I have always been an avid lover of all things movie, television, and musical. I have also struggled with mental illness for as long as I can remember. Many people who are struggling turn to Hollywood to show them an ideal world that they can get lost in, just to forget about how painful life is for a while. I definitely appreciate the good that a Netflix binge can do when I just need to relax for a while. However, this has not always been the case as of late.

Recently, there has been a huge upswing of shows, movies, and musicals featuring protagonists with different mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, and eating disorders. Trust me, I am all for calling attention to the signs of mental illness and attempting to break the stigma surrounding these disorders. That being said, the way these characters are represented are not always accurate and can do more harm than good in my opinion.

The first example that I'm sure everyone knows about by now is the Netflix series 13 Reasons Why. The main character, Hannah, commits suicide before the series starts. The show also focuses on substance abuse, depression, and PTSD. I have watched the show, and I really appreciated it as a fictional narrative; I enjoyed the storytelling and the suspense of it. However, as a narrative about mental illness, it is severely lacking. By committing suicide, Hannah gets exactly what she wants, and what many suicidal people want; she creates change.

In reality, most suicides do not spread positive change. No one is going to suddenly realize that everyone has worth and the whole community isn't going to come together and take down the evils of society. Suicide should never be used as a catalyst to social change, because it's probably not going to change anything at all, except one more person will have left this world too soon. The show overly romanticized this beautiful, young girl who created an entire network to finally take down her demons. She sacrificed herself for the greater good. She even had a cute boy who pined after her, and finally realized that he loved her when it was too late. Isn't that just so painfully beautiful? No, it is a fantasy. However, teenagers who are watching this do not have fully developed frontal lobes and are less able to tell fantasy from reality. It is no surprise to me that the show has already inspired two copycat suicides, probably by young women who just wanted the world around them to be different.

Along the same vein, the Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen presents a similar issue for me. I do think Ben Platt is an amazing actor, and he does a great job portraying someone with severe social anxiety and suicidal ideations. However, it is the plot that I have an issue with. One of the characters commits suicide in the beginning of the show, and again the entire community comes together and suddenly realizes that no one deserved to be ignored and everyone matters equally. While this is definitely true, everyone does matter and no one should feel forgotten in this world. Killing yourself or lying about being friends with the kid who commits suicide isn't going to make people realize that. Personally, I feel that the show promotes the message that it is fine to lie to people who are grieving to make them feel better, and one person killing themselves can start a social movement that will make life better for everyone. To me, that is a dangerous message to be spreading.

Mental illness can't be solved in a couple of hours or 13 episodes. You can't just cut the shot away from the ugliness of a panic attack or a suicidal episode. You're not going to meet some manic, pixie, dream therapist who takes you to rain rooms to make you feel alive. Therapy is hours of hard emotional work, and probably would make for a very boring TV show. In reality, real, true mental illness does not make for good entertainment, and a lot of times, there's no bug, happy ending. The happy ending is just continuing to trudge forward with no major jumps forward or steps back. We're not trying to reach the light and the end of the tunnel; we are just trying to keep moving forward.

However, if there's no miraculous recovery or no nice ending tied up with a bow, that doesn't make for very good storytelling. The story of mental illness lasts a lifetime. It's not cute, it's not in-your-face, it's not tragically beautiful. Mental illness is insidious and subtle, it's very private and personal. Right now, Hollywood and Broadway are giving us mental illness lite, but being praised for being so raw and accurate. However, someone with real mental illness will watch these shows, and might wonder why this is not their experience with mental illness. Why is the entire community not rallying around them? Why is there no uplifting background music when their YA male protagonist comes to wipe away their tears? Is there something wrong with them? No, the only thing wrong is that real mental illness doesn't have a perfect beginning, middle, and end, and real mental illness isn't what people want to see.

Trust me, I realize that people struggling with mental illness are not the first group to be wrongly represented by Hollywood (Native Americans, anyone?), but this misrepresentation has really dangerous implications. A lot of young people turn to television and movies to tell them what their life is supposed to be like, and to allow them to live out their fantasies through other people. When those fantasies include changing society through suicide, Hollywood tells them that fantasy can be a reality. I don't really have a solution for this, except for the writers to do more research and talk to people with mental illness about their experience. The actors do a very thorough job of researching what it is like to play a mentally ill person, and usually portray them fairly accurately. I suggest that the writers do the same, and think about what your message looks like to someone who is already struggling. What does it say to them? Who does it say they should be? Think about it.