Tiger King

Up through the series’ parting sequence, which squares one individual’s punishment with a moment of self-reflection, “Tiger King” manages to tell an electrifying story with an open mind, a shrewd eye, and a delicate touch.

At first glance, Tiger King may look like another Fyre Fest-esque documentary: a catastrophic series of events that are easy to laugh at thanks to the hot-mess egomaniac at the center of it all. But audiences should prepare themselves for some deeply distressing moments of darkness uncovered in Joe Exotic's story.

Superbly entertaining and unexpected docuseries.

What unfolds from this years-long scrimmage is too delicious to give away, but it involves a cast of colorful oddballs living on the fringes of society. ... “Tiger King” exposes the furry underbelly of a big-cat community I’d never known about, in which the lines between loving wild animals and exploiting them are never quite clear. In the end, I felt queasy at what I had seen, but the time sure had flown.

The Netflix documentary is so horrifically addicting you’ll be like a cat at feeding time. Never mind some of the seven-part series’ editing or focus. The production pulls you in because the characters are so unabashedly brazen. They don’t just talk about their hatred. They openly demonstrate it, helping you understand a layer of society you never knew existed.

Tiger King is genuinely compulsive viewing, although those who are sensitive to depictions of animal abuse should be warned that while we don’t see that much of it, it’s sometimes described in graphic detail. ... As with a lot of compulsions, indulging it may not leave you feeling satisfied as much as spent, with a vague feeling of having done something that’s not entirely healthy.

Tiger King is a wildly entertaining reality binge-watch, but it could have a lasting effect that raises awareness and inspire change as well.

The outlandish world presented by "Tiger King" is funny, gross, frustrating, contemplative, and ultimately sympathetic. This is a story of animals, yes, but it's also a story of what makes us human.

Netflix has made a lot of noise with unscripted programming, but it's going to roar with this beyond-bizarre docu-series distraction, which demonstrates that outlandish people who love filming themselves are a formula for TV that's grrrr-reat.

At its most profound—and engrossing—Tiger King is a portrait of a world that’s entirely alien, and yet also reflective, and diagnostic, of this country as a whole. It’s funny, and creepy, and frustrating, and, in the longview, pretty sad. Which feels just about exactly right at this particular juncture in our national experiment.

Though the story begins with their respective love for their animals, “Tiger King” quickly devolves into the complex and downright bizarre tale of the rivalry between Joe Exotic and Baskin, the outsize characters of the big cat collecting world, and the dangerous cults of personality that fuel all of the above.

The doc feels like it started life as a message film, lost the thread completely and ended up, especially in its closing installments, with a lot of hastily unfolding plot. It's a series that might, in its ideal form, have been a substantive and nourishing meal, but premieres on Netflix as a yummy bag of potato chips. ... I'll leave it to the directors to decide whether, amid what may be turn out to be great popularity for the show, they miss the desired nutritional value.

A compelling series in fits and starts that doesn't amount to much more than a trip through an extremely strange world filled with extremely strange people.

All of this is incredibly interesting, and it gets much wilder from there, with compulsively watchable tangents galore and incredible access to the inner workings of Joe’s world. ... But it feels like Tiger King keeps getting distracted by shiny objects.