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Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror Review – One woman's thirteen-year nightmare

Season 1 Episode Guide Episode 1 Episode 2 Episode 3 Nearly a third of women and one-sixth of men will experience stalking at some point in their lives. This means millions of people across the world carry the uncomfortable trauma of being watched, followed and harassed. To make matters worse, only 1.4% of reported case (at least in the UK) end in conviction. Stalking and harassment is a growing and ever-present (for lack of a better word) societal problem. This troubling backdrop forms the crux of Hulu's latest docu-series, Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror. As the title may allude, this documentary centers on a young woman called Samantha, who winds up terrified, harassed and eventually kidnapped by an unhinged guy called Christopher. Initially presenting himself as a socially awkward recluse at school, Christopher went out of his way to stalk and harass Samantha over the years, growing ever-bolder and more uncomfortable as time goes on. All of this eventually leads to the worst possible outcome. For Samantha, she manages to get closure for her story, but for many others that's not the case. The three episodes here document Samantha's harrowing ordeal, with the first giving a background into Samantha and Christopher's past, how they crossed paths and the beginning of the stalking. It starts as a bit of a joke between Samantha and her friends as Christopher persistently messages. Unfortunately, there's nothing funny about his behaviour, as it slowly gets worse. The second episode is where Samantha's kidnapping comes into view, and she goes into shocking detail about how she was grabbed in the middle of the night, bundled in her own car and taken to a secluded bunker. Eventually, this story culminates into the third and final chapter, where we see the mounting evidence against Christopher come to the foreground, as well as a couple of surprise inclusions. One of those includes the surprise of another woman who was stalked and harassed by Christopher, called Kelli. Her inclusion is necessary for this story but it's also oddly edited into the story. She only has a few words to say and she shows up midway through episode 3, almost like an afterthought despite how important she is to the backstory and mindset of Christopher's actions. We also don't really see anything of Christopher's family outside of a few recorded phone calls with his mother. However, this is very much a documentary designed to give Samantha a voice to tell her story, and in that respect, the show succeeds. On that same note though, I can't help but feel the docuseries missed a trick by not expanding out to the widespread problem of stalking in society, how damaging that can be to someone's life, and the ongoing struggles that this legally presents to different courts. Even just some legal understanding over how restraining orders aren't always dished out or how hard it is to prove stalking would have helped give this documentary a bit more weight. Stalking Samantha is nicely paced though and at only 3 episodes, there's enough here to prevent this one from dragging its heels. The story itself features a ton of evidence and a lot of archival footage, blending in with re-enactment scenes blurred and done tastefully so it never feels exploitative. There are also videos from police interviews, CCTVs outside the bunker and police cams from raiding Christopher's house. All of this works well to flesh out more of the story, and the reveals hit that much harder as a result. Ultimately, Stalking Samantha plays out as a cautionary tale, retelling one woman's awful ordeal and how, despite justice being served, she may never heal from the scars Christopher has left.