The much-talked-about true crime show Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is breaking all kinds of records. Just two weeks after its release on Netflix, Ryan Murphy’s series has become the streaming services’ ninth most popular English-language TV show of all time.
When it comes to calculating a show’s popularity, Netflix measures hours viewed in the first 28 days of a title being available. In a mere 12 days, Monster has racked up an astonishing 496.1 million hours worldwide. With 16 more days to climb even higher on the chart, Monster looks set to be a monster hit. Netflix has already calculated that at least 56 million households have viewed all 10 episodes (around 8.8 hours) of the limited series.
Monster stars Evan Peters as infamous serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, who murdered 17 men between 1978 and 1991 before his arrest. He was later killed in prison in 1994. This is the series’ second week at number one on the English-language chart. Between September 26th and October 2nd, it accumulated 299,84 million hours of viewing time, second only to the fourth season of Stranger Things
Shortly after the series debuted, the families of Dahmer’s victims came forward to criticise the series for exploiting their suffering for the sake of entertainment. Speaking out against Monster, Eric Perry, cousin of Dahmer victim Errol Lindsey, said: “I’m not telling anyone what to watch, I know true crime media is huge rn, but if you’re actually curious about the victims, my family (the Isbell’s) are pissed about this show”.
Perry added: “Recreating my cousin having an emotional breakdown in court in the face of the man who tortured and murdered her brother is WILD,” before arguing that the show is “re-traumatising over and over again, and for what? How many movies/shows/documentaries do we need?”
