Netflix’s “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” has now become one of the most-watched series on the streaming platform of all time — and that’s less than a month since the show first premiered. According to Variety, in just two weeks following its debut, “Monster” has accumulated over 491 million hours of viewing time, with a reported 56 million households having tuned in to watch all 10 episodes of the exhilarating series.
It has therefore become one of the fastest and biggest shows lifted on the platform and joins the likes of “Squid Game” and “Stranger Things” in the sector of most-streamed original programs. The Ryan Murphy-created series follows the life of former Milwaukee serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, who murdered 17 people between 1978 and 1991 before being convicted in 1992. He was killed by an inmate two years later.
The police officer who pulled Jeffrey Dahmer over while he was drunk driving and had a human body in his car let him go because he “had his whole life ahead of him”. The judge in his rape case said Jeffrey “reminded him of his grandson”
White privilege at its finest.
— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) September 30, 2022
During its premiere week, “Monster” had already gained 196.2 million in viewing hours, so the fact that its second week outperformed its debut shows that the conversations being had on social media may have helped sustain the series’ popularity, as viewers who weren’t familiar with the case are being reintroduced to one of the most notorious killers in history.
In a previous interview, actress Niecy Nash, who plays Dahmer’s neighbor Glenda Cleveland, spoke out about her involvement with the series and why it was important for her to bring the storyline to life to the best of her abilities.
Cleveland played a central part in “Monster,” given that she had alerted law enforcement officers about Dahmer’s behavior for months — having seen multiple terrified young men fleeing his apartment, but police officers never followed up with her report.
Had Cleveland been taken seriously in the matter, the victim count would have been far less than the 17 men Dahmer was able to murder during his decade-long massacre. “When you hear the different things that happened with regards to Jeffrey Dahmer and his victims, Glenda was one of his victims, too, and her story has been told the least,” Nash said in an interview with Netflix.
Boosie says that Netflix needs to remove the Jeffrey Dahmer series from their platform pic.twitter.com/8mSPwgZ0wd
— SAY CHEESE! 👄🧀 (@SaycheeseDGTL) September 29, 2022
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown to tell this story, specifically through Glenda’s lens as it had never been done before. So that comes with a lot of responsibility because you want to make sure you get it right.”
Despite the success of “Monster,” the series was only intended to have a limited run, so unlike “Squid Game” and “Stranger Things,” which followed up with a second run following its success with season one, “Monster” won’t be receiving that same treatment.