What Makes a Murderer: What the Must Watch Reviewers think

Tuesday 19 November 2019, 8:10

Must Watch reviewers Scott Bryan and Hayley Campbell share their thoughts on What Makes A Murderer which starts on Channel 4 on 21 November at 21:00 GMT... you can catch up on All 4.

Have you watched it? What did you think? Leave your comments below.

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(Copyright: Channel 4)

Hayley says: "It felt kind of patronising"

"This is all about life experience colliding with how the brain is programmed genetically and whether you are capable of feeling fear or feeling it less than normal. All of that is dependent on how big a certain part of your brain is. So there’s a lot of science stuff in here. If the fear part of your brain is smaller then you’re more likely to take risks.

"They’re looking at that with various murders. There are three. The first one is John Massey who was 27 when he shot a bouncer in Hackney in the 70s. He’s Britain’s longest serving murderer. He served 43 years because his sentence kept getting extended every time he escaped, which was three times.

"So they’re looking at the science of brains and they’re also looking at how trauma and neglect and abuse can affect you to the point where you are changed psychologically and emotionally for your entire life.

"This sounds like something I would love but my main beef is that I don’t exactly know what is ground breaking about this because as you know from Mind Hunter, the FBI started psychologically profiling criminals in the 70s and it also goes back further than that.

"I thought that this show moved really slowly and was really drawn out. There was music to ramp up the sensationalism of it and if you’re a true crime fan, there’s nothing here that you won’t have seen before. So it felt kind of patronising."

(Copyright: Channel 4)

Scott says: "I feel uncomfortable giving convicted murderers air time"

"It felt really patronising. There were so many sexy shots of cliffs for some reason, even though it had nothing to do with beaches. It had both the psychologist and the professor basically trying to do like a sexy show.

"They were writing on transparent white board when we knew they already worked it out anyway - they were just basically re-disclosing it for the fact that it’s on TV. They used really sterile interview rooms to make it seem like it’s a proper investigative show and it’s really ground-breaking but there was nothing I felt that it was really teaching me anything new.

"Then it sort of says this whole thing of: if we’re able to pin point the exact characteristic traits or the exact way that a brain works, maybe that means that the whole prison system will be overhauled because you can basically detect if a murderer is going to murder somebody…But then in terms of justice it doesn’t necessarily change anything because surely if somebody does commit murder, even if their brain might be more likely to say that they would do such a crime, surely they should still be imprisoned because of the crime that they have committed.

"Also I just feel quite uncomfortable giving people who have been through the criminal justice system, convicted murderers and so forth, the air time where they can talk quite candidly and openly about the crime that they have done."