Making a Murderer Part 2 has now been out on Netflix for several weeks and the docuseries, which came to the attention of millions back in 2015, has fallen on relatively deaf ears for its second outing. Here’s our post-mortem of Making a Murderer, why it fell flat, and why it, frankly, sucked.
Let’s get one thing out of the way to start with: I absolutely loved season one of Making a Murderer. Had you asked me to sit through 10 hours of real-world courtroom “action” before this show I’d have turned my nose up at you.
This also isn’t a criticism of the case itself, but rather picking holes at the show as a whole.
Do fans and critics agree Part 2 was a disappointment?
Before we get into why we think part two wasn’t as good as part one, let’s take a look at what the reviewers and, more importantly, what you, the viewer, thought of season two.
The fans on IMDb that have watched the second season seems to go against our title. Most episodes have scores over 8 which match the first season.
The critic scores aren’t so kind. On Metacritic, the first season sits at an 84 and season two sits at a 68. That’s a significant drop.
Perhaps one of the most telling cases of the show’s peak and fall in popularity is the Google Trends graph. Part 2, while rising slightly, barely registers against the behemoth numbers that season one caused in Google searches. Was this fault of marketing or the points we’re going to make below? You decide.
Kathleen Zellner
Kathleen is Steven Avery’s new lawyer. She’s a big figure when it comes to overturning convictions and you could argue she is the main star of part twUnfortunatelyely, her screen presence just isn’t that engaging. Some have even argued that the whole second part seems to be an advertisement for her firm.
A Repeat of Season 1
Through most of the new season, we see the case covered again in excruciating detail. The problem with this is we’ve already seen or heard most of it. The first half of part two seems like a recap more than an introduction of anything new. It completely zaps you out of the show and any pace that’s built up with new evidence or new voices are lost.
Kathleen Zellner is the main star in Part 2.
We’ve been living the Steven Avery story since Season 1.
Most of the second season of Making a Murderer is either reprised of recapping everything from season 1 (as mentioned above) or covering all the happenings since season one launched.
Because of the national and global attention the story garnered, every significant development has been well covered by the media whether it be in newspapers, online, or through television broadcasts.
In effect, this complaint is the same as the previous point being that it’s just covering stuff which is public knowledge.
The same criticisms for Part 1 carry over to Part 2.
The first season, despite being massively popular, didn’t go without disparagement. The biggest criticism is that part one didn’t do enough to represent both sides of the story. Specifically, neglecting to give enough airtime to the prosecution such as Ken Kratz who plays a pivotal part in the story.
Once again that happens in part two. The filmmakers behind the show did say they reached out to prosecutors but they declined. Naturally, this results in another season where it’s trying to convince you he’s innocent rather than providing a balanced picture from all sides. It seems to be biased.
Part 2 is released in a different environment.
Making a Murderer was Netflix’s first real docuseries released back in 2015. It’s a different world now and since part one was released, loads of outlets have picked up similar formats for TV shows. Could it be the case that the murder docuseries genre is now saturated? It could definitely be argued.
How could part 2 have been better? Should it have even be made?
The filmmakers behind the docuseries have gone on record to say that doing the second part was never part of the plan. They said that it “evolved” because of significant developments of the case.
Unfortunately, we don’t think enough development were made for a second part, at least not a ten-part second season at least. All of the developments for Steven since part two could have been covered in an hour and all of Brendan’s developments in another hour.
Will there be a Part 3?
Part 3 likely isn’t planned at this point in time, but should there be more developments in the case you can bet Netflix will be back with more of the story.
What did you think about Part 2 of Making A Murderer? Let us know in the comments.
