stranger-things-netflix-prank-show-backlash

Gage Skidmore/Flickr

‘Stranger Things’ star’s new Netflix prank show is receiving backlash

It's about pranking people who are looking for work.

 

Eilish O'Sullivan

Streaming

Posted on Jun 16, 2019   Updated on May 20, 2021, 10:31 am CDT

Gaten Matarazzo, who best known for playing Dustin on Stranger Things, is set to host and executive produce a hidden-camera prank show for Netflix. The show’s announcement has been met with backlash.

The show is called Prank Encounters. The concept of the show is based around an elaborate prank that will first give people, looking for work, jobs. The pranking begins once they start their part-time jobs. Ultimately, the individuals are yet again rendered jobless once the prank ends.

“Each episode of this terrifying and hilarious prank show takes two complete strangers who each think they’re starting their first day at a new job,” the Netflix press release for the show reads. “It’s business as usual until their paths collide and these part-time jobs turn into full-time nightmares.”

Netflix is calling the show “epic.” Yet, many people are finding the concept insensitive.

The 16-year-old tweeted about the show’s announcement on Friday. Matarazzo’s tweet was met with fans calling the show “cruel,” “mean-spirited,” and begging him not to go through with it.

https://twitter.com/factspusher/status/1139705258232258560

The other individuals serving as the show’s executive producers are Ben Silverman, Howard T. Owens, Rob Hyde, and Kevin Healey for Propagate. The director will be Anthony Gonzalez, who is best known for his work on Dance Moms and Undercover Boss, another hidden-camera show.

Prank Encounters is set to have eight episodes in the first season, which is slated to roll out at the end of 2019.

Yet, I’m not sure how many viewers will be binging it. The consensus seems to be that it’s probably best sticking to pranking people who have job security or men who send unsolicited “dick pics.”

The Daily Dot has reached out to Netflix.

READ MORE: 

Got five minutes? We’d love to hear from you. Help shape our journalism and be entered to win an Amazon gift card by filling out our 2019 reader survey.

H/T BuzzFeed News 

Share this article
*First Published: Jun 16, 2019, 9:04 am CDT