I Can’t Unsee The Painfully Coordinated Outfits From The Watcher

Have you ever watched a show and found yourself screaming at your television like a Republican dad watching Fox News? That was me on Thursday night, but it wasn’t caused by faux outrage propaganda, it was due to the obnoxiously neutral outfits of the Brannock family.

When I clicked play on The Watcher, Dean’s (Bobby Cannavale) camel hat, camel jacket, camel shirt, camel pants, and camel shoes (I’m not exaggerating) were the first thing I noticed. Though I was annoyed by the conclusion-less ending, the family’s violently khaki outfits angered me to my core. I literally couldn’t unsee it if I tried, because the aesthetic carried on throughout the entire series.

In episode one, Dean wore a head-to-toe tan look and continued that vibe scene after scene, trading it only for the occasional groutfit. There was a tan suit with a tan tie and tan shirt, the gray robe with charcoal pants and a heather gray top, and the gray suit with a matching shirt and tie — just to name a few.

Nora’s (Naomi Watts) looks were equally monochrome, mostly consisting of beachy, whitewashed tones. The artsy mom wore ivory from head to toe (no doubt to communicate her career as a potter) or textured layers of suburbanite gray. When she wasn’t cloaked in those dreary colorways, Nora was stealing her husband’s love of an all-camel ’fit.

To quote another infuriated watcher (heh): “We get it, they’re white and rich.”

As a career Fashion Person, the unrelenting color coordination felt just as aggressive to me as the mysterious letters. And a quick Twitter search revealed that I wasn’t alone in my fury. The app is currently ablaze with complaints about Netflix’s strange choice of costume design.

Give me creepy letters any day, but you can miss me with those outfits.