The Hooters Murders: Deadly Shift | Crime Seen episode 217

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[00:00:22] Hello everyone, I'm Mari Forth.

[00:00:51] I'm Sarah Carradine, podcasting from unceded Gadigal land. And this is Crime Seen, the true crime review podcast where we get to the heart of how true crime stories are told. We are welcoming new member Smith H0114. Thank you so much for buying us a coffee. Slurp. A shout out to Maggie who recognized me at Tullamarine Airport in Melbourne. We love meeting our listeners like we did in Milwaukee. Oh, I'm still riding high on that.

[00:01:20] Last week we watched Welcome to the Family, the murder of Dan Markell with Chappellee. Mari, what did we watch this week? This week we watched The Hooters Murders: Deadly Shift on Oxygen. It's just us today, so let's get directly to the crime. Hooters was founded in 1983 as a casual, beach-themed, and so-called delightfully tacky restaurant chain and sports bar.

[00:01:47] The waitresses, referred to as Hooters girls, wore tiny orange shorts and tight-fitting tank tops. The sex appeal of the workers was the brand's primary marketing tool. Girls were expected to sit down at the table to take orders, flirt with customers, and never say no to a photo. Female employees were required to sign that they acknowledge and affirm the following. My job duties require I wear the designated Hooters girls uniform.

[00:02:15] My job duties require that I interact with and entertain the customers. The Hooters concept is based on female sex appeal, and the work environment is one in which joking and entertaining conversations are commonplace. The documentary presents that over a decade, five Hooters girls were murdered. However, it focuses primarily on two cases.

[00:02:37] In 2010, 23-year-old Alyssa Blanton from Florida was harassed over a prolonged period by a regular customer, 61-year-old Roger Troy. After she quit and moved away, he stalked her and fatally shot her in a parking lot, then completed suicide. In 2008, 21-year-old Prisma Contreras was an employee at the Hooters Casino Hotel in Las Vegas. She was kidnapped from the employee parking lot, sexually assaulted, and murdered by Gregory Hover.

[00:03:07] Ten days later, he fatally shot 61-year-old Julio Romero during a robbery. Hover was convicted and sentenced to death. His accomplice, Ricky Freeman, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison. In 2025, Hooters filed for bankruptcy. So Sarah, what were your broad thoughts about this documentary? And do you guys have Hooters in Australia? No!

[00:03:32] Well, maybe I do have Hooters, and we certainly have some beautiful owls, native owls. But no, we don't have Hooters. I knew of it, of course, through popular culture. I've never been to one. I don't wish to go to one. I don't think I'd be welcome at one. But I thought it's going to be tacky. The place is tacky, but I thought perhaps the documentary might be tacky. It's on oxygen.

[00:04:01] But I thought we should get a good overall step-by-step. I was pleasantly surprised. I actually think that they treated it with the seriousness that dead women deserve. They dived into the lack of protection by the corporation, the retaliation by the corporation to managers who tried to stand up for the waitresses.

[00:04:26] And so the lack of education of these 18, 19-year-old girls who are earning money for whatever reason they need to earn money. Everybody needs to earn money. But there was no guidance as to how to gracefully get out of it when someone asks for your phone number, how to not answer emails, how to not be available outside of hours. I mean, we're going to talk about raisins, the South Park episode.

[00:04:52] They are much more protected than these girls were. My overall thoughts are it is much better than I had expected. It's not the best thing we've ever seen. At an hour and 33 minutes, it gets through them. It is very attentive to the victims, which we like. So overall, I was surprised at the quality. How about you, Mari? Yeah, same. It's a oxygen one-off, right? Yes.

[00:05:21] They call it a TV special. Yes, a TV special. To be quite honest, I kind of wish they went into each one of the murders. It was kind of interesting, right? Because they're setting the stage for Hooters and they start doing, they do this thing at the beginning where they're like, number of women killed at Hooters and they have the ticker going up. And I was like, oh. And then it stopped at five. I was like, oh. Okay.

[00:05:51] Let it be known, Mari wanted more dead girls. I did not want more dead girls. I just didn't want it presented to me like that if it was only going to stop at five. Like, I just, I don't know. Weird. I think because one of the three earlier ones was killed by her boyfriend, so it couldn't really be tied to them working at Hooters and Hooters being seen as a sort of happy hunting ground, as it were. So I think that's why they skipped over those earlier ones.

[00:06:19] But so that's the thing, though, right? So like, in the earlier ones, one of the girls, she was killed by her boyfriend who was jealous that she took a picture. Oh, okay. Okay. That's why I misspoke. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. One girl was abducted after her shift, killed in her uniform and found like in a dumpster or next to a dumpster. That's the unsolved one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:06:49] And then I forget what the third one was. Sorry to that lady. Yeah. So sorry. But it was just like, it was very interesting that they kind of yada yada over those first three there. Yeah. Let's just give their names. So Tanya Hillerud was killed by her boyfriend, jealous that she took a photo, which was required by her job.

[00:07:14] Carrie Ann Williams, that's the unsolved mystery in her uniform, killed immediately after her shift, as Murray tells us. And Tina Foster was 20. And a man offered to take modeling shots of her. His name was Christopher Haynes. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison. And again, he had met her at Hooters, said that he could take modeling shots of her before her shift. She went and met him before her shift and was killed.

[00:07:41] So to me, those three are definitely related to Hooters. Those are three deaths, very much caused by Hooters. So again, I'm wondering if they were being, you know, they're trying to be succinct with their specials, an hour and a half. They couldn't get into every single one of them, which I commend them for showing restraint. I really do. I'm never going to say don't show restraint. But it would have been very interesting if they did make it like a five-part special and

[00:08:11] dive into each one of those cases. Did you just ask for five parts? Well, not, okay. Not five parts technically, but like an anthology series, you know, kind of like a deadly woman. Yeah, I know. I know exactly what you mean. Yes. This would have made sense, right? We're constantly seeing Sarah like dorm murders or something like that. And then it's stuff that's like barely even related to the original title or something like

[00:08:39] these would have actually fit the like the Hooters murders title if they each had their own episode, you know? Yes. And I think obviously each of them deserves their own episode. Looking back now at my notes and being reminded by you, yes, they are all related to Hooters. Perhaps it was that the latest two, the later two, let's say 2008 and 2010 were the ones that

[00:09:08] they had the most access to because they certainly did both of the later two girls. I said girls, women, they did them justice. And I was happy for that rather than sort of perhaps whipping through five. And then they're just a sort of a photo and a bottom in orange. Just between you and me, how many bums? I mean, I like bums, but it was quite disturbing how nude and how nude they are really.

[00:09:38] So I will say as somebody who is in the States, of course, and knows about Hooters and would, I would go to, we used to go to Hooters during college because there was a Hooters right near our campus. Surprise, surprise. Some of our college friends were Hooters waitresses. One of my former roommates was a Hooters waitress, actually. And for college kids, the specials were great, cheap.

[00:10:05] And we were in college when the Alyssa Blanton murder happened. And I vaguely remember the story, actually, when I was rewatching this. I was like, I do remember this. I remember Hooters coming under fire for this. And I just know that for me, I was just, I was just like, it was a rest. It was never anything I ever aspired to, shockingly, because it was one of those things where it's

[00:10:35] like Abercrombie and Fitch and Hollister is like, you know, that they don't, they don't necessarily want black girls working there. You know what I'm saying? Like, yes, I know what you're saying. Yeah, absolutely. I absolutely know what you're saying. Certainly all the images that we saw were of that cheerleader, the so-called cheerleader type, you know, taller, blonde, white girls. Yes. And my roommate, she, former roommate, she was a Hooters girl.

[00:11:04] She was one of those, she was a cheerleader, but she was black. So she was one of those girls that could fit into that. And she used to tell us about like the, the weird code and all of that. I feel like I saw another documentary. I was trying to, I was trying to figure out if I could find it. I can't, I can't remember if it was like a documentary or maybe like an expose about Hooters.

[00:11:30] Cause I think after that murder, it really started to, their, their business practice really did start to like come under fire. Um, because I feel like I saw a documentary or something about all of the, the, the, the stuff about them having to, having to, uh, flirt with the customers. Uh, how the managers would, would, uh, treat them stuff like that.

[00:11:57] So I, all of this was like vaguely familiar to me. And can I just say the biggest failure in marketing here is that Hooters wings are actually very good. We've been going to Hooters before the wings are spectacular to be quite honest. And you know, they didn't need to be because that's not why people are there. Well, it's why you were all there, but. That's why I'm there. But those wings are actually delicious.

[00:12:24] Or they, or they were when I, when I was a starving college student. So like, um, it, it, it is very interesting that there is five murders and, and it is a relatively young chain. I guess you can say it's a little bit older than me and it opened in the eighties, uh, 83. So, but I, I do like how this documentary is kind of asking that question.

[00:12:49] Why all of a sudden in like, it was like a burst of murders, uh, because the first three murders happened in 1997, 2001, 2002. And then the second two, 2008, 2010. It was like, it was just like two different bursts. And I think the documentary tried to answer, like try to answer that question about maybe culturally how, um, Hooters girls were looked at. Yes.

[00:13:16] If you, if listeners, if you would care to go to the Wikipedia page for Hooters and look under the tab legal, it's not just these murders. There are so many suits by some men brought a suit because they weren't allowed to be waitresses, uh, but so many, uh, sexual assault ones. And of course the famous one, which I knew, which was that there was a competition amongst the waitresses nationwide to win a Toyota.

[00:13:44] Toyota and the girl that won the Toyota was given a toy Yoda. And the manager said to her, Oh, it was an April Fool joke. She sued them and settled. So I remember that super clearly. Oh my gosh. I don't remember that. Oh, yes. So, and he had, he actually had the Toyota for her. I think that might be worth something these days, but not as much as a brand new Toyota.

[00:14:04] So I think that they're very clear about these girls had very few friends other than each other and a manager we hear about who went to the mat for one of the girls and got fired for speaking up for the girl. And again, I'm using girl because that's, that's, that's what they call. But also when I look at them, I think they are girls. They're young, young. They're so young.

[00:14:29] Mary, can I ask you when you used to go as a student, did the girls flirt with you as well? Or was it solely with the men? No, no, because we would go, I, I always would go with my guy friends too. So it would, so whenever we would go, it'd be a big old group of us and it'd be mixed gendered. And so I know they, they never flirted with guys who had girls, at least not when I went like the,

[00:14:59] I'm pretty sure they were like, Oh, thank God. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? I think they're like, okay, a table we don't have to flirt with. I would, I would assume something like that, but no, they, they were just nice. They were just nice and friendly. They would, they would have to like at our location, that, the thing where they would have to like sit down, they would sit down and like, they'd sit down and like, Oh, what do you want? Da, da, da, da, da, da. And it'd be real up close. I'd be like, okay, girl, you can back up. But it wasn't like overt flirting.

[00:15:26] You know, it was being very personable. They had stools for them. So if like, if you're sitting in a booth, if you and your, your people are sitting in a booth at the end of the table, they had this little stool for them so that they would, they would come in and they pull up the seat and they would sit down and, and take your order like that. Like, they'll be like, Oh, hi, what are you guys doing? And what college are you from? Oh, okay. You know what I'm saying? And like have full conversations sometimes. And sometimes, you know, you'd be in the mood. Sometimes it's like, okay, girl.

[00:15:55] Just bring me the wings. Exactly. So, yeah, but yeah, I, I, being personable, not over flirting, not, not in front of me, not in front of me. So they are forced to acknowledge that the workplace is probably not as safe for them. And that's kind of the yucky part, right?

[00:16:21] Like in the employee handbook, they're like, so, you know, there's going to be a level of sexual harassment. And as we're seeing Christine, I believe it was read the employee handbook that she signed. She's like, Oh, didn't really, I don't really know that. Like, yeah, you know what I'm saying? But that's what it is. It's young, young people. They need a job. They need the money. They're not necessarily reading the contract. And even if they do, they say, well, no, I don't agree with this.

[00:16:50] Then you don't get the job, you know? And as far as a waitressing job, it seems pretty easy. You know, what do you want? It's going to be wings and fries and beer. It's not an extensive menu. So the actual act of ferrying the things around isn't going to be too hard. You get to hang out with your friends, I imagine. Either you and a friend go and apply or you become friends with the other girls. And certainly the former, the older women who we have now that are former waitresses talk about that kind of camaraderie.

[00:17:19] And particularly if you're in a toxic work environment, you become even closer. So I can see why a young girl would go to that. It's easy. You get paid. You have friends. And if you have to put up with, you know, a bit of touchy-feely, they should not have to.

[00:17:37] I'm talking about what it's like as a woman who has been socialized to be polite and has been socialized in that way within a culture that the original founders who are not interviewed for this documentary, but we do see them interviewed elsewhere, where they say that they created a place that men couldn't get kicked out of. And that they encourage the blurring of boundaries. And, you know. Yeah, exactly.

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[00:19:01] Let's talk a little bit about Alyssa's case, which was so, it was so extremely sad. And I will say that I feel like Alyssa's case was probably the best fleshed out Prisma's. I thought, I thought it felt a little rushed, but it was kind of weird, right? Because like, as I'm watching this hour and 33 minute show, I was like, I knew it was an hour and a half going into it.

[00:19:30] Because when I pressed play, it said an hour and a half. And as I'm watching it, I'm like, this can't be an hour and a half. Because it felt like they were getting a lot into it. I was like, how much longer? Like, not in a bad way. Like, it was just like, I was actually floored about how much information they actually were able to succinctly packed into the hour and a half. I think that's a good point.

[00:19:56] Because Alyssa was so clearly, it was so clearly centered within the Hoosiers. So this asshole comes along and takes a liking to her. And, you know, one of many single men who go there because they can't get kicked out. And the girls have to be nice to them. But he takes a liking to her. He comes and he sits in her section. And if she's not working, he doesn't stay. He asks her for her phone number.

[00:20:23] And this is what I mean about they haven't been provided with tools. Have a little training session where if a man asks for your phone number, this is how to deal with it. Because it was also a thing of like, well, if you want to, you know, make a little money on the side, you know, we don't mind. So she gives him her email address instead. And this wild series of escalating emails happened to her. And she has no tools of how to deal with it. Her friends don't say, take these to the police.

[00:20:52] They're appalling. So she's trying to deal with it herself. She isn't supported by management when she finally talks about it. So she can only quit and move away. And he pursues her, kills her and then kills himself. So I think that that case and the reason why Alyssa got the most time and the detail of it was because it is so centred. I mean, they all are because they worked at Hooters, but it's so centred on that.

[00:21:21] Whereas Prisma didn't actually work at Hooters. She worked at the casino and she wasn't a Hooters girl and she'd been working there three days. Now, she was targeted because of Hooters because this particular asshole says to his young asshole friend, oh, I need to, I'm going to go and get some sex. It's like, go and pay a sex worker guy. Go and hire a sex worker.

[00:21:47] But he saw, as I said before, a hunting ground, a target rich environment outside the Hooters casino where he could capture Prisma and get what he wanted from her. The interesting thing there is how they solve the case because, of course, they know it's a white car. And then the documentarians in a nice bit of shade film the streets of Las Vegas absolutely full of these white cars.

[00:22:17] But because he kills Julio Romero and shoots Julio's wife Roberta in the face, she only survives by playing dead, that they are able to follow through with the car, realise that it's the same perpetrator, take him down, this pathetic loser.

[00:22:38] So while Prisma did work at the casino for Hooters and while he was there specifically to pick up a Hooters girl in the parking lot, I think that there's a clarity in Alyssa's case where she stands for a lot of the girls who would have had this kind of harassment, inability to fend off these men who were asking for something from her and lack of support by management.

[00:23:06] And if they are supported by management, management isn't supported by corporate. So it really is most, it's mostly Alyssa and then these other cases. Yeah, like Alyssa's is like legit Hooters basically helped it happen, like legit, he's in their establishment. And so there was, and that's what I'm saying, they packed so much into it. They packed in the history of Hooters, they packed in, we get the former manager.

[00:23:36] At Alyssa's branch saying that he complained about Troy and that again, like you said, he was, he was, he wasn't backed up. The fact that Alyssa was only worked there for three months. She only worked at Hooters for three months and was ran out because she had, because she had no help with Troy.

[00:23:58] And the fact that she moved away, her got married and a year and a half later, he finds where she worked at and killed her. She's, she's no longer at Hooters. She, like Christine says, has a big girl job working at AT&T and she's minding her business, living her life. And he, and he kills her.

[00:24:24] And it is so annoying because not only that, she tried to get a restraining order against him and the judge denied it. It was denied, which makes no sense since the restraining order that she filed was so thick. And again, had these damaging emails, all of these threats. Like why wasn't she granted a protective order? Now, even if she was granted a protective order, it wouldn't have meant, it wouldn't have mattered.

[00:24:52] As we know from all the other different stalking cases. I mean, the, the weak thing is that if you call the police and say, I have a restraining order against this person and they're right here in front of me, they're supposed to come quickly. I'm going to not finish that sentence because they might not. It's a restraining order to lock them up. Yeah. I just, it's just, it was just so frustrating. It was so frustrating. And I like, you couldn't help but feel bad for Alyssa.

[00:25:22] I was wondering like, how did he track her down and all of that? Or maybe she thought just moving away would be fine. Maybe she didn't realize he was still stalking her or whatever, but it was just, it was just very sad. Like, like you said. Yes. Can we talk about the South Park Raisins episode? Please. Can we talk about the South Park Raisins episode?

[00:25:45] If anybody knows, they know, they should know that South Park basically raised me. I, I watched the very first episode, the very night it premiered when I shouldn't have. I was seven. So like, I love South Park. It's had its ups and downs over the past few years, but they have righted the ship. They have righted the ship. And the Raisins episode is one of those episodes that I remember so clearly.

[00:26:14] And it's literally one of my favorites, which doesn't say much because I love a good portion of the episodes. But strategically, the Raisins episode comes out in 2003, I believe, which is again, right after those first spate of murders. And South Park normally always has its, has its pulse on, on what's happening and knows how to be satirical about it.

[00:26:41] And it, and it, it does get a few minutes here in this documentary. Christine, the former Hooters girl who is very nostalgic. You can kind of tell about her time at Hooters. She, you could, she said she went into being a Hooters girl to get that, like that fame, the calendar, become a Miss Hooters, like the pageant thing. She has, I don't want to like say it, but she has that aesthetic that like, that, that, that Florida, Miami aesthetic.

[00:27:11] She's blonde, has lip fillers type thing, that, that type of aesthetic. And she, she did used to work with Alyssa and she's a main talking head, but she also talks about the South Park episode. And in the South Park episode, this, this, uh, restaurant called Raisins, which, not, not wink, wink opens up. And it's girls, young girls who are Stan, Kyle and Kenny's age, um, that are waitresses at this place called Raisins.

[00:27:37] And I can't remember, I don't think it's the, it's not the main storyline, right? Cause the main storyline, I believe is Stan and Wendy breaking up. Yes. Um, yeah. And, uh, and Stan becoming a goth. So I remembered Stan becoming a goth very fondly. And I remembered Butters falling in love with the Raisins girl very fondly. And it wasn't until I rewatched it that I saw, oh my God, it's in the same episode, like these two kind of major memories of, of, it's such a good episode, everyone.

[00:28:06] It's season seven, episode 14. Exactly. And so Butters falls in love with this Raisins girl. Her name is Mercedes. She's just doing the Mercedes who's working with Ferrari and Porsche. Yeah. She's like, come back and see me sometime again. And she just, and Butters is like, oh my God, she's my girlfriend. And he goes and he tells his mom and dad, mom and dad, I have a girlfriend. And he, he keeps going to Raisins and spending his money.

[00:28:35] And he's like, oh, I would love to take you on a date. And she's like, I can't cutie. I work. So you just got to come here. And they're like, and he's like, okay, I will do that for you. And he comes back at like night with a present and he's trying to walk her to her car. She's like, oh, hey. And then she's like, Maureen. And she has a big old burly bodyguard. Huge bodyguard. Huge bouncer.

[00:29:01] So that's what I mean about the girls at Raisins having a lot more protection than the girls at Hooters. Yeah. Than the actual real girls, because he manages to keep Butters off of Mercedes. Long story short, Butters thinks that he's in love with her. She's like, she finally at one point is just like, no, this is just my job. Yeah. And Butters starts to get angry. You can tell Butters is starting to like get mad.

[00:29:25] And he just so happens to be the moment that he runs into Stan, who again, heartbroken over Wendy, turned into a goth. And Butters is like, I'm so mad. Like, you know, he's implying he wants to hurt people. And he never wants to love again and all this stuff. And Stan was like, I mean, Stan with the moral of the story with the music in the background. He's like, yes, this sucks. This feeling hurts. But I know that I actually loved her because of this feeling. And you kind of got to take the good with the bad, you know?

[00:29:56] Like, it's such a moral of the story. And it's like, you know, talking to the audience, like men cannot be so fragile about rejection. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And it's just such a great episode, y'all. It's a great episode. And the thing that I loved about it, I love a lot of things about it. But the thing about it is you see the Raisins girls going around and serving everybody. Hey, cutie. Hi, cutie. And they all have the same voice.

[00:30:23] I think that I don't know if it's the same actress who voices them all. And at every table, one of them goes up and says, oh, thank goodness you've come because it's been so boring. But at last an interesting table has come. And then you hear another girl saying exactly the same thing. And another girl saying exactly the same thing. And it was the spending of all the money that I thought was very interesting. That was a very dark undertone of it. He's getting advances on his allowance. And eventually his parents say, what are you spending all this money on?

[00:30:51] And of course, they're thrilled that he has a girlfriend. But it was very ha-ha-hee-hee, definitely. But also incredibly cutting and biting. And about these two men, boys, boy men. And as you said, their fragile ego and their inability to take rejection. My favorite thing is Bebe coming up to Stan and saying, Wendy drops you. Yeah.

[00:31:21] Wendy breaks up. That's right. Wendy breaks up. I loved it. It was fantastic. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And it's just one of those things that this, if you haven't seen this documentary and you're wondering if you should, you know, we'll get to our ratings. But, you know, I want to say I thought it was very well done. And I mean, it's very straightforward. But again, it really asked a lot of questions.

[00:31:49] It asked a lot of questions about what is the responsibility of this restaurant. And then it also talks about the re-hooterization. Hooters went bankrupt in 2025. We have one down here near me. We have lived here for like five years and have never gone, I believe. We might have gotten delivery before, but I'm not sure. That was another thing why we used to go to Hooters 2 is because they played the games. My husband's a diehard Eagles fan.

[00:32:18] So that was kind of the only way for him to be able to watch the games too. But yeah. So they went bankrupt, but they didn't close all locations. The location near me is still open. And they're, yeah, a re-hooterization. And they're, they're, they're putting out like, they're looking, they're looking to hire folks. And then it's like people with pants and shirts on and different colors and men. And it's like, okay.

[00:32:45] And like, honestly, again, like I said, the food's delicious. So, you know, they, they said, oh, we want to go family friendly again. Like the journalist lady said, who was also a very, very good talking head. I don't know if y'all were ever, uh, family friendly. We want to return to our roots of being a family restaurant. I don't think so. Called. But we took, it's an owl. Don't you get it? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Big O's. Yeah.

[00:33:15] Any final thoughts, Sarah, about Hooters before you go into our radio? Oh no, I think your point is very well taken about the journalist, Kate Taylor. Uh, she has a very interesting area that she works inside where her interests are. Her research was absolutely impeccable. And she gave the outsider view of the corporation, the, the way that the, the corporation structured

[00:33:39] and the, the real structural inequities within it that we needed someone to take us through. And she was the perfect person to do so. Exactly. So Sarah, how many magnifying glasses are you going to rate the Hooters murders, colon deadly shift out of a possible five? Well, it is a great surprise to me that I am going to rate it a very strong three and I am going to recommend it.

[00:34:06] It's straightforward in terms of the way it tells its story. Uh, but I think that what lifts it above a ordinary episode of this nature is that it does actually go hard on, on the culture, uh, harder than I thought it was going to. And it really pulls back on any sensationalization, which again, would have been very easy to do.

[00:34:31] There are a lot of egregious filming of buttocks coming out of the bottom of orange shorts and, you know, boobs straining against, straining against the tank tops. I could have done without it. But then I think it really is giving you that idea of this is the atmosphere. And also this is how the girls are being looked at because you don't see the actresses faces. You just see them chopped up into their body parts. Oh gosh, chopped up.

[00:34:58] But I mean, that sort of gives you that thing of what is the draw of this place other than the excellent wings that Mari talks about. So I'm going to say a solid three and recommend. How about you, Mari? What are you going to rate this? Yeah, I'm gonna give it a three and a half. I was really high on it. Um, again, I, I wish I had more to be quite honest. And why, why the, why the colon deadly shift? Uh, that, that feels, that feels weird, you know? Yeah.

[00:35:27] But anyways, they, what, everything ought to have a subtitle nowadays. Weird. But yeah, no, I strong recommend, strong recommend. Oxygen did a great job with this. I was introduced to, to murders I didn't know about. I, I got a little bit more insight on one that I realized I was familiar with. I, I think the victims were featured very well. We do get family members, um, in the talking heads. Lots of good talking heads.

[00:35:55] Didn't feel like there were any frivolous ones. So yeah, I, I thought, I thought it was, it was really good. So Sarah, what do you have to recommend to our listeners? I have a few things to recommend today. I watched the AI doc comma or how I became an apocaloptimist, a director by Daniel Roher, who directed Navalny, which, uh, as you know, I think is terrific. And Charlie Tyrell, it's, it's on Netflix.

[00:36:23] I was looking forward to seeing it, but I was also hesitant to see it. And a few people that I know who I've asked, oh, did you see the AI documentary? They go, oh, I really want to, but I'm scared and I don't want to be depressed. And, you know, the AI's are coming to killers and all of that. It is absolutely fantastic production point of view. So Daniel Roher is an artist, a sketcher and painter. So there are the animation and it is absolutely wonderful.

[00:36:49] So you see his drawings in his notebooks and also the paper comes up into three dimensions. And the access to talking heads is incredible. The first is not a spoiler. The first third is maybe the doomsayers. Uh, he, his wife is pregnant and he asks them, would you bring a child into the world? And the doomsayers say, no, absolutely not. I know people who, who feel their children won't finish high school. Then he talks to the optimists.

[00:37:18] And so with him, we're sort of swinging from one thing to another. He's trying to make sense of it. He asks questions like, what is AI? I mean, it's, it's fantastic. And then towards the end, we meet the CEOs. I was unbelievable. So of the top six, we meet four of them. One of them that doesn't speak is Mark Zuckerberg, surprisingly. And the other one is Elon Musk, surprisingly.

[00:37:43] So the others are sitting there full face and talking about it. So I thought that was super interesting. And I would say, I would understand why people are reluctant to watch it. But not only is it beautifully made, but it has a, a balance. Ultimately, it's like an unsolved mystery, I'm afraid, Mari, because we don't quite know which side to come down on. But I have a lot more information and I like listening to experts.

[00:38:12] Oh, for people who don't know, experts are people that have studied a particular subject and know a lot about it. And we should be listening to them just in case you needed to know that. Of course, our listeners all know that. So the joy of sitting with people who are experts, but experts in all sorts of things as well. It was very varied and we see Daniel on camera a lot, which works incredibly well. And his talking heads are really reacting towards him as a person

[00:38:42] rather than answering questions in rote. So absolutely terrific. I'm going to give it, I'm going to give it five magnifying glasses. It was so good. I also saw John Cameron Mitchell in his Bowie song cycle, which is called I'm Afraid of Americans. It was transporting. Bowie was very important to me. He's the most important musician, artist in my life. I saw him three times. I was lucky enough to see him three times the first time when I was 17.

[00:39:12] His music was the soundtrack of my teen years and young womanhood. Of course, I still listen to it, but my attachment comes from the fact that he knew me. He knew me. Bowie knew me. He was writing words that were just all about me and expressed how I felt. And it was wonderful to revisit and get excited. John Cameron Mitchell, people may know him as the writer of Hedwig and the Angry Inch.

[00:39:39] And Bowie was an early supporter and put money into that show, which, as John Cameron Mitchell himself says, Bowie never saw that money again. But it's wonderful. So he's curated the songs in a wonderful way as they come one after another. It's not all the hits. There's lots of lesser known things. Not lesser known to me, but to a general audience. And he's supported by Amber Martin. You may know Amber Martin. She's an absolute powerhouse singer. She's one of the Scissor Sisters. And she was absolutely incredible.

[00:40:09] And in Australia, certainly Meow Meow, the acclaimed cabaret singer, was another of his supports. It's very theatrical. The band was great. I can't speak enough about it. I don't know about American dates, but if you see it and anything that I've said piques your interest, I think you probably don't even have to be a Bowie fan to enjoy it because it's an amazing show. So that's John Cameron Mitchell and I'm Afraid of Americans.

[00:40:36] And the last thing I'll say, Mari, is that Traitors US, New Blood, we've just had week one, we've had two episodes. I am very into this Australian season three, which just finished. It grew on me. This one, straight away, I'm into. The only thing I would say is New Blood, ordinary people. No, they're not. I know three of them parasocially from following them on various social media. They all have followings of various kinds. But that's fine. Who?

[00:41:05] Sherry is Snarky in the Suburbs. Sherry? Which one is Sherry? Sherry's the older woman, the southern one. She's southern. Oh. That said to, if you were my son, I would have said, put that shield back. She's very funny. Okay. She's wonderful. So shout out, Sherry follows Snarky in the Suburbs on Instagram. Mm-hmm. And the other one is, I don't know what her name is. It's the girl who whispers. I don't know. She says that.

[00:41:31] And the other is one of the men who talks about true crime, whose name also escapes me. But if I know three of them, then I'm thinking. But it's not even an argument. It's like, they have to sell it somehow. And why wouldn't you pick people with followings? You know, it's just the way it goes. So I am going to, on the basis of two episodes, I'm going to recommend Traders US, New Blood.

[00:42:01] And what about you, Mari? What have you got to recommend? Well, first we had a message from listener Jenny. She said, hi team. Hi Jenny. I have been wanting to write to you for a while, but was never brave enough. I couldn't help but write to thank Mari. Yes, me. That's me. For the book recommendation of None of This is True. I started the audiobook, then ran out of Spotify time. That's real. That's so real as a book listener.

[00:42:29] I had to buy the book like a caveman. I haven't read a book since I was at school, which was a long time ago. I haven't been able to put this book down. It, like your pod, is addictive. Please keep doing what you are doing. I find myself listening to episodes even when I haven't seen the property. Thank you again, Jenny from Australia. Jenny, thank you so much. I'm so glad you liked the recommendation.

[00:42:57] We love to hear when we get recommendations right. That feeds my soul. I am absolutely so happy, Jenny. None of This is True was such a good book. The audiobook is amazing. I know some people have qualms about audiobooks versus regular books.

[00:43:17] I will say that the subject matter of this book really leads well to audiobook because it's in podcast form. It's about a woman making a podcast. So they do really cool audio things with the audiobook when they're like podcast. It's so cool. It's so cool. So, yeah. Jenny, I'm so glad that you love that recommendation. Thanks for writing to us, Jenny. And please, everybody, be brave.

[00:43:47] We love hearing from you. There's nothing to be afraid of. We're just stars. We're just like you. I'll put this in the show notes, but it is Lisa Jewel, J-E-W-E-L-L. And I have just ordered it at my local library. Shout out local libraries. So as recommended by Mari and Jenny. Thank you. Yes.

[00:44:11] So a show that I watched on HBO Max here that I was just needing something to put on while I was like nursing a bad day. And kind of like just tired and needing to nap and lay down and relax. Relax a true crime. It's a docuseries called The Pandemic Prophet. It's a docuseries on HBO. It's a French documentary. So it's all in French. So I was like, what? Am I relaxing?

[00:44:39] Like it was all in French with subtitles or you could do the dubs. The dubs were absolutely horrible. HBO Max's dubs are not like Netflix's dubs. Like this was not a cast dubs. I was like, oh, this is a I think this was a I think it was a I dub to be quite honest. That aside, it is a it's a it's kind of a cool almost like a heist docuseries about a French scientist during the pandemic.

[00:45:09] I cannot say his name because it's very French. Yeah. No. So but like he he's the one who said that hydrochloric. I can't even say that hydrochloric. Chloric keen, something like that. Hydrochloric keen or something like that. It was an early. He was saying that it would help. I don't know if the word is cure COVID, but stay COVID off.

[00:45:37] They do a sizzle reel in the beginning of people talk about, oh, hydrochloric, hydrochloric keen or whatever. Uh, it's it's a miracle. It's a miracle. Trump's talking about how he's taking it, you know, stuff like that.

[00:45:50] And basically a group of scientists and amateur sleuths like a a scientist who surfs a researching doctor who spoiler alert, twist alert is his daughter.

[00:46:07] And like a a it was like a band of misfits come together who never met each other, meet on the Internet that are like, this guy is lying to people like they're like this hydrochloric. There's nothing for this virus, but he's on everywhere talking and pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, pushing this drug, pushing this drug, of course, all this stuff. And it is it's four parts. It is four episodes.

[00:46:35] Um, and it is all like I said, it's all French, but it was pretty good. I got through the first two episodes. So I'll sleep on the third. So I'll have to go back in and look at the last two. But it's basically them trying to take this guy down as he's like skyrocketing to the top as like the top scientist in France. So it's so and it has like these really cool kind of like animation. It's very, very cool. I did like it.

[00:47:04] Um, I don't think it's like sensational. I don't think it's kind of like it. It is kind of, uh, not boring, but like it's very medically. That's why I liked it. It was very medical, like very medical. So, um, and then also he's just in front of this panel, just throwing out words that nobody knows. So it was really good. I really liked it. Listen to the experts. Yes.

[00:47:31] I also have been watching a lot of history hit on YouTube. I believe I might've recommended it before. I am not sure. I think I did. Yeah. I don't care. I'm recommending it again because they, they started this series where they'll take like, uh, a two door expert and show them AI slop images of like historical two door, uh, events. And they have to try and guess what the event is.

[00:47:59] And then they rate how bad the AI slop is. It's such a good, it's such a funny series. And it, and it's like, it's like a Tudor historian. She's a middle evil historian who, who specifically knows a lot about Prague. They had a, uh, Oh, the guy, guy was a American historian and they showing him like these horrible AI creations of Washington crossing the Delaware. And it, it was horrible. Like, it's just so funny.

[00:48:28] They're trying, they're trying to guess what the AI thinks something looks like. And then they just tear it to shreds. And it's so good. It's so funny. And it's like, it's funny. And then you're learning a lot of, you're learning a lot of history as they then tell you the backstory of, of this and then why this is like wrong. So I've been, I've been in my history bag a little bit too. So that's been fun. And then finally I have an anti recommendation. Oh, I love these.

[00:48:58] So I had to, I, I had to, I don't know why, but I had to watch the first episode of monster. The Lizzie Borden story. Oh my God. No. I know. I know. Ryan Murphy. Chappelle literally said on recap, kickback. If I die, do not let Ryan Murphy write about me. And it's so true because the, oh my God, Sarah, it was bad. It was bad from the very first fucking second.

[00:49:27] I am so angry. Like it was so bad. Oh, Mary, Mary, was it as bad as me? Mary, was it as bad as me? Yes. Yes. The Lizzie Borden actress. And you said you would never do that again. I did say that. Yes. The Lizzie Borden actress kind of had her own voice like that too. Like, it's like he makes them make weird voice choices. But from the outset, just she, they, they, he has her show them.

[00:49:55] He shows the murders a second in and who cares about historical accuracy? Just out the window. We're just gonna. Anyways. And yeah, it's, it, I, I watched, I might've actually accidentally watched two episodes, but it, it was just bad. It was bad. It, I lost my remote. Oh my God. Tragedy. It's just like, fine. I'll just sit here and watch this until I have to get up and go.

[00:50:24] So Mary, how many magnifying glasses are you going to rate Monster, the Lizzie Borden story out of a possible five? One, one. It just, I mean, the, it's so over the top. It's so over the top. It's so over the top. It makes no sense. Like, it's so over the top. I just can't, I can't do it. I can't do it. The actress who does Lizzie is actually, I actually do enjoy her performance.

[00:50:53] And is the, and there's an actress who plays Bridget, their maid as well, who is very funny. But the rest of it is just so over the top. It's too much for me. Please subscribe to the show at CrimeScenePod.com or search Crime Scene. That's S-E-E-N wherever you get your podcasts. Follow Crime Scene everywhere at Crime Scene Pod. You can support us at BuyMeACoffee.com slash Crime Scene Pod.

[00:51:20] Sling us a couple of bucks or join our monthly membership like SmithHO114. Members receive episodes early and ad-free as well as other exclusive bonus content. The recording of our live episode from RahapCon in Milwaukee is up. We also, in that episode, cover Celebrity Crime Scene, colon, Princess Diana. That's available to all members whenever you join. You can also support us by buying our merch.

[00:51:47] Go to MariCraftsToMuch.BigCartel.com. There you can find our custom tumblers. You might find some shirts there soon. You can check out my other book theme merch. If there's something that's not there quite for you, I can make something specifically for you. So just the link to the store will be in the show notes. You can also support us for free. Rate and review Crime Scene so that others can find us.

[00:52:17] Five stars only. Five stars. Your support makes a big difference, genuinely. And part of your support, too, is writing to us like Jenny did and just letting us know what you like about the show. If there's anything you don't like about the show, be respectful. But you can tell us that if you want to. But, of course, we prefer it when you say this was great. And that will guide how we do our episodes going forward. So, Sarah, what do you have going on and where can the people find you?

[00:52:46] You can follow me on Blue Sky at Sarah Carradine if that's something you want to do. Here on Crime Scene on the members only feed at Buy Me A Coffee, I'm covering season two of Ludwig from the BBC, episode by episode with Katie from A Date with Dateline. We're going to be starting with a recap of season one and then, as I say, go episode by episode.

[00:53:07] You can watch both seasons now on the BBC if you want to fly to England or in the US and Australia on BritBox starting on October 13th and dropping weekly. What about you, Murray? Where can the people find you? Well, you can find me on Blue Sky at MariTalksTooMuch. That's too like the number two over on Recap Kickback. Me and Chappelle are just starting our coverage of The Drop, A Snowfall Saga. It is so good.

[00:53:34] We're so excited to be back in the snowfall universe. And we are breaking it down every week just for you. Coming up, we also will be covering A Different World, the new reboot over on Netflix. So we're very excited about that. So just make sure you're subscribed to Recap Kickback. You can go to RecapKickback.com in order to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Or even better, go see our pretty faces on YouTube.

[00:54:00] Go to YouTube.com slash at Recap Kickback in order to see us. And we pull up pictures and photos. It's so fun. So go and support us over on Recap Kickback. I'm also over on RHAP covering the final weeks of BB28. I can't believe it. It's almost over and done with. It's been such a fun season to cover. So if you follow me on Blue Sky, that's mostly what I'm talking about all day, every day.

[00:54:27] And I'll be, I've been, I was on the Double Eviction episode recap last week. And I will be on the Stockwatch and Life Eat Update. So yeah, talking a lot of Big Brother over on RHAP. Sarah, what are we watching next week? Next time on Crime Scene, we're covering A Killer Story with Kirsten McInnes. All three episodes have now dropped on HBO Max. You can watch them there and send us your comments and questions.

[00:54:55] Thanks to Will from America for the theme music and to all of the Hooters girls out there who are serving those very delicious wings. Until next time. Case closed.

[00:55:07] Case closed.