Richard Gadd returns with "Half Man" HBO series, overshadowed by "Baby Reindeer" success

Scottish actor and screenwriter Richard Gadd, who captivated the world in 2024 with the hit series "Baby Reindeer", returns with the HBO miniseries "Half Man". The story of a complex relationship between two adoptive brothers received a tepid reception, earning 78% critical approval on Rotten Tomatoes compared to "Baby Reindeer"'s 99%. Critics note that the new series is too bleak and monotonous to become an equivalent hit.

Richard Gadd is known as the man who shocked the world in 2024 with his autobiographical series "Baby Reindeer". Now he is back with the HBO miniseries "Half Man", which concluded its run in June 2026. The result is ambitious, but it does not surpass his first hit.

What the series tells

At a modest wedding in a Scottish village, an uninvited guest appears-Ruben (Gadd himself), recently released from prison. He shares a complicated past with the groom Niall (Jamie Bell): their mothers were in a same-sex relationship, making these two completely different boys adoptive brothers by circumstance. Hot-tempered Ruben always solved disputes with his fists and protected shy Niall from bullies at school. Niall, in turn, helped Ruben pass his exams.

Over the years, their strange attachment to each other turned toxic: jealousy and imitation, love and hate, shame and fear accompanied every meeting. At some point, Niall did something that destroyed Ruben's life, and now he has come to the wedding to settle the final score.

Gloomy drama vs. "Baby Reindeer"'s dark comedy

Unlike the debut series, "Half Man" is neither autobiographical nor contains irony. Gadd analyzes coldly where aggression, violence, and self-destruction come from. The early episodes focus on Niall's difficult upbringing: his father dead, his mother brought a new lover and her troubled son into the home, schoolmates bullied him because of his unconventional family.

In his adult years, Jamie Bell, star of "Billy Elliot" and the sadist K in Lars von Trier's "Nymphomaniac", plays Niall. Bell portrays a complex, insecure, obsessive neurotic who destroys his own life as if in desperate pleasure. As Ruben, Gadd appears himself, this time in the role of a brutal adult rather than in the fragile protagonist's skin from "Baby Reindeer".

Why the series didn't become a hit

Viewers and critics received the series cordially, but without enthusiasm. It has 78% critical approval on Rotten Tomatoes (for comparison: "Baby Reindeer" has 99%). On IMDb, audiences rate the series 8.1/10, while "Baby Reindeer" received 7.7, but based on a much larger number of ratings.

The main problem lies in the story itself: each episode opens and closes with a wedding scene, promising viewers a mysterious plot twist. But this "hook" fails to deliver on expectations-no surprising revelation or explanation follows. The series begins to repeat itself: Niall suffers under the denial of his sexual identity, Ruben under his macho image, and eventually this becomes tedious.

Gadd wants to forgive but cannot

Gadd is not a misanthrope; he wants to convince viewers that even the cruelest person harbours pain, shame, and a desire to be seen and heard. Yet he does not allow his characters to journey from "half man" to full human. He invites empathy, but finds no mercy for his own characters himself. And this disappoints viewers even more than a weak ending.

"Half Man" is ambitious work on toxic masculinity and codependency, but remaining too bleak and monotonous, it fails to become a second hit.