Baby Reindeer’s Real-Life Stalker Is Threatening To Sue Netflix For Defamation

For those who haven’t seen Netflix’s latest hit series, Baby Reindeer is a dark comedy/thriller/psychological head f*ck about a man who has a stalker. That’s a very basic explanation of the show as I don’t really want to give anything away. It deals with an extremely dark and twisted subject matter and is (intentionally) not an easy watch, as you can’t really believe what you’re witnessing at times. It’s all a true story too, based on the writer’s own real-life experience with an obsessed fan, which makes it all the more compelling.

Which leads us to the title of this blog and the batsh1t crazy stalker the show is based on. It seems like she’s extremely unhappy with Netflix and how she’s been portrayed on the show, and is now threatening to sue them for ‘defamation’.

For reference (minor spoiler) – this lady sent victim 41,071 emails, 350 hours of voicemail, 744 tweets, 46 Facebook messages and 106 pages of letters during her stalking campaign.

The 58-year-old woman from London, portrayed as ‘Martha’ onscreen by Jessica Gunning, spoke to MailOnline (who declined to identify her by name) about how she’s been receiving “death threats and abuse from Richard Gadd supporters” ever since the show went viral:

“He’s using Baby Reindeer to stalk me now,” she said, arguing that Gadd was “bullying an older woman on television for fame and fortune.”

“I’m the victim. He’s written a bloody show about me.”

Martha’s real-life counterpart says she is now considering legal action. She also claimed Gadd has “main character syndrome.”

Although details in the show were changed to protect people’s identities, the woman says she shares several similarities with the character of Martha: they’re both Scottish, studied law, have a history of stalking and are more than 20 years older than Gadd. They also look somewhat alike, she said:

“She sort of looks like me after I put on four stone during lockdown but I’m not actually unattractive.”

Well, I’m not sure those quotes are going to do the real-life Martha any favours as far as convincing us she’s totally sane of mind. Apparently, despite the efforts from Richard Gadd and Netflix to shield her identity, internet detectives managed to track her down (naturally) and it all blew up from here. Still, I’m sure Netflix had their lawyers look over it before the show aired and you’d assume they’re in the clear over it.

It does seem a little crazy that Richard Gadd made this show while his stalker is still alive and out there and capable of continuing her campaign of terror against him. All he’s done now is let the whole world know what a maniac she is! Which has rubbed her up the wrong way, clearly. How can anyone be sure she won’t snap and have another go at him?

Well anyway, check out the show if you want, but also don’t if you’re not good with graphic/uncomfortable subject matter. It’s got great reviews by both critics and viewers on Rotten Tomatoes, so clearly it’s doing something right. Maybe real-life Martha can give us her own version of events one day?