Dirty John

Debra Newell (Connie Britton) is an interior designer at Madeira, where she goes on a date with John Meehan (Eric Bana) after four failed marriages. Very swiftly, she buys a house with him and marries him. She is a mother to three children, Trey, Veronica and Terra, who are immediately not very accepting of John.

Dirty John is a Netflix drama based on the true story where in 2014, John Meehan and Debra Newell went on a date and she very quickly fell in love with him and devoted her whole life to him. She distanced herself from her children who decided that there was something not right about him; a fact that Debra could not comprehend. The series consists of 8 episodes, showing how he slowly emotionally manipulated her and indoctrinated her.

The pair get married within two months in Las Vegas, unbeknown to her children. He appears to be more interested in the money than her love, and decides to put all of her money into a new account. Debra reveals that she wants to keep some money in the house in case of emergencies, to which John tells her he will not allow her to do.

The eight episodes show Debra distancing herself from her children and focusing primarily upon John. However, when Terra reveals that John is on multiple dating websites and stating that he is single - seems to finally have an impact on Debra. She meets with a solicitor to see what rights she has and what she can do in order to leave John.

Meehan steals Debra's car, where CCTV footage shows John getting inside and driving off. The car was found a block away, covered in petrol and alight.

When she reveals to John that she wants a divorce, she moves out and he becomes a stalker. He follows one of her work friends from Madeira Interiors (her work place) to her new apartment, and sits outside in the car. He regularly returns to this spot to watch and observe the building and any people who may pass through.

One evening Veronica returns home in a taxi and spots Meehan sat outside the apartment. Meehan notices her, and drives off immediately. Veronica gets back into the taxi and observes the driver to chase the black car. After a tense car chase, where the taxi driver jumps multiple red lights, he turns down a road on the right and Veronica loses sight of Meehan. Veronica goes to Terra's house to inform him of what she saw.

The series finishes with Terra being attacked by Meehan in a car park outside her apartment, where he tries to stab her repeatedly with a knife. Terra, screaming with fear, manages to kick him and send the knife flying into the air, where she reaches it and stabs Meehan multiple times in the back, neck and once in the eye. She stabbed him 13 times in total. Once she manages to escape, she phones her mother and passers by call for an ambulance for both Meehan and Terra.

John died in hospital four days after being stabbed by Terra. Debra had to identify him as being John Meehan, who was pronounced as brain dead and his sister, Karen, decided to turn off his life support.

There was no memorial service held for Meehan.

I firmly believe that the series portrays how manipulative a person can be, and it was so clear as to how Debra was indoctrinated into believing his every word.

Debra told Fox5 that her nightmarish experience with John inspired her to try and help victims of domestic abuse. “There are women that are probably scared to death to leave,” she said. “[They] don't see any other way of getting out of the relationship and I want to have a voice for them."