i like to think of myself as someone who's worked in the industry, has consumed hundreds of hours of content both professionally and personally that i've got pretty decent taste. so, during my out-of-work era (because the industry is collapsing) i've been watching more and more docs that i would share some of my favourites from over the years. also, this is an ever-growing list.
↠ summary
💬 my general word vomit
⚠︎ content warnings
✶ star rating (as a caveat, i'm not ranking the true crime stories themselves as it feels highly unethical just more the editorial decisions also, i'm a firm believer in not watching true crime docs where the people involved haven't signed off on it).
TRUE CRIME GENRE
girl in the picture (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ in this documentary, a woman found dying by a road leaves behind a son, a man claiming to be her husband — and a mystery that unfolds like a nightmare.
💬 the way this just gets worse and worse as the story progresses. everyone failed this poor kid.
⚠︎ child abuse themes • strong language • sexual references, including assault
into the fire: the lost daughter (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ cathy learns of the disappearance of her birth daughter, aundria, in twenty-ten. a search for answers leads to a shocking suspect.
💬 gonna be honest, one, never doubt a mother's intuition. two, i figured it out within the first five-minutes however, for me this story is more about seeking justice for a little girl who lost her voice. also, never trust a pick me.
⚠︎ child abuse themes • strong language • sexual references, including assault
night stalker: the hunt for a serial killer (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ a four-part true crime series documenting the hunt for serial killer, richard ramirez.
💬 if i've learned anything from these documentaries, the police, especially in the eighties are as thick as pig shit at best and negligent at worst. however these guys did not too bad compared to the rest. i watched this years ago and i think it was the first time that i thought, "woah, netflix is actually putting money in their metaphorical docs department."
⚠︎ child abuse themes • strong language • sexual references, including assault
ice cream wars (✶✶✶✶✶) — netflix (could go back on bbc iplayer)
↠ this documentary series delves into the gang wars that terrorised ice-cream van drivers in glasgow and the nineteen-eighty-four attack that killed a family.
💬 so this hits a little close too home for me. i basically grew up in the east end, my mum and her family are from easterhouse and my step-dad used to work in a van, in easterhouse not long after all of this. the doc does a really good job of setting the scene of the working class in glasgow and our relationship to the gangs and police.
also, they don't really go over it in the doc (understandable because it is hearsay, so they can't confirm it but the perpetrator is an open secret).
⚠︎ distressing images • strong language
the hunt for the world's end killers (✶✶✶✶) — bbc iplayer
↠ the story of one of scotland's most notorious double murders. this series charts the twists and turns of a case that remained unsolved for thirty-five years.
💬 this was a hard watch. a lot of these are, but specifically this one for me because it goes over misogyny of the time and the role of women that is still very much a part of scottish society still to this day. the fact they had to get scots law changed for a conviction... like our system needs a massive overhaul.
⚠︎ upsetting scenes • vawg • sexual references, including assault
the ripper (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ in the nineteen-seventies, the brutal murders of sex workers in ecconomically depressed areas of the uk (england) spark little public interest — until a teen is also killed.
💬 seriously, fuck the police and fuck the papers. the way they tried to turn this story into victim blaming the sex workers when all women were at risk of this bloke. then again, what can you expect from the british tabloids? like, it's so twisted because he's compared to 'jack the ripper' on the basis of misinformation and flashy headlines.
⚠︎ upsetting scenes • vawg • sexual references, including assault
murder trial: the vanishing woman (✶✶✶✶✶) — bbc iplayer
↠ two people face trial for the murder of thirty-five-year-old margaret fleming.
💬 not gonna lie, the defence really riled me up as they do in all of them by taking cheap shots at stereotypes and comically farcical assumptions, which they know.
(not in this one but one of them implies the reporting of a sexual assault as 'fake news', most definitely a tory.)
⚠︎ upsetting images / descriptions • child abuse • abuse of a vulnerable adult
waco: american apocalypse (✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ gunfire erupts when federal agents arrive at the branch dividian compound with a search warrant and hostage negotiators attempt to free the children, leading to a fifty-one day stand-off.
💬 my sympathy to the cult members can only stretch so far when they support a guy that abuses children, sexually, and every time they spoke, outside of the kid in the situation all i could think was, "but you're knowingly supporting a pedo who just wants to blow shit up."
also, you know why they had to start saying, "women and children first."? because men would so often ditch to save themselves. case-and-point. i hate to say it, but i'm with the feds on this. (again, to an extent but more than the cult).
⚠︎ upsetting scenes • child abuse
don't f**k with cats (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ a shocking online video brings together a widespread internet group of animal lovers out for justice. their target, meanwhile has more horrors planned.
💬 don't fuck with the internet. the pinnacle of fuck around and find out.
⚠︎ animal cruelty • sexual references, including assault
EXPOSÉ GENRE
the shamima begum story (✶✶✶✶) — bbc iplayer
↠ at fifteen shamima begum left london to join the terror group islamic state. for the first time, her account of what happened is investigated to find the truth.
💬 i'm sorry, i don't care what anybody says, the uk government is in the wrong for this shit. they are refusing to take responsibility for a situation they knew about and did fuck all to stop on the basis of gathering intel. i have a lot of sympathy for this kid, i truly do. the uk failed her and now they want to act like none of this is their fault and its setting a scary precedent that the uk, if they don't want to deal with their mess, they can strip you of your citizenship. bring her back and lock her up here.
if we can show sympathy for the incels in this country, then why is she any different? both groups are a risk to national security.
⚠︎ strong language • vawg • upsetting scenes
american conspiracy: the octopus murders (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ photojournalist christian hansen continues the work of danny casolaro, a reporter who mysteriously died while investigating a major political conspiracy.
💬 this is insane, unsurprising but insane with how deep it goes - even in regards to stuff that isn't covered in the doc. there's a scene in episode four when they're going through the police box and they uncover something that made me feel physically sick. there's also a real funny moment about the nsa, i think also in episode four. i did think christian playing danny was a little on the nose but after hearing not only what's in the doc but also how danny's family initially reacted to him showing up at their door, it makes a lot of sense not to mention, christian points out that danny spoke with michael the first week of his sentence, over twenty-years later, the crew picks him up at the end of it. it really does come full circle.
people like to paint danny as naïve, mainly to suit their own narrative that he was a little out of his depth and overall i couldn't disagree more but i do think his naivety stems from just a societal naivety that was around in the seventies and eighties.
⚠︎ bloody injuries • distressing imagery
the program: cons, cults and kidnapping (✶✶✶✶) — netflix
↠ former students of the academy of ivy ridge return to the now-shuttered school and reflect on the horrors the endured during their time in the program
💬 it's wild to me that the troubled teen industry is not only still legal but so widespread and you just know that because it's so ultra republican that nothing's going to be done about it.
⚠︎ distressing scenes • child abuse • sexual assault mentions
disclosure: kids on the psychiatric ward (✶✶✶) — bbc iplayer
↠ young women tell their stories from years spent on an adolescent psychiatric ward - a place supposed to make them better, but which they say failed them and left them traumatised.
💬 oh look! its the uk's own 'troubled teen industry' except this one is public and government funded. yeah, this shit sucks. all of these girls are around my age and it reminds me a lot of fern brady's book (which you should absolutely read) when it comes to the nhs' negligence and borderline vitriolic hatred towards young autistic girls.
↠ the nineteen-ninety-nine fest takes a hard swerve away from the nineteen-sixty-nine woodstock co-creator michael lang's version with a military base locale, profit focus and toxic vibe.
💬 who needs a horror movie when you can just watch this? genuinely, this festival represents the deepest, darkest and most depraved aspects of toxic masculinity and their pseudo-underdog notions with a lord of the flies backdrop.
that fat boy slim story will stick with me a lot longer than the carnage of day three and the way the ceo's wash their hands and try downplay then borderline victim blame it is disgusting.
⚠︎ bloody injuries • vawg • sexual references, including assault
waking sleeping beauty (✶✶✶✶) — disney+
↠ a revealing look at the events that ushered in the second chapter of disney's animation legacy - i.e. the disney renaissance.
💬 finally, something a little more light. this is such a feel-good doc. it has it's emotional ups and downs but if you want a good cry, this is it and if you want to know what it's like to work in media for better or worse, it's a good indicator for your tolerance in mismanagement.
⚠︎ death, mentioned • references to the aids crisis
howard (✶✶✶✶) — disney+
↠ "howard" is the untold story of howard ashman, the brilliant lyricist behind disney classics.
💬 i recommend watching this after waking sleeping beauty to give you a full scope of howard's work for disney. there's a beautiful irony in the only person i would consider to be the next 'walt disney' was a gay jewish man. can you believe disney had the cheek to try and remove this from streaming?! (i mean easily, but still...)
⚠︎ mentions of the aids epidemic • substance abuse
today I did my laundry, my summer shirts, I hadn’t done it in a while
when they say that grief come back by sneaky little waves, they did not warn you that it could come in the shape of seeing your grandmother’s shirts, neatly layed next to yours
you remember her seeing her in those same summer shirts, on a bright afternoon, celebrating her birthday
grief makes you teary eyed in front of the drying rack
but in this grief, you find joy, because you remember her face and you are wearing her shirts, striving for the same happiness on that same summer day
hearing the distant laughs & jokes of my roommates in the corridor, the distant noise of happiness, while the last of the late afternoon light poured into my room
Academy Award Winners for Best Cinematography:
2026 — Autumn Durald Arkapaw, ASC
Sinners (2025)
Directed by Ryan Coogler
Aspect Ratio: 2.76 : 1 · 1.90 : 1 · 1.78 : 1 (IMAX Blu-ray) · 1.43 : 1
Q: How long did it take to shoot the Juke music sequence?
We shot the interior sequences in one day. For that music interior day, we brought everyone together beforehand for a rehearsal: the choreographer, the actors, the dancers, and the music team. That way, we had a solid plan going in. Our night exterior crane pullback was shot on a different night, and the burning roof plate was captured on our final day of photography. So if you break it down that way, the whole sequence came together over three separate days.
— Autumn Durald Arkapaw for Motion Picture Association, March 2026
This is called the "analog loophole" and there's nothing anyone can do to stop it. They can encrypt and copy-protect all they want, but eventually the file has to be sent to a speaker and/or screen, and it has to get there in a human-readable form because that's the whole dang point
The simplest way to exploit the analog loophole is just pointing a camera at a screen or a microphone at a speaker, but direct recording is also always possible and always will be. Anything that can be displayed can be saved and displayed again
Back in the day, people also used to share software over the radio with this technology. Because computer programs and files are really just sets of binary code, and that code can be turned into audio tones.
The resulting audio file can be played over the radio (sounding a bit like the old dial up noise, as it's just two quickly oscillating notes) and recorded to a cassette tape, which you can then give to your computer to "decode" back into 0's and 1's, which gives you the program file. You can then run it as if you'd installed it from a disk.
I just realized, I got to make sure my VCR and CRT TV still work. I still had them when I got my PS3. So I tried this with that. So the first time I ever "streamed" is on a VHS somewhere.
First it was the double-jack. Back in the days where the jack input and jack output were separated, I used a cable (jack male to male) to link them both.
Then they stopped to separate them. I learned about the "Stereo Mix" you can use on Windows. The input signal is the output you get in your headphones. You can activate it by going into your recording devices.
For Linux, you have PAVUcontrol (Pulse Audio VolUme Control) that you can install:
vaporwave
kianamaiart
jbbartram-illu
turnnoffyourmind
baratheonpilled
discoholicmusic
