# Tiger King - new series on Netflix **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** tv-shows-scripted, netflix\ **Created:** [March 21, 2020, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966 "2020-03-21T16:57:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/81 "2020-04-05T01:50:34Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > and next week they are adding another episode to this series , they are filming it now. I heard that, will it really be true? ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/82 "2020-04-05T01:53:25Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > I don’t understand how this was made. Were they in the middle of filming a documentary when Joe went to jail? It started off as a pilot for a reality series and spiraled into this. In the David Spade interview, the reality show producer said he had to go into therapy and actually spent a week in an inpatient mental health facility after he left the project, because he had such serious PTSD as a result. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/83 "2020-04-05T03:53:45Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > I have feeling that Carole’s (late?) second husband, Don, is worthy of a Netflix series in his own right. > > He married his first wife when he was 17 and she was 14, and she wonders why it eventually collapsed? I do know that child marriage was not uncommon at that time (mid-century). Yeah, I don’t think he made all of his money legally. It would be interesting to see what all businesses he had and what his life was like before he disappeared. What I don’t get is why did so many people hate Carole Baskin? I see all these memes about Carole Baskin hate. Yeah she killed her husband, and yeah she was a hypocrite who criticized other people for keeping cats in cages when she did the same thing. And she is a multi millionaire who relies on slave labor while criticizing other people who do the same. But every major character in this film was deeply fucked up. Joe Exotic was far and away the worst to me. The guy struck me as a narcissist, they even mentioned how he pretty much robbed his parents due to the lawsuits he brought on himself with his behavior with Baskin. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/84 "2020-04-05T05:37:23Z")
> [@planetcory](#): > > I got the sense that there was a spiritual element too. His upbringing was shaped by some form of Eastern mysticism. So beyond fucking with tigers (and Doc), I’m sure they anticipated a higher reward. Well he is a doctor of mysticism. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/85 "2020-04-05T05:47:13Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > Joe ran for president in 2016 and also for OK governor in 2018. Both seemed like publicity stunts but he did hire a guy to help run his run for governor. I got the impression from the show he got 19% in the general election for governor, which horrified me. Actually, he came in third in the Libertarian primary with 19% of the vote (which is still pretty shocking, even if it only amounted to 664 total votes), and never reached the general election. ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/86 "2020-04-05T06:06:13Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > What I don’t get is why did so many people hate Carole Baskin? I see all these memes about Carole Baskin hate. > > Yeah she killed her husband, and yeah she was a hypocrite who criticized other people for keeping cats in cages when she did the same thing. And she is a multi millionaire who relies on slave labor while criticizing other people who do the same. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/87 "2020-04-05T06:27:10Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > :dubious: Yeah, I was going to post the same thing. Why do people hate Carole Baskin? Sure she did twenty bajillion evil and horrendous things, but Hitler did just as bad or worse so why the hate? 🙂 I’ll add that she used the money from her husband that she murdered to pursue Joe in a way that none of us would be financially able to do just as a jab to him knowing that she would never be able to collect, yet attempted to collect anyways. Tort lawyers around here call that “blood money” and as a gentleman’s (or gentlelady’s) agreement, never take those cases, but only go after insurance companies, except in the most extreme cases. Joe was rightfully outraged by this, but he handled it in the single most irresponsible and reckless way possible. I saw that his father was alive. My father would have beat my ass if I had done that. No matter that I was an adult, he would have beat my ass if I acted that way. Where was his Dad in all of this? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/88 "2020-04-05T08:16:48Z")
I just saw the first episode last nigh and the one thing I couldn’t stop thinking was, where are the experts? The show seems to take place in an intellectual dead zone, with nobody involved on any side having any formal training in zoology, biology or veterinary science. All I see there is a bunch of amateurs, bumbling about without the slightest idea what they’re doing. I find this mind-boggling. And the thing is, the documentations themselves don’t bring in any academics, either! I mean, I get it - if someone who actually knew something were to say what these bozos were doing right or wrong, it would take away much of the drama, but still, it all comes across as a terminal case of anti-intellectualism. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/89 "2020-04-05T11:10:31Z")
Only if you think the documentary is about the big cats. But it’s not really. It’s a series of character studies about truly terrible people and how they function. The background - in this case - happens to be about small independent zoos with big cats. But what we’re watching is how terrible people are and how they behave. The background could have been caverns or roadside attractions or small restaurants in mid-sized cities. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/90 "2020-04-05T11:48:24Z")
But the cats are what I care about! Putting the filmmakers’ intentions aside, I just find it striking how little formal education anyone there has. Running a zoo or fashioning yourself an “animal rights activist” without any sort of training or licensing seems absurd to me, like being an unlicensed airline pilot or surgeon. Hell, all the _farmers_ I know have degrees in agriculture, and they’re not raising exotic animals! If the show were about sideshow operators or restaurateurs, I wouldn’t be thinking, 5 minutes in, that none of these people should be doing what they’re doing - even if they weren’t terrible people. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/91 "2020-04-05T13:23:37Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I got the impression from the show he got 19% in the general election for governor, which horrified me. Actually, he came in third in the Libertarian primary with 19% of the vote (which is still pretty shocking, even if it only amounted to 664 total votes), and never reached the general election. He got 19% in the libertarian primary for governor but that was only 664 votes. He did not make the libertarian runoff so he was not on the ballot in the general election. I don’t see any evidence he was on any ballot for president in 2016. ---
**Author:** ![smithsb](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smithsb/32/12107_2.png) [@smithsb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smithsb)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/92 "2020-04-05T20:54:05Z")
Probably made no ballot but he did file and announce in Ohio??? for some reason. Links to his Presidential filing and run for governor back in post #58. They show up under older articles. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2020, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/93 "2020-04-05T22:40:42Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > He got 19% in the libertarian primary for governor but that was only 664 votes. He did not make the libertarian runoff so he was not on the ballot in the general election. > > I don’t see any evidence he was on any ballot for president in 2016. Yeah, the show was very deceptive on that point as it made it seem that Joe got 19% in a three way general election race, not that he got 19% in a third party primary with only 600 votes. I have no cite, but I read somewhere where he made the presidential ballot in Colorado. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/94 "2020-04-06T02:07:56Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > Agreed. However you do get the sense that deep down, and I really mean deep, deep down that Joe is a decent guy. But then you see the approximately 1 million terrible, awful things that he does and you don’t think so. But then you do. > > I have no doubt that Joe tried to pay someone to have Carole Baskin killed, but the show leaves you with a sense of unfairness. As you said, everyone in the show was a total piece of shit, but the government laser-focused on Joe because of his antics. How many serious felonies or other bad acts did it ignore or plea bargain away just to get at Joe? And I have real problems with a justice system in which the government uses the types of witnesses they used against Joe and says with a straight face that you can believe them. > > And that aside about adding the tiger-killing charges to the murder for hire to get a jury conviction was spot on and terribly prejudicial. I have owned dogs my whole life and enjoy them, but juries and judges have lost their mind. I say only partially joking that you have a better chance in court if you are accused of child abuse than you are of cruelty to an animal. People have lost their minds over that stuff and it was terribly prejudicial in his trial. Joe was by far the biggest piece of shit in the series. Guy was a typical narcissist who only cared about fame and money and fucked over everyone he came into contact with. Rick Kirkham basically said Joe burned down all the film and audio that Rick recorded since Rick informed him that he owned the rights to all the video. There was video of Joe killing animals and laughing about it, etc. that Joe didn’t want to get out. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/9HsYVPZuUfE/maxresdefault.jpg "Rick Kirkham Shares What Was Left Out of “Tiger King” - Lights Out Lo-Fi Chats (April 1, 2020)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HsYVPZuUfE) ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/95 "2020-04-06T02:11:59Z")
[quote=“Wesley\_Clark, post:94, topic:849966”] Joe was by far the biggest piece of shit in the series. Guy was a typical narcissist who only cared about fame and money and fucked over everyone he came into contact with. Rick Kirkham basically said Joe burned down all the film and audio that Rick recorded since Rick informed him that he owned the rights to all the video. There was video of Joe killing animals and laughing about it, etc. that Joe didn’t want to get out. [/QUOTE] I know. You’re right. I have no justification at all for what I said. No cites, no anything. But I just got the feeling that deep, deep, deep, and I mean all the way down, that Joe was a decent guy. I think many people felt that way or else they wouldn’t be posting all of these memes. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/96 "2020-04-06T02:24:31Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > I know. You’re right. I have no justification at all for what I said. No cites, no anything. But I just got the feeling that deep, deep, deep, and I mean all the way down, that Joe was a decent guy. I think many people felt that way or else they wouldn’t be posting all of these memes. I think it may be from the one clip of him from years ago. He was running the zoo as a sanctuary and seemed to be against breeding and everything he later became. It seems like it was the money that was the problem. It’s insanely expensive to maintain the animals, which leads to needing more revenue streams, which leads to breeding more animals which leads to more expense, which leads to gaining some fame, which leads to Carole Baskin. He was on a roller coaster he couldn’t control and always seemed to be one inch away from unraveling completely. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/97 "2020-04-06T02:33:01Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > part 2 is on Carole Baskin and her missing husband I like how the missing husband’s will (found by the wife) starts off with “Upon my disappearance…”. Like he knew he was going to “disappear,” not “die”. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/98 "2020-04-06T02:37:23Z")
> [@Isamu](#): > > I like how the missing husband’s will (found by the wife) starts off with “Upon my disappearance…”. Like he knew he was going to “disappear,” not “die”. The only plausible story that doesn’t lead to her offing him is that he had a very large amount of money in off shore accounts or something and he fucked off to Latin America to live comfortably. But she probably killed him. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/99 "2020-04-06T03:18:54Z")
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that it is illegal to sell or buy a tiger in the United States. It is also illegal to kill a tiger under federal law because they are an endangered species. However, it remains legal for guys like Joe to continue to breed tigers and show them off as cute little pets to zoo visitors. However the law that Carole Baskin and her group was trying to enact would prohibit any private person from owning a tiger? Wouldn’t that outlaw all zoos which contain tigers or could local municipalities or states have zoos with tigers? So, if I am correct, the ownership of tigers is pretty much grandfathered in, in that if you don’t already own tigers and can breed new ones, you cannot own one in the future. If all of this is true, then you can hardly blame guys like Joe for breeding them. It’s either breed them now or come to a point where you can never own one in the future. ETA: Could Carole Baskin keep her tigers under the proposed law? I guess my main point is: what is the bitch about people owning and breeding tigers so long as safety and anti-cruelty laws are followed? ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966/100 "2020-04-06T03:36:33Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > I know. You’re right. I have no justification at all for what I said. No cites, no anything. But I just got the feeling that deep, deep, deep, and I mean all the way down, that Joe was a decent guy. I think many people felt that way or else they wouldn’t be posting all of these memes. [![](https://media.makeameme.org/created/great-cant-tell.jpg) ](https://media.makeameme.org/created/great-cant-tell.jpg) In the film, Rick Kirkham feels Joe was a decent guy who started out doing the right thing, but then the money, fame, and ego got to him and totally changed him into something bad. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tiger-king-new-series-on-netflix/849966.md?page=6)