These aren ’ thyroxine idle questions. They ’ re what Tiger King directors Eric Goode and Rebecca Chaiklin surely asked themselves before starting study on the series ’ five-episode second season, now available on Netflix. Yet judging by what they produced, they never figured out the answers. The Tiger King sequel is a frustrating mess, with none of the gripping storytelling that made the original run such a guilty pleasure .
It ’ second hard to figure out what this second temper is intended to be. The first episode is the most promise one of the solid batch. It takes a larger look at the solid Tiger King phenomenon, recalling how the express swept across the United States during what turned out to be a very foreign class for America and the world. The episode captures the many ways that the documentary ’ s subjects became about like fictional characters to the populace, some of whom dressed up like Joe and Carole for Halloween, or ferociously debated the guilt or artlessness of the serial ’ participants .
then episodes two and three change course, disappearing once again down the rabbit hole of the accusations against Carole Baskin, who — as covered reasonably thoroughly in season 1 — has been suspected of foul maneuver in the 1997 fade of her affluent ex-husband Don Lewis. The raw material adds small, except for fresh interviews with people who rehash a draw of the same information, in boring detail.
Episodes four and five pivot again, and function the most like a proper sequel to the inaugural Tiger King. The beginning season exposed the miss of governmental oversight at “ wildlife confrontation ” tourist spots, and drew demands both from animal-rights activists and from ordinary concerned citizens that the politics shut down these sketchy operations. The last two episodes of season 2 document the pressure put on Jeff Lowe and Tim Stark, two of the Joe Exotic-like menagerie owners featured in the former range. defiant to the last, even as federal agents roll onto their properties to take their animals away, Lowe and Stark grow increasingly frantic, making desperate moves. Their scenes are easily the most exciting of these five episodes, though like the rest of this season, their stories aren ’ t particularly well woven into the whole .
Throughout all the episodes, Goode and Chaiklin return regularly to Joe Exotic, placid sitting in prison, where he ’ randomness been following what ’ s gone on since Tiger King debuted, and hoping person from his old liveliness will step up and help exonerate him of the charge that he hired a gunman to kill Baskin. The modern temper covers the fail efforts to get Joe a presidential amnesty, including some startling footage of the team behind the campaign unfurling a standard at a January 6th D.C. “ Stop the Steal ” rally, and drawing some angry reactions. Lawyer John Phillips finally moves from representing Don Lewis ’ family ( and losing their trust after convincing them to appear in an ad during Carole Baskin ’ s appearance on Dancing with the Stars ) to representing Exotic, and trying to get all the people who turned on him to rally to his defense .
But precisely as alien ’ randomness case seems about to take a turn in his party favor, the season abruptly ends, suggesting that somewhere down the road, like it or not, we can expect a Tiger King season 3. Goode and Chaiklin then tag on an epilogue that ’ s about like an reconsideration, revealing the potentially happier futures for all the boastful cats seized from Stark, Lowe, and Exotic.
That epilogue at least projects the smell of purpose that the rest of the temper is lacking. Tiger King is brassy, but season 1 did shine a light on some distressing mistreatment of animals, and season 2 shows that some good was done because of it. But the epilogue besides smacks of self-congratulation — as does the season ’ sulfur prologue, which celebrates the big consultation the series drew when people were on the spur of the moment stuck at home stopping point class, anxious for any kind of fun shared experience .
besides, the filmmakers ultimately double down on some of the most distasteful elements from their initial run. once again, they let their subjects serve up uncorroborated accusations of criminal behavior, couched as dishy gossip. They turn actual people ’ s lives and deaths into the thrust of soap operas, for viewers to laugh at, gasp over, and scrutinize .
In episode 1, at least, it about seems like Tiger King is going to be self-critical, getting into how the series ’ subjects have been handling their newfound fame — which in some cases has meant having terrifyingly hateful comments directed at them, on-line and in populace. ( Carole Baskin, who has been the most knock, notably does not sit down for a new interview in this season, and is presently suing Netflix for including her at all. ) Some of the new episodes ’ most provocative moments return to this estimate that sudden fame can obscure the lines between fact and fiction, like when Don Lewis ’ class sets up a tip-line about his disappearance, and it ’ south inevitably gets flooded with calls from people who want to parcel theories they developed only from watching Tiger King.
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And sure, the team behind this display hush has a sense of what kind of outlandishness their fans want to see, whether it ’ s a psychic hired by Don Lewis ’ class vomiting as he walks around what he swears is the place where Lewis was killed, or it ’ s Jeff Lowe building a little airstrip club in the middle of his menagerie, complete with a hot tub cortege for when “ Shaq and Flav ” drop by. The people in this microcosm are even perversely fascinating — and possibly none more than Tim Stark, who comes across like the bill poster child for 2020s “ live free and die ” american animation, as he insists that no one can tell him what he can and can ’ t do with any animal he owns .
distillery, season 1 put all these odd ducks in a well-ordered row, telling a narrative with carefully timed twists at the end of about every sequence. Season 2, on the other hand, continues some parts of that narrative and merely reprise others, randomly strewing all these loosely plug in pieces across 200 or thus amorphous minutes. possibly we need the feds to step in again. Can person please come along and liberate the more harbor parts of Tiger King ?
Season 2 of Tiger King is streaming on Netflix immediately .