Murder Among the Mormons on Netflix: It's alright I guess

I have been kind of upset with Netflix lately because I don't really understand why there has been a dramatic drop in quality shows that have been coming out of the Netflix "factory" lately. It seems for every 1 decent something or other they produce they make 9 piles of garbage. If I was actually paying for my subscription I probably would have cancelled it months ago. *Murder Among the Mormons" isn't great and at times it seems as though it is anti-Christian propaganda... but it is still one of the better documentary series that they have at the moment (which isn't really saying very much.)

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The entire 3-part series is about a lot of things, including how the Mormon faith got started in the first place and this is the part where it seems as though Netflix is directly going after the faith in a general sense, which I don't like them doing even though I am not Mormon and think that a lot of their beliefs, and almost all religious beliefs, are stupid. My (or their) opinion on what religion is the correct one is a question that can not be answered by anyone and even though I am not Mormon, and I have only ever met one family that is, I don't like the idea of anyone having an exposé done about their religion since the recounting of events for all religions are based on speculation and fables anyway.

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The real meat and potatoes of the show is about some bombings that happened in Salt Lake City in 1985 and the reasons behind them. The reason why the bombings happened is because someone was attempting to discredit some rather important documents that are at the center of the Mormon church's belief system. These documents involved a collector named Mark Hoffmann and whoever it was that organized the bombings was intending to kill him and all the others that were involved in the supposed documents that would expose the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints as being fraudulent.

When they change the narrative of the series to focus on the crimes, rather than the authenticity of the religion itself, the show gets a lot more interesting because prior to that, it seemed as though this mini-series had only the objective of making the Mormons look like a bunch of frauds, which they very well may be but I don't personally like it when Netflix, or any other streaming service, seems to have some sort of religious or political agenda. I want to be entertained, not brainwashed.

Personally, I would feel exactly the same way if they were trying to pain any religion as wrong, regardless of which one it is. Just let people live how they want to, I say.

Should I watch it?

I think that once you get past the part about attempting to nullify the religion based on the opinions of some of their experts the show really takes off and it is entertaining. I enjoy true crime documentaries so episodes 2 and 3 were very interesting to me. I could do without the attempts (if that is in fact what was going on) to discredit the faith though, which is what most of episode 1 is about.

On the other side of things though, this documentary is basically done in exactly the same way as every other Netflix true crime series and therefore isn't terribly original. This wont be for everyone, but if you like true crime and want to learn a little history at the same time, this might be something you would enjoy. It is only 3 episodes long so it isn't too much of a commitment either.