Grace Saif — theactor who recently joined 13 Reasons Why's third season as new girl and narrator, Ani Achola — has reportedly deactivated all of her social media accounts in the wake of massive fan backlash and cyberbullying.
From the get-go, Ani has been a contentious characters amongst fans and critics alike. Much of the criticism seemed to be rooted in her "meddling" and rape apologist rhetoric, while others were tripped up by the apparent narrative incongruencies related to her sudden introduction to the series.
However, things took a dark turn once fans of the show began cyberbullying Saif herself about Ani with many accusing the actor of "ruining" the show.
Subsequently, Saif appeared to make her Twitter private and took down all her photos from Instagram. And it even got to the point where her co-stars had to begin weighing in on the situation.
For example, co-star Timothy Granaderos Jr. (Monty de la Cruz) took to his Instagram in the wake of the backlash to ask 13 Reasons Why fans to be nicer and remind them that "there is a talented and beautiful actor/actress bringing those scripted words to life."
"One of the underlining themes in our show is to take care of each other. I've seen some pretty nasty things being said online, concerning the introduction of a new character," he wrote in a post. "Y'all are passionate & we love you for that, but PLEASE PLEASE try to be kind and respect the work of the talented actress/actor behind the character."
View this post on InstagramA post shared by timothy granaderos jr. (@timothygranaderos) on
That said, in the wake of Saif's disappearance from social media, others have begun defending her, pointing out the hypocrisy of bullying a "woman until she deleted all her accounts," amongst other things.
See what else Saif's defenders have to say, below.
@gracesaif does NOT deserve hate. She played a character. If you don’t like the character then yeah that’s in opinion but it doesn’t mean you go shitting on the actress.
— ♥️ (@djangxjane) August 26, 2019
Some people are so fucked it’s so sad Grace Saif who plays Ani on TRW had to delete all her pics bc of the hate comments she was getting. Yall need to realise she is just playing a character 🤦🏻♀️
— 𝔅𝔢𝔠 🖤 (@sassyprada) August 26, 2019
Grace Saif deleted her IG after fans bullied her. Please remember these actors are playing characters https://t.co/Am66zVM3wZ
— Brianne (@__SHES_STRIVING) August 30, 2019
I wasn’t really rocking w Ani in #13ReasonsWhy but I find it cruel how y’all bullied this woman until she deleted all her accounts! It’s just a show guys. Hell yeah her character was annoying but y’all forget that this shit isn’t real @gracesaif I hope you’re doing fine ❤️
— kween bee (@Urafukboi1) September 2, 2019
Photo courtesy of Netflix