{"id":2385703,"date":"2026-04-23T12:03:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T12:03:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2385703"},"modified":"2026-04-23T12:03:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T12:03:23","slug":"half-man-review-richard-gadds-masculinity-drama-is-masochism-at-its-worst","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/half-man-review-richard-gadds-masculinity-drama-is-masochism-at-its-worst\/","title":{"rendered":"Half Man Review: Richard Gadd\u2019s Masculinity Drama Is Masochism at Its Worst"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n

Half Man <\/em>begins with a punch to the face. Richard Gadd\u2019s character hits Jamie Bell twice until he\u2019s coughing up blood, and you don\u2019t find out why until six hour-long episodes later. Is it worth the watch? Well, even when you finally find out why, the Baby Reindeer<\/em><\/a> creator\u2019s sophomore series about masculinity, sexuality, and the prisons we impose on ourselves rarely amounts to anything more than one guy beating up another guy. Unlike Bell\u2019s poor, bloodied face, it\u2019s not the strong blow that Gadd thinks it is.<\/p>\n

The HBO<\/a> series follows Niall Kennedy (Bell), a writer on his wedding day who receives a surprise visit (and a sock to the face) from his aggressive, sort-of stepbrother Ruben Pallister (Gadd). The story then flashes back to the \u201980s to show how the two men first met in their teens. The bullied, closeted Niall leans on the hypermasculine Ruben to solve his problems for him, and he quickly learns the violent answer to what happens when you befriend the devil. Bad choices turn into even worse consequences. By the third episode, you\u2019re already asking yourself when enough is enough.<\/p>\n

\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Anne Binckebanck\/HBO<\/span><\/figcaption>

Ruben (Richard Gadd) beats up Niall (Jamie Bell) like he\u2019s Bane from Batman<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n

In the beginning, Niall and Ruben\u2019s arrangement reminded me of one of the most toxic relationships in TV history: the dynamic between mob boss Tony Soprano and his therapist, Dr. Melfi. There\u2019s a controversial episode in The Sopranos<\/em> season 3 titled \u201cEmployee of the Month\u201d\u2014which might also be one of its best\u2014when Melfi considers a similar devil\u2019s bargain. The therapist is raped in a parking lot, and she later sees a path toward revenge through Tony\u2019s violent impulses. \u201cI\u2019ve been charmed by a sociopath,\u201d she says. But when the moment comes and she contemplates telling Tony about the attack, she stops herself. Once you cross that line, there\u2019s no going back.<\/p>\n

Half Man<\/em> is a bit like what would have happened if Dr. Melfi unleashed Tony Soprano on her enemy. But where Melfi had the foresight to show restraint, Jamie Bell\u2019s character is lost inside his relationship with a sociopath. As Niall represses, Ruben retaliates.<\/p>\n

\n

So throughout his continued involvement with his stepbrother, Niall steps on one mousetrap after another and never learns to move with a bit more caution the next time he lifts his toes. If you\u2019re picturing that Simpsons <\/em>bit in which Sideshow Bob steps on rake after rake despite each one lurching up to hit him in the face, then you\u2019re dead on. Niall\u2019s entire<\/em> life is pathetic, and his downfall reaches a point by the end where it\u2019s only half Ruben\u2019s fault. \u201cThis is all your shit, son,\u201d he eventually tells Niall. He\u2019s kind of right when he says it, too. Niall\u2019s worst action in the series is entirely his own, and by the time it happens you can\u2019t even really feel bad for him anymore.<\/p>\n

The saddest part is that Gadd wrote a decent allegory buried underneath Half Man<\/em>\u2019s melodrama. Ruben is basically Niall\u2019s shadow self\u2014feeding off his anger like Venom from Spider-Man<\/em>\u2014until we reach a rather inevitable conclusion about literally wrestling with your demons. And yes, Gadd is <\/em>trying to land some grand statement about masculinity in turn-of-the-century Scotland and what its regressive attitudes did to young men struggling with their sexual identity. But when you\u2019re watching Niall receive blow after blow from Ruben, it\u2019s hard to think about anything else.<\/p>\n

I wish I could appreciate what Gadd was clearly working toward. But after six hours\u2014and two separate curb stompings\u2014it feels less like Half Man <\/em>is following real people and more like it was simply using them to work backward from Gadd\u2019s provocative ending. Cut these half men down to size and there\u2019s simply nothing left standing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.esquire.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Half Man begins with a punch to the face. Richard Gadd\u2019s character hits Jamie Bell twice until he\u2019s coughing up blood, and you don\u2019t find out why until six hour-long episodes later. Is it worth the watch? Well, even when you finally find out why, the Baby Reindeer creator\u2019s sophomore series about masculinity, sexuality, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2385704,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[274717,465005,285977,285684,441858,465004,440065],"class_list":["post-2385703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-content-type-news","tag-contentid-988d7a51-5c38-4c90-9961-4b107e5aa02c","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-locale-us","tag-read_time-3","tag-shorttitle-half-man-is-masochism-at-its-absolute-worst","tag-subsection-tv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Half-Man-Review-Richard-Gadds-Masculinity-Drama-Is-Masochism-at.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2385703"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2385705,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385703\/revisions\/2385705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2385704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2385703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2385703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2385703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}