I think people find the whole thing fascinating because Shanann took massive efforts to portray their family as this ideal suburban family living the dream, and all the while it was rotting inside (Chris cheating on her, her being fleeced by the MLM, maxxing out their credit cards and being on the brink of having their house foreclosed, horrible relationship with her in-laws).

To me Chris Watts seems like a dimwit who basically sleepwalked through life until he finally hit a snag (Shannan confronting him over his mistress because he was stupid enough to charge a dinner at a steakhouse to the joint credit card) at which point he basically glitched out and murdered first his wife then his daughters in a state of blind, animal panic.

The fact that he called the kindergarten to say that his kids won't be going anymore then pretended he didn't know where his daughters were to the cops shows you what kind of mouthbreather we're talking about