Netflix’s latest true crime docuseries “Dirty Pop: The Boy Band Scam” is finding itself at the center of an ongoing controversy regarding the use of artificial intelligence in documentary filmmaking. Director David Terry Fine’s decision to include a deepfake recreation of the late music mogul Lou Pearlman, who died in 2016, has renewed debate around the ethical applications of AI technology in storytelling.

In an interview with IndieWire, Fine defended utilizing a deepfake version of Pearlman, which was modeled after an unreleased pitch video discovered in his office. The process involved a stand-in actor and AI algorithms to generate Pearlman’s likeness and vocal performance. Fine argues the deepfake serves as “poetic justice” aligned with Pearlman’s own deceptive persona, which he used to scam countless artists and investors over the years through boy bands like Nsync.

While acknowledging traditional VFX could achieve a similar result, Fine was drawn...