PrimeTime

Evil in the Name of Justice: A Macabre Show.

Disclaimer: I’d never heard of the TV show “To Catch a Predator” or Chris Hansen before this movie was announced. So… I did my little research, and I’m definitely going to dig deeper into this whole story, because this shit really got under my skin.

We know how these shows work. Reality TV, sensationalism, collective psychosis, talking heads, and people willing to do anything for fame. But what initially seems like a dramatised fictional tale of a very successful career falling apart after pushing its boundaries a bit too far, ending in tragedy and scandals, doesn’t stay stuck in its own story.

Instead, it has a not-so-unexpected connection to the way we consume these kinds of tragedies as entertainment today.

Back then, all we needed was a TV network, a charismatic host, an audience and a primetime slot to turn someone’s humiliation into media pillory. Today, the dynamic hasn’t changed much.

The rules have, and so have the devices: now we have the internet and social media, with endless voices and faces, ready to become online vigilantes without the knowledge or context.

But what is more concerning is that they don’t give a damn about the responsibility involved in exposing people just for the sake of algorithms and followers.

The movie throws us back to that early-2000s TV visual style. The reality-TV format and its narrative have all its slightly ugly, invasive quality of an old-school aesthetic.

A choice that makes you feel like you’re watching something you probably shouldn’t be watching but somehow can’t look away from.

The hunger for attention is still there… The moral ambiguity too. The audience is even happier to watch someone get publicly destroyed while convincing itself that this is about justice and freedom of speech.

When the sad true is that it’s only pure perverted voyeurism of the macabre. And the outrage moves from TVs to online shitstorms… and that’s where things get even messier and extremely dangerous.

In online communities, things can quickly turn into a public execution, with stories getting lost somewhere along the way, sacrificed for visibility, engagement and comments.

The question is no longer just whether someone deserves to be exposed, but who gets to decide in the first place, and what happens when the punishment becomes cancel culture and the haters offensive language.

And maybe that’s what makes “PrimeTime” so uncomfortable. It isn’t really just about a TV show and its creator. It’s about what happens when exposing someone becomes more important than understanding what you’re actually exposing.

And when a potential good cause becomes the perfect excuse to turn someone else’s downfall into social hype.