The final part of this documentary is follow-up. What has happened to these two guys since the conclusion of the trials. In the previous episodes there were two convictions of first degree murder. Avery with no chance for parole and Dassey, a chance for release at age 58. We now get to see the appeals process in motion. Again, I'm no lawyer and documentarians can be partial, but one can't help but feel that law enforcement from the lowest level to the very top really look out for each other and the chance of a new trial is almost laughable. Where is some karma involved when the lead prosecutor is found to be a sexual predator. I loved it when he told the reporter who e-mailed him to be aware of the damage he would do to his reputation and to his family. There is a lot of fallout about this presentation and it will be interesting to see what happens now. Quite an experience watching it.
4 Reviews
S1: Engaging and chilling in its construct, despite running a little long, and leaning the viewer one way more than t'other (TOTAL SPOILERS)
bob the moo23 May 2017
Warning: Spoilers
I'll spoil the detail of this show for the handful of people who have not seen it, so, if like me you are late to seeing this, just skip this little comment from me. For me, I could hardly wait till I had finished watching to be able to jump online and read around the subjects and other material to do with this show, because I had found it compelling throughout. Reading the many online commentaries of the show, at lot get split into the camps of "he did it" or "he didn't do it", but many are closer to where I ended up – which is to say that I am not sure he didn't commit this terrible murder, but at the same time I don't think he should have been found guilty. In the same way, one wonders why he couldn't have done it, and the police could still have been involved in shady or downright wrong practices to help the case along in the direction they 'knew' it should go.
It is this murky messiness that engaged me so deeply in the series. The presentation certainly tends to lean towards one 'side' more than the other – although this is partly down to one side being more active to engage with the filmmakers, not just their agenda in the presentation. There is certainly a lot of twists and turns with various testimony and evidence presented as it goes, and it is very well edited together to keep the viewer informed as to what is going on, the significance of it, and also making it work in a way that has a dramatic narrative flow. While this certainly involves sacrifice in terms of the complete picture, it makes for a compelling watch, and I do not think it costs the reality too much.
Everyone can have their opinion, but outside of this it is hard to imagine many people coming away thinking that justice was done and the system worked precisely as it should have done. There is a lot of dubious stuff on both sides (well, one more than the other), and mostly the show does use this well so that the viewer has lots of doubts all pulling in different directions at different times. At 10 episodes it does run a little long – but I only really felt this toward the end, and not too often. Otherwise it is an impressive piece of editing and story-telling, to take such a complex and long- running series of cases, with a lot of moving parts and characters, and make it reasonably easy to follow and engaging.
There is a lot to debate, read about, argue over, or dispute about what is shown (and not shown) in these ten episodes, but I find it hard to believe that the majority of viewers will not be gripped and chilled by this depiction of the process of 'justice', and this is the strength of the show.
It is this murky messiness that engaged me so deeply in the series. The presentation certainly tends to lean towards one 'side' more than the other – although this is partly down to one side being more active to engage with the filmmakers, not just their agenda in the presentation. There is certainly a lot of twists and turns with various testimony and evidence presented as it goes, and it is very well edited together to keep the viewer informed as to what is going on, the significance of it, and also making it work in a way that has a dramatic narrative flow. While this certainly involves sacrifice in terms of the complete picture, it makes for a compelling watch, and I do not think it costs the reality too much.
Everyone can have their opinion, but outside of this it is hard to imagine many people coming away thinking that justice was done and the system worked precisely as it should have done. There is a lot of dubious stuff on both sides (well, one more than the other), and mostly the show does use this well so that the viewer has lots of doubts all pulling in different directions at different times. At 10 episodes it does run a little long – but I only really felt this toward the end, and not too often. Otherwise it is an impressive piece of editing and story-telling, to take such a complex and long- running series of cases, with a lot of moving parts and characters, and make it reasonably easy to follow and engaging.
There is a lot to debate, read about, argue over, or dispute about what is shown (and not shown) in these ten episodes, but I find it hard to believe that the majority of viewers will not be gripped and chilled by this depiction of the process of 'justice', and this is the strength of the show.
Fighting for Their Lives
Michael_Elliott14 January 2016
Making a Murderer: Fighting for Their Lives (2015)
Both Steven and Brendan are behind bars, convicted for murder and rape. The final episode in the series takes a look at several years worth of appeals plus what the men are currently up to.
As the tenth episode comes to a close I must admit that I didn't get my law degree in the ten hours that it took me to watch this. Do I think either men are guilty? I honestly can't say because the documentary is so one-sided that you can't believe it at face value. I honestly think there are many questionable things that happened in the trials but everyone keeps talking about the dirty cops but there must have been something there that made 24 people think that the two men were guilty. I'm sure this isn't the end to this story.
Episode: A
Both Steven and Brendan are behind bars, convicted for murder and rape. The final episode in the series takes a look at several years worth of appeals plus what the men are currently up to.
As the tenth episode comes to a close I must admit that I didn't get my law degree in the ten hours that it took me to watch this. Do I think either men are guilty? I honestly can't say because the documentary is so one-sided that you can't believe it at face value. I honestly think there are many questionable things that happened in the trials but everyone keeps talking about the dirty cops but there must have been something there that made 24 people think that the two men were guilty. I'm sure this isn't the end to this story.
Episode: A
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