what you do and who you do it to. To you it may seem trivial, but you can't be sure how the person and those around them will react. This is also very much Truth in Television; Lack of Empathy is one of the main causes of bullying. However, that only makes Hannah's complete disregard in how her tapes would have affected the lives of the people she sent them to worse.
• The Un-Twist: Will Clay, the Dogged Nice Guy, turn out to have secretly hurt Hannah or participated in her pain, even if unknowingly? Is he an Unreliable Narrator? Nope...he doesn't belong on the tapes.
• The Woobie:
  • Hannah, full stop. When she slips into Unintentionally Unsympathetic mode, she overlaps with Jerkass Woobie.
  • Clay as well, by the end.

In the Series:

A - C

• Actor Shipping: Brandon Flynn (Justin) and Miles Heizer (Alex) are shipped by fans. Also Brandon and Alisha Boe (Jessica) due to their on-screen couple.
• Adaptation Displacement: Most people know it was a book first, but it gradually faded into obscurity as the series is far more popular (and controversial) than the book ever was.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Zach in the first season. He was portrayed somewhat as standing idly by (and at times, joined in) while his friends bullied and sexually harassed Hannah. But she did overreact and humiliate him in the cafeteria. It's hard to know if his stealing of her compliments was because he was genuinely hurt, or if he simply wanted to twist the knife further.
    • In the same situation, you can ask why Hannah thought he tore up the note? Was she merely seeing what she wanted to see? Was she so far gone mentally that she was misremembering things as more traumatic than they are?
  • Did Ryan publish Hannah's open because he wanted to help her come out of her shell, or was he only thinking about the magazine? The second season indicates that he thought it was the latter.
  • Tyler was a lonely, heavily bullied kid with No Social Skills, so his stalking of Hannah might have been less predatory and more of a poorly-conceived attempt at reaching out to her. Especially since he didn't seem to understand why Hannah rejected his offer to hang out directly after being handed a card full of photographs he took of her without her consent.
  • Is Bryce Walker a purely evil guy who enjoys hurting others, or is he actually missing something that allows him to understand the impact of his actions? Is he even aware that he is a rapist? His words at times indicate that he is aware of what he did, whereas other times he seems clueless, like when he asks Chloe, "You feel safe with me, right?" He is shown making genuine connections with people like Justin, Chloe, Ani, his mother and even, it's revealed, Hannah. But he also sometimes reverts right back to his old self, like when he went after Zach, or started cursing at Alex and Jessica while they were trying to help him. Was is it active manipulation or him genuinely trying to get better and lapsing occasionally?
    • Season 3: Was Bryce really trying to change and feel remorse, but was held back by his anger at Zach? Or was he just regretting the fact that everyone hates him now?
    • Bryce as a kid in the flashback scene with Justin. Was he just someone who genuinely wanted to help Justin, hence why he stood up for him? Or was he already planning on manipulating Justin all the way back from the start by ‘helping’ him? As for the Twinkies moment, did Bryce say that he really ‘just wanted a Twinkie’ without realising what he said, or does this imply something more about his sense of entitlement?
  • Was Monty's relationship with Bryce purely platonic? Or did Monty have a secret crush on him? Throughout the second season Monty goes to disturbingly great lengths to keep Bryce's victims from testifying against him, lengths that exceed what a mere "friend" would do. And was his earlier violence the result of the anger he felt both toward his father and/or the stress of being closeted?
  • Did Hannah intend to hurt Clay as badly as she did by including him in the tapes, or had she been counting on someone (most likely Tony) to spoil him about his own tape and why he was included before it got to that point?
  • Clay's decision to hand the tapes to the authorities is presented as him breaking Hannah rules, but could this be what Hannah actually wanted all along? Consider that by including Justin and Jessica as early as she did, she was essentially giving Jessica the choice to pursue justice for both of them right now, or to keep passing the tapes on to her classmates while ignoring what happened to her for as long as she could.
• Angst Dissonance:
  • Some viewers felt this toward Hannah. Despite her experience being sympathetic, especially toward the end of Season 1 (and, to later find out that she also knew her father had had an affair) she is also shown far too many times having opportunities to either speak out, stand up for herself or confront issues head-on and instead she opts for either passive-aggressive or dramatic options. She also has little patience for anyone who misspeaks, like Clay, and seems to demand perfection from everyone.
  • Bryce in Season 3 is this to a T. He angsts about having to move to a new school and everyone rejecting him or treating him with hostility, but considering the reason for this is that he's a serial rapist who got off very lightly for it (and lied about it in court), many viewers weren't inclined to pity him, especially as it's entirely his own fault he's in this position.
• Angst? What Angst?:
  • After all of Season 3 built up to uncovering Bryce's killer, their motive, and watching other characters grieve, none of the main group react in horror, disgust, shock or are even conflicted when the killer is revealed as Alex. They even willingly cover it up and frame Monty. This is especially jarring as Alex was willing to let Clay go down for the murder and even spent a few days in jail while Alex did nothing to try to clear his name and in fact considered killing himself before Clay could see justice. Additionally, when you know that Jessica was there and witnessed Alex kill Bryce, her actions at the beginning of the season make no sense. She acts fine at school the day after homecoming, and acts surprised when she finds out Bryce is missing.
  • Despite being a friend of Monty- implied to be a very close friend considering the amount of scenes they share together- Charlie doesn’t have any problem framing him for Bryce’s murder (though him recently discovering that Monty really did rape Tyler most likely had something to do with it). Likewise, despite it becoming common knowledge in the group that Monty was a closeted gay, he doesn’t seem to show any remorse for his situation despite also not being heterosexual.
• Anti-Climax Boss:
  • Clay's role on the tapes is built up to be The Reveal, with several characters mentioning "he's not so innocent" and how he should listen to his own tape before blaming others. Tony even goes as far as to state that in his opinion Clay killed Hannah. Cue the tape and we learn albeit Clay possibly could have saved Hannah if he acted differently, he truly did nothing wrong. Hannah even admits that he doesn't belong on the tapes and is only put there to complete the story.
  • Winston was built up to be the major antagonist of Season 4, however, he never actually started his investigation into who killed Bryce until halfway through the season (mostly out of spite that Clay convinced Alex to dump him.) He never even figures out the identity of killer until Alex admits it to him at the end of the final episode, and he simply drops it.
• Anvilicious: The show has several fairly anvilicious aesops, all of them likely intentional; some might view them as cases of Tropes Are Tools, however.
  • Slut-shaming is bad: The original root of all of Hannah's ordeal was the rampant slut-shaming that she was subjected to all the time, based on a rumor.
  • Sexual entitlement is bad: Even the boys who aren't full-on rapists feel entitled to sex, like Alex (with Jessica) or Marcus (with Hannah). And of course, there's Bryce.
  • Objectification is bad: The "Hot or Not" list is shown to be deeply upsetting to many girls, with long-term effects.
  • Frat-boys are the worst: The jocks, already designated villains in most stories, arguably come off as even worse than usual: users, abusers, molesters and even actual rapists.
  • Homophobia is bad: Courtney's backstabbing is motivated by her fear of being outed (which is ultimately the consequence of societal homophobia). Later, Hannah gets that treatment after she's thrown under the bus by Courtney.
  • Being forced to conform to gender roles is bad: Alex's attempt to ingratiate himself with the jock squad is motivated by his past experiences as being other people's punching bag for not conforming to traditional norms of masculinity.
  • Victim-Blaming is bad: While the questions asked by Mr. Porter might be Innocently Insensitive since he didn't know he was talking to a rape victim, from the perspective of an actual victim (Hannah) him questioning her account of the events qualified as refusing her the support she needed at that point and was basically the final nail in her coffin.
  • Suicide is not a solution: Arguably the most important message. By committing suicide, Hannah left a lot of people who loved her devastated. Moreover, even though she created the tapes to explain why she did it and probably get her antagonists punished, she isn't around anymore to gain satisfaction from it. If instead she confided in her parents, Clay or a real professional therapist, they probably would have been able to help her.
  • Doubles with Accidental Aesop, but never hesitate with telling someone you love him/her. You might never get the chance to anymore.
  • How the creators feel regarding Hannah's graphic suicide and how it was filmed. Word of God said that sometimes, TV shows have a habit of shooting suicide scenes in a romanticized fashion, with somber music and artful shots, when suicide is just the opposite. The same justification was offered for the equally-graphic rape scenes, with a point made to not make the scenes titillating like such scenes in other media often are.
  • Despite the controversy surrounding how Hannah's suicide was portrayed, pretty much everyone praised the show for its nuanced Deconstruction of issues like bullying and sexism and the effects that seemingly small and petty actions can have on a person, especially misogynistic actions such as Slut-Shaming.
  • Empathy. The story has its flaws, but it makes abundantly clear that while at least some of the people on the tapes may not have intended to be actively malicious, none of them thought about how their actions would hurt other people before they did them. If they had cared about the consequences beyond how it affected themselves, then Hannah might still be alive.
    Tony: Hannah got hurt. It happens. You never really know what's gonna hit how. You really don't know what's going on in someone else's life.
  • The show does not shy away from deconstructing the Asshole Victim trope. As much as they embody the Hate Sink trope narratively, both Monty and Bryce still had people who cared about and mourned them in-universe. Both of them still get the "he was still a human being" defense from Winston and Justin respectively and the people who celebrate their deaths receive What the Hell, Hero? speeches from direct victims of the deceased. The reactions to Bryce’s death are more understandable though as he did feel remorse and try to atone himself despite failing.
• Ass Pull: Season 2 has a whole bunch that almost completely change the first season:
  • Hannah and Justin apparently remained friendly shortly after their falling out. While Hannah never fully forgave him, they resumed texting and met in person a few times. Yet in the first season, after Hannah has died, Justin acts as though they've barely spoken since the incident.
  • Andy's affair. It's unclear on when it was supposed to have happened in the timeline, but Olivia knew about it before Hannah died. So of all the things we see Olivia and Andy fighting about before and after Hannah's death, including money, moving, Hannah, work and family, the affair never comes up?
  • But, of course, there is no Ass Pull bigger than the reveal that Zach and Hannah had a full-blown relationship throughout the summer between sophomore and junior year (and, concurrently, that Zach lost his father that summer). It's impossible to reconcile their relationship with how Zach reacted to Hannah's death or the way his tape – which never mentioned their relationship and focused on a petty squabble instead – addressed him. Some have attempted to find reasons why this was justified, and the show attempted to Hand Wave it (Hannah wanted to keep the relationship private, but didn't have a problem telling 11 people that Jessica was raped at a party), but it doesn't account for Zach not mentioning it at all. In fact, Zach doesn't like the idea of perjuring himself in court, so he reveals their relationship, but he has no problem doing so in his deposition – he says he "said some unkind things" but did not mention having sex with Hannah. Even Word of God confirms that their relationship was written into the show after Season 1 aired, thus making the relationship a self-admitted Ass Pull.
• Audience-Alienating Ending: The final season is regarded as rather underwhelming and a lot of viewers were unimpressed with the handling of certain plotlines. In particular, many disliked that Justin, one of the more popular and sympathetic characters who had made a genuine effort to turn his life around, is killed off just as things were looking up; fans criticized this for being a needlessly cruel and poorly set up twist, and for its problematic portrayal of HIV. Combined with all the writing problems of the second and third seasons, some viewers prefer to just stick with the first season.
• Awesome Music: The series is well-scored with some indie rock and a bit of classic rock thrown in.
  • Vance Joy's "Mess Is Mine" plays at the end of the first episode and sums up Clay's state of mind trying to deal with Hannah's death. It's a perfect Alone in a Crowd moment, with the image of Hannah disappearing into the sea of scattered kids walking to class.
  • Lord Huron's "The Night We Met" is used prominently, particularly in relation to Hannah and Clay's friendship. It's the perfect melancholic, nostalgic, remorseful ode to what could have happened, but never did.
  • “Back To You”, the lead single of the second season’s soundtrack, as sung by executive producer Selena Gomez.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Justin is a divisive character; some fans claim that he hasn't atoned for or even can't be redeemed for his actions, others believe that his troubled home life and glimpses of remorse make him fully sympathetic and a third camp feel that while his sad backstory and moments of guilt make his redemption possible. It's generally agreed upon by the fourth season that he is redeemed. Of course... in this universe, Redemption Equals Death.
  • Hannah herself. Some believe that she's a good person who tries to do the right thing but comes up short, and that her mental state pushed her past the Despair Event Horizon. Others believe she overreacted to relatively minor setbacks prior to the worse things that happen (few would argue she overreacted to being raped, but other conflicts like that with Jessica could have been solved with time and communication). She also made poor choices without acknowledging them, like wanting to party with the popular crowd even after knowing how it could go wrong and pushing away those who tried to connect with her. In this view, she blames everyone for her suicide except the most important person: Herself. She didn't do anything while Jessica was raped which might be understandable, but she also didn't report it afterward. See Unintentionally Unsympathetic for how fans reacted to the creation of the tapes. Depending on who you ask, either Hannah is a big Woobie or someone who really should have gotten her act together. There's a third camp who feels that she works as a character because she comes across as a realistic person and like that the show doesn't turn her into a saint just because she died.
  • Clay, worse and worse as the series goes. He starts out as a Nice Guy who occasionally lashes out, somewhat justified considering the Trauma Conga Line of losing two friends in only a couple months. But some view his actions as harder to justify, like his taking Courtney to the graveyard. In the second season, he still continues to try to do the right thing, but he still acts incredibly entitled to Hannah's love – posthumously – and lashes out at Tyler, Zach, Justin and anyone who suggested that she gave attention to anyone other than him. In the fourth season, he's at his least likeable point because of how much he seems to get away with.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Tony has Clay free-solo an outdoor wall that is around 50 feet when Clay admits to have never climbed anything before —- even indoors. It’s hard enough to believe that Tony can solo this perfectly, let alone an unathletic kid with no climbing experience, shoes or overall outdoor know-how. Just his buddy and some chalk.
  • Strangely, this is given a call-back in the 4th season premiere where Alex and Zack go walking along the edge of a rooftop despite both having leg injuries (the former needing up a cane up until the end of last season). Presumably this was to show Zach's uncaring attitude on life but the whole scene comes across as something out of a dream.
• Broken Base:
  • There's a division in the base over Hannah's treatment of Clay. For some it's "good-natured teasing" and perhaps a little flirty. For others, it's quite imbalanced, since Hannah criticizes Clay, his personality and body a lot, while anytime he makes an Innocently Insensitive remark, she goes to pieces. Then there's the act of putting him on the tapes at all.
  • How much blame does Justin deserve for Jessica's rape? True, he is definitely guilty of covering for the rapist. But as for the rape itself, Justin was almost as drunk as Jessica and he did try to stop Bryce, who threw him out and locked the door. Given Justin's intoxication and trauma at the time it's possible he was just unable to act, just as Hannah was because of her fear - and that her decision to blame him on the tapes might have been partially based on her own guilt for not intervening.
  • The depiction of Hannah's suicide is by far considered to be one of the most divisive moments in the show. Some people agreed with the intentions of the creators that it shows the brutal reality of suicide and is intended to be hard to watch. Others felt it was needlessly graphic, could potentially traumatize vulnerable viewers or worse, serve as a 'how to' guide. It doesn't help that the suicide in the show is changed from the book (in the show, Hannah is shown cutting her wrists in a bathtub, whilst in the book, it's simply mentioned she took a fatal overdose).
  • Consequently, the rape of Tyler in Season 2 is thought to be just as controversial as the above scene, if not more. It's very graphic, prolonged and some viewers felt it came across as unnecessary shock value. According to Word of God they were trying to depict that rape victims aren't always female, but then also said it was done to make the audience sympathise with Tyler. He is subsequently driven to try and shoot-up the school, but we're apparently supposed to be on his side. While some viewers appreciated the message they were trying to get across, others felt the scene was still too graphic or that rape-as-a-backstory is a problematic trope, even when it happens to guys. Others have pointed out it's potentially problematic to sympathetically portray school shooters, especially since Season 2 was released the same day a real incident took place at an American high school. Others simply felt it the way it was portrayed came across as Narmy melodrama that they couldn't take seriously.

• Captain Obvious Reveal:
  • To some viewers, it wasn’t exactly a surprise to see that Alex is actually bisexual considering his Camp Straight tendencies and heavy amount of Ho Yay with Zach. His eventual relationship with Winston was merely the confirmation.
  • Most people called that Justin dies in the fourth season before the season even began considering it was clear from the football uniforms at the funeral that it was a football player, and Charlie and Zach were revealed to be alive fairly early on in the season.
• Catharsis Factor:
  • Bryce's death can come off as this for many people. Even though it's played as Alas, Poor Villain, it is still satisfying to finally see him get his comeuppance after two seasons of evading justice for his actions.
  • Same for Monty's death. While it too was played for sympathy, you can't help but feel relatively content to see him first being arrested, then spat on, then killed (albeit offscreen) after everything he did (including and especially the broomstick rape of Tyler), especially given he never felt any remorse for his crimes and continued making excuses to the very end.
    • A few other moments involving Monty include Tony decking him in the hallway fight (especially since this was the most punishment he got in the entire second season), Zach punching him in the face in the locker room and Bryce blackmailing him for raping Tyler by threatening to expose his crimes throughout the second season.
• Creator's Pet: Ani in Season 3 is overwhelmingly disliked by fans. She's a brand-new character who is immediately treated as the main character, also becoming the narrator of Season 3, despite having no previous connection to the plot and cast. She inexplicably and quickly gains trusting relationships with almost everyone within the first day of her arrival. She was the one who managed to tame Bryce Walker, something not even the other characters had managed, and the morally questionable things she did (sleeping with her friend’s rapist, framing Monty for Bryce’s death and accusing Clay of being Bryce’s killer) were still treated as being completely in the right or defended. Many fans perceived her as a failed attempt to replace Hannah Baker who didn't come off as remotely realistic.
• Cry for the Devil: A case where Tropes Are Not Good, as the attempts to make these despicable characters more sympathetic and three-dimensional didn't really fly well, considering all they did.
  • Somehow, Bryce Walker gets this in Season 3. He's a sociopath who raped a self-estimated "seven or eight" girls, but he genuinely starts to feel remorse for some of the things he's done and tries to atone for some of them including seeking therapy. His home life is explored and it is revealed that his father disowned him after the trial. And although it might be a satisfying moment for some, he's brutally beaten up by Zach and thrown into a river to drown by Alex, both of whom he once considered friends.
  • Montgomery de la Cruz also gets this in Season 3, to a lesser extent. He's arguably an even bigger sociopath than Bryce, never feeling any remorse for his actions, however it's revealed that his awful behavior is a result of being horribly abused for years by his father. And although his friendship with Bryce was destroyed, he still mourned his death and truly considered him his "best friend". Later he's imprisoned for rape (which he did do), finally comes out as gay to his father who calls him a slur and spits on him, and is then killed in his cell offscreen. Even Clay and his friends admitted his death wasn't "justice".

D - L

• Designated Hero:
  • Clay for most of the series. In Season 1 his actions are somewhat justified even if he's kind of an asshole – he's grieving two friends, after all. But he does photograph and circulate a nude photo of Tyler, which is circulation of child pornography – something treated not nearly as badly as something like the hot or not list or publishing a poem. And he never apologizes. In Season 2, he's called out by the school's litigator, but he never faces proper consequences. Also in the second season, he pushes people away and alienates them in the interest of justice for Hannah, and puts both Jessica and Justin under an obscene amount of pressure. He's mostly fine in Season 3 although he does demonstrate some weird entitlement toward Ani in a romantic sense. In Season 4, he's arguably one of the bigger villains of the season, and is completely awful to Ani and especially Justin, whom he doesn't really apologize to in the end before he dies.
  • Tony, to an extent. Many of his actions in Season 1 could easily be interpreted as making things worse for those involved. For example, he is in possession of Hannah's tapes and never delivers them to her grieving parents who are looking for closure and answers to their daughter's suicide. He lies to the Bakers about being unsure of Hannah's relationship to Clay. He's totally cagey to Clay throughout the first season and even tells Clay he believes he killed Hannah despite her saying to him on his tape that he did nothing wrong. Clay and Jessica's mental states deteriorate throughout the season, and it's because of Tony that everyone knows that Jessica was raped while unconscious – the knowledge of which messes her up for weeks. To make things worse, in Season 2 it's revealed that he has a terrible temper and once beat a man so badly he was in a coma (the man was homophobic, but nevertheless, Tony's reaction was probably a few steps too far). In the third and fourth season, he refuses help from others dozens of times out of pure pride to the point where it's surprising anyone has any patience left for him.
  • Almost the entire main cast become this by the end of Season 3. One of them is a murderer who would've let a friend take the fall for it, and the rest of them cover up the crime and pin it on someone else, for which they ultimately get off scot-free (except for Justin, though his death is completely unrelated). They've also covered up an attempted mass murder, which Tyler would've gone through with if Clay hadn't intervened (and they had to appoint themselves as Morality Chains to make sure Tyler didn't try anything again). And this is only the worst stuff they've done. We're apparently supposed to still root for them to all live happily ever after, because they've all suffered a lot and the people they murdered or framed were two sociopathic rapists, but many viewers thought this didn't excuse their actions and they should've received more consequences.
• Designated Villain: Clay's mother, Lainey, was this in Season 1 where her main function was to serve as a lawyer defending the school and to occasionally nag Clay. Many fans saw her as in the wrong for being so smothering and a bit clueless, while also working for the school and, by extension, against Hannah. However, Lainey was also incredibly forgiving of Clay for some of his antics, which in the first season included damaging a $60,000 car and getting drunk mid-day only to throw up on his dinner table. As for her job, she lacks the context to understand what really happened to Hannah, and there's Truth in Television that some litigators just have to take cases that don't always match their values. She gets better in future seasons, considering she not only recuses herself from the case (eventually quitting the firm all together) but also showing that she's an incredibly devoted mother to Clay and eventually Justin as well.
• Do Not Do This Cool Thing: The series came under fire for what some perceived to glamorize suicide (though the creators made it clear that their intention was the very opposite), noting that the idea of killing oneself to make others in their life feel guilty about their demise was a troublesome plot device, while glossing over other factors that lead to suicide beyond bullying, like suffering from mental illness and/or lack of sufficient coping mechanisms. The National Association of School Psychologists even sent a letter to school mental health professionals in regards to the show, an unprecedented step for the association. It doesn't help either that the first season was linked to an increase in teen suicides, with several examples of teens citing Hannah Baker as an inspiration being reported.
  NASP: Research shows that exposure to another person's suicide, or to graphic or sensationalized accounts of death, can be one of the many risk factors that youth struggling with mental health conditions cite as a reason they contemplate or attempt suicide.
• Don't Shoot the Message: A lot of people acknowledge that the show's creators are well-intentioned in trying to bring awareness to serious issues affecting teenagers like suicide, mental illness, sexual assault and many others, but that the execution can at times come across as melodramatic, exploitative and/or nonsensical. While the tackling of some subjects, such as rape culture, has been praised, other subjects are presented in an overly-simplistic or problematic manner.
• Draco in Leather Pants: After season 3, Montgomery de la Cruz got plenty of this. Many people began to fangirl Monty due to his attractiveness and his sex scenes with Winston, arguing he was simply a victim of his abusive father and that he would have changed for Winston if given time and possibly even did feel bad for his crimes such as raping Tyler. This is ignoring that Monty brutally assaulted Winston simply because he thought people would discover he's gay from Winston talking to him (not to mention, a strong argument could be made their relationship was simply lust rather than true love) and that Monty actively antagonizes Tyler throughout the season, mocking him about his rape, lying by throwing Bryce under the bus for it just to avoid apologizing and even outright threatening to do it again (whereas even Bryce himself is not only trying to atone for his crimes but is openly disgusted upon discovering what Monty did to Tyler). And this is ignoring the fact that Monty still acts like a total Jerkass to everyone else he interacts with throughout the season.
• Ending Fatigue: Some of the episodes in general have been criticized for dragging, with countless montages and narration voice-overs that always seem like they're the conclusion of the episode, only for it to continue for another 10 minutes.
  • The Season 2 finale has shades of this; Hannah's trial is over, but the episode covers Jessica's testimony, Bryce's sentencing, Tyler's return to school, his violent assault by Monty, the Bakers' meeting with the minister, Clay finishing his tattoo and meeting once more with Ghost Hannah, Hannah's funeral (which has the vibe of a series conclusion), only to go to an afterparty at Monet's where Olivia leaves town and the Jensens decide to adopt Justin. Then there's the Spring Fling, where Clay has another breakdown, Jessica and Alex share a kiss but she cheats on him moments later, and finally Tyler attempts (and fails) to shoot up the dance.
  • The Season 4/series finale is 95 minutes (sans credits), which is especially odd since the showrunners opted to do an order of 10 episodes instead of 13. The episode has the first hour alone focusing on Justin's excruciating death and funeral, followed by wrapping up everyone's story relatively quickly, heading into more than 20 minutes hearing three full graduation ceremony speeches (Bolan, Jessica and Clay), succeeded by getting the band back together to hang out and bury the tapes, then Clay has a final good-bye with "ghost" Justin, and finally, he leaves with Tony, with a full minute of driving in silence. And there's not one, not two, but three of Clay's therapy sessions sprinkled throughout. It's... a lot.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Jeff is very popular in the fandom for being a Lovable Jock in a sea of Jerk Jocks. His friendship with Clay is very sweet and genuine.
  • Much like Jeff, Charlie St. George for subverting the stereotype that all jocks are utter assholes. Despite being friends with Monty, he never goes along with any of his obnoxious bullying and is thoroughly against what he did to Tyler.
  • Winston. For being the only character capable of bringing out the human side of Montgomery de la Cruz. Him calling out Ani for framing Monty is considered a very satisfying Take That, Scrappy!. He loses some of that appeal in Season 4 when many questioned his character's motivations and found it strange how he claimed to be in love with Monty, whom he only spent one night with, and Alex, with whom he had an extremely brief relationship.
  • In the first few seasons, Denis Vasquez was this for some, being a Crusading Lawyer who took on noble cases and dealt with wrongdoers in a straightforward style.
  • Matt Jensen, who for all his Bumbling Dad tendencies was shown to be understanding, kind and one of the last sources of comic relief in the increasingly grim series.
  • The final season has "Ghost Bryce." Unlike season 2's "Ghost Hannah," who appeared exclusively to Clay as a manifestation of his guilt over her death, Ghost Bryce speaks to and interacts with multiple other people with no real explanation given for why this is. Some fans see him as something of a Memetic Troll who shows up periodically to screw with the cast for shits and giggles.
• Fandom Rivalry: Among all the Netflix shows that were renewed when Sense8 wasn't, the fans came down especially hard on this one as being less deserving of another season, as there's no more source material to draw on and consequently there seems to not be much of anywhere the story can go from that point to justify a whole second season.
• Fanon Discontinuity:
  • A portion of the fandom will only watch the first season (the only one directly based upon the source material) and disregard the rest due to Seasonal Rot.
  • Some fans of the whole show will usually ignore Season 4, because of Justin’s death from HIV/AIDS and other issues with the plot and characters (though Justin's death is one of the most contentious).
• Fan-Preferred Couple:
  • Clay and Sheri became this immediately after their study make-out session.
  • Clay/Hannah, Clay/Skye and Clay/Tony are also fan favorites.
  • Alex/Justin has quite a following as well thanks to the chemistry between the actors, likely due to their real-life closeness.
  • Zach/Hannah is a popular pairing, if fanvids are anything to go by. Especially after the reveal that they had spent some time together and even lost their virginities to each other, the summer before Hannah killed herself.
  • Zach/Alex, after their friendship was explored and strengthened in Season Two, with the two of them having a LOT of Ho Yay. An early season 4 scene does not help that.
• Fans Prefer The New Him: Tyler has a buzzcut after his time in a juvenile detention centre, and he has his hair like this when he gets raped by Monty. Turns out, Devin Druid looks great with a shaved head.
• First Installment Wins: At least according to Rotten Tomatoes, the first season holds up pretty well as a genuinely sobering if heavily divisive teen drama, in sharp contrast to the rest of the series (which unfortunately became what the show is overall known for), which is mostly considered exploitative, dragging and nonsensical.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • At Jessica's party, Hannah and Clay both say "I'm never getting old". Of course, Hannah never will.
  • In season 1, Justin and Jessica dress up as Sid and Nancy for Halloween, with the joke being Justin doesn't know their story and how it ended. This becomes less funny come season 2, when Justin has become addicted to heroin like Sid Vicious, who famously died from a heroin overdose.
  • Season 2 was released the exact same day (May 18, 2018) as a mass shooting at Santa Fe High School (granted, several hours before it happened).^note A cast party was canceled in honor.
  • In season 1, Hannah compares herself to Jessica, wondering if she could be as pretty. In season 2, Jessica compares herself to Hannah, noting that Hannah is a preferred victim to herself (as a white girl).
  • In season 1, at Jess’s party, Hannah tells Clay that her parents “don’t see [her] seeing them.” In season 2, we find out that she has already found out her father has been having an affair.
  • In season 2, to recall, Jessica's first words to Justin when he returned to the school for the first time since he admitted to knowing Bryce raped her and did nothing about it were that she wished he was dead. Tragically enough, this wish ends up being granted in the series finale when Justin dies from HIV/AIDS.
  • As Jessica even points out, quite a few of Justin’s scenes become a lot harder to watch after the reveal in season 3 that he was molested/raped as a child. In particular, Jessica telling Justin that she “hopes [he] never knows what it feels like to be raped.”
  • Grace Saif (Ani) deleted her social media after being harassed online by a chunk of fans who disliked the character...even though one of the main themes of the show they're fans of is how harmful and wrong bullying is.
  • Monty dies in prison before he can go to trial. This plot twist came months before the sensational sudden death of notorious financier/alleged sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, who was found dead in his cell and ruled a suicide by hanging; however, given the show's sensitive subject matter, it's pretty chilling that season 4, which focuses on the aftermath of Monty's death, was released the same week as a limited series on Epstein's life and the allegations of rape, prostitution and molestation of underage girls surrounding him at the time of his incarceration and death.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight: A fanfiction called "13 Reasons Why Not" came out shortly after the release of the first season. In the second season finale, it's revealed that Hannah had written a list of reasons why she shouldn't kill herself too.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • A (very popular) Crack Ship between characters named Justin and Alex ^note  largely thanks to great chemistry between the actors in a Selena Gomez show? Again?!^note At least this time, it's not incestuous.
  • In the first season of Riverdale, Ross Butler played a Jerk Jock who accused the resident Lovable Jock of helping the outcast loner murder another jock. In the third season of 13, Butler plays a Lovable Jock who is accused of helping the outcast loner murder another jock by the resident Jerk Jock.
  • In Season 2, a fight breaks out in the hallway, to which Courtney and Ryan look on in disgust and Courtney mutters “fucking boys” and Ryan nods knowingly, as though excluded from “boys.” A few years later, his actress, Tommy Dorfman, would come out as a trans woman. In hindsight, the moment of comedy comes across like Ryan identifying with Courtney’s statement in a literal sense. Doubles as Heartwarming in Hindsight for Dorfman.
• Ho Yay:
  • After taking Clay rock climbing, Tony tells Clay that he's gay, and that his boyfriend's upset with him because he's constantly hanging out with Clay. Clay remarks that it's different between them than it is between Tony and his boyfriend. Tony gives Clay a look and says "Sure" before walking off.
  • Considerably a lot between Clay and Justin in the Season 2 finale. They even go to the High-School Dance together.
  • Alex and Zach spend a lot of time in swimsuits together in season 2. It's for Alex's PT but there's also the scene in the season 2 finale where Zach teaches Alex how to dance.
• Hype Backlash: The show was initially very successful with critics and audiences but quickly became extremely controversial and polarizing. The most common criticisms are that Hannah is Unintentionally Unsympathetic, that the story is unbelievable or unrealistic, and that the show "glamorizes" or "romanticizes" suicide. As the series progressed, topics that the writers intended to portray sympathetically were also increasingly seen as exploitative and done more for shock value.
• Improved Second Attempt: To the readers who found Hannah Unintentionally Unsympathetic in the book, her actions are framed in a very grey light in the series. Numerous other characters also claim she's lying or distorting the truth. Katherine Langford also makes sure that Hannah in the flashbacks looks like a very effective Woobie — showing that while some of her actions may be selfish, she still has a hell of a reason for them. For how successful this was, check Base-Breaking Character.
• Informed Wrongness: So much in the third (and somewhat fourth) season, mostly revolving around feelings about Bryce:
  • Clay is viewed as a monster for not feeling sorry that Bryce is dead, when he raped multiple people, including one of his best friends and a girl he had a huge crush. Bryce also beat the hell out of Clay to the point where he had to go to the hospital. In the fourth season, he gets this treatment for hot feeling sorry for Monty's death, when Monty also raped one of his best friends and physically harassed most of the people in Clay's circle.
    • The show's stance seems to be that Clay needed to feel sorry for these people dying, considering the third season concludes with Clay telling Nora Walker that he's sorry about Bryce and her saying that she wasn't sure he believed that when he said it before. In the fourth season, he publicly expresses grief for Bryce and Monty's deaths.
  • Casey and HO are also seen as aggressive for refusing to grieve Bryce and for protesting his funeral, but considering the way everyone else is acting like Bryce was just misunderstood, it feels like they're the only ones who are actually making sense.
  • The show also attempts to portray Clay as an entitled "nice guy" of his feelings toward Ani, but that loses a bit of water considering he's not just frustrated that she won't date him, he's frustrated that she's sleeping with Bryce – a guy she knows has raped multiple people. She's also vehemently defending him from people who have been horribly hurt by him, and one-by-one throwing each of her friends under the bus and purposely casting suspicion on them for murder. It's also very clear that she knows Clay is interested in her and she continues to do things that could be seen as borderline manipulative – like stripping down to her bra and underwear in front of him without asking if he's comfortable, and expecting him to be casual about it/berating him for being dumbstruck, or kissing him, then saying it was a mistake, then watching him squirm as 'he' apologized for kissing 'her' and never saying, "Actually, I kissed you." The show's stance seems to be "Ani's actions still aren't consent to a relationship," which is true, but it makes her less sympathetic that she absolutely knows what she's doing and seems to be intentionally teasing Clay.
• Iron Woobie: See The Woobie section for all variants on the show's woobies.
• It Was His Sled:
  • From Season 1, Hannah overheard Bryce raping Jessica and was too scared to intervene, Clay is on the tapes because Hannah wanted to apologize and doesn't actually blame him at all, the catalyst for Hannah's suicide was Bryce raping her, episode 13 graphically depicts Hannah's suicide (at least until the scene was heavily edited in 2019) and the tapes end up being leaked.
  • From Season 2, Bryce is confirmed to be a Serial Rapist who gets only three months probation for raping Jessica, Monty is the one trying to shut everyone up and Tyler is raped by Monty and tries to commit a school shooting, but is stopped by Clay.
• Jerkass Woobie: See The Woobie section for all variants on the show's woobies.
• Just Here for Godzilla: A few viewers admitted they mainly wanted to watch Season 3 because Bryce gets whacked.
• Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Clay. He gets shipped with Hannah, Tony, Sherri, Skye, Alex, Jessica, Zach. Just about anyone who isn't a scrappy is shipped with Clay.
• Love to Hate: Bryce. Despite being a firm Hate Sink, Bryce shows a level of charisma and pragmatism (at least as charismatic as a serial rapist with no real redeeming qualities can be) that makes the audience just love loathing him, especially compared to the more openly spiteful, Ax-Crazy, Stupid Evil Monty. Gets even more complicated in Season 3 though.

M - T

• Memetic Mutation:
  • "X deserves better", which has been a fandom cry by the fans of the show who feel the characters deserve a better happy ending.
  • "JUSTICE FOR JEFF", since fans grew to love Jeff to the point of Ensemble Dark Horse and shock at his tragic death. It's beginning to reach Barb levels, and that's saying something.
  • 'Fuck off Courtney', which was said by Ryan to Courtney in 'Tape 6, Side B' with her constant attempts to not take the blame for Hannah's death. It's become fans' own snarky comment to Courtney due to her character becoming unlikable considering her treatment of Hannah.
  • "Welcome to your tape" jokes as a reaction to petty slights have become quite popular, but have also faced backlash for trivializing suicide and feeding into the same toxic line of "she's overreacting" reasoning that led Hannah to kill herself in the first place.
  • "Thirteen Reasons Why X", mainly due to the fact the title ends with "why", which would lead a specific phrase.
  • "So you see, that's where the trouble began. That smile. That damn smile." became a template used with other fictional characters' smiles, such as The Joker.
  • "Fourteen Reasons Why"/"Twelve Reasons Why", where something seen by the creator as negative/positive respectfully is posed below the series title, with the aforementioned title change being posted after.
• Moral Event Horizon: Bryce raping Jessica and Hannah and having absolutely no remorse about it. Justin's role in Jessica's rape is seen as this by some people in universe and out of it as well. Also, some people's (namely Courtney and Marcus') will to side with a rapist to protect their own asses might be seen as the point of no return for them - though it's mostly because of them being unwilling to redeem themselves.
  • Any sympathy that the viewers had towards Monty after Bryce ended their friendship (due to Monty’s actions of threatening people) is thrown out of the window when he, Taylor and Kenneth confront Tyler in the bathroom and brutally beat him, stick his head in the toilet, and sodomize him with a mop handle because of his hand in exposing Bryce costing them their championship season. Hell, this action was so bad that even Bryce Walker was disgusted. He could have crossed it earlier when he attempted to kill Clay, sent a gun, bullet, and shooting diagram to Alex (who is still recovering from a suicide attempt), when he gave Jessica (a rape victim) a naked sex doll reading “slut” or when he happily watched Bryce rape Hannah and did nothing.
  • Zach trying to rape a girl in “Prom”. Thankfully Alex stops him.
• Narm:
  • Clay stealing Tony's walkman in the first episode is shot and framed so dramatically, it almost feels like the show is trying to present it as a Moral Event Horizon for Clay.
  • Olivia passive-aggressively criticizing Courtney for not knowing her daughter's favorite flowers, as if it's something she's realistically supposed to know (though this could be forgiven in that Courtney did try to falsely portray herself as Hannah's friend).
  • Some more serious parts of "Tape 2, Side B" are left looking very odd by the fact that it's a Halloween Episode and everyone's in costume (such as Marcus attempting to have a serious conversation with Clay outside Tyler's house while wearing a ridiculous light-up sombrero).
  • Clay's Sanity Slippage during the basketball game in Episode 7 due to its persistent usage of the Imagine Spot.
  • Some viewers find it distracting that some of these "high schoolers" have tattoos all over their bodies, some close to a dozen and highly visible. This is illegal in the state of California and would result in child protective service investigations. The Season 2 premiere does try to hand wave it by implying that Skye uses a fake ID, as she buys one for Clay to get a tattoo.
  • Tyler being sodomized by a mop pole, while intended to be a dark scene that'd make the audience sympathize with him, is unintentionally funny for some.
  • A lot of the dialogue can come across as silly and unrealistic to some viewers (especially as the series progresses). Tony in particular is presented as an almost sage-like figure, to the point where many people believed him to be a figment of Clay's imagination, and his actor actually had to come out and shoot down the theory by pointing out how many times Tony interacts with others. Clay even lampshades this in-universe by calling Tony an “unhelpful Yoda”.
  • Some decisions the characters make range from ridiculous at best, to absolutely ludicrous at worst. The most egregious example would probably be Justin flat-out suggesting that they murder Clay and make it look like a suicide(though this is lampshaded even in-universe as ridiculously over-the-top).
  • The sequence in which Tony has Clay free-solo an outdoor wall that is around 50 feet high when Clay admits to have never climbed anything before —- even indoors. It’s hard enough to believe that Tony can solo this perfectly, let alone an unathletic kid with no climbing experience, shoes or overall outdoor know-how. Just his buddy and some chalk. Doubles as a Big-Lipped Alligator Moment as it really has nothing to do with the narrative and just gives the show an excuse to do a cool outdoor sequence and make things feel action-packed and high-stakes for a few minutes, and give Clay a weird revelation at the end.
  • For a lot of viewers, the presence of 'ghost Hannah' in Season 2. For a show that is all about presenting a gritty and realistic look at teen suicide and bullying, it can seem rather jarring and out-of-place when Clay suddenly starts seeing Hannah's ghost everywhere. He actually has entire conversations with her (including in public) and the sheer bizarreness can cause many of their interactions to border on or become outright comedic even when they're supposed to be dramatic or somber. It doesn't help that it's left up in the air as to whether Clay is really seeing Hannah's ghost, if it's purely symbolic, some kind of coping mechanism for Clay, or if he's suffering from schizophrenia or a similar disorder. The surrealness of it can feel rather tonally off compared to the rest of the show and/or a contrived excuse to give Hannah more screentime despite her being dead, making it difficult for some viewers to take it seriously.
  • The visual style of the flashbacks-versus-present-day split in Season 3 is so heavy-handed that it borders on unwatchable and a bad attempt at artistic filmmaking.
  • Bryce deciding to injure Zach's leg during the Homecoming fight should be an impactful moment that solidifies Bryce as a villain who's beyond the redemption he's been striving for throughout Season 3. However, it loses a lot of weight due to them using a very obvious stock scream that's pitched down for Zach as he's injured. The fact it sounds a bit too similar to the screams you'd hear in Happy Wheels also doesn't help.
  • The face Clay makes during the reveal that he is the one who’s been terrorizing other students and vandalizing school property under an alternate personality. Good luck trying not to crack up during the scene.
  • Ghosts are back with a vengeance in Season 4, and it's not just Clay seeing them now either. Clay is at least given the excuse of having disassociative episodes and severe mental health problems, but it doesn't explain why other characters like Jessica and Alex are suddenly seeing and interacting with dead folks.
  • Clay's delusions get so bad and so visceral that they prompt him to do extreme things like grab a gun and light a car on fire, some of which he doesn't even remember. And yet, it's all played off as "depression and anxiety" and apparently can be helped with a few weekly therapy sessions.
  • When you look at the overall events, Clay has chances for romance with several girls – Sheri, Skye, Ani, and even Sheriff Diaz's daughter. For one thing, it undermines the idea that Clay is supposedly an awkward geek. But by the end of it, it just seems like the show is desperate to not let Clay find happiness, in-universe, with anyone but Hannah. Him moving on should be considered healthy, but it's treated almost like a crime.
  • The football team wear their uniforms. Always, no matter how illogical or inappropriate. Every day at school, when camping, when going to a funeral, when visiting Justin on his deathbed, always - which looks absolutely ridiculous.
  • As the show gets into Denser and Wackier story arcs, it is still a high school drama so ultimately, you’ve got issues like prom and relationship drama being juxtaposed against murder, rape and the nature of evil which results in the expected amount of melodrama.

• Narm Charm:
  • Hannah, Jessica and Alex all say "FML forever" as their Catchphrase. It's quite silly and overdramatic, but still manages to work.
  • The reveal of Justin's terrible home life is slightly over the top and comes out of absolute nowhere, but it retroactively explains a lot about his character and is treated with just the right amount of seriousness for it to not come off as silly.
• No Such Thing as Bad Publicity: The myriad of attacks the show has gotten, from in-depth critiques to the occasional troll, have only made the show more widely-known if no less controversial. Special points when its actors/actresses claim the show could "trigger" some viewers despite the obvious subject matter being very Anvilicious (in an arguably positive way), which makes it more glaring considering [[spoiler:Episode 9 onwards puts trigger warnings.
• One True Threesome: Throughout the seasons, Clay/Justin/Jessica became quite popular as they are the show's Power Trio after the focus on Hannah shifts away. That help they were in the final scene in Seasons 2 and 3. And also Justin being a fan-favorite as the show continues, fans tend to ship his most popular ones (Justin/Clay and Justin/Jessica).
  • Possibly not to same extent but all those follow can count: Clay/Hannah/Tony, Hannah/Jessica/Alex Jeff/Clay/Tony Alex/Jessica/Justin and Justin/Clay/Tony.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Mrs Antili, the overly perky and slightly Misplaced Kindergarten Teacher of a Guidance Counsellor. Only appears in Episode 2 but makes a lasting impression.
  • Hannah's friend Kat is only in the first episode, but comes Back for the Finale. And she's only featured in the party scene. But her actress has lots of charisma and she's instantly believable as the Lovable Alpha Bitch.
• Periphery Demographic:
  • Like the original book, the series has been well-received by many outside its "intended" young adult audience.
  • The show aims to be a serious drama about teenage social issues. However, due to the later seasons' narmier moments and far-fetched plot twists, it has attracted some viewers who watch it for unintentional black comedy and soap opera-y melodrama.
• Portmanteau Couple Name: Few examples:
  • Clay/Hannah: Clannah
  • Jessica/Justin: Jesstin
  • Clay/Tony: Clony
  • Zack/Hannah: Zannah
  • Zach/Alex: Zalex
  • Clay/Justin: Clustin
  • Jessica/Alex: Jalex (though it's also the name of a more known ship)
  • Clay/Jassica: Clessica
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
  • A lot of fans seem to be forgiving Ryan after he delivered his infamous "Fuck off Courtney" line, along with constantly snarking at her for her Jerkass behavior, along with the fact she is trying to hide behind a rapist.
  • Jessica garnered a lot more sympathy once it was revealed she was raped by Bryce and the others have essentially been gaslighting her about it. She also starts to redeem herself towards the end of the season - and the following episodes amp up her cruel treatment at the hands of the jocks and the rest of the school, turning her into a full fledged Woobie (see below).
  • Within the second season opener, Mr. Porter corners Bryce in the bathroom, physically threatens him and warns him that he will be destroyed if he tries anything. He also threatens to have a baseball player suspended from the team for making a rape joke. He's definitely become The Atoner and has gotten off to a good start.
  • Courtney is one of the few people to completely come clean in her testimony for the lawsuit, rather than let the defense attorney continue to smear Hannah's reputation.
  • Justin became more sympathetic once his shitty home life was revealed - though he still had plenty of detractors for allowing Bryce to rape Jessica and later trying to hide it from her. Come Season 2 and he's put through the Trauma Conga Line with his heroin addiction. But he also takes steps to redeem himself, coming to Clay's defence several times and testifying against Bryce, with the full knowledge that he could be convicted as an accessory. By the Season 2 finale, Clay adopts him as a brother.
  • Tyler, in universe, during season three. In the video he made he talks about not just feeling alone but feeling rejected, and there's no denying that for many characters that was the case, but during the course of the third season he is welcomed into the group and many of the people who disliked him previously grow to not only understand him better but genuinely care for him.
  • Ani still isn't a fan favorite but the majority agree that that the final season made huge steps in improving the character. Namely, having her apologize to Jessica for sleeping with Bryce and showing vulnerability when she realizes her meddling nature and that she can't save everybody.
• Replacement Scrappy
  • Ani. Ani, Ani, Ani. Many saw her as a direct replacement for Hannah after Katherine Langford left the cast in Season 3. And, Ani has a lot of the traits that people liked about Hannah — she marches to the beat of her own drum, she’s clever, she can play off of different characters. The problem is, partially because the show writers needed someone who could somehow know everyone and everything because of the framing device of the police interview, Ani was made to be ‘’far’’ too perfect, whereas Hannah’s flaws at least make her interesting. Ani is shown right away to be a genius, fawned over by her teachers, whereas Hannah is a middling student at best. Ani can relate to every single character in the group from Tyler to Zach, whereas Hannah has some awkwardness. Ani always seemingly had the moral high ground and can stand up to anyone, whereas Hannah is more vulnerable. Everyone immediately trusts Ani and lets her into their lives on an intimate level, whereas Hannah never knew where she stood. Basically, she comes across as a self-insert fan fiction character with no flaws who inexplicably is the glue to hold every plot together. Worse, fans responded to her so harshly that her character was reduced to almost nothing in the fourth season.
• Salvaged Story:
  • Hannah was a Base-Breaking Character due to engaging in some fairly bitchy behavior, jumping to conclusions and being slightly whiny. Season 2 showed some much kinder behavior on her part, and some more understandable justification for her actions (like her conflict with Courtney).
    • By the same token, many people thought Hannah was less sympathetic since she never approached her parents about her treatment. Season 2 reveals that she had legitimate reasons why not, such as her mom making some Innocently Insensitive comments that made her feel slut-shamed. She also did tell her mother about the stalking, but her mother brushed it off. And to seal the deal, Hannah was the one that caught her father cheating on her mother. All of these things, and more, have it make so much more sense why she wouldn't go to her parents about her problems.
  • Following all the controversy and criticism around Hannah's graphic suicide in Season 1, in 2019 it was announced that Netflix was heavily editing the scene (the scene no longer shows Hannah's suicide in detail, instead cutting from Hannah staring into the bathroom mirror to her parents finding her body). The showrunners and producers made this decision after consulting with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
  • After the negative feedback the show got for Season 3 for showing Bryce in a mostly redemptive light, the showrunners are a lot more careful with Monty's death and the reaction to it. There's no flashbacks of Monty being a "good guy," and it's the people close to him (Winston, a teammate and especially his sister) that humanize him and they're understandably heartbroken that he's gone. Further underscored in the Prom episode where Winston realizes that he was only in love with the idea of Monty and had no idea about his rage issues.
• The Scrappy:
  • Unlike most of the characters, like Justin or Jessica (who are given sympathetic back stories), most really hate Marcus due to being an asshole who act nice and kind, especially considering how he originally started off as a Lovable Jock next to Jeff. Unlike Zach, though, who feels guilt over his involvement in Hannah's death, Marcus shows zero remorse if it means to protect his image. Especially more glaring is the fact he tried to sexually assault Hannah in public and acts like her rejection of his behavior was a bad thing and the fact he lies at his deposition makes it worse, along with his disregard of his friends and how he holds himself as the brains of the group when Justin and Jessica are dealing with their own problems. And unlike other characters who garner some karma for their actions (especially when Clay leaks the tapes around episode 8), Marcus suffers no karma other than being suspended from school and doesn't appear again, even getting the last laugh by leaking Tyler's number as karma for his and Cyrus's blackmail.
  • Courtney has gathered immense fan hatred due to her refusal to take blame in Hannah's passing, but what really set fans into anger was trying to hide behind Bryce Walker as a means to not take blame for Hannah's death and constantly saying she did it for attention. Even the group felt disgusted, which led to Ryan's aforementioned "Fuck off, Courtney" line. She eventually joined the Rescued from the Scrappy Heap after realizing the error of her ways and not only came clean about how Hannah was a true friend to her, but even came out as a lesbian.
  • Mr. Porter also seems to be very disliked within the community due to being a prime example of Adults Are Useless. While he is a Deconstruction of the usual "useless" adult, (in actuality being one who was way out of his league compared to what he dealt with his last school, with him arguably simply not knowing what he could have done), he's still very disliked because of his lack of action. The fact he's listed as the final reason that lead to Hannah ending her life didn't help matters either. He got better with Season 2.
  • Pratters is very disliked for being a one-dimensional asshole completely irrelevant to the plot of the series. This is likely the reason why he didn't appear any after Season 1.
  • Monty is a bit of a weird example. Although he was definitely portrayed as a sociopathic Hate Sink in Season 2 after it's revealed that he's the one who harassed the gang, and he later instigated the infamous mop pole rape of Tyler, viewers often hate him for how much of a seemingly one-dimensional Stupid Evil Jerk Jock he is, even compared to other vile characters in the series like Bryce. He garnered even more hate in Season 3 when the narrative attempted to portray him in a more sympathetic light despite him doing absolutely nothing to deserve it and still behaving like an amoral sociopath.
  • The school's attorney Sonya became very hated due to her obsession with painting Hannah as a lying slut and constantly interrupting and condescending the characters during their hearings. The fact that she was never called out on her actions only intensified the hate.
  • Ani, who was introduced in season three, served as the Character Narrator for the season, much like Hannah was in seasons one through two. She became a quick Replacement Scrappy, but there's also some Character Shilling involved. She becomes Clay’s new love interest, Jessica’s new best friend, Bryce’s new confidant, just to name a few. She seems to just intuitively be able to tell who each character is after just meeting them, somehow knows everybody’s secrets, and is the only one capable of seeing the good in Bryce. Despite not having been there for any of the events of the first two seasons she is heavily invested in the connecting storylines and treated by the other characters as if she’s an important part of the group. Episode seven also has her being afraid of Clay but happy to get into bed with Bryce, the guy she knows has raped her best friend.
  • Jess’s feminist friend Casey was despised for being a cartoonishly stereotypical feminist with little regard for how her actions affected the people around her.
• Seasonal Rot:
  • The show's second season was incredibly polarizing compared to the first in quality. To start, many viewers believed that an extension of the story beyond the original plot was simply unnecessary. On its own merits, the second season was also criticized for having significantly more clunky writing and dialogue, making it far more narmy and exploitative than the first. For reference, the first season’s Rotten Tomatoes score was 80% among both critics and audiences, while the second’s was just 28% for critics and 58% for audiences.
  • The third season received overwhelmingly negative reviews, with the shift to a murder mystery widely panned as unwise and the increased melodrama heavily criticized. It scored a paltry 12% on Rotten Tomatoes, a far cry from the first season.
  • Even though Season 4 was viewed by some as a slight improvement from Season 3 (just barely having a higher Rotten Tomatoes score at 18%), a lot view it as a total waste of a season, to the point of having an Audience-Alienating Ending. Even if it didn't have the exploitative plots of Season 3, many have noted that there's not really a tight, central plot to the season, and the closest thing to a climax at all is Justin's death, which comes completely out of left field in the penultimate episode. Loose ends aren't even really tied up – for example, Zach has developed alcohol and substance abuse until well into the finale, when he's asked to sober up to go visit Justin in the hospital, and then he's essentially fine after without really addressing his problems.
• Ship Mates: Justin/Jessica with both Clay/Hannah and Zach/Alex are this.
• Signature Scene:
  • For season one, Hannah's suicide and Clay's famous tirade halfway into the show that showcases not only a "The Reason You Suck" Speech to the people who caused Hannah's death (and by some extent, Liberty High, for their lack of involvement to help her) and his own Sanity Slippage to the loss of his friend/crush and the fact he arguably may have played a part in her death.
  • For the second season, the infamous bathroom scene where Monty violates Tyler with a broomstick.
  • For the third season when Tyler tells Clay what Monty did to him.
• So Bad, It's Good: From the beginning, the show has had a sizable hatedom of people who find the premise of the show (and how seriously everyone involved takes it as) inherently hilarious. The second season onward especially not only cultivated a hatedom but a sizable following of people who enjoyed many of the more far-fetched or exploitative plot twists.
• Strangled by the Red String: Winston and Monty randomly meet at a party, are attracted to each other and (aggressively) hook up. Later, when Winston tries to chat with him, he gets the everloving crap beaten out of him, with Monty's excuse being he thought people would realize he was gay and didn't want to be outed...which is still not a good reason to beat someone up. In spite of this, the fact he barely knows him and that he becomes aware he's been arrested for sexual assault, Winston still falls head-over-heels for Monty, to the point he's willing to transfer schools to investigate Bryce's murder and prove Monty was set up. Season 4 even eventually acknowledges this to some extent, indicating that Winston loved the idea of Monty more than anything (especially seeing as the real Monty is nothing more than a Hate Sink).
• Strawman Has a Point:
  • When Hannah goes to Mr. Porter to talk about her rape, she refuses to name Bryce as the attacker and doesn't want to press charges. Yeah, his handling of the situation was less than perfect and could be seen as Victim-Blaming, but if she won't name the person, and won't press charges, there's absolutely nothing that Mr. Porter can do except get her help (which he does fail at).
  • Marcus may have been simply trying to cover his ass, but he did have a point when he claimed that Hannah's plan of telling people they played a part in her suicide is "fucked up".
  • Not really related to the broader context of the story, but Marcus makes a good point that shows that despite being a Manipulative Bastard, he's fairly tuned-in to issues of justice and equality (when he wants to be). When Bryce says that Marcus, student council president, shouldn't worry about buying weed on campus because Bryce does all the time and he's captain of the football team, Marcus sternly says that "the rules are different for you and I." He's most likely referring to the fact that he is black, while Bryce is white (and rich as hell, though we don't know that Marcus isn't rich).
  • It doesn't justify what she does to Hannah, but Courtney's will to stay closeted isn't respected at all by anyone (except, it would seem, Hannah). Her pain about the discrimination her fathers faced draws her sympathy from the audience but it's easy to forget it soon after since she shows her worst side, but she still very much has a point – it's not easy, and she panicked. Regardless of how awful Courtney is, seeing Ryan, Clay and Alex try to goad her out of the closet can strike a harsh tone.
    • Even then, it's worth knowing that in order to stay in the closet, she's willingly and actively try to convince people that Hannah was lying about the tapes including what happened at Jessica's party and what happened with Hannah and Bryce. At one point, she even explicitly tells Jessica (who's beginning to doubt that they were lies) that they were in fact lies. Ryan's quick to point this out.
  • Clay, when he yells at Hannah after Jeff's death. Hannah may have had a good point, but Clay had no idea, and Hannah did have a tendency to make things all about herself. While it's unfortunate that the one time Clay tried to call her out on being so dramatic, he should have listened, it also wouldn't have hurt if she'd chosen a better, less dramatic means of communication.
• Take That, Scrappy!:
  • Ryan's "fuck off Courtney" comment.
  • Although it comes before Courtney's worse deeds, Mrs. Baker gets a good one in on her too. She walks by the memorial to Hannah and icily tells Courtney that Hannah didn't like the flowers she's picked - essentially telling her that she would know that if she actually had been friends with her daughter.
  • Kat also refers to Bryce as "frat boy Darth Vader".
  • Laura, a minor character who is a lesbian, tells Bryce that she would never get involved with him and would call the police on him after he sleazily hits on her.
  • Marcus getting snarked at by Clay, Alex and Monty during the Honor Council hearing.
  • While she's no more than a Base-Breaking Character, Alex gets a good dig on Hannah in the third episode of Season 2. A flashback to the night she found out he and Jessica were dating has him snark "not everything's always about you, you know".
  • In Sheri's return in Season 2, Mr. Porter offers help. She responds by snarking that she'll come and see him if she's ever raped.
  • Alex pulling a gun on Monty during the group's confrontation with him in "The Box of Polaroids".
  • Early in season 3, Jessica's "You know what, Monty? Fuck you. Fuck all of you jocks."
  • Justin's "Fuck off" comment to Ani in 3x07.
  • Winston calling out Ani for framing Monty for Bryce's murder in the Season 3 finale.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • As noted here many fans were annoyed that Sheri was so Out of Focus in Season 2. No attempt is made to explore her Ship Tease with Clay from the previous season, and she pretty much disappears from the series after the eleventh episode, without any explanation. Many fans mourn this, for believing that she was charismatic and could have been a good romantic pair for Clay.
  • Jackie, the anti-bullying advocate, only reveals a bit about her history, not much is known about her motivation (which, while righteous, comes off as unnerving to Dennis, Olivia and Andy). Her leaving is never explained either; it’s presumed after the testimony coming out about Hannah having a past history with bullying that Jackie no longer considered her a worthy cause, but the lack of an actual conversation around it feels like a lack of closure on the character.
  • With Marcus being Demoted to Extra for most of Season 2 in order to focus on more developed and likeable characters, we miss out on some stuff that was teased out. For example, in his testimony episode, we meet Marcus's dad, an ambitious politician who pushes Marcus to succeed and makes him keenly aware that as a black man, he has to out-perform his every white counterpart and then some. Then he calls Bryce a rapist publicly, is suspended and we never hear from him again, wondering what kind of consequences and development he could possibly face.
  • Estela, Monty's younger sister from season four. You would think with her being related to Monty that she would try to uncover the truth behind Bryce's death and seek justice for her brother. Instead she shows little interest in the investigation and her presence is never made a plot point, not even for flashbacks detailing what her relationship with Monty was like or if she was abused by their father too. This made a lot of people wonder why she was included in the cast when they did next to nothing with her character.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • Season 4 ends with Justin dying of AIDS. A lot of viewers believed it would've been better if the character survived, arguing it could've been used as a opportunity to explore the character coping with an HIV diagnosis and learning they can still have a fulfilling life (which is entirely possible as long their condition is being treated).
    • Some have argued that if they were going to kill off Justin either way, it could've happened when he relapses into taking drugs after learning his mother died and accidentally overdoses, which is a lot more believable and tragically highlights the struggles of recovering addicts.
  • Zach's alchohol abuse. Throughout the fourth season, Zach starts heavily drinking as a coping mechanism for all the trauma and stress around him, leaving him in a constant drunk state for the entire season. Despite the heavy toll being drunk all the time would have on a teenage boy's body, Zach is never shown suffering any kind of health issues. Some say, if the season needed to kill off a character, it would have made far more sense for Zach to die from alcohol-induced liver failure which is more immediately life threatening than HIV/AIDS, and would have been a great way to raise awareness around the danger of substance abuse.
  • Jessica is a survivor of sexual assault and trauma and as she recovers becomes somewhat hypersexual for her age. She also has difficulty being faithful to whoever she's dating, whether it's Alex, Justin or Diego. It's actually a very common thing that survivors go through as they attempt to cope with trauma and reclaim their bodies. But despite this, the show offers no commentary on this. In fact, Jess is treated like a Hypocrite for her behaviour, especially by HO, a group of fellow survivors. The show makes no attempt to elaborate on this.
    • To a lesser extent, this is the case with Justin as well. We only find out he's a survivor in Season 3 although Porter says in Season 1 that he suspects Justin experienced abuse as a child, and most of his hypersexuality happens before the start of the series. He's known as a playboy before he leaves Evergreen. However, he spends most of the show devoted to one woman: Jessica.
  • In Season 3, Chloe gets an abortion after her pregnancy is used as a cliffhanger. The one episode that focuses on it manages to show all the nuances that Chloe goes through – she doesn't regret it, but she still feels traumatized by the experience of her pregnancy and the harassment she receives. She knows she's better off for it being done, but she also wants to move on. The problem is not only is her recovery and her quest for a better life dropped after that episode, she's more-or-less dropped as a character after that episode. When we meet her again (briefly) in Season 4, she talks about how much better she's doing – she's going to a good college, she has a boyfriend and she feels good. But we don't get to see her actually rebuild her life. Season 3 has already been criticized for writing out almost half of the past season's female characters (Nina, Skye, Sheri, Mackenzie, Olivia Baker for the most part), it could have at least focused on how one of Bryce's victims tried – and succeeded – to rebuild her life.
  • The third season focuses a lot on the complications of grieving a bad, hurtful person like Bryce. In particular, Jessica and Casey clash because Casey wants to protest Bryce's funeral but Jessica believes that her opinion should matter more, as someone who was a victim of Bryce. This is a worthwhile discussion and possibly one that could have become a greater plot focus – should others get to decide how Jessica grieves her rapist? Is it appropriate to tell victims how to feel? The season seems to take Jessica's side – unfortunately, it then goes on to basically tell everyone else how to they are required feel about Bryce's death. Instead of taking a stance of "it's okay for Jessica to grieve," it became "it's mandatory to grieve." While the show could have explored why this is such a hard topic, instead of settled on a lecture.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: 13 Reasons Why, well-known for its controversy, has earned a reputation for becoming increasingly dark over the seasons as well as questionably written.
  • In the first season, all the episodes are painful flashbacks of how Hannah suffered a horrible Trauma Conga Line as she explains the reasons why she ended her life. It becomes harder to watch, it gets worse and worse, and the frustrating perspective of the audience feeling like Clay with nobody explaining anything along with a Black-and-White Morality setting for most of the characters. There's also the fact that each time you feel Hannah gets better, you're hit with the reminder that she's dead. Worse is the setting of Liberty High.
  • The second season upped the ante so much that many online discussions of the series have people who genuinely liked the show crowded out by arguments between people who felt the show was trying too hard and sending the wrong message to the point of offensiveness, and those who found the second season's darker plot twists and dramatic moments unintentionally hilarious and bizarre.
  • Season 3 makes this point much worse; the show's most evil characters (read: actual rapists) are humanized through characters who barely know them and/or weren't introduced prior and Freudian Excuses that wouldn't have been enough to justify their behavior before they crossed the Moral Event Horizon, let alone after it (in addition to them still doing bad things), while the "good guys" do questionable things that they ultimately end up getting away with (up to and including murder). The people who are only guilty of celebrating the death of a rapist are made to feel like monsters by the people who were actually responsible for their deaths. In short, the cast does not offer many characters one can truly root for, on top of the sheer offensiveness that is applying the "He was a human being!" argument to a (up until this season) Karma Houdini rapist with no redeeming qualities who finally faced consequences for his actions^note to the point that Titanic sequel that tried to make you feel bad for the iceberg would be significantly less offensive.
• Took the Bad Film Seriously: Every season after the first one has gotten a consistently worse reception, but most people agree the actors are still trying hard to make their characters believable and take the subject matter seriously. Dylan Minnette is particularly praised for his emotional performance as Clay Jensen and practically carries the show at times.

U - W

• Uncertain Audience: Especially following the first season, 13 Reasons Why doesn't seem to know what it wants to be: a serious and brutally realistic portrayal of how youth are affected by bullying, sexual assault and suicide, or a melodramatic teen soap opera with crazy plot twists coming out the wazoo. The (likely unintentional) blending of the two resulted in a show that was increasingly too silly and outlandish to take seriously, but was also emotionally gruelling to watch due to the graphic content and incessantly grim subject matter. Some have further noted that despite being aimed primarily at teens, the show's depictions of violence and rape were so graphic it got slapped with 'adults only' age ratings.
• Unintentionally Sympathetic:
  • When we see the act that got Justin on the tapes, him spreading the suggestive photo of Hannah around the school, we see that Bryce took his phone and sent the photo around while he tried to get it back. Later on, when Hannah blames him for Jessica being raped by Bryce, she overlooks the fact that he's absolutely drunk and has no idea what's happening (and even then, he still tries to stop it before Bryce shuts him up), but Hannah acts as though he raped Jessica himself. While he should've deleted the photo of Hannah, and him leaving Jessica is up for interpretation, the fact is that he's on the tapes for something he didn't actually do. Hannah also doesn't help her case when she's able to tell the story of Jessica's rape because she was hiding in the closet in fear instead of doing anything about it, making her a huge Hypocrite as well.
  • Casey in Season 3. She's supposed to be a Straw Feminist, and, yes, crashing Bryce's funeral is a dick move, but Bryce raping both Hannah and Jessica was actually a large part of the reason Hannah was Driven to Suicide in the first place. With Season 3 doing the very base-breaking action of making us feel some sympathy for Bryce, a serial rapist, it can often feel like Casey is one of few characters who remembers what absolute carnage Bryce's monstrous actions caused.
  • Clay is mostly Unintentionally Unsympathetic throughout the series, but gets a raw deal in the third season. Him being upset at Ani for getting close to Bryce — and repeatedly lying to him about it — is framed by Ani (and, it seems, the show’s narrative) as him being an entitled Nice Guy, or having a savior complex. The reality is, Bryce is a lying sociopath whose rape of ‘’at least’’ three girls had been known to these characters and communicated to Ani. Ani not only was fine with this, but also spent the entire season chiding Clay for not feeling sad that the rapist died. She also kept trying to get Clay to turn on friends like Tony and Tyler, then decided Clay was a killer and ‘’scared her.’’ He basically couldn’t say anything without Ani giving him the third degree, and he was treated like a volatile person for simply reacting.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
  • Season One saw a small niche of critics and bloggers who found Clay a bit problematic at times. While he definitely suffered from a Sanity Slippage throughout the season and was grieving the loss of two friends, he engaged in some pretty terrible behavior, not limited to circulating actual child pornography with his revenge photo of Tyler and deeply disturbing Courtney by taking her to Hannah's grave and essentially telling her she caused Hannah's death. Then there were his ever worsening mental state and increasingly tenuous grasp on reality making him becoming more and more of a clear and present danger to himself and others as he starts acting openly delusional in public, up to the point where he steals a gun from a cop in front of the principal and a group of other cops, and continues to wave said gun around while shouting maniacally, but in spite of this, he never faces any kind of lasting consequences for his unhinged behavior or even get the help he needs. Despite all the bad things Clay does, the end of the series rewards him as though he's much more of a hero than he is.
  • Jessica becomes this in Season 3 when she gets back together with Justin instead of Alex purely because of how he understands her body and does sex better than Alex does (even though she now knows that Justin was involved in her being sexually assaulted). She also proves to be a hypocrite by dismissing Alex's suicide attempt trauma until he received a threatening poster, criticizing Chloe for not testifying against Bryce, and attempting to ban male aggressive sports because she claims it promotes sexism and rape culture, despite the fact that she's with a jock who let her get raped and said nothing about it for months. Many people called her out on his (including Alex and even Justin himself) and even she calls herself out on it but she ultimately does nothing about it. Lastly, she was never called out on keeping the secret that Alex killed Bryce even though Clay was about to go to jail for it.
  • Even Alex falls into this due to him being Bryce's killer. While Bryce is far from a saint and while Alex does show some regret when listening to his tape, Bryce was trying to become a better person. Also, murdering him by pushing him into a river and watching him drown after he was beaten to a bloody pulp and had both of his legs broken by Zach was utterly cruel. Lastly he was initially willing to let Clay and Zach take the fall for said murder, and ultimately lets Ani and the others pin it on Monty. His murder of Bryce also means that he can never be truly brought to justice legally for his crimes, especially considering he was finally grasping the gravity of his crimes and had actually confessed on tape to raping Jessica and several other girls.
  • The show attempts to make the audience sympathize with Bryce Walker of all people in the third season. While he does seem to feel some remorse and attempts to make amends for his actions, many viewers felt it was far too little, too late. For the first two seasons, Bryce has been portrayed as nothing but a selfish, arrogant and entitled Serial Rapist, who left Jessica traumatized and was the catalyst for Hannah killing herself, on top of being a violent bully as well, who never expresses any remorse for the lives he's ruined. And due to being a privileged rich kid, he got off with what was effectively a mild slap on the wrist for the heinous crimes he committed. As a result, a lot of viewers had a very hard time sympathizing with him in any way; many people doubted the sincerity of his remorse seeing as he continues to act in scummy ways such as traumatizing a young boy, and breaking Zach's leg out of spite, or felt that he had long since passed the Moral Event Horizon to warrant any pity. Hell, even Justin Prentice himself thought that Bryce, while he did learn his lesson, was beyond redemption.
  • In addition to Bryce, Season 3 tries to make us feel bad for Monty, too, who is about on par with Bryce in terms of loathsomeness. He's yet another sadistic Jerk Jock and bully, who actually witnessed Bryce raping Hannah but did nothing to intervene, later wages a campaign of terror on Bryce's many victims to try and silence them (going as far as trying to kill Clay and tempt Alex into suicide) and becomes a rapist himself, brutally assaulting Tyler with a mop pole...because he inadvertently got the championship season cancelled (to the point where even Bryce himself was disgusted when he found out about it and warned him to stay away from Tyler). Season 3 gives him a Freudian Excuse by showing more scenes with his abusive father and revealing that he is deep in the closet, but many viewers felt this wasn't enough to make us pity such a vile character, especially considering he still does crappy things throughout the third season such as beating up a person he slept with because he thinks people will realize he's gay purely from Winston talking to him. Also, while Bryce starts showing remorse for his actions and at least tries to become a better man, Monty only apologizes to Winston for beating him up and doesn't show any remorse for any of his other horrible actions, nor does he make any attempt to change.
  • Ani, who was introduced into the show in Season 3. Although she doesn't do anything remotely as horrible as Bryce or Monty, she does take some actions that many viewers found rather morally questionable. She's not only very sympathetic towards Bryce Walker, she's even happy to have sex with him despite knowing he's raped multiple girls (among other nasty things) and that one of his victims was Jessica, who is supposed to be her best friend. For the same reason, viewers also found her to be a bit of a hypocrite in that she's fine hanging around with Bryce — a violent and repeat sex offender — but says she's afraid to be around Clay, her other supposed best friend, because he's suspected (wrongly) of killing Bryce. Ani is also viewed as unsympathetic for continually defending Bryce, insisting he was trying to become a better person (with very mixed results) and even suggesting that Clay and the others are wrong for judging Bryce solely for "the worst thing [he] did"; the fact that she's making these arguments to Clay and co makes her seem particularly insensitive and delusional, seeing as they all knew Bryce much longer than she has and suffered greatly at his hands either directly or indirectly. It's also revealed she's spent the whole season lying to the police to protect Alex after she finds out he murdered Bryce and helps set up Monty for it.
    • She also leads Clay on ‘’hard’’ and then acts like he’s being an entitled Nice Guy — not even for wanting to date her, but for ‘’not’’ wanting her to date Bryce. It’s one thing to say Clay misinterpreted their friendship just because Ani was nice to him and he became obsessed with her, but Ani knowingly was very forward with Clay, taking her clothes off for almost no reason around him and kissing him (and then sitting back while he apologized for kissing her). When Clay breaks down over her rejecting him, it’s mostly because she rejects him for a ‘’known serial rapist.’’ It’s hard to feel bad for her having to deal with Clay’s reaction when Ani made all her decisions by herself and simply didn’t want to deal with the consequences.
  • Just like the book, Hannah becomes this as well in the series. While she didn't deserve the treatment she got from others, didn't deserve to be sexually assaulted by Marcus and didn't deserve to be raped by Bryce, she's still cruel and spiteful on her tapes. While she had perfect reasons to have people like Bryce and Marcus on her tapes, her reasons for everyone else having tapes were pretty minor, and in some cases, outright non-existent. For but one example, she had the gall to blame Justin for Jessica being raped (instead of Bryce who actually raped her), and not helping her, even though she was in the same room as them and did nothing to help Jess afterwards nor did she report it whereas Justin at least attempted to stop Bryce.
• Wangst:
  • The expanded focus on the present-day story can make you irritated with Clay, as he keeps whining about how he needs answers, when they were literally delivered right to him and all he needs to do is keep listening (and everyone he talks to keeps telling him to do it).
  • Courtney considering her reasoning for spreading the rumor about Hannah was to hide the fact she's gay. It comes off as sympathetic at first (especially as she does show remorse at first when at her gravestone), but goes hard to Unintentionally Unsympathetic as it goes on, especially in 'Tape 6, Side B'.
• What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: The series is aimed at teenagers but deals with some pretty dark and distressing subject matter that even some adults find hard to deal with, namely suicide and rape. The violence in the show gets pretty graphic, including showing the entirety of Hannah's suicide and three rape scenes (which we also get flashbacks to). The show's content earned it a TV-MA rating on Netflix, meaning that anyone under 18 — aka, the target audience should probably only watch the show accompanied by a parent/guardian, if at all.
• The Woobie: See The Woobie section for all variants on the show's woobies.

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