After five seasons of stalking, scheming, and spine-tingling monologues, Penn Badgley is officially ready to break up with You — and not in a creepy Joe Goldberg way.
The 38-year-old actor, who has played the infamous antihero since 2018, stopped by The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on May 2 and admitted that he’s reached his limit with the Netflix thriller.
“I was 30 when I took the role,” Badgley shared.
“It’s been close to eight years, but the way that ends up working out is that I will — I’m gonna be 40 by the end of next year and I’m probably still gonna be talking about it — so that’s my 30s right there.”
He added, “It was a definitive event of my 30s. That’s huge.”
Fans have followed Joe through bookstores, brownstones, and body counts, but now that the final season has dropped — yes, it’s streaming right now if you’re brave enough — Badgley is at peace with the show’s ending.
When Fallon asked if he was satisfied with how the twisted tale wraps up, he simply said, “Yeah,” noting that the show closes out with “a deconstruction of Joe, of this character.”
And that deconstruction isn’t just psychological — it’s physical. In fact, shooting the finale literally wore him out.
“I’m expressing rage all the time on the show, and I’m, you know, it comes through your neck,” Badgley said, explaining the bizarre toll the role has taken on his body. “It’s just like a lot of neck muscles involved.”
“I found that those muscles were just completely giving out, just entirely giving out,” he admitted. “I couldn’t manipulate my performance. I couldn’t do anything.”
He even demonstrated the raspy result for Fallon, saying, “What I was doing I thought was very uninteresting, but all I could do is just kind of say everything like this. And I’m not kidding. That’s not an exaggeration.”
Fallon couldn’t help but quip, “It’s because of all the years, seasons of doing this show and you’re like my body was saying goodbye.” To which Badgley replied, “It was everything. My body was saying no to this man.”
Still, despite the wear and tear, the Gossip Girl alum told People he’ll carry a bit of Joe with him — in a less murdery sense.
“I think I will miss him a little bit. He’s been a profound experience for me,” he said. And while he doesn’t condone his character’s crimes, Joe still taught him a thing or two.
“He’s taught me a lot about what it is to be a man by knowing what it is not. And I don’t mean the obvious things like, ‘Oh, don’t murder. That’s bad.’ That’s very clear.”
