Penn Badgley ‘Saw the Similiarities’ Between His ‘You’ and ‘Gossip Girl’ Characters
After six seasons on the teen drama series Gossip Girl, Penn Badgley graduated from the role of Dan Humphrey to Joe Goldberg in the Netflix series You. Although Dan never murdered anyone, he has a surprising amount in common with Joe. Badgley definitely saw the similarities between his You and Gossip Girl characters.
Penn Badgley portrayed Dan Humphrey in ‘Gossip Girl’
Although on the surface, they might seem like very different characters, fans have found a lot in common with Penn Badgley’s Gossip Girl and You characters.
In Gossip Girl, Badgley portrayed Dan Humphrey. A teenager from Brooklyn, Dan attends an elite private school where he doesn’t fit in due to his shyness and lack of wealth. He also aspires to be a writer.
Apart from being shy and artsy, Dan doesn’t at first seem to have much in common with You‘s Joe Goldberg. However, Dan eventually develops a sense of “nice guy syndrome.”
Like Joe, Dan is also living a double life. The series reveals that Dan is Gossip Girl and has been spreading rumors about those around him (including his friends and loved ones) for years.
Badgley is aware of the similarities between ‘You’ and ‘Gossip Girl’
Of course, Gossip Girl doesn’t make Dan Humphrey a serial killer, but some fans have pointed out his stalker-like behavior. “Dan Humphrey is Joe Goldberg. He literally stalked Serena all the time, and then when he and Blair were together, he followed her when she went to the mansion with Chuck,” one Reddit user wrote.
Dan and Joe are also both skilled at using social media to their advantage. “When I first read the pilot script for You, I definitely saw the similarities,” Penn Badgley told InStyle in 2020. “I think I was really caught between being able to appreciate how that’s an interesting progression of things for me, but also how it’s not.”
He continued, “We pulled off this somewhat remote possibility of the show doing just what it’s done. I feel like the fact that I’m the person helps it be just that thing because I was Gossip Girl.”
HBO Max rebooted ‘Gossip Girl’
Years after the original series reached its finale, Gossip Girl got a reboot for HBO Max. The new series premiered in 2021 to mixed reviews. In the same year, Penn Badgley confessed to InStyle that he hadn’t gotten around to watching the new series.
“With a one-year-old and a 12-year-old and dogs and work, my wife and I, we’ve still not finished Ted Lasso,” he told the outlet.
As for his role in You, the Netflix series will air its fourth season in two parts, the first of which will drop in February. This time the series takes Joe Goldberg across the pond to continue his stalking endeavors.
All episodes of You are currently streaming on Netflix.
