I'm waiting in the Garden for you.
Red Rose is a 2022 horror mystery drama TV series originally on the BBC and later made available internationally via Netflix, created by Michael and Paul Clarkson. A strange link to an app download has terrible consequences for a young group of Bolton friends fresh out of their senior exams. Red Rose sees all, and Red Rose demands all.
Red Rose contains examples of:
- The Alcoholic: Anthony and Liam’s mother. Anthony usually has to act as the parent of the household due to this.
- Ambiguous Criminal History: Rick. All we know is that he was convicted of manslaughter, angered very dangerous people, and served time.
- Arc Symbol: The infamous app icon showing a red rose. And after Red Rose has been 'deleted' and the Gardener has started again across the world, this becomes a yellow rose.
- Badass Bookworm: Jaya, being able to break through Red Rose’s encryptions and in the finale, where she escapes from her burning home and hides until she can get back into Red Rose systems and keep her friends alive.
- Bad Samaritan: The Gardener, towards Jacob, who they comforted after his attempt to ask out his crush failed and the other members of the chat made fun of him. This is strongly implied to be faked sympathy to gain trust and access to the Red Rose program.
- Bond Breaker: Social media posts repeatedly drive a wedge between both the Dickheads and other fellow students, but this is especially bad between Rochelle and Wren.
- Burner Phones: The main group ditch their smartphones and go for old brick tech phones to deter tracking and hacking.
- Cute Bruiser: Wren. When the Jennas confront her about social media and call her derogatory names, Wren starts swinging. Two people end up bleeding, but Wren remains quite pretty to look at.
- Destroy the Evidence: What Jaya ends up having to do in order to shut down Red Rose feeds and take the audience away from the Gardener, buying time to save Wren.
- Deadpan Snarker: Ashley, whether its insincere ribbing to her friends or genuine annoyance.
- Dead Person Impersonation: The Gardener imitates and manipulates images to seem like Rochelle’s dead mother. Also applies to the Gardener later doing this to impersonate Rochelle herself.
- Did Not Die That Way: At least two deaths are shown to be from different causes than what the general population has accepted.
- Don't You Dare Pity Me!: Rochelle gets angry and defensive about being treated like a charity case when Wren offers to loan her nice clothes for a party with a dress code, and hides her face when at the food bank for her sisters.
- Downer Ending: There is no real justice for the victims of Red Rose, and Rick returns to jail after repeatedly proving he has reformed. And worst of all, The Gardener isn’t dead, or done with their schemes.
- Entitled to Have You: The attitude of both Jacob and his online friends towards his crush.
- Improvisational Ingenuity: When her friends are being followed and threatens, Jaya manages to use her computer skills and quick thinking to get the terrorizer to clearly show his face in a photo.
- Insidious Rumor Mill: Red Rose uses hacking to post the target’s social media, often ruining their reputation or causing a major fight between friends.
- Internet Safety Aesop: Don’t tap on strange links or download anything random strangers send you, and consider carefully to who you allow to access your information and data.
- The Main Characters Do Everything: A group of teenagers works to solve the mystery behind suspicious deaths and an invasive, threatening application that can't be removed from phones as the police refuse to investigate the matter and familial adults wave away concerns.
- Manipulative Bastard: The Gardener, of course, but also Jacob to a degree based on their approach to romance.
- Official Couple: Wren and Noah.
- The Scapegoat: Simon lures Wren to her mother’s cafe and chases her to its roof. The police arrive and everyone comes to the conclusion that they are behind Red Rose, but it turns out they’re merely another victim.
- Stalker with a Crush: Justin spent weeks coding a program to cyberstalk their crush and learn everything about them.
- Taking the Heat: Rick takes the pipe covered in blood, wipes off the fingerprints and sits in a room with the corpse of the Gardener, even though Wren is the one who killed, and that isn’t the Gardener. Slightly justified by Rick’s wounds and being held hostage giving him a strong self defense claim.
- Teen Genius: Applies to both Jaya and Justin for their remarkable talents using computers and coding.
- Trauma Button: Bringing up Rochelle’s mother’s suicide deeply upsets her.
- What the Hell, Hero?: During their argument, Rochelle and Wren both bring up parents. Rochelle’s mom is recently deceased and as she storms off Wren realizes how poorly she acted. Her mother Rachel calls her out on this.
- What You Are in the Dark: The Gardener tries to push this trope onto Wren, but while she kills the fake Gardener, it doesn’t seem like anyone else feels as if this trope applies, not even Wren herself.
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: When the Gardener is given access to Red Rose, they and dozens of other depraved watchers use it to torture and stalk people with intent to cause harm or even death, all for the sake of ‘entertainment’.
- You Cannot Kill An Idea: Said word for word, by The Gardener to Jaya after the latter deleted Red Rose and asked if things were all over now.
