The Nailbomber

A well put together documentary that tells the story of Dave Copeland and what he did. If anything I wish this was slightly longer but that's just a personal preference.

There's certainly an interesting doco in here but it's very poorly produced.

None of the participants in doco are identified and producers try to be way too cute in how it's all presented.

Subject is interesting but program presentation lets it all down.

BOOM!

A documentary about a series of bombings in London in 1999, aiming at minority groups.

This was a boring one. There honestly wasn't really much to the story in the first play. Most parts in the documentary were seen before. There was a person who was a spy within an far-right group. He was potentially interesting, but then there wasn't much revealed from his aspect.

The biggest problems here are that the themes felt underwhelming and I didn't learn much about the event. Except for the spy guy, the other interviewees were all not interesting. Many times in this documentary I was bored and looked at phone instead. For only an hour and 12 minutes, it still felt long.

Overall, it's better to just watch some YouTube videos or go to Wiki to learn about the event. 4/10.

The story is gripping and the plot was a golden opportunity for the show-makers. What was needed, was to exploit the reason for racial wars, go deep into their activities in Britain, to explain how they convince members to hate, and what was the modus operandi of a spy who infiltrated the BNP. But what we got was a half baked cause and effect POV from the spy and some other characters. Better sequencing, storytelling and character buildup would've made Manhunt: Nail Bomber as good as the Manhunt series. But this was bland and at times boring, with very few moments that pull you in. Disappointing.

Netflix can been quite hit or miss with It's documentaries and the stylistic presentation can quite often make or break a netflix documentary. As can how long it runs for. Be it 1 episode or 4 episodes.

The Nailbomber did a very good job at telling the story of a lone wolf bomber who let off multiple bombs in attacks that were racially motivated in London in a single solid episode.

My number one desire from a documentary is to get across as much interesting and relavent information as possible and The Nail Bomber certainly did that. I was only 9 or 10 at the time of the attacks and although I'm from the UK, I don't really recall the attacks. Also being from Northern Ireland, terrorism based around The Northern Irish troubles was far more prevalent in my mind and still is when I think back to the 90s. So it was very interesting (and saddening) to learn about other problems occurring in the same decade. The show had interesting interviews with victims and played insightful tape recordings of the perpetrator being interviewed. Unlike other Netflix documentaries (Son of sam). It doesn't mix and match the style of voice over vs interviews. Nor is the the documentary stretched out over many episodes. Someone could have tried that if they had the motivation or had been given the go ahead. Due to it being a multi bomb and court case story. Luckily they stayed with an hour and a bit single episode and it worked.

It's definitely a crime documentary to watch if this genre is your thing and it's better than other recent attempts by Netflix. A good solid 7/10. So give it a go.