Sulla scena del delitto: Il killer di Times Square

I decided to watch this because I've become fascinated with the serial killers that were active in the 70s and 80s. I enjoyed the documentary series about the Night Stalker on Netflix and thought this would be similar...it was not.

The information about the murders and how they finally caught the serial killer would've only filled one episode (if they were lucky). The majority of this limited series was actually about the sex business in Times Square in the 70s and 80s. There were a lot of explicit photos and videos that had absolutely nothing to do with the murders. Sure, some of the victims were sex workers and sure, the serial killer did find some of his victims in Times Square. However, the connection they gave between the murders and the sex businesses in Times Square was extremely tenuous at best and non-existent at worst.

Honestly, this should've been two different series: one about the history of the sex business in Times Square and one about the serial killer and his victims. It was very disappointing to find the information of the serial killer was randomly peppered into this story about pornography in NYC.

If you're looking for a good true crime series about a serial killer, this isn't it.

If I'm being honest, I missed some of the 2nd episode because I kept falling asleep. Some of that was not having had a lot of sleep lately but the show just wasn't what it's purported to be. It's more a story about the tawdry pornography of Times Square before it got cleaned up. It focused on the sex workers as well as the peep shows and sex clubs that were so prevalent back then. The murders were almost a side story and admittedly started the series off with a bang with a double murder in a hotel near Times Square. Clearly the murders were done by a deranged man. And then another murder happens. And so the investigation began. That part of the story kept this at 5/10 stars for me. It's before DNA and surveillance cameras so it was interesting to watch what the police did with little to no evidence. But, as I said before, this is mainly a story about Times Square when it was a dangerous part of the city. It's full of pimps and XXX rated movies and former prostitutes telling their stories. Former police officers from that time period as well as that particular case were also interviewed. When it wasn't talking about the murders I did get a bit bored. Sorry. I just think it would have been better told with less about the sex trade and pornography and more about the murders. It might have made it shorter, but that would have been to the good, not the detriment of the documentary.

Much like the Cecil Hotel series from the same show this version spends way to long explaing things that are interesting, but not necessarily relevant to the story. I lost count oglf hiw many times we were told that Times Square was a sexual wasteland where whatever happened to whoever. We get it, it's relevant but not for 2/3 of your runtime. At least unlike the Cecil episode this one doesn't rely on YouTube bloggers.

By 1980, the sex district attached to Times Square had grown from 42nd street to Central Park and extended as far south as 35th street. At dusk, young women clad in silk dresses and heels invaded the bars in the luxury hotels of Midtown, and walked up and down Avenue of the Americas, looking for tricks. The sex trade changed as it got closer to Times Square itself, devolving into kiosks selling hard porn newspaper, live sex shows, on premises sex clubs, and "touch joints" where men paid to interact with the performers.

In the years after the pill and before the AIDS epidemic, every major city had a Times Square, but no place (not even tolerant Mitchell Brothers San Francisco) was like that area of NYC. It was the epicenter of sex and sex tourism, and one of the major attractions for adventurous couples and single men.

Into this Wild West atmosphere came a serial killer who was also a sexual sadist. However, in an area when rape was seldom prosecuted but prostitution was, it's impossible to know how many victims the killer had before he began mutilating the corpses and getting into the news. He kept killing, not until he was caught by police work, but until he was trying to murder a prostitute in a hotel. When she fought back, she was rescued by a hotel maid.

The circumstances of the man's capture by a victim and another woman say so much about criminal Justice, prostitution and men. While the murderer's male coworkers know there is something off about him, but do nothing, and the male cops fail to convict him in spite of the evidence, two women from the Pink Collar Ghetto catch him in the act.

It's the most interesting part of the case, and Joe Berlinger fails to highlight it. (Maybe that's why there should be more women making films about men who do violence to women).

The second most interesting part of the case is that the daughter of one of the killer's victim is pursuing a friendship with the murderer to help find out who his other victims are. It too is a trail that Berlinger doesn't follow. (I found out about it by reading an article in an NJ paper!)

Why are these points important? Because, in spite of the police in the film saying that the Wild West of Times Square ended with AIDS, at least 16 bodies of prostitutes have been found on Gilgo Beach, less than 40 miles from Times Square,

Women are still being murdered, and nothing seems to have changed in how the crimes are being investigated. Shouldn't that be the point of the series?

The series, which is drawn to the grisly and seedy parts of the original murders, fails to put either the killer or his victims into context. By treating them as "something that happened a lot during the 70s," it fails to understand sex crimes, sex criminals, prostitution or the way it is happening again.

Could have been a very interesting documentary if it was 2 hours long. But as usual they had to stretch into 3 episodes. Very tired of shows on Netflix that are stretched out and turn repetitious and boring.