Pam & Tommy. Review.

The problem with Pam and Tommy is that they are exploiting the exploited.

Without the approval of one of its subjects, the much-hyped show about the theft of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee's sex film offers a screwball meditation on consent.

Pam & Tommy, a Hulu series about the story behind the world's most famous sex tape from the 1990s, is unsettlingly entertaining. The Robert Siegel-created eight-part series, half of which has already shown, is jam-packed with 90s nostalgia and crazy humor meant to spark online debate. There's Lily James and Sebastian Stan as Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, a mulleted Seth Rogen as Rand Gauthier, the stiffed carpenter who pulls off an impressive heist of the couple's safe, played for suspense, and a mulleted Seth Rogen as Rand Gauthier, the stiffed carpenter who pulls off an impressive heist of the couple's safe, played for suspense.

At best, it's a dizzying blend of screwball comedy, madcap romance, pricey nostalgia, and serious retrospective of a public scandal in which a woman's private was invaded, her intimate moments used and evaluated without her consent. But there's one thing that makes me want to gag: the actual Pamela Anderson didn't want this story rehashed. Anderson did not respond to producers' solicitations, despite Stan's confirmation that he spoke with Lee, who appreciated his portrayal. She hasn't commented publicly about the show, but several people have stated her dissatisfaction and disgust with it.

Anderson's reserved demeanor hangs over everything. Pam overhears the Baywatch crew watching the recording and understands that it's her voice, that it's her tape, and that strangers are watching her private film in one memorable scene from the fourth episode. James gives an outstanding performance of paralyzing terror, her slow-burn horror tangible and terrifying. But it's inextricably linked to the off-screen situation for me. Isn't it possible that we're repeating the horror? Pam & Tommy recreates portions of the tape, using actors to replicate Anderson and Lee's sex noises, montages of them having cartoonishly vigorous sex, and prosthetics to imitate their iconic anatomies.

It's made to be unsettling to watch, and while there's a lot going on here, most of it fascinating and praiseworthy, not all suffering is beneficial. I can't get beyond the idea that a show about consent exists without the consent of one of its key topics, no matter how good the mimicry or empathetic depictions are.

It's not without effort; the show's sympathies are clearly with Anderson, particularly in upcoming episodes that reveal how the slut-shaming consequences from the tape's (illegal!) publication was extremely traumatic for her.

That is something I understand. Television is a team effort that shouldn't be based solely on one person's emotions. The narrative control and participation of a subject isn't always the best prescription for clarity, honesty, or even empathy – take, for example, most pop-star films, which essentially serve as long-form PR, such as Taylor Swift's Miss Americana. Anderson's unwillingness to address a foundational public tragedy, which she claims is still "extremely painful" for her, jeopardizes the entire effort. It infiltrates every scene, especially during the mid-season stretch when Pam and Tommy learn the breadth of the tape's dispersion. It makes otherwise powerful, provocative content – on the limits of privacy, the harsh bounds of sex appeal, and the double standards of public exposure – a little uneasy.

It's reasonable to wonder if this show should have been made in the first place, and whether there are limits to a media retrospective, even revision, presented as entertainment. To be fair, the first three episodes of Pam & Tommy, which revolve around Gauthier as a pitiful, sympathetically put-upon figure and recount Anderson and Lee's pairing as a romp, belie a more thoughtful and skewering back half of the season yet to air. In the sixth episode, directed by Hannah Fidell of A Teacher, a violent deposition sequence in which old, white, male lawyers prod her memories for sport is particularly squirm-inducing, evocative, and tragic. However, the source of this insight is overshadowed by the fact that the person in question, once again, did not invite public examination.