Crimes That Shook Australia

In this age of loud, boisterous TV 'real' or 'true' crime shows, the focus appears to be on jarring music, industrial sound effects, poorly written scripts presented straight to camera by a pseudo- expert or media 'head' and ill-conceived and executed dramatizations. Crimes that Shook Australia succumbs to all of these pitfalls.

Aaccuracy is shoved to one side in favour of giving vapid host Stan Grant a celebrity link man pay check, dramatizations are terribly cast, important details are glossed over and in the case of recidivist crimes (like Peter Dupas) there is no mention on the system failing society in allowing a clearly disturbed man to reenter society to escalate his violent predilections.

Marry that with the above-mentioned cheesy-yet-jarring music bed & CtSA is just another bit of sensationalist filler, not even adopting the sometimes more sombre approach of its progenitor, the middling Crimes that Shook Britain.

Milperra massacre? The murder of Sian Kingi? The murders by Ivan Milat? You chose to show Matthew over Ivan! There are by far bigger crimes that have shook Australia.

Apart from the obvious tragedy and digusting nature of these crimes, the thing that stood out to me, and was consistent in every one, was the involvement of the media in hindering the police investigations of these crimes.