Born Evil: The Serial Killer and the Savior

Of all the goofball people to tell this story what in the world makes Bay believe he's the chosen one?

All we are missing here is some extraneous explosions and it definitely gives that 'Bay' feeling, and I mean that in the most profoundly ridiculous way. It's so disjointed, nonsensical, and incredibly obnoxious and I had hope, despite the incredibly obnoxious trailer, that this would be a meaningful story told in a thoughtful, intelligent manner, but yikes. I clung to hope through the first episode, despite the jumpy, shaken angles, despite portraying these LEOs like some sort of heroes/heroines, despite trying to eek out remote sympathies for the victims in the most insanely minuscule manner. But midway through the second episode that was the end.

I'm not sure what audience Bay thought he would appeal to, but given our very visceral reaction to this drivel, it absolutely does not feel like it was for anyone interested in the true crime genre, documentary genre or psychology genre.

What we witnessed was something like a grift, of sorts. Someone trying to capitalize on the genre(s) thinking he had a clearly better way to tell a provocative story but wound up with some weirdly macabre, morose and despicable portrayal.

The people you should feel empathy for are completely secondary, victims aren't important anyway, amirite? The family/friends seem oddly distant and more like a comic book rendition of what Bay told them to be (Hadden's brother wants so desperately to have so much attention and it's all we could do to keep from FF through his interviews) and then there are law enforcement. Good God almighty. The travesty these abominations perpetrated should be implicitly taught in academies as solid 'how-not-to-interrogate' material. That they pled him out to get the remains located tells you how well this nonsense worked and all four should have been immediately fired and barred from being in LEO ever again. But I'm sure they found employ until retirement, since God knows these idiots always fail upward. It was completely horrific to watch, and as grotesque as you think it could be, multiply that by 200.

What a waste, and the fact that this lunacy is drawn out for eight pointless episodes is the epitome of Bay's career- long past its shelf life and needs to be disposed of immediately. Stop funding these vapid vanity projects.

This should not have been a seven episode series. So many episodes showed a lot of the same clips and interviews and, frankly, was very annoying, confusing and a waste of time. The topic itself and interviews were interesting but by the time you watched the same ten minutes in several episodes it becomes boring. It wasn't just one clip or interview they repeated over and over, it was many. At first I thought I put on the same episode, but then they would finally move towards new information. Then the same thing would happen in the following episode.

If this was condensed to a two or three hour program I would give it at least nine stars. I give it one star for editing and continuity so I give the program five stars.

Forensic Files covered Hadden Clark's case in under 30 minutes and still managed to share more info than this whole documentary season. The story is interesting but it could've been told in a single episode or short film. The documentary jumps between victims without clear structure and doesn't explain the evidence or forensics behind the convictions. It focuses too much on the killer's psychology and not enough on the crimes themselves. There are no interviews with Navy personnel to back up Clark's claims of killing while enlisted-even though one episode mentions him throwing someone off a ship. That should've been easy to verify. It also lacks the investigative depth of a show like The Jinx.

If you are looking for a documentary with respect for the victims, that's not it. Don't know how much Michael Bay was actually involved in this but this is not a movie about alien robots, its a doc about real victims and it was not treated like one. Montage and music on steroids, lame reenactments. As if the presentation of the crimes of a serial killer aren't engaging enough, the pacing of this series ( I can't call it a documentary again with peace of mind) is clearly made for people who can't focus on the screen for more than 5 seconds unless its got explosions and stuff. Shame on everyone involved, exploitation of murdered children is an all time low.

Everyone in my true crime groups are raving about the series as well. Many of us binged the whole 5 episodes already.

The interrogation interviews were interesting. The characters were captivating when telling their stories. Many of them are from the East Coast so they had that blunt and humorous aspect to them.

For a documentary about such a depraved and sick cat, the detectives and the savior were hilarious at times. I don't think I've ever laughed watching true crime, but the characters were so real and candid.

I also appreciate that this case hasn't been overly covered like most are. You have to wonder if producers, directors and networks are just lazy are trying to save a buck. Even though I had seen one show on this case, the content in this series was original. The evidence presented was interesting as well.