TV, DOCUMENTARY
Striped Madness Fueled by Redneck Stupidity
Tiger King is fast food for thought
“Seven episodes of weirdos, murder, and giant cats? Sign America up.” — Alissa Wilkinson, Vox
Nothing But Trash
All McDonald’s branches shut down in the UK and Ireland since the 23rd of March due to the pandemic. That happened to be a perfect time for Tiger King to grab hungry eyeballs. Everybody in the world wants to be distracted right now, and Netflix’s show serves its purpose perfectly. But “how do you explain the 34 million views generated by the series in the first 10 days of its release in the US alone”, you might ask.
It’s simple. People love trash — and Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness is simply a blown out of proportion trash-reality.
Joseph Allen Maldonado-Passage, aka Joe Schreibvogel and Joe Exotic. The man has so many names it’s already an exaggeration, a cry for attention. He succeeded to reach worldwide fame in just a few weeks, through a unique lifestyle that took place in his zoo at Wynnewood, Oklahoma. Now, as he’s facing 22 years of prison, what kind of consolation is that for the 57-year-old gay man, I wonder?
Tiger King is nothing but an attention-seeking attempt that has very little to offer and doesn’t even come with a toy like Happy Meal menus.
Seven Hours of Fame
In the history of television, we’ve already seen a bunch of soapy reality shows and true crime documentaries. So why is Tiger King any different? What does it have to offer other than low life criminals and misfits? Big exotic cats? Is that enough to entertain us?
Apparently so. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve jumped on the hype-train, I’m guilty too. After the brilliantly engaging Don’t F**k With Cats, I thought the bar is high enough, and they might try to hit it again. I was wrong.
“There’s little point to Tiger King beyond its sensational thrills and credulously presenting everyone it puts in front of a camera.” — Joshua Rivera, The Verge
Although, the series has every potential to raise awareness about animal trafficking and mistreatment, rather than underlining that as a central message it focuses on rumors, murder allegations, and made up personal dramas between characters who were “reportedly victims of abuse, dogged by misfortune and embraced by strange circumstances.”
The creators trigger our curiosity by raising questions about guilt, moral deficiencies, and real or imagined authority. Yet they don’t even make an attempt to reveal the truth about them. Every moment of the show is meticulously edited, the depictions of the characters are crooked, and in the end, the most important issue is lost under the weight of conspiracies and lies.
The program’s focus changes so many times, after a certain point it’s like a drug addict who’s hesitant to decide if he should go with a guy who lures him into a bar’s toilet with a promise of cocaine, or the other one inviting him to the back, offering a loaded crack pipe.
Tiger King isn’t special, but it could have been, and that’s its biggest mistake. Why should we care about crackheads running around, telling lies, creating feuds, throwing F-bombs every two seconds? That’s nothing new to television. Exposing the world of zookeepers in the US, who mistreat their animals, running a cult, killing and trading cubs for a profit? You might have something there.
In the End, Tigers Lose
My only hope is that people associated with this industry, having the power for significant change, will watch Tiger King. Because the biggest losers are the innocent animals, who suffer for their owners’ temporary fame, which will disappear in a couple of months or so. However, they will remain there, locked in cages, fed by rotten meat, and being euthanized by dumb idiots who wanted to play King in the countryside.
P.S.: Netflix won’t let us down as they bringing back the show for one more episode with Joel McHale on the 12th of April.
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