Author Caroline Kepnes originally created Joe Goldberg in her novel series, You. Going from pen and paper to the screen adaptation, Joe’s (played by Penn Badgley) character takes on a whole new life when a hopeless romantic doubles as a narcissistic serial killer. To avoid the more menacing and mysterious cliché of a serial killer, Joe brings a personality that the audience cannot help but feel is worthy of redemption. He looks after his abused neighbor’s child. He inserts himself into uncomfortable situations with his love interest’s family. He genuinely wants the best for his son, and he makes sacrifices for him to live a better life. Joe’s internal narrative makes him the hero that simply wants the best for those he believes are deserving of his help.
In short, Joe Goldberg is a smart, witty, and funny man. He gives attention to those he loves, and he finds a way to tolerate those he does not. The only problem with this piece of work is that he has the most unfortunate luck with women. Between the exes that haunt him from the grave (literal and figurative), the women with whom he finds a new obsession, or the equally quick-witted women who are too smart to fully trust him, Joe has his work cut out for him in the world. Let’s explore the women in Joe Goldberg’s life in Netflix’s You, and see how they rank from the best to worst company to keep around.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
8 Karen (Season 1)
Warner Bros. Television Distribution
Karen Minty (Natalie Paul) was the adult relationship Joe needed to snap out of his obsessive ways. Karen was a friend of Claudia’s, Joe’s abused and drug-addicted neighbor, and she just so happened to meet Joe in passing. The two end up dating after Joe’s breakup with Beck. Karen is portrayed as an average girlfriend who likes to hang out, watch television, and call her significant other “babe.” There is no stalking, murdering, or chaos with Karen. Not only is she a good girlfriend, she is a great friend. When Claudia was strung out on drugs, Karen helped her through the messy detox. She understood the hardships of an addict and was not afraid to support a friend in need. Unfortunately for Karen, Joe cheats with Beck, so their relationship was short-lived. After the split, Karen tries to warn Beck, whom Joe was again dating, about a past relationship he could not seem to shake. Even in the depths of a breakup, Karen was still looking out for others.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
7 Delilah (Season 2)
Delilah Alvez (Carmela Zumbado) comes into Joe’s life initially as his Los Angeles landlord. She has a serious nature, is quick with the comebacks, and does her best to take care of her teenage sister, Ellie. Delilah is good company to keep because she seeks justice for those who have been wronged. She tells Joe a story about when she was a minor, she was sexually assaulted by a well-known comedian in the area. She feels that she owes it to herself, the other women who were put in that situation, and to her sister that she needs to do something about the pedophile. Like with Karen, Delilah does not bring too much chaos into Joe’s life. She and Joe have a sexual relationship for a short period, but it does not span into a relationship. Anyone, especially someone like Ellie, would be lucky to have Delilah in their life to maneuver harsh truths.
6 Ellie (Season 2)
Ellie Alvez (played by Jenna Ortega) may be a small 15-year-old, but she is fierce and headstrong when it comes to knowing what she wants. She is focused on the film industry and finds herself with older “friends” that are not exactly appropriate for a teenage girl. Joe takes note of her situation immediately — no parents involved, an overworked older sister, and a knack for being in a field with sketchy adults — and decides to keep an eye on her. Ellie’s age and naïveté earn her a spot under her sister because she proves to be quite a bit to put up with. However, once Ellie faces some unfortunate yet inevitable situations when in Joe’s life, like her sister’s death and her own arrest, Ellie makes the smart move and leaves Joe’s vicinity for the foreseeable future.
5 Marienne (Season 3)
Marienne Bellamy (played by Tati Gabrielle) is Joe’s most recent pursuit. Their lingering stares and secrets began in Season 3 when Joe, who was married to Love at the time, started working at the local library. While Marienne seems like a completely put together and intelligent woman on the surface, she hides a darker past which eventually comes to light. After her ex picks a fight about custody of their daughter, Marienne lets Joe know that she was a drug addict who took some time to get clean. After she and Joe bond over their traumatic childhoods, she sleeps with him. While Marienne may not be the ultimate bad guy, the drama she is involved in and the willingness to sleep with a married man do not make her the best company. Audiences shall see if she can redeem herself as a better person in You Season 4.
4 Candace (Season 1 and 2)
Candace Stone (Ambyr Childers) starts off the storyline as the original love interest of Joe. She has come back from the dead — Joe buried her in a shallow grave after he thought he killed her — to get her revenge. While her story sounds justified, she manipulates a troubled yet great guy, Forty Quinn, to get closer to Joe. In the grand scheme of things, Candace is not a horrible person. She does not actively cheat, her lies are created for a greater good, and she tries to warn Joe’s current love interest of his secret past. However, her ability to lead a guy on for quite some time and make him believe their relationship was a beautiful love story does not make her someone that others exactly want around.
3 Beck (Season 1)
Season 1’s Guinevere Beck (Elizabeth Lail) first meets Joe in the bookstore where he works, and his secret obsession with her later turns into a relationship. In short, Beck is a rollercoaster. At first, she has an on-again off-again relationship with her boyfriend, Benji. After Benji’s disappearance, courtesy of Joe, Beck continues on with her pattern when she gets together with Joe. She does not seem to know exactly what she wants other than she desperately strives to be a famous writer. Beck eventually gets her wish after the capitalizes on her best friend’s death, also courtesy of Joe, by writing about their friendship. She and Joe later have a falling out, and he finds a new girlfriend, Karen. Beck, unhappy about their relationship, makes inappropriate advances towards Joe, and they end up having sex. Beck’s selfishness, cheating tendencies, and lack of direction earn her a spot with the bad company to keep.
2 Peach (Season 1)
Peach Salinger (Shay Mitchell) is Beck’s best and most shallow friend. Aside from her backhanded compliments towards Beck’s work and her need to sabotage her shot at getting noticed, Peach holds a very important secret: she is obsessed with Beck. Joe, while doing his usual snooping, discovers a file on Peach’s laptop dedicated to pictures of Beck, several of them being inappropriate. If that is not enough to write Peach off as being a horrible friend, she manipulates situations in an attempt to be Beck’s sole focus. She fakes a suicide attempt to get Beck to come to her aid. Later on, when Peach gets Beck to agree to go to her family’s cabin for some writing time, she drugs Beck and tries to get her to have a threesome with a mutual friend. Though Peach seemingly has all the connections and a great lifestyle, her one-sided infatuation and manipulative behavior does not make her worthy of true friends.
1 Love (Season 2 and 3)
Love Quinn (played by Victoria Pedretti) makes her way as the #1 woman in the show who is the worst company to keep. Love was introduced as a harmless, quirky, and sweet love interest, but that soon turned as her secret obsession, much like Joe’s, surfaced. Love kills out of passion. She killed her family’s au pair when she discovered the woman had sexually assaulted Love’s twin brother, Forty. In Season 3, Love admits to killing her former husband when he talked about getting a divorce. Her obsession for Joe spirals into a series of murders for the sake of the two having their “happily ever after.” Love, while wildly intense about the love she has for certain people, is Joe’s equal as a serial killer. She is not someone who can be trusted due to her possessiveness, but since her death, courtesy of Joe, she will not be harming anyone any longer.
