While the fall television season begins in earnest for broadcast networks, marking the annual return of widespread comfort television, the biggest show on Netflix was the crime drama “Dahmer Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story,” which received Evan’s star. Peters a lot of positive reactions from fans, as well as a huge number of outraged responses. However, some of the most notable reviews had nothing to do with the Peters game, as the sister of one of the victims of Dahmer shared her thoughts about the series after seeing the actress invent her memorable appearance in the courtroom.
Rita Isbell is the sister of Errol Lindsay, the 19-year-old victim of Jeffrey Dahmer, who was killed in April 1991. She gained some national recognition during the highly publicized 1992 trial for her very emotional victim impact statement and that part of the trial was staged for a Ryan Murphy Netflix series with Bosch actress Dashone Barnes in the role. Izbell told Insider about her memories of this experience in a candid verbal essay, and also reflected on how it happened on Damer. In every word:
“When I watched some shows, it bothered me, especially when I saw myself — when I saw my name appear on the screen, and this lady literally says the same thing as me. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think it was me. She had the same hair as me, she was wearing the same clothes. That’s why it seemed to me that all this needed to be relived. It brought back to me all the emotions I was feeling back then.”
True crime series like this one very often create problems for friends and family members of victims and others involved in cases, especially for high-profile projects like everything that is broadcast on Netflix. And considering that the movie “Dahmer Monster: The Story of Jeffrey Dahmer” is ranked in the top ten on Netflix for the second weekend after its release, this means that many people are delving into this story, perhaps for the first time, which provoked a lot of online discussions. .
Noting that she has not watched any streaming drama outside of the scene depicting her courtroom performance, Rita Isbell does not exactly accept personal claims against Netflix for the existence of the show. Nevertheless, she wishes that there would be some positive result for the children and grandchildren of the victims. As she put it:
“I’ve never been contacted about the show. I feel like Netflix should have asked if we mind or how we feel about it. They didn’t ask me anything. They just did it. But I’m not greedy for money, and that’s what this show is about, Netflix trying to get money. I could even understand it if they gave some of the money to the victims’ children. Not necessarily their families. I mean, I’m old. I’m very, very comfortable. But the victims have children and grandchildren. If the show had done them any good, it wouldn’t have been so harsh and carefree.”
Netflix has run into problems because of the “true stories” series, which are allegedly too far from reality when it comes to people whose rights to life have not been paid for, which is the subject of a recent lawsuit over “Anna’s Invention” among other projects. This clearly does not apply to Isbell, whose comments and court appearances are part of public reports, but she highlights another possibly negative outcome caused by the surge in real-life criminal projects on linear television and in streaming.
If there’s anything like a silver lining here, it’s what Dashon Barnes earned for handling such a compelling image that Izbell herself was so moved. She appears in three of the show’s ten episodes, and the aforementioned victim statement appears in episode 8, “Lionel”.
“Dahmer the Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” is available to anyone with a Netflix subscription, and anyone looking for something more lighthearted can check out our 2022 TV premiere schedule to see what other new and returning shows are coming soon.
