American Manhunt: Boston Marathon Bombing is Netflix's latest documentary offering. Its three episodes comb through the true events that unfolded after April 15, 2013, when two explosives detonated during the famous race, killing three people and leaving over 280 with injuries.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev soon became prime suspects, and a manhunt (hence the show's title) for the two men immediately followed. The docu-series is a comprehensive, nuanced look at what happened, also giving time to add important context to a world after 9/11 which held a lot of prejudices towards the Muslim community.
The series spoke with victims of the bombing and those that lost loved ones, while also hearing from those that knew the Tsarnaev brothers personally. While it wasn't necessarily the primary focus of the documentary, there was an attempt to unpack Dzhokhar and Tamerlan's motives and what first put them on the path towards ultimately committing such an atrocity.
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One contributor that shed the most light on this was David Filipov, a Boston Globe reporter who covered the story extensively at the time. In his filmed interviews for the series, Filipov introduces himself as the person who was "trying to understand the story" – setting his narrative purpose from the off.
"You're not born a monster who blows up a marathon and kills an eight-year-old," he said. "We need to know how this happens. How did he get there?"
Within Netflix's Boston Marathon Bombing, Filipov referenced an article that he co-wrote for the Boston Globe, published in December 2013, with the headline 'The Fall of the House of Tsarnaev'.
The piece is an in-depth look at the family history of the Tsarnaev brothers, and it provided an alternative motive to the one believed by the Federal investigators (who were working to the theory that the bombers had been directly influenced by extremist revolutionaries outside of America).
The Globe conducted its own five-month investigation (with reporting in Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Canada, and the United States) by talking to those that had crossed their paths, from neighbours to friends.
One claim made in the article that did not get mentioned in the documentary was that Tamerlan Tsarnaev had talked about hearing an internal voice from a young age.
An excerpt from the story reads: "Tamerlan confided in a close friend that the voice had begun to issue orders and to require him to perform certain acts, though he never told his friend specifically what those acts were."
The article later adds: "The Globe corroborated with several people who knew him just how plagued Tamerlan felt by the inner voices. Some family acquaintances feared for his mental health, among them a doctor concerned it could be schizophrenia."
The article also explored many avenues that were discussed in the Netflix series, namely the breakdown of the Tsarnaev family upon moving to America and the difficulty in fitting in.
Another excerpt reads:
"If the truth is that Tamerlan Tsarnaev and his rangy teenage brother acted out of private motives, reinforced by the fervent entreaties of the Muslim militants whose voices and images boiled on their computer screen, they would join the ranks of homegrown murderers such as the Colorado movie theater shooter and the Oklahoma City bombers."
In the American Manhunt series, Filipov addressed the widespread response to his original article.
"A lot of people were really upset because to some it looked like by making them look like people, we were somehow rationalising away or, I don't know, justifying or giving him a pass," he said.
Filipov also went on to detail one particular email that he received, which told him:
"'I hope that you or someone you love gets killed by Islamic terrorists, so that you know how it feels.'"
"I know exactly how it feels," he told the camera. "My dad was on the first plane that went into the World Trade Center."
Filipov wanted to make his stance clear: "We're never going to, in any of this, try to justify what they did by saying they had a rough time. But these people were not born marathon bombers. They became them. That is the truth. That's the story."
His wasn't the only article of its kind.
A now-infamous Rolling Stone edition decided to put Tamerlan's brother Dzhokhar on its cover. He was arrested in April 2013, while Tamerlan was killed from injuries sustained during a gun battle with police that saw him run over by a car (via CNN).
Alongside the headline 'The Bomber', the front page included the words: "How a popular, promising student was failed by his family, fell into radical Islam and became a monster."
The magazine's issue sparked outrage when it hit news stands, with many shops taking it off their shelves. The Boston mayor also spoke out to condemn it, accusing the publication's cover of "[rewarding a] terrorist with celebrity treatment" (via BBC News).
The introduction to the magazine feature included a statement from Rolling Stone's editors, which read:
"Our hearts go out to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing, and our thoughts are always with them and their families. The cover story we are publishing this week falls within the traditions of journalism and Rolling Stone's long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day.
"The fact that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is young, and in the same age group as many of our readers, makes it all the more important for us to examine the complexities of this issue and gain a more complete understanding of how a tragedy like this happens."
In some ways, giving the Tsarnaev brothers the documentary treatment forces us to revisit this debate. It is an ethical question that also speaks to viewers' wider interest in true-crime stories and the consumption of real-life tragedies.
There is a constant and delicate balance to tread. We must ask if we're picking at a story for exploitative purposes, or in a manner that does not consider the victims, or whether the retelling actually serves a purpose of offering a deeper understanding of events.
Where Netflix's American Manhunt: Boston Marathon Bombing fits into all this? We'll leave you to decide.
American Manhunt: Boston Marathon Bombing is available on Netflix.
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TV Editor, Digital Spy Laura has been watching television for over 30 years and professionally writing about entertainment for almost 10 of those. Previously at LOOK and now heading up the TV desk at the UK's biggest TV and movies site Digital Spy, Laura has helped steer conversations around some of the most popular shows on the box. Laura has appeared on Channel 5 News and radio to talk viewing habits and TV recommendations. As well as putting her nerd-level Buffy knowledge to good use during an IRL meet with Sarah Michelle Gellar, Laura also once had afternoon tea with One Direction, has sat around the fire pit of the Love Island villa, spoken to Sir David Attenborough about the world's oceans and even interviewed Rylan from inside the Big Brother house (housemate status, forever pending).
