There's a certain genre of true-crime documentary that makes you wonder if the feminist movement has a covert psyops wing. The latest entry, 'Don't Date Brandon,' which follows a group of women who banded together to expose one man's destructive rampage through their local dating pool, is a prime example. It's a story that could have been a powerful cautionary tale, but instead it's a lazy, voyeuristic mess that fails to do justice to the women at its center.

The premise is ripe for drama: a man, Brandon, love-bombs emotionally vulnerable women, then isolates, controls, and coerces them, leaving a trail of psychological devastation. These women found each other and pooled their stories, creating a collective testimony against him. It's the kind of narrative that, in the right hands, could be both gripping and important, serving as a warning to the young and innocent about the early signs of a predator.

But 'Don't Date Brandon' doesn't bother with the details that would give you a real understanding of what these women endured. Instead, it wallows in the surface-level shock of it all, treating these women's horrors as mere fodder for your streaming queue. It feels less like journalism and more like exploitation, a missed opportunity to turn a harrowing real-life story into something meaningful.

At its best, true crime can be a tool for education and empowerment, a way to arm the vulnerable against the wolves in sheep's clothing. At its worst, it's just voyeuristic filler for the ever-gaping schedule maw. 'Don't Date Brandon' falls firmly into the latter category, and the women who trusted it with their stories deserve far better.