The real story of the Watcher is terrifying – but the series is just cringey

The best of Voices delivered to your inbox every week - from controversial columns to expert analysis Sign up for our free weekly Voices newsletter for expert opinion and columns Sign up to our free weekly Voices newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. The tale – about a suburban family receiving a series of threatening letters from a person calling themselves “The Watcher” – resonated as particularly terrifying for three reasons. I’d written about the story earlier this year, talking to a previous owner of the home and Boulevard neighbours – including the brother of a man who’d been one of the main suspects. An odd neighbour – an overall-clad, barely verbal older man resembling Uncle Fester – is found hiding in the home’s dumbwaiter. Jennifer Coolidge does what she does best, playing a selfish, scheming, voluptuous real estate agent who sells 657 Boulevard to Cannavale and Watts, who play a couple named the Brannocks; when they eventually sell the home because of The Watcher, she snaps it up for a song and immediately moves in – only to find her dog murdered and see a menacing, black-clad hooded figure looming over her in the house.