Three days. That’s how long it took me to binge watch season two of American Vandal.

Three days. It may seem like this is nothing, that you can do it in less. But let me clarify something; these were no ordinary days. These were three school days, and unbeknownst to my mother and my teachers, (and we’re going to keep it that way), I didn’t complete my homework those nights.

You may be a bit confused about why I would do such a thing. Many people are. So let me tell you why I sacrificed my sleep and risked my grades to watch this series as quickly as possible.

It started about two weeks ago when I first found American Vandal. It took me a little less than those two weeks to finish it, mostly because I forgot about it midway through the first week. Season one was slow coming, like an elderly lady slowing down 1000 ft before the traffic light; I took my time. Mainly because I was in no rush to finish it. This was not at all what I experienced in season two.

As soon as I finished season one, I let the countdown of the seconds run out until the first episode of the next season began to play. Little did I know that these seconds would control me for the next three days. I would say to myself this would be the last one. I would promise myself to start on my homework after this episode. But as the countdown from five ticked down- rather quickly, in my opinion- my will to stop was nowhere to be found. And so the next episode began.

You may be asking yourself why I couldn’t stop the countdown and how I managed to let a TV show dictate my sleep. Well, I’ll tell you why.

Everything. Everything about season two was brought to the highest potential it could have. Season one already had impeccable acting, but the plot was slow to unravel and seemed to drag on. Not season two. Season two had the same quality of acting, if not even better. And how could I forget the plot?

The main characters were Peter Maldonado and Sam Ecklund whose characters were executed perfectly by Tyler Alveraz and Griffen Gluck respectively. The acting was taken to the next notch, with weird and crazy characters that did not appear tobe even remotely easy roles to play.

The plot in the second season was based around Peter and Sam driving to another state to film their documentary as their end of the year project. In the previous season, they started their immensely popular documentary that was set around proving a high school delinquent innocent from a graffiti crime. In the next season, all stakes are raised after there are three different pranks that are executed upon St Bernadine’s high school with one common theme. The crimes are disgusting, and I’ll leave that to you to figure out what they are.

Similar to the last season, they set out to prove a “guilty” man “innocent.” My favorite part about the season is that the issues run so much deeper than vulgar crimes. Just when I thought that they had solved the case and found the true culprit, the plot would completely turn upside down, and everything I thought was true was proven false.

Another great aspect of the series is that there is always a deeper meaning behind the facade of pranks. In the last season, the overarching theme is how we don’t know people just because we see them every day, and we should not be quick to write people off and label them before we really get to know them. The second season is heavily based on social media and how we “hide” behind our screens. In the end, both Sam and Peter come to the conclusion that we don’t really hide, but we use them as defensive walls so that we cannot be judged without anyone truly knowing us.

With the acting and the ever-thickening plot, you would think it couldn’t get any better. But much like the plot, what you think is never reality.

The humor in the show was much different from any I’d heard before. We all know the typical gags that TV shows pull with overly popular jokes. With American Vandal, the humor is only subtle if you’re not paying attention. I remember watching one of the episodes late into the night, worrying I was going to wake my sleeping sister with my laughter.

American Vandal outdid itself in every manner. It was obviously a fast watch but was a TV show I didn’t want to end. Dan Perrault and Tony Yacenda have outdone themselves with this perfect parody of true crime TV series, and season two can be summed up in the sentence, “I cannot wait to lose more sleep over season three.”