True-crime docuseries have become too reliant on cheesy reenactments

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/arts/television/this-is-a-robbery-netflix.html

McMillions and Murder Among the Mormons "are among the more egregious offenders in their use of murky, dialogue-free re-enactments of such behaviors as sitting down on a couch, shaking hands and holding envelopes — images viewers are capable of conjuring on their own," says Margaret Lyons. "With its generic drone footage and repeated use of the same handful of photographs, This Is a Robbery, about an unsolved Boston art heist, seems to assume you’ll be playing on your phone while half-watching it, and it makes no demands on your visual attention." She adds: "The true-crime wave has turned out to be more of a true-crime tide, and it continues to roll in, with new tales of horrors and heartache washing ashore every day. Mysteries, miseries, the disgruntled. I have grown to accept the general appetite for others’ agony as entertainment, I guess, and whatever spiritual responsibility documentary makers have to their subjects is their business. What I cannot accept is another cheesy, bland re-enactment wedging itself into an otherwise compelling story."