Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e07 – Dethroned

Based on his interviews this episode, it appears Jeff Lowe spent years getting Joe Exotic more and more enraged over Carole Baskin so at some point Lowe would be able to convince Exotic to hire someone to kill her. Possibly even just Allen Glover. Both “Doc” Antle and Joshua Dial think Joe was set up. Lowe attests he did mean to encourage Joe to do it, which isn’t a crime apparently.

A number of people find it highly suspicious the government let Lowe and Glover go, including reporter Sylvia Corkill. Meanwhile federal prosecutor Amanda Green cooperates with the filmmakers so much she performs some of her closing arguments at Joe’s trial for them?

Except they didn’t just get Joe on trying to hire someone to kill Baskin, they got him on violating the endangered species act because it turns out Joe killed five tigers at some point. It really pissed off the zoo employees at the time, which means directors Eric Goode and Rebecca Chaiklin maybe knew about it and decided to just keep it quiet for best effect later.

The jury finds Joe guilty and he’s sentence to twenty-two years. Once instead he decides to sell all the big cat owners he knows out to PETA, which is good. There’s a card at the end about how “Doc” Antle got raided; Joe says Antle has a gas chamber to get rid of the aging tiger cubs, so, you know, fuck him.

Despite “investigating” her for murder, “Tiger King” gives Carole Baskin a positive send-off. Her husband comes off like a tool but whatever.

And things don’t go well for Jeff Lowe. He screws over major creep Tim Stark leaving him without a zoo partner, which really just screws over the tigers. No one really gives a shit about the 200 tigers Joe Exotic had in his zoo. Given one of the interviewees even brings it up, you’d think it’d get some attention but no.

Rick Kirkham plays victim again, says how bad he felt showcasing an abusive-to-animals Joe Exotic and making him appear loving, which doesn’t track with his previous interviews or the other footage of him….

As for Exotic, there’s at least some footage showing he’s aware of the damage he’s done to the animals.

Oh, and James Garretson playing himself as the hero in the whole thing is ick.

“Tiger King” is extremely compelling and ultimately distressing.

I don’t think I want to see a movie of it, even with a dream cast. It’s too much, too sad.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e06 – The Noble Thing to Do

So now we’ve got the downfall of Joe Exotic, promised in the first episode, the pieces not aligned until now.

Businesses undefined businessman Jeff Lowe has returned to Oklahoma after basically getting run out of Las Vegas to discover Joe has been forging his name on multiple documents in addition to using zoo money on his presidential and gubernatorial campaigns. Like, campaign manager Joshua Dial is obviously on the premises all the time, clearly Joe wasn’t hiding it too much.

So after hearing the Feds are investigating Joe Exotic and now the embezzling, it’s time for Joe to go. Somehow he has enough time to burn all the documents showing his fraud and all the computers, plus sell a bunch of the animals for cash, and run off with new husband Dillon Passage and at least one cub. Joe’s on the lamb. From what, no one knows yet.

Except James Garretson, strip club owner, who’s helping the Feds investigate Joe Exotic. See, James knows how Jeff Lowe and Joe Exotic planned to have Carole Baskin killed. Or something. Jeff Lowe talks about it a lot, so he’s clearly not worried about being prosecuted—he was the only one who could use Google Maps—but then again, maybe it’s just the deal Jeff made because after James turns CI and sells out Allen Glover (prison Nazi maybe Allen Glover so he’s completely unsympathetic), Jeff Lowe wants to rat out Joe Exotic too. Everyone wants to drop the dime on Joe Exotic.

A lot of it is low-key homophobic. Something about the way Glover and James talk about Joe and the husbands… plus last episode established Lowe’s a bigot too.

But, wait, given the show plays so fast and loose with its interview timelines and whether or not interviewees are alive or dead… did Glover kill Carole Baskin? Nope, he took Joe Exotic’s money and got high and didn’t do it and can’t remember anything, which sounds like absolute nonsense but then… what’s Glover going to admit on camera.

The episode ends with Joe in prison, whining, and one hoping local news reporter Sylvia Corkill, who covered a lot of Joe Exotic news, gets to write a book about it at least.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e05 – Make America Exotic Again

So, luckily, businessman Jeff Lowe beating tigers at the end of last episode was just a horrifying teaser not the actual content of this episode. In fact, Lowe doesn’t hit a single animal in this episode. They don’t even use the footage again. And the ominous “Jeff Lowe takeover” of the zoo… it wasn’t as immediate as last episode implied. I’d be very curious to see how Rebecca Chaiklin and Eric Goode would have presented this story in a three hour piece; there’s so much information they withhold for effect; master manipulation.

For example, the reason we don’t see anything of Joe’s newest husband, Travis Maldonado? Because he’s dead. He killed himself. Possibly accidentally, possibly not, in front of Joe Exotic’s campaign manager, Joshua Dial. Campaign manager for what? President.

See, back when Lowe took over the park and did things like open the “watch the cats” pizza parlor (with the pizza made from spoiled Walmart ingredients), Joe Exotic also got the idea to run for President. His wacky campaign ads made it national on “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” and got Joe enough attention he was able to get a campaign manager, Dial. Also from Walmart. Dial ran the ammo counter.

Around the same time husband John Finlay knocks up the desk clerk at the zoo and they run off together because, turns out, Finlay wasn’t gay all those years—no one on the show seems familiar with the concept of bisexuality; anyway, the reason Finlay stuck with Joe Exotic was because of meth. Joe kept him high all those years. Once the presidential campaign goes bust, then the subsequent governor one, Joe Exotic starts getting really nasty with everyone. He can’t stand Jeff Lowe’s point-man in the zoo, Allen Glover, for instance. There’s also a sequence where Joe shoots at the tigers (because they’re annoying him). It’s very uncool and disturbingly presented.

So after Travis dies, Joe’s even more upset, leading to him marrying another nineteen year-old two months later—Dillon Passage. Dillon doesn’t get the same kind of interviews as everyone else because we’re getting close to the present and Chaiklin and Goode are sort of done manipulating the viewer with clips from different time periods. See, this episode is where everything catches up to Joe Exotic and he’s arrested. Why? We don’t know, just the Feds are after him, which Jeff Lowe finds out because the bank tells him.

It’s a really interesting episode, but it’s also a cheaply played one. There’s actual footage of Travis killing himself—or at least of Dial witnessing it—and they cut it for exploitative effect. It’s actually surprising they don’t put music over it.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e04 – Playing with Fire

This episode’s about how awful both Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin turn out to be when it comes to money. Baskin’s won a lawsuit against Joe Exotic and he owes her a cool million. Carole and Howard aren’t doing it to prove a point or to stop Joe from doing his cub petting roadshow, they’re doing it to bleed him dry.

The problem with bleeding Joe Exotic dry is he’s pretty smart about putting everything in other people’s names so it doesn’t seem like he owns anything. And when they do start trying to squeeze that stone… well, it’s just going to hurt Joe’s sweet old mom, who had the zoo in her name or something, which leads to Joe’s mom on the streaming channel talking about how Baskin’s been hounding her.

Again, really want to know how many people watched these streams.

Meanwhile, Rick Kirkham is making his reality show and trying to get Joe Exotic to amp it up. Kirkham doesn’t need to push hard because give Joe the chance, he’ll play mean private zoo boss all on his own.

But all suing Joe Exotic’s going to do is starve the animals and it never seems like Baskin—Howard speaks the most this episode—has any concern for the tigers. When we hear about the settlement Joe Exotic turns down, there’s nothing about what to do with the 200 tigers. You’d think it’d be a story thread to pick up on but the history intervenes. Joe’s new pal, “businessman” Jeff Lowe—you get the feeling people are going to investigate him after this series and he’s going to sue them all—is going to step in and save the zoo. So Joe puts it in Jeff Lowe’s name and Lowe steals it. The cliffhanger is Lowe beating the tigers. It’s swell.

Because the episode’s already upbeat after someone sets fire to Joe’s studio, which is the same building as the alligators and they all die. Kirkham’s footage gets destroyed too. Basically Joe Exotic and company think Kirkham did it, Kirkham thinks Joe Exotic did it.

Kirkham sort of has a better reason for not doing it—without his footage, the reality show is just… but, seriously, he didn’t make backups? In like, 2015 or something. He could have pretty easily made back-ups. It’s a weird screw-up.

But then Kirkham had screwed Joe out of his own Internet streaming show so motive for Joe. The show doesn’t look too hard into it before Lowe shows up to ruin the day.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e03 – The Secret

Has Michelle Pfeiffer ever played a femme fatale? I almost want to say no, which will make Tim Burton’s Tigers even better. Because Carole Baskin sure does seem like she killed her second husband, rich guy Don Lewis (it’s unclear how he got rich but they’re in Florida so it doesn’t seem like it was legit), chopped him up in a meat grinder, and fed him to her tigers. Joe Exotic, for one of his country music albums (because of course), made a music video with a Baskin look alike feeding tigers chopped up husband.

Frankly, it’s awesome.

Because nothing Baskin says in the episode ever makes her seem any less guilty. When she says something about achieving her “highest possible self,” you’re not wondering if she chopped him up, you’re wondering if she fed him to the tigers whole. Neat tiger trivia? Their stomach acid is so intense it’ll break down the bones. They don’t shit bone. They wouldn’t have shit any of Don Lewis out.

There’s a lot with Lewis’s first family and ex-assistant. See, Lewis was out cruising one night in the eighties, saw twenty year-old Baskin walking down the street, picked her up, married her immediately following. Because of course. They started getting into the animals, but apparently he didn’t like how much she was spending on the tigers and she was sick of his complaining. There’s some weird stuff with the will, like Baskin had something added to make it easier to declare him dead if he disappeared.

I mean, at least Baskin is using the money for something good… she’s not breeding the tigers, she is rescuing them… at least so far as “Tiger King” has told us so far.

There’s a bunch of stuff with Joe Exotic’s crusade to bring Baskin to justice for the husband’s murder, all from his website. It’s unclear if he was on YouTube or just self-hosted. The show really hasn’t engaged with how popular Exotic is online, though it’s established Baskin’s got clout.

It’s a good true crime episode. The cops look like they really want to say they think Baskin did it but know they shouldn’t.

Making already skeezy reality show producer Rick Kirkham even more skeezy is his enthusiasm recounting how dangerously obsessed Exotic was becoming with Baskin.

It’s a lot. “Tiger King” is a lot and in the most compelling ways.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e02 – Cult of Personality

Somehow this episode manages to bury the lede. Will I spoil that lede? Not yet, but probably. “Tiger King” is a masterwork of manipulation as far as narrative non-fiction. Directors Rebecca Chaiklin and Eric Goode have a great sense of what to hold back and what to get out there.

For example, a disaster at Joe Exotic’s zoo feeling like low budget Jurassic Park for rednecks? It’s out there right away, along with Exotic’s indifference to employee Kelci Saffery’s newly missing limb. In fact, Saffery had the arm amputated so she could get back to work. Why does she want to rush back to work? So the animals don’t suffer, which then turns into the theme of the episode… Exotic, “Doc” Antle, and Carole Baskin all exploit their workers. In fact, Exotic’s the only one we know for sure is paying them. Between a hundred and a hundred and fifty a week, presumably in addition to room and board, but it’s unclear. Meanwhile, Baskin’s labor is all volunteer and Antle’s running a marriage cult. Antle and Baskin groom teenage girls through the Internet while Exotic tries to primarily hire people in dire life straits.

So Exotic and Antle seem to be running labor camps while Baskin relies on her volunteers’ sense of empathy for the animals. Given Baskin’s running a rescue… that reliance is… better? But Exotic is trying his damndest to keep the animals alive too… whereas Antle probably kills his tiger cubs once they’re too old to be petted. It’s mentioned and never contradicted.

We also find out this episode Exotic relies on reject or spoiled meat from Walmart to feed the tigers, which is better than the roadkill while not great. It’s almost like you shouldn’t have a 200 tiger zoo in the middle of Oklahoma without a dietary veterinarian on staff in addition to a sufficient, reliable endowment.

Or if you are going to have a private one… be like Mario Tabraue, who’s got a private zoo in Florida. Tabraue, the inspiration for the 1983 Tony Montana in Scarface—including the chainsaw—has the money to provide for his animals. Why? Presumably because he got rich enough selling cocaine and had enough of it stashed from laundering, he’s all good. He buys tigers from Joe Exotic, which—theoretically—means they have a better life than with Antle for sure and maybe even Baskin, who doesn’t have the deep post-cocaine pockets.

Tabraue, who’s aged better than Al Pacino, is way too likable. Like… way too likable. He’s like a cool grandfather. No one else in “Tiger King” is cool though, at all, so it might just be by comparison.

Also all the other guys—Exotic, Antle, major creep Tim Stark—are all violent misogynists. Like, it’s obvious some of the reason they have a problem with Baskin.

So Baskin having gotten rich from her mysteriously dead husband—that aforementioned buried lede—well… it doesn’t make their virulent misogyny okay (Antle’s dangerous), it does give them enough valid anti-Baskin fodder to hide some of it in. Or at least Chaiklin and Goode edit it so they can hide some of it.

But, yeah… Baskin’s rich because her (second) husband disappeared. She’s apparently on number three, Howard Baskin, who’s been on the show both episodes now without any mention of him having reformed a black widow. It’s a great cliffhanger and at just the right moment to make “Tiger King” “must see TV.”

Must see streaming. Whatever.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020) s01e01 – Not Your Average Joe

First off, let’s just get the following statements out of the way. Netflix needs to hire Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski and Tim Burton to make “Tiger King” into a movie and they need to cast Michael Keaton, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Val Kilmer. George Clooney can stunt cameo. It’s what we deserve.

Though the first episode of the show does feel very much like a wealthy professional dilettante (co-director Eric Goode) doing a reality show and punching down at eccentrics who’ve gone through a lot of trauma in their lives. The show’s all about the (tiger) cub petting industry, which has a bunch of exceptionally irresponsible people running private zoos and profiting off breeding tigers for show. The main subject is one Joe Exotic (Michael Keaton), who runs a private zoo in Oklahoma where he has over two hundred tigers. Exotic’s an assault rifle loving, proud gay man with a mullet. He’s a reality show character waiting to happen; shame he’s currently incarcerated because “Big Brother: Tiger King” would definitely bring in the ratings, though apparently if you’re wealthy and in the private zoo racket, you’re so wealthy you wouldn’t need “Big Brother: Tiger King.”

“King” contrasts Exotic, who (according to this episode) mostly feeds his tigers roadkill and accidentally killed dairy cows, with other big cat zoo owners Carole Baskin (Michelle Pfeiffer because even if it’s 2020 it’s still Hollywood) and “Doc” Antle (Val Kilmer). Antle charges a fortune for people to go to his zoo and spends a fortune feeding his tigers. Baskin runs a rescue and presumably feeds them well.

Baskin and Exotic are mortal enemies—the episode does cover the inciting incident, but I don’t remember if it’s when Baskin started tracking Exotic’s mall tours throughout the midwest—the show also goes far in establishing Oklahoma is the Florida of the Middle West—and contacted the mall owners to let them know how bad Exotic’s form of tiger “conservatism” was for the animals themselves. Not to mention the species. Because basically you have a bunch of anti-professionals breeding an endangered species. It’s like realistic Jurassic Park but for idiots.

Anyway.

We see how bad private big cat owning is for the animals, how people with no business having a big cat as a pet—including Shaq—have big cats as pets… we see what happens when private zoos go wrong, which is some rural sheriff’s department having to kill fields of endangered animals (beware, it’s a really upsetting sequence), but what we really see is how—thanks to the Internet—Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin are going to be able to wage a flame war that transcends fiber cables.

In the end, what the episode—which, frankly, isn’t great (it’s way too forced oblivious, like how it avoids accurately presenting craven reality TV producer Rick Kirkham at the start, not to mention Goode egging people on—he’s occasionally onscreen)—establishes is, given Joe Exotic’s personality and persecution complex (he also wars against PETA), it’s inevitable this web-based cold war is going to go hot.