The Terrifying True Story Behind Netflix's The Watcher

Just in time for spooky season, & with just enough sinister spine-chilling malevolence to scare you sideways, Netflix’s new release The Watcher is the next binge-worthy thing. So plausible it lingers long after the credits roll, maybe because it’s based on a true story.

The 7-part series spins a mix of fact & fiction based in opulent suburbia. It may appear formulaic – new family moves into haunted house with dark history – but stereotype scary is still scary, & although the story seems predictable at first, it’s not exactly derivative.

Created by acclaimed American writer, director & producer best known for recent viral hit ‘Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story’, Ryan Murphy has form keeping audiences on the edge of their seats. He is also responsible for ‘Glee’, equally as terrifying but for different reasons.

In 2014, Derek & Maria Broaddus spent $1.3M on 657 Boulevard, a stately manor in Westfield, New Jersey, which they believed to be their dream home. It wasn’t long before that dream turned into a nightmare when an anonymous letter writer launched a campaign of terror against them.

In a series of creepy, cryptic letters delivered to the Broaddus’ door, the self-titled Watcher reminds the newcomers they are being constantly observed while laying down an obscure history of the 100-year-old house & issuing oblique threats about an anticipated ‘second coming’.

Second coming of what exactly? Therein lies the first mystery. The meticulously appointed mansion & implausibly beautiful people dressed in impeccable cream & beige leisurewear paints an idyllic picture of family life ordinarily reserved for servile Stepford Wives.

From neighbours in matching sweat suits scrutinising proceedings from their lawn chairs to a private investigator with her own secrets to hide, all we need are some dark mysterious tunnels, a disused dumbwaiter, a precocious teen & a dead ferret & the scary stage is set.   

Are the characters facile & one dimensional? Sometimes. Is the mystery mainly manufactured in tense diegesis & jump scenes? Definitely. The Watcher is Netflix doing what Netflix does best, making a fictional mountain out of a factual molehill while keeping us completely riveted.

You can read the fate of the real-life Broaddus family to find how the story of 657 Boulevard went down. Or you can pull the curtains, load up on popcorn & lose a couple of hours in a nouveau New Jersey where bizarre interactions & unexplained behaviour are par for the course.

After all, nothing says Hallowe’en like a scary stalker, a haunted house & a series chock full of chilling pauses, perturbing plot twists & menacing music.

From the ominous real-life words of The Watcher themselves:

It might not frighten you yet. But it will.