American Greed

Anybody remember the Wall Street meltdown of 2008/2009? Remember how they fixed this mess? Tax Payers bailed out not only Wall Street, Banks, Insurance Companies (AIG) and more entities than I care to list.

I have seen every season of American Greed with exception to seasons 2 and 3.

If I can say one positive about the "Great Recession" of 2008/2009 it exposed multiple Ponzi Schemes that showed corrupt businesses ripping off not only Americans but investors all over the world in the billions of dollars.

Charles Ponzi was famous for starting this scheme many many years ago but really took off again in recent years with the great economies of the late 1990's and also early in the 21st century. Bernie Madoff is the most infamous of this type of scheme as he took it to another level which lasted for over two decades and bilked honest American and International people out of billions.

American Greed covers many of the most incredible cases where one or a group of individuals defrauded countless Americans out of their life savings and destroyed many families financially as a result.

Some of the more intriguing cases for me where the criminals were convicted:

Gerald Payne - Greater Ministries International

Scott Rothstein - Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler law firm

Tom Petters - Fingerhut and Polaroid

Nevin Shapiro - Major League Fraud - Gambling addict but started legitimate business originally. Exposed Miami Hurricanes Football

Steven Warshak - Enzytes. Products he sold was a total fraud but his commercials most funny in history with smiling Bob.

So many more great episodes during 8 seasons of fraud and ponzi schemes.

Stacy Keach does a great job narrating and this is an awesome true crime series that has just recently started their 9th season. I give this series a 10/10. I hope this series lasts forever and keep exposing the criminals throughout the USA and Internationally about multiple crooks with only one goal in mind: steal your money!

I really enjoyed watching this series, however, I did notice a pattern in how certain women were talked about. There was one episode (Family Fortune Feud) in which one of the fraudsters married an adult entertainer. One of his friends is interviewed, and says that he didn't think she would have the qualities to be a good wife or mother, specifically because of her line of work.

I understand that he's free to say what he wants. However, the network has a responsibility to not promote casual sexism. They likely had plenty of interview footage to work with, but chose to use the "juiciest" parts. There is another episode where a woman they interviewed said she would never have invested with him (the fraudster) if she'd known what she (his wife) did for a living. The fraudsters wife was a stripper.

Men are also not spared. Multiple episodes go into great detail about how unattractive certain men were, or how short they were, almost as if to say, "so you understand why they'd..."

Even worse is the narration, when employs various outdated phrases to describe a variety of women who don't fit the oblivious homemaker mold.

It was very interesting to see a show explaining essentially that you can't trust someone based on what you see and what they say, while still enforcing the antiquated cultural ideas of who should and shouldn't be trusted.

So, yes, this was very interesting. I would not, however, recommend it to children or teenagers without context because of the casual sexism.

We need a show like this for every industry and job. Where there is a human element there will always be shenanigans a foot. My hope is that exposing the truth is the best way for people to learn right from wrong or at the very least weight the risk vs reward of the crimes portrayed in this show.

I'd like to see American Greed create mini-series and movies. A show for religion and politics would be a nice change of pace as well. American Greed themed episode box sets or playlists would be a nice touch.

If you like this show, may I suggest: Enron: Smartest Guys in the Room Jerry & Marge Go Large FreakEnomics

Thank You for Smoking.

I like the show. But one thing they got wrong on the above episode is that they said he was living on a dingy street. They showed a hotel named "Ocean Surf" to be one of the dingy hotels. I'm from Miami and...the street they showed was on South Beach, which is a very nice area. And the hotel is also nice. If you want to view it, do a Google search on the hotel.

The show is well executed in just about every way. Each case is chosen very carefully, they make sure there is enough detail that it will keep your attention for the deration of the episode. I don't like feeling as though a show could have explained the case in 5 minutes. This is just the opposite it is STUFFED with twists and unpredictable characters that commit unpredictable crimes. I was 100% hesitate when I began watching, I didn't like the narrator I thought he was...tacky (for lack of better terms). He sounded like someone narrating '1000 ways to die'. But then, I realized how well written his script was and how detailed he is. He captivates your attention in a way that one with intelligence would, it was undeniable, I fell in love with him... The show is well executed and a great addition to the true crime genre; I'm totally addicted and can't stop watching. I'm a big fan of well made shows such as dateline and 48 hours, I feel as though this show is just as good. My biggest concern about a perfectly executed true crime show is the cases which are chosen. I believe the best quality American Greed has is their choice of cases they investigate. I see that they have a lot of other sub series that I will look into after I'm done! I'm so happy they have as many episodes as they do. They are so thoroughly made I was wondering if it was a short lived series before looking to see how many series they do have. I notice that well made shows don't tend to last as long because they cost so much to make, I hope that means people like it as much as me!