Hulu’s hit show “Tell Me Lies” isn’t exactly an easy watch. The show follows a college friend group while struggling with classes, relationships and personal crises, but three seasons in, the drama has only intensified.
Season three premiered on Jan. 13, and students stayed up all night waiting for its release. Since then, new episodes have dropped on Tuesday mornings, with six out so far. The praise of the show on social media has been overwhelmingly positive, but with themes like death, gaslighting and manipulation, it begs the question: how accurately does it depict the lives of real college students?
It’s important to note that the main story takes place in 2015 with flashbacks from 2008-2009, so while the BlackBerry phones and low-rise jeans may be dated for today’s students, the emotional subjects seem universal.
Jacie O’Shea, a junior marketing major, said the show makes her anxious when watching because it is so realistic.
“We’re the same age as the characters,” O’Shea said. “There’s so much drama and these things could happen to me or someone I know.”
For others, anger is their primary reaction.
Sophomore political science major Brenda Martinez said the character Lucy Albright, played by Grace Van Patten, makes her angry since she acknowledges she has relationship problems but continues to hurt the people around her.
“It’s like how people can be addicted to drugs — that’s how her relationship with him is like,” Martinez said. “If she’s not with Stephen, she tends to feel worthless and stuff.”
Martinez said she thinks watchers are drawn to the show because it mirrors similar toxic experiences they may have experienced themselves. She compared this phenomenon to social apps like Yik Yak, where users anonymously comment on people’s lives or situations. In the same way, she said, it’s easy to recognize toxic behavior on a show because it’s not happening directly to the viewer.
The show also depicts early social media behavior in a way that is relevant to what students see today. While still in its early years, the use of Facebook on the show to spread a rumor about sexual assault demonstrates some of the online dynamics that students have grown up with on modern social platforms.
Yet some do find the show disconnected from their personal lives. Ava Zaccour, a junior kinesiology major, thinks the show does a great job of encapsulating the college scene with parties and class stress, but she said she doesn’t relate to the characters.
“I don’t think I have a toxic life,” she said, adding that the show sometimes shocks her with how the characters act.
Similarly, Olivia Kulakowski, a political science student, said she relates to some scenes where the characters are getting ready to go out or are hanging out together, but everything else is just dramatized.
On Reddit, fan theories and predictions dominate discussion boards. In one “Tell Me Lies” subreddit, user u/Muted_Hotel_7943 asked if anyone’s college experience was like the show.
Another user, u/crapdontdoit, wrote, “I went to college around this time period and found it to be really similar. I went to a lot of themed frat parties…I think I like the show so much because it reminds me of being in college.”
Whether it’s a fictional liberal arts school in New York or a huge SEC university in Louisiana, some issues are familiar across every college campus. While the show offers late 2000s nostalgia or a reminder of past Friday nights, certain moments are too realistic to be made up.
