Review: Don’t Date Brandon – a lazy true-crime show that fails to do justice to the victims' horrors
A critic pans the new documentary series "Don’t Date Brandon," calling it lazy and misguided, failing to adequately portray the experiences of women who suffered at the hands of abuser Brandon Johnson.
The Guardian critic delivers a scathing review of the true-crime series "Don’t Date Brandon," describing it as lazy and misguided. Based on the podcast "Ex-Wives Undercover," the documentary follows two women, Amber Rasmussen and Athena Klingerman, who were victims of Brandon Johnson. He manipulated them emotionally, lied about his job, health, and even faked messages to pit the women against each other. Johnson was eventually convicted of assault and attempted kidnapping with intent to commit rape, receiving a 10-year prison sentence.
The main criticism is the show's structure – the first episode spends most of its time recounting basic facts without delving into the psychological impact. The critic notes that without deeper explanation, the abuser's actions seem so blatant that viewers may feel exasperation at the victims' naivety rather than sympathy. While emphasizing that the victims are not to blame, the critic says the show's slow pacing and lack of granular detail fail to convey the gradual erosion of mind and spirit that abusers like Johnson rely on.
Presumably, the next two episodes will show how the women united and uncovered other victims of Brandon – he had been served his first restraining order back in 1997 at age 19. However, the review argues that from the start, the series puts the victims in a position where they have to prove themselves, rather than focusing on the harm caused by the abuser.
