Stanley Milgram had an epic vision for social psychology: to create strong experimental contexts that would demonstrate the power of the social world to shape individual behaviour. Consistent with this goal, variants of the obedience paradigm reveal participants' propensity to show not only total obedience but also total disobedience. This article argues that the key remaining task for researchers is to explain this variation, but that to do this we need to reconnect with the richness of Milgram's data and ideas. This theme is echoed and elaborated in other contributions to this special feature. Alexandra Milgram tells us about the passions that motivated her husband's life and work; Jerry Burger discusses his replication of the Milgram studies; film scholar Kathryn Millard explores an overlooked side of Milgram; and historian Richard Overy considers the impact of Milgram's ideas on our understanding of destructive obedience in, and after, the Second World War.