THE RIPPER
Netflix, 3:00 a.m. ET
DOCUMENTARY SERIES PREMIERE: This multi-part documentary has a purely British flavor, in approach and tone as well as subject matter. It tells of a period, in the mid-1970s, when a killer skulked around West Yorkshire, murdering and brutally disfiguring prostitutes in the general manner of the infamous Whitechapel murderer Jack the Ripper a century or so before. In such areas as Leeds, four women had been murdered in a 10-mile radius within 18 months – but then the patterns widened. From then on, it wasn’t only prostitutes who were attacked, and eventually, there was a survivor to tell her tale. But the murderer kept eluding police, and kept killing. The Ripper retells this tale methodically, patiently, and with what might be described as British understatement… making it a far cry from the usual sensationalized crime documentary or typical Dateline NBC murder case.