Joe Goldberg

Joe manages a New York bookshop, quotes literature with real affection, and seems like the rare decent guy in a city full of phonies. Then Beck walks in to buy a book, and his interest tips instantly into fixation. He tells himself he's protecting her, watching, learning her passwords and her patterns, all in the name of love.

The trick is the voiceover: Joe's narration sounds so reasonable, so literate and self-aware, that you're halfway to agreeing with him before you catch yourself. Badgley plays the warmth completely straight, no wink to the camera, which makes the gap between what Joe says and what Joe does the whole unsettling engine of the show.