Cheer

I am not from the US, and cheerleading is not a thing here. I obviously knew it was a thing because of movies and tv-shows and these did really mostly present it as like "not hard" or its only "dumb blonde girls" doing it. Personally I saw that it probably takes a huge amount of practice and effort to do it before I watched this, but I really didn't know anything about how competitive it is for so many young athletes. It's insane how many injuries occur almost every other day and how hard they have to work to get everything done right. Nothing but huge respect to all the people involved here.

As for the documentary itsself, I think it really does its job well. The bigger picture is the training for the Daytona competition, but they also take their time to focus on some of the athletes involved and I really appreciated that. All in all a great documentary that is also really captivating because you really start rooting for these people to succeed.

Can only recommend this for people who are interested in sports and how athletes practice, not only for cheerleading but for other types of sports too.

It's in the title, I have never taken the time to review any movie/series before but for some reason cheer has moved me to do this, it is so worth a watch, watching the team grow from the start to the championships is an emotional journey and really makes you appreciate what these athletes go through. Only criticism is sometimes it is slightly over emotional at time's, but once you're past this it's a really good watch!

Before I rip into the utter disregard for safety in this cheer program, I'll point out the positive things. The kids work their butts off and support one another. The series showcases the personal struggles in the lives of some of the cheerleaders, but none of these struggles stem from any of the stereotypical cheerleader drama that you see in movies. These are kids trying to do their very best in life and that's admirable. I'll also positively note that the head coach Monica instills in the kids a work ethic. It's also great that she is willing to accept kids with rougher backgrounds into the program and be a role model to them in certain ways.

But oh man.... It's hard to watch this show at times due to the utter disregard for these kids' safety. I really shouldn't have to qualify my review because any viewer with a brain can see this, but I'm sure some people will assume that I don't understand competitive cheerleading (since no, I wasn't a cheerleader), but I will note that I competed in Division I college athletics. I've been around all kinds of high level sports my ENTIRE life (playing, coaching, and watching). I've overcome injuries that required surgeries all in the name of the sports I've loved. And yes, this kind of cheerleading is most definitely a sport. It is intense and dangerous acrobatics aimed at winning a national championship by having the most difficult and well-executed routine.

The routines are dangerous. That in and of itself is a concern and you could debate that certain stunts should no longer be allowed, such as basket tosses where a cheerleader is thrown incredibly high into the air, executing multiple flips and twists, only to be caught in the arms of several teammates. Cheerleaders sometimes die doing those kinds of stunts. That said, I feel like that's a different kind of debate altogether, because as it is, competitive cheerleading currently allows that kind of thing. So going into this TV series, you kind of have to accept that premise since it's currently part of the sport and to win a National Title, the team would have to include those stunts. And the kids in this series are seriously good athletes, performing seriously complex sports.

Therefore, I actually think the thing that is most CRAZY about this show (and admittedly entertaining in a train wreck way) is how these kids worship their head coach Monica and do anything she says. If she says to do the routine full-out or throw extra tumbling runs even if they are way too winded to perform these things safely, they do it, no questions asked. If they're clearly in physical pain, the coaching staff tells them it's mental and to shake it off, so they do. This is a dangerous formula. It's the formula of cults. It wouldn't be so bad if Monica and her assistant coach made better decisions, but since Monica is not the kind of coach you should actually trust, she constantly puts her kids in danger and MANY of them get hurt as a result. Granted, you see this too often in many sports (football comes to mind), but I'm not reviewing a docu-series about a dangerous football coaching team, but I wouldn't hesitate to do so if I watched it.

Without giving away any major spoilers, I'll give a few examples. When one of the athletes has a chronic rib cage injury that leaves her crumpled on the floor, they do NOT have it checked by a doctor. Just the college trainer. The assistant coach goes as far as to admit in his interview that they don't know exactly what is wrong with her, but they call it "ribiosis." If you Google "ribiosis" it does not even return any legitimate medical hits on the first 2 pages. Instead, it comes up under cheerleading pages (incl. discussions about this show). Why? Probably because it's code word for "the cheerleader has cracked ribs but we aren't going to do an X-ray on her because we need her to compete." Good Lord.

Additionally, a common training method that Monica employs is to have them do their routine "full-out" (which means all of the stunts, basket tosses, tumbling, and pyramid) while they extremely winded. This is meant to be part of their conditioning! Hello! There are some sports you can do while extremely winded - such as soccer or basketball or running. But other things that can have devastating outcomes if performed without precise form should NOT be done while extremely winded - such as max weight lifting, gymnastics, and cheerleading stunts. If these things can't be done with correct form or with the required strength, it is a recipe for disaster. This is HOW people get hurt (and, yes, this happens in the show - while winded, the cheerleaders make serious mistakes and injuries happen). These cheerleaders should be conditioned with safe methods instead of being forced to throw dangerous stunts. Anyone who doesn't understand this and defends Monica for doing this (calling her "tough") has either never played high-level sports or they DID but they only had bad coaches. Because I was so lucky to have some great coaches at both the high school and college level who knew what they were doing, who knew how to push us without putting us in danger.

When another girl is struggling with a rib injury (sensing a pattern?), the trainer tells her that she needs to go to the ER after practice. When the girl tells Monica this, Monica's response is an irritated, "Cute." Cute? Who responds like that upon hearing that an athlete (that they are supposed to care about) has a rib injury bad enough to be checked out at the ER? Oh, that's right: A coach whose #1 priority is to put her best athletes in a routine no matter what, even if they are injured, suffering, and will possibly deal with long-term chronic pain their whole life as a result of doing incredibly jarring stunts while already injured. Immediately, I said to my roommate, "Looks like that trainer is getting fired!" In reality, the coaches should be fired.

This show was unbelievable on so many levels! But it is worth the watch for sure!

There is something so special about sports documentaries-especially when they focus on young, scrappy athletes who have battled personal struggles to make a family out of their team. We have all seen the fluff behind the world of cheerleading, but this compelling documentary exposes the hard work and intense regimen behind this sport, while shifting our focus to the the individuals who make up the team and what makes each one special. By the end, I felt like I knew these remarkable, resilient young men and women. I feel grateful to have been let into their lives for a few fleeting hours. And Coach Monica is the heart and soul of this drama. As a former college athlete, I know what a gift it is to have a coach like her.

I binged straight through this limited series. Held my breath. Cried. Cheered the athletes on. What a lovely portrait of tenacity.

I spent 40 years as an investment banker for Texas municipal bonds. During that time, I had to sit through a school board meeting where the board president was being arrested for shooting his wife, where a community member screamed at the district lawyer for being "a Mexican," and where a husband hit the superintendents for sleeping with his wife. But, by far, I never experience ANYTHING as bad as a "cheerleader controversy." I sat for four hours while community members came close to blows over whether the cheerleader should be suspended over drinking beer at the game, or whether it was true that it "was just NyQuil."

In small town Texas, cheerleaders are the closest thing to royalty. They are terrific athletes and they are full of drama.

This is the peak of the lives of a lot of kids, and it deserves as much acclaim as "Friday Night Lights."

Trinity Valley was one of my clients, and I miss those kids.

Classify them as "athletes."