Is It Really the End of the F***ing World?

The End of the F***cking World is a Netflix Original show that I decided to watch per my roommate’s request. Of course, being the person that I am, I had to do a little research on the show itself. From what I found The End of the F***cking World is a dark-comedy drama that was originally based on a comic series by Charles S. Forsman. It follows two teenagers, one who believes he is a serial killer, and a rebellious classmate trying to escape her toxic home life. So wow, after reading all of that I was ready to write my feelings about the first episode.
Okay, so first off this show is a train wreck. I hated watching it, but at the same time I could not stop. There was something about the show that kept me clicking next episode, even though I knew it would bring me nothing but stress. “Episode 1” was only 18 minutes, and boy did they really jam pack a lot of stress within that time. Now the very first line of the show was, “I’m James, I’m 17, and I’m pretty sure I’m a psychopath”. Now I am not a huge fan of the character James. I mean, come on, he killed a cat. A CAT. I almost stopped watching the show then but I persisted. James also has no sense of humor so wow we would not be friends.
After a few minutes of hating James, we meet Alyssa. I actually really liked her in the beginning because she seemed poetic about life and I felt really bad for her as she has a very bad home life. Boy could I have been more wrong. She is so aggressive and forward and everything she does stresses me out. She is full of hormones and teenage angst and decides that she is going to fall in love with James.
The whole time they are together James is trying to kill her while she is using him as her rebellious pawn. So of course if two people are in love they go on dates. James took Alyssa to this diner and I’m not even kidding I was cringing during this whole scene. It seems like it is going to be normal at first but I was once again wrong. Alyssa being Alyssa decides to smart mouth back to the waitress and uses profanity. The waitress was having none of it. This fuels Alyssa so she takes it up a notch and ends up getting them kicked out of the diner. Classic Alyssa. She even goes on to say that she worries that she ruins things. Spoiler alert: you do. Something about watching unmannerly people just stresses me out.
As the episode draws to a close I thought nothing climactic could happen. Once again I was wrong. Alyssa is back at home with her mother and the stepfather that she hates. He goes to talk to her and flat out tells her that she should do the family a favor and run away. He then puts his arm around her waist and tells her she can look good when she tries. Her mother was watching the whole time and did not do anything to stop him. I did feel bad for Alyssa at this point. As her adrenaline was rushing she went to see James and requested that they run away together. This was really shaping up to be a Bonnie and Clyde story. The episode ends with James stealing his father’s car and them running away.
Throughout the first episode I was on a roller coaster of emotions. I would go from feeling bad for Alyssa to flat out hating her for acting so brash but throughout the whole 18 minutes I could not stop watching. No matter how stressed I got I always wanted to know what happened next. I have a huge love-hate relationship with this show and you bet your bottom dollar I am going to watch the rest of the season, no matter how stressful it will be.