Why ‘Making a Murderer’ Part 2 Sucked

Making a Murderer Part 2 is now available on Netflix. The docuseries was first viewed by millions in 2015. It has been largely ignored since its second appearance. 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.

Are fans and critics in agreement that Part 2 was disappointing?

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.

IMDb fans who have viewed the second season seem to be against us title. The majority of episodes score more than 8, which matches the scores from the original season.

The critic scores aren’t so kind. The Metacritic score for the first season is 84, while season 2 sits at a mere 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. While Part 2 is slightly higher than season 1, it barely compares to the massive numbers of Google searches that Season 1 generated. 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. Many have suggested that this second segment is an advertisement for her company.

The Repeat 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. Part two's first half seems more like a summary than introducing 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.

The majority of Making a Murderer's second season is either a reprise of season 1, or a complete recap of all of season 1.

Every significant development, regardless of its size, has received national and international attention due to the high level of coverage by media outlets, whether they be online or in print.

In effect, this complaint is the same as the previous point being that it’s just covering stuff which is public knowledge.

These same critiques of Part 1 are also applicable 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. Particularly, not giving enough time to Ken Kratz, the prosecutor who is a key part of the story's narrative.

Part two repeats the same thing. Although the producers of the series claimed they tried to reach out to prosecutors, they refused. 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. This seems biased.

Part 2 will be released in an entirely different setting.

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. Is it possible that murder documentaries are now over-saturated? This could be true.

Part 2 could have been even better. Could it even have been made?

According to the filmmakers of the documentary, the idea for the second installment was not in the original 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.

Is there 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.

Was Part 2 of Making A Murderer a success? Comment below.