The 1 Major Problem Fans Have With the Netflix Documentary ‘Don’t F*ck With Cats’
There’s been some major buzz about the Netflix documentary Don’t F*ck With Cats, which is more than just another crime documentary. The limited series takes a graphic glimpse into the twisted world of notorious Canadian murderer Luka Magnotta.
True crime documentaries are nothing new and for the most part, audiences can’t get enough of them. However, Don’t F*ck With Cats is also receiving criticism for the unique stance it takes on the subject. Some are even calling the documentary hypocritical for committing the same crimes they ultimately condemn at the end.
Warning: This article includes spoilers for the Netflix documentary Don’t F*ck With Cats.
The premise of ‘Don’t F*ck With Cats’ is especially gruesome
Most true crime documentaries include gory details that may be hard for sensitive viewers to watch. But Don’t F*ck With Cats is especially difficult because it includes online videos the suspect made of himself killing defenseless kittens.
The filmmaker never shows the YouTube clips in their entirety. But viewers see Magnotta placing kittens into a vacuum-sealable bag and then can hear the sounds of him removing the air from the bag and suffocating them. Similarly, they show the moments before he Magnotta drowns a cat and before he feeds another to a python. There is also imagery of the deceased cats.
And that’s not even the worst of it. Viewers are also able to see Magnotta’s human victim, Lin Jun, just moments before the convicted murderer stabs him to death while filming the whole event.
Critics claim the documentary glorifies the murderer without remembering the victim
It’s a common complaint with the true crime genre. Many of these documentaries offer detailed accounts of the murderer’s intentions and background without giving much screen time to the victims. In Don’t F*ck With Cats, the limited information about Lin Jun comes from short interview clips with a former friend.
The audience learns almost nothing about the Chinese student who Magnotta murdered, dismembered, and stuffed in a suitcase. Instead, they’re accused of “glamorizing” murderers just like many other true crime documentaries.
‘Don’t F*ck With Cats’ blames the audience for fame-seeking murderers
It’s bad enough that Jun is barely mentioned during the three-hour documentary. But perhaps the most shocking moment for fans comes at the very end when filmmakers start to blame the audience’s obsession with true crime for creating murderers.
Magnotta was especially vain and wanted nothing more than to be internationally known. He was an aspiring model and actor before turning to murder, and made frequent videos of himself plus fabricated wild rumors to get his name into the news. But it was only by murdering someone that Magnotta finally achieved the level of notoriety he really wanted.
And most ironically, a documentary glorifying Magnotta’s actions and making him look like a genius for recreating his favorite Hollywood films in real life is exactly the attention he wanted.
The ending is being called hypocritical
After watching the entire documentary, the filmmakers seem intent on putting the blame on someone besides Magnotta. They choose their audience. One interviewee turns to the camera and chastizes viewers for watching the documentary at all because “it’s what Magnotta would have wanted.”
As Screen Rant reported, “With that ending, however, its lecture becomes a smarmy ‘screw you’ to the audience that does nothing to truly understand the topic at hand. Indeed, all it really does is shove the narrative responsibility onto the audience rather than deal with the messiness itself.”
The whole thing brings up the question about whose fault it really is — the audience, the filmmaker, or the murderer?
