105: Uncovered (The McMartin Family Trials) and Bundyville: The Remnant
Toby Ball and I liked Uncovered: The McMartin Family Trials well enough, but we still wished Oxygen were less whodunnit and more whydunnit in its coverage of this most famous of Satanic-panic cases -- how it got so big and lasted so long. We'll never know what really happened...so why not spend more time on why THIS was allowed to happen?
The second season of Bundyville gives us just the Frontline-ian perspective we craved, but without underlining its own conclusions. After investigating the rebellion of Cliven Bundy in its first season, Bundyville expands its scope in S02 to look at anti-government groups, white-supremacist code, Pacific-Northwestern crime sprees, and how they all connect to a seemingly random suicide bombing in Nevada. How domestic terrorists become radicalized, the ethics of undercover work, and why we wish host Leah Sottile had worn some body armor on location, in The Blotter Presents Episode 105.
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SHOW NOTES
- Uncovered: The McMartin Family Trials on Oxygen: https://www.oxygen.com/uncovered-mcmartin-family-trials/watch-oxygen-new-special-uncovered-mcmartin-family-trials
- Lawrence Wright's "Remembering Satan, Part I" for The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1993/05/17/remembering-satan-part-i
- Bundyville: The Remnant companion piece(s) on Longreads: https://longreads.com/2019/07/15/bundyville-the-remnant-chapter-one-a-quiet-man/
- A complete list of Frontline episodes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_Frontline\_(American\_TV\_program)\_episodes
Special Guest: Toby Ball.