4 Stranger-Than-Fiction Documentaries To Watch After Netflix’s ‘Trainwreck’
If you’ve logged into Netflix recently, there’s a decent chance you’ve seen a whole lot of buzz surrounding the streaming platform’s new documentary, Trainwreck.
An anthology series that breaks down several shockingly true stories, Trainwreck has deftly explored everything from the failed Woodstock ‘99 music festival to the disturbing business practices of American Apparel, earning a significant amount of attention from viewers in the process.
As the final installments of the Trainwreck series debuts to the streaming service, we decided to highlight a few similarly-veined documentaries viewers might want to check out, each of which feature stories so bizarre, most people will have a hard time believing they actually happened in real life.
The Tinder Swindler (2022)
As long as there’s dating apps, there’s always going to be opportunistic individuals who use promises of love and relationships for their own nefarious ends. Case in point with Israeli conman Simon Leviev, who operated a widespread Ponzi scheme through the popular dating service, Tinder. Matching with like-minded women and slowly manipulating them into bankruptcy, The Tinder Swindler showcases Leviev’s growing network of financial forgeries and misleading romantic connections, causing viewers to think twice the next time they log on to their dating app profiles.
Don’t F**k with Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer (2019)
First of all, no one should ever harm an animal, especially one as adorable and innocent as two newborn kittens. But such is the disgusting act that provides Don’t F**k with Cats’ underlying premise. Chronicling a group of amateur detectives as they investigate a mysterious Internet animal abuser, Don’t F**k with Cats slowly spirals into some unexpected directions, with the true depth of the killer’s crimes gradually coming to light with each new episode.
Tiger King (2020)
While its final two seasons are lamentably bad (and definitely worth skipping), the inaugural season of Tiger King took the world by storm when it debuted in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Captivating mainstream viewers with its captivating breakdown of so-called animal conservationists, Tiger King also ventures into the murkiest corners of professional zookeeping, where murder, criminal conspiracies, and unethical exploitation of animals are grotesquely commonplace.
Fyre (2019)
Just as Trainwreck covers the botched Woodstock Festival of 1999 and the fatal Astroworld Festival incident of 2021, Fyre details the similarly chaotic concert event that came about with 2017’s ill-fated Fyre Festival. A music festival on par with Woodstock ‘99 for its horrific conditions and misleading ticket pricing, Fyre illustrates how greed and unscrupulous corporate planning eventually led to lawsuits, legal convictions, and over $26 million swindled from unassuming festival investors.
