{"id":621864,"date":"2026-04-21T17:49:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T17:49:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/621864\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T17:49:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T17:49:17","slug":"this-new-show-from-baby-reindeers-richard-gadd-is-punishing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/621864\/","title":{"rendered":"This new show from Baby Reindeer\u2019s Richard Gadd is punishing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Craig<\/p>\n

April 21, 2026 \u2014 11:00pm<\/p>\n

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Half Man \u2605\u2605\u00bd <\/p>\n

Richard Gadd, whose 2024 Netflix series Baby Reindeer<\/a> was a wrenching, unforgettable debut, pushes his grasp of trauma, violence, and self-deceit beyond its limit in this punishing follow-up. Freed from autobiographical parameters, Gadd has written a show that straddles the line between unrelenting and repetitive.<\/p>\n

\"JamieJamie Bell (left) and Richard Gadd star in Half Man.BBC\/Mam Tor Productions\/Anne Binckebanck<\/p>\n

This new six-part series covers the corrosive brotherly bond between the closeted Niall Kennedy (Jamie Bell) and the swaggering Ruben Pallister (Gadd, layered in muscle). Told over 30 years, the story captures their painful back and forth, but both men deprive the viewer of self-illumination.<\/p>\n

Savagery is the punctuation here. A stand-off in private between the two at a middle-aged Niall\u2019s wedding, which Ruben crashes, ends with a punch serving as the cut to a classroom blow in late 1980s Glasgow, where a teenage Niall (Mitchell Robertson) is being bullied. When he gets home, the nervy boy discovers a domineering new roommate just released from juvenile detention, Ruben (Stuart Campbell). Niall is both fearful and entranced. Ruben has a volcanic temper, but he\u2019s also a crutch for Niall.<\/p>\n

\u201cToxic masculinity\u201d is a phrase Half Man will attract, but Gadd wants to peer beneath any labels. While the historical detail is cursory, the show serves as a period piece in depicting how Niall\u2019s nascent sexuality is a secret he\u2019s desperate to keep.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

With an echo of Douglas Stuart\u2019s acclaimed novels<\/a>, Niall struggles with the repercussions of his actions, living in terror of Ruben finding out. Homophobia is normalised in 20th-century Glasgow, and a telling point that Gadd makes is that even when it isn\u2019t, Niall \u2013 a struggling author \u2013 still acts like it is.<\/p>\n

Gadd gives a charismatic, chaos-laden performance. His Ruben doesn\u2019t breathe, he simmers. But it\u2019s locked in to Gadd\u2019s physicality, and deprived of insight until the ritualistic close. It\u2019s Niall who is the barometer, and Bell captures not only his self-evasion and panic, but slowly spins the perspective so that Niall nettles Ruben, and even secretly damages him. Both actors deliver what their roles require, but the narrative of Niall\u2019s dynamic with Ruben repeatedly reaching a horrifying breaking point becomes a kind of unavoidable ritual.<\/p>\n

\"RichardRichard Gadd, of Baby Reindeer fame, returns in new series Half Man.BBC\/Mam Tor Productions\/Anne Binckebanck<\/p>\n

Gadd can end an episode with a terrific twist, and he has an unnerving way with long, intimate set-pieces, starting in that shared teenage bedroom. But there\u2019s barely a shred of Baby Reindeer\u2019s blackly consolatory comedy here, and the narrative takes too long to find an outside voice that can navigate both Niall and Ruben. Its focus on the pair is exhaustively tight \u2013 Niall\u2019s interior life as a writer is rarely felt.<\/p>\n

Half Man seeks understanding through extremes, but that can also leave you desensitised to this demanding show.<\/p>\n

Half Man premieres April 24 on Stan*<\/p>\n

*Stan is owned by Nine, which also owns this masthead. <\/p>\n

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\"CraigCraig Mathieson<\/a> is a TV, film and music writer for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"April 21, 2026 \u2014 11:00pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621865,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[64,63,134,427],"class_list":["post-621864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=621864"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621864\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}