(Warning: Spoilers ahead.)
Matthew Macfadyen is no stranger to playing a Midwestern sycophant willing to kiss any powerful a-- to get ahead.
Whereas Tom Wambsgans fails up to the very top in Succession, his role as Charles Guiteau in the new Netflix historical drama Death by Lightning depicts an intoxicating mix of political ambition and obsessive fandom that turns lethal.
The four-part limited series, adapted from Candice Millard’s Destiny of the Republic, tells the parallel stories of President James A. Garfield’s (Michael Shannon) reluctant rise to power and the man who ended his administration months into his first term with a bullet. It took two months for Garfield to die in 1881, but there is no mistaking that Guiteau pulled the trigger.
A great politician can make individual voters feel like the only ones in the room; actually having a private interaction with someone like this can be life-changing. In the case of Guiteau, fervor and delusions of grandeur mutate from a benign nuisance to an active threat after his sit-down in the penultimate episode with Garfield at the White House. This brief face-to-face also is a prime example of the most toxic admirer dynamic, ticking all those buzzy parasocial boxes.
It is a troubling tale, showing Guiteau as the OG bad stan whose desire to matter curdles his intentions. In 2025, the events and figures involved are mostly historical footnotes, with Stephen Sondheim’s Assassins being Guiteau’s biggest pop culture claim. Similarly, I can’t be the only one who thinks of the cartoon cat first when hearing the name Garfield, and not the 20th President of the United States (Andrew comes in a close second).
Still, there is nothing dusty about the Death by Lightning subject matter, starring wall-to-wall prestige TV favorites like Macfadyen, Shannon, Bradley Whitford, Shea Whigham, Nick Offerman, and Betty Gilpin. Say hello to Peak Dad TV. By watching Mike Makovsky’s Death by Lightning, the lasgana-loving feline may no longer be the first Garfield who springs to mind.
Of the mostly bearded cast, it is two-time Emmy-winner Macfadyen who has the most challenging task. Not because his facial hair has the least grooming (matching the real Guiteau), but because it would be easy to crank up the “crazy” to wild lunatic heights as a man who thought assassinating Garfield would save the republic. It is no easy feat charting this swing. Still, Macfadyen’s sincere portrayal of Guiteau’s delusions and outsized ego effectively captures his state of mind without ever making mental health a punchline.
Guiteau spends weeks waiting for his audience with his icon. Even when they are face-to-face, he can’t quite believe it is happening; all his bluster disappears. It is Guiteau at his most relatable as he struggles to form a complete sentence and nervously laughs opposite the man he has met once before. Garfield, who has shaken many hands, apologizes that he has no recollection of their previous interaction.
“All I want, sir, is to be your friend,” says Guiteau. The line between fan and obsession blurs dramatically. One reason Guiteau clings to Garfield as a “flare of hope” is what they share, from growing up in poverty to being left-handed—he sees signs everywhere. When Guiteau tells Garfield that he really knows him, it is a profound but misguided declaration, proving parasocial sentiments existed long before social media.
Having a “Presidents! They’re just like us” connection means Guiteau has a grand future if only Garfield can give him a boost.
As the tears brim in Guiteau’s eyes, Garfield remains a vision of neutral calm. Shannon depicts this moment with quiet kindness, as an uncomfortable president still figuring out how to handle fan worship. It would be easy for either (or both) actors to play this moment big, or slyly wink to the audience that an unsuspecting victim is conversing with his killer. Instead, the understated details and muted pleading hammer home the heartbreak to come. It is a meeting cut short by the illness of Garfield’s wife, Crete (Gilpin), but Garfield shows nothing but kindness.
The two-hander is the rare moment in the series where the two men directly engage alone. In every other encounter—including at the train station where he is shot—Garfield is surrounded by constituents or his colleagues. Suffice it to say, one of the jaw-dropping realizations while watching Death by Lightning is grasping the limited lessons from Abraham Lincoln’s assassination at Ford’s Theatre. The Secret Service would not step into its current role until President William McKinley was killed in 1901. That’s right, it takes three successful assassinations to bolster security protocols.
Undoubtedly, the level of direct access to the president is meant to shock audiences in 2025, and at times, the dialogue labors to underscore the difference between past and present. However, I will freely admit that my mouth fell open at seeing how easy it was to get into the White House without so much as a pat-down.
Garfield doesn’t outright reject Guiteau, but he becomes a target anyway. A flashback in the same episode reveals Guiteau’s previous struggle to find a place in the world. Getting asked to leave a free love community (okay, sex cult) is a humiliation that is hard to face. But this is far from the most painful rejection: It is only when Secretary of State James Blaine (Whitford) spells out the cold, hard truth that Guietau throws his adoration into the ring of Vice President Chester Arthur (Offerman).
Like most fans, Guiteau is eager for everyone to know that he has been a Garfield booster since the beginning. He was there before it was cool. Except, this is a lie. When Garfield won the nomination at the Republican National Convention, it was a shock to everyone, including Garfield, as he wasn’t even campaigning for the position.
Given how much of a fantasist the future killer is throughout the series, this is hardly the biggest crime to fudge the date when he started stumping for Garfield. Plus, he quickly goes from “Who?” to chanting Garfield’s name after shaking hands for the first time. It is this physical touch that unlocks Guiteau.
Garfield cannot provide a roadmap for Guiteau’s “help me to succeed” plea because Garfield doesn’t believe that being president elevates him above other men; it is God that grants men purpose. Little does the president know that Guiteau will use religion as part of his defense strategy—the other being that medical malpractice led to Garfield’s death, not Guiteau.
Souring admiration for a politician is not a uniquely 19th (or 21st) century concept. However, Guiteau’s leap from Garfield worship to believing God told him to kill the president he thought could save him is, thankfully, less common. Nevertheless, in the parasocial fan stakes, Charles Guiteau is a cautionary tale worth remembering.
