The Millions Of Views On Kevin Spacey’s Weird Video Show That, For Better Or Worse, People Miss Him

One of the most-watched videos of this past holiday weekend was the weird, bizarre “Let Me Be Frank” video that Kevin Spacey released on his YouTube channel. In the video, which must be seen to be believed, his House of Cardscharacter Frank Underwood addressed his fans and haters while wearing a festive Christmas apron and preparing food in his kitchen.

There was lots of speculation about whether he was addressing all of the things said about Frank or he was addressing the sexual assault allegations that have been leveled against him in the past year, culminating with sexual assault charges being filed in Massachusetts shortly before the video was released.

One thing is clear, though: a lot of people were curious about Spacey. As of this writing, the video has over 6.4 million views on YouTube. This is likely more people than who have seen any of the final season of House of Cards — we really don’t know, because Netflix doesn’t release those numbers — where Underwood is dead and his wife Claire (Robin Wright) becomes president.

But I’m not sure what’s more alarming: The number of people who have viewed the video or the plethora of comments below it that not only are in full support of Spacey but hate the fact that Netflix fired him in the first place.

Yes, YouTube comments are a cesspool; we’ve known that since the site started 12 years ago. There are plenty of comments that call Spacey a “pedo” and worse. But when you see comments like this, you raise your eyebrows a bit:

Many of them, though, are not quite as eloquent as the one above:

Then there are the arguments that go back and forth between the Spacey supporters and those who think he’s guilty of all the accusations against him:

From all the comments we read, and the fact that this video got 144,000 “thumbs up” vs. that 44,000 “thumbs down”, it’s pretty safe to come to the conclusion that people miss Spacey, especially on HoC. But we have to wonder: Does these folks’ desire to see Spacey act again really outweigh the desire to see the accusations against him play out, especially the one in Massachusetts that’s going to send him to a courtroom?

It’s a weird limbo to be in, and we’re inclined to see Spacey face his accusers before we ever see him in a new show or movie again. The charges and accusations against him are serious and, whether he goes to prison or not, they’ll likely damage his career for good. But that is nothing compared to the emotional damage he inflicted on his victims, if the charges are true. It’s disrespectful to his accusers to dismiss what they’re saying about him just because he’s not on your favorite show anymore.

But when did the words “respect” and “YouTube comments” ever appear in the same sentence?

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere.