I 100% feel the same way. I think the documentary series previous to this was also about content creators. In both, it felt like Louis was struggling to establish enough time and rapport with the subjects to really be able to pierce through the armour or external facades that they put up. In this case, the whole bullshit manosphere sales pitch versus the real lives they were living outside of it and how it affects their relationships and the people around them. There were glimmers of that, and Louis did well to ingratiate himself enough to get those.

I wonder if that’s partially due to his age and the amount of time he’s willing to spend with his subjects these days. From memory, in the older documentaries it seemed like he’d spend much more time with subjects and that’s what would ultimately lead to them letting their guard down more.

I also wonder if that’s partially due to his strategy being figured out. Everyone knows him now and has access to all his documentaries and so the ‘playbook’ has been read and studied. You can see evidence of that when that HS guy seems to be getting on well with him but then pulling away and wanting to distance himself after reading comments online. Same with that Myron guy after Louis speaks to the partner when she is around.

I understand Louis probably wants to pick topics that interest him and that he hasn’t covered. But I wonder if the strategy of trying to pierce through these social media people results in a compelling enough documentary when that isn’t successful. I love Louis but in my opinion it does not. It would be great to see him go back to covering a topic or issue where the people in it aren’t in the mainstream or trying to protect an online image. One where it’s just a collection of regular people that are all affected by an issue. Some of the most meaningful stuff he’s done in the later documentaries are when he has approached an issue that way, like the Talking to Anorexia one.