#crime documentary

[maeganbobaegan]

Murder in Glitterball City -- it's giving Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil 🪩

[sadsluthours]

i've absorbed 700+ hours of podcasts and netflix crime binges, and i think my brain is now using my dreams to run entirely new, poorly-researched cold cases

[ostaraswhisper]

crime documentaries and snuggling would be a dream rn ✧｡⁠*⁠♡

[ab0g1arka]

✨Y’ALL. GATHER AROUND. WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THE UNKNOWN NUMBER.✨

Okay, besties, pull up a chair, grab a snack, hydrate, do some stretches — because I just watched the new Netflix documentary The Unknown Number and my soul hasn’t known peace since. I feel like someone dumped me in the Upside Down but forgot to give me a flashlight.

Let’s begin.

So the story centers around Lauren — a 13-year-old living her small-town life, minding the business God gave her — and her boyfriend, Owen. Cute, small, wholesome couple doing wholesome teenage things.

UNTIL.

They start getting messages from an “unknown number.”

And when I say “messages,” I don’t mean silly prank texts like “ur mom” or “lol who r u.”

No.

I mean:

full-on threats, body-shaming, psychological warfare, and “unalive yourself” level harassment.

And these texts don’t stop.

For years.

The whole town gets involved. Parents are in a frenzy. The school is investigating like they’re all auditioning to be in True Detective. The police are in there. They’re interviewing children like someone lost the Infinity Stones.

And THEN enters Chloe — poor, innocent, scapegoat Chloe — who seems to be everybody’s favorite suspect because… reasons? She basically got bullied INTO being the bully without ever being the bully. Like she’s in the documentary looking like she’s aged ten years in stress alone.

And listen — the messages are NOT normal. They’re not mild. They’re not teenage drama. They are vicious.

They shame Lauren.

They tell her Owen doesn’t want her.

They talk about her body.

They tell her to do unspeakable things.

It gets dark.

But THEN — because the universe decided this case wasn’t deranged ENOUGH — the harassment spreads to Owen’s new girlfriend… in another town. Another ZIP code. New ecosystem. New air. New existence. And the mystery number STILL finds her.

At this point, the local police are like: “We’re out.”

And the FBI enters like a dramatic reality show cameo.

So the FBI starts tracing the IP address.

And BESTIES…

They find out the perpetrator is…

✨LAUREN’S.

ACTUAL.

MOTHER.✨

THE MOM.

THE WOMAN WHO WAS “HELPING” INVESTIGATE.

THE WOMAN WHO WAS CRYING ABOUT HOW HER BABY WAS BEING HARASSED.

THE WOMAN SITTING IN THE FRONT ROW OF THE WHOLE CRISIS LIKE “OH NOOO WHO WOULD DO THIS 😭”

It was her.

For TWO YEARS.

Tell me WHY this woman was sending her own daughter messages telling her to unalive herself like she was applying for Villain of the Decade.

And then she had the NERVE — the absolute Olympic-level audacity — to go on the documentary and say:

“People do bad things all the time. People drink and drive.”

Girl.

Ma’am.

MOTHER OF THE YEAR AWARD WINNER.

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT.

A DUI and tormenting your 13-year-old daughter with threats are NOT the same category. Not even the same sport. Not even the same planet.

Now here’s the part where the documentary tries to be clinical and “objective.”

The experts start talking about Munchausen by proxy, the idea that the mom wanted her daughter to need her emotionally.

And like… maybe?

Sure?

But there’s just one teensy little problem:

If she JUST wanted her daughter to rely on her…

WHY WAS SHE ALSO HARASSING THE NEW GIRLFRIEND??

What does a girl in a DIFFERENT TOWN have to do with mother-daughter codependency?

The math isn’t mathing.

It felt less like Munchausen by proxy and more like:

✨obsessive jealousy, competitive weirdness, and inappropriate fixation on her daughter’s relationship✨

BECAUSE LET’S TALK ABOUT THE CONTENT OF THE TEXTS.

The mom was literally sending messages like:

“You’re not giving it up fast enough, I’d give it up faster, that’s why he wants me not you.”

I’m sorry.

WHAT???

Why is a grown woman writing fanfiction about stealing her teenage daughter’s boyfriend AND sending it TO HER DAUGHTER???

This isn’t illness.

This is ego.

This is jealousy.

This is full-blown “I want to be my daughter” energy.

And here’s the part that disturbed me the most:

The documentary kept implying Lauren might’ve been involved somehow, even though she was literally 13 and the victim.

Other parents in the doc were straight-up blaming her.

Blaming.

HER.

A child.

Who was being tormented by her mother for two years.

Like, what rehearsal for Bad Parent Olympics did I just watch???

And THEN you have Owen — the ex-boyfriend — sitting there saying he’s STILL upset with Lauren and somehow partially blames her like SHE sent the texts from prison.

Sir, be for real.

Be so serious.

She was THIRTEEN.

Meanwhile, Lauren — literal sweetheart — still wants a relationship with her mom. Not because she’s naïve but because trauma bonds be trauma bonding. She misses her mom. She says she loves her. It’s heartbreaking.

And honestly?

You can tell the documentary didn’t know how to handle that nuance without blaming her.

By the end of the doc I was like:

“Great concept, terrible execution. Deeply unsettling. Not enough accountability. Too much victim-blaming. Too many parents deflecting. And NOT ENOUGH INTERROGATION OF WHY THIS MOM WAS SO WEIRDLY FIXATED ON HER DAUGHTER’S DATING LIFE.”

My conclusion:

This case is horrific, heartbreaking, and bizarre.

The mom is terrifying.

The community reactions were questionable at BEST.

And the documentary creators needed to think HARDER about what narrative they were feeding millions of viewers.

Anyway, that’s my dramatic TED Talk.

Thank you for coming.

Please hydrate.

This case aged me five years.

[showtime-buttonz]

FAZBEAR'S FOLLY: A LEGACY OF LIES

[sweetonsugden]

This is me. Pointing out all the things the killer has done wrong.

Amateurs.

[local-lover-boy]

I tried using the flash and its kinda cute but mostly I look like the missing teenage girl in a crime documentary

[bijouxcarys]

I’ve been doing this thing for about a year now, where I’ve made it a goal to try and find the documentary that disturbs me the most.

I stay away from documentaries that focus on animal abuse, since that’s just a massive no-go area, I can’t even think about someone as little as shout at an animal.

But I’ve watched quite a few at this point. I know a lot of people out there are also interested in this kind of thing, so I’ll give you some of the ones that have really had an impact on me. I’ll start with the tamest ones (available on mainstream platforms like Netflix) and it’ll get progressively more upsetting lol.

I’m actually quite a desensitised person, so if a documentary affects me, you know it’s worth it.

Green = unfortunate and upsetting

Orange = Jesus that’s fucked up, that’s latched onto me for a while

Red = The above + will find it difficult to watch again, and this made me cry my eyes out

Bold Red = Kept me up at night for a while + all the above. Still think about it to this day.

Bold with ** = don’t watch if you don’t have a strong stomach and can’t handle emotionless gory images

Take Care of Maya (2023) - Netflix

A nightmare unfolds for Jack and Beata Kowalski after they bring their 10-year-old daughter to the ER with unusual symptoms.

Tell Me Who I Am (2019) - Netflix

When Alex loses his memory after a serious motorcycle accident, he trusts his twin Marcus to tell him about his past, but he later discovers that Marcus is hiding a dark family secret.

Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey (2022) - Netflix

The rise of Warren Jeffs in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and his criminal case.

Abducted in Plain Sight (2017) - Netflix

In 1974, 12-year-old Jan Broberg is abducted from a small church-going community in Idaho by a trusted neighbour and close family friend.

Dreams of a Life (2011)

Discovering the truth about the life of a vivacious, intelligent woman - and how she came to be so tragically forgotten. Nobody noticed when 38-year-old Joyce Vincent died in her bedsit above a shopping mall in North London in 2003. When her remains were discovered three years later, her heating and her television were still on. Who was Joyce Vincent, and how could this happen to someone in today's age of communication?

Just Melvin, Just Evil (2000)

In this documentary focusing on his own tortured family tree, James Ronald Whitney chronicles an evil that seems too pure to be real: Melvin Just. Over the span of three generations, Just, who married Whitney's grandmother and was later convicted of child molestation, is revealed to have abused his stepchildren from two marriages. Whitney not only explores the unspeakable acts perpetrated by his grandfather, but also the legacy of self-destructive behavior that can all be traced back to Just.

Tickled (2016)

In a story stranger than fiction, journalist David Farrier uncovers a strange tickling subculture. Delving deeper into the dark world of a tickling competition, he meets with fierce resistance.

Holy Hell (2016)

Filmmaker Will Allen documents the time he spent with the Buddhafield, a Los Angeles spiritual group.

Jesus Camp (2006)

Filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady visit an evangelical Christian summer camp called Kids on Fire, where children take part in programs designed to strengthen and intensify their beliefs. The camp's founder, Becky Fischer, discusses her mission to indoctrinate youths in the word of God, while young campers play certain combat video games and talk about their love for Jesus.

There’s Something Wrong with Aunt Diane (2011)

The accident made national headlines: a suburban mother drove the wrong way on the Taconic State Parkway in New York and crashed head-on into an SUV, killing herself and seven others. In the aftermath, Diane Schuler was portrayed as a reckless drunk and a mother who cracked. But was she the monster the public made her out to be...or the perfect wife and mother that many say she was? Investigating the case six months after the accident, this documentary searches for answers to a mysterious and senseless tragedy.

Goodnight, Sugar Babe: The Killing of Vera Jo Reigle (2020)

The discovery of the mutilated body of a mentally challenged young mother begins a journey into madness that is so unbelievable the mastermind behind the crime ultimately got away with murder.

Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills (1996)

Paradise Lost was a groundbreaking true crime documentary series released in 1996 that set the bar for the genre and influenced similar productions. The trilogy follows the story of three teenage boys who were wrongfully accused and convicted of a brutal triple homicide in West Memphis, Arkansas. The series explores themes of societal hysteria, wrongful convictions, and the power of media influence, and it launched the careers of filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky.

**Orozco the Embalmer (2001)**

A Spanish-language, Japanese-Colombian mondo film (a subgenre of exploitive documentary films) directed by Kiyotaka Tsurisaki, following a Colombian embalmer named Froilan Orozco Duarte, who is shown living in El Cartucho, an impoverished and crime-ridden area of Bogotá, Colombia, where the homicide rate is high and corpses can be seen on the streets.

The Dying Rooms (1995)

Documentary about a crew going from one orphanage to another in China to investigate these so called "dying rooms" where the orphanage workers leave baby girls to die.

The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan (2010)

In Afghanistan many hundreds of boys, often as young as ten, are being lured off the streets on the promise of a new life. Also known as Bacha Bāzī: an ancient Afghan practice in which men train, buy, and keep adolescent young boys for entertainment and sex in a society that keeps women hidden from view.

Boy Interrupted (2009)

Filmmaker Dana Perry documents the life of her son, Evan, a 15-year-old who committed suicide. The film traces Evan's growing mental illness, including videotapes made throughout his short life and interviews with his friends and doctors.

Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008)

Dear Zachary is a both a touching tribute to a fallen friend and a heart-wrenching account of justice gone astray, skillfully put to film with no emotion spared.