True Crime is Cool Crime
True Crime Content Reinvented for a Millenial Generation.
In 2020, the explosion of true crime content across every digital medium may give the appearance that an onset of morbid fascination with human depravity has suddenly gripped the world. As far back as ‘Jack the Ripper’, and as recently as the trial of O. J. Simpson, true crime storytelling has played a culturally significant role in Western culture. The recent rise in true crime media consumption whether via the medium of podcasting, documentary television, attending conventions, or by collecting ‘murder-a-bilia’, is less to do with a decline of a moral society and more a result of the impact of modern technology. The development of online and digital technology increasing the distribution and dissemination of content has done a lot to bring an old tradition to a new younger, more digitally engaged Millennial and Get X consumers. This increased awareness amongst a new generation grown up with the internet is one of the major factors in what made true crime suddenly ‘cool’ to an engaged and socially conscious demographic — and changed it forever. This essay will explore the impact of modern technology on reinventing the true crime genre for the Millennial generation using Marshall McLuhan’s media theories of ‘hot and cool’ and ‘the Medium is the Message’ as a framework for analysis.
Unquestionably, the origins of the ‘true crime renaissance’ (Burger 2016) begin with the viral sensation of the podcast series Serial. Known to be the fastest podcast to be downloaded by over 5 million listeners, Serial introduced 90% of its audience to podcasting as a form of entertainment (Northern 2020). Surveys of Serial listeners following its success showed that ‘almost all of those first-time listeners said it changed the way they think about podcasts’ (Northern 2019). For advertisers, approximately 81% of Serial listeners remembered the podcast sponsor, almost all ‘first-time listeners were inspired to try more podcasts’ (Northern 2019), and half of the listeners continued listening to podcasts on a weekly basis (Northern 2019).
For some context to Serial making this level of an impact amongst the Millennial generation, it is important to examine the history of how true-crime storytelling previously was consumed in the mainstream media. In 2008, the Investigation Discovery Network Channel (ID) was ranked as the front-runner of original true crime programming amongst women aged 25–54 (Futon Critic 2013).
Women’s interest in true-crime is well documented as evolutionarily-informed from a survivalist perspective. This was typically exploited by networks in the selection of real-life criminal cases chosen to be covered in its true-crime programming to reflect the interests of their audience. McLuhan’s ‘hot and cool media’ theory suggests that media can be either ‘hot or cool’ depending on how audiences would participate with the medium as it was consumed (Martel 2020). Television viewing is considered to be an example of a ‘hot’ media, for ‘little is demanded by the viewer’, as the medium ‘spoon-feeds’ the content’ to the audience’ (MediaWiki 2008).
The key draw for those who consume media via streaming appears to be in the way viewers are ‘unrestricted by time slots set out by networks’ (Karaoutsadis 2017). This flexibility for consumers means the ‘freedom to choose the time that best suits them’(Karaoutsadis 2017). The medium of streaming consumption of a series made the service more preferable to a demographic of ‘digital natives’ than the scheduled programming of traditional media (Karaoutsadis 2017). Essentially, nobody had to miss an episode ever again.
The medium of streaming consumption of a series made the service more preferable to a demographic of ‘digital natives’ than the scheduled programming of traditional media
Prior to mainstream media digitisation, true-crime storytelling typically involves the re-telling of a real criminal case through a formulaic narrative approach; the consumer is introduced to the facts of the case and then progressively learns why the crime has occurred, and how it was resolved. The entire case would need to be wrapped up and solved within the time afforded by the medium of television programming, such as a prime-time television slot of around 45 to 60 minutes.
For example, if watching an episode of ID’s Deadly Affairs, viewers watching from home would be interacting with a ‘hot’ media, with salacious narration and visual dramatic re-enactments depicting step-by-step a murder case, typically of a ‘mediagenic’, white female victim, and resolved within a 45-minute length episode. In 2013, ID president and CEO Henry Schleiff believed this represented the key format in true crime narrative drama, claiming ID to be ‘the number one guilty pleasure for women’ (Futon Critic 2013). Schleiff’s insight into what women wanted, however, could never have prepared him for the ‘cool media’ phenomenon of the Serial podcast that arrived the next year in 2014.
In contrast, the ‘cool media’ content of mainstream media, Serial stood out. Throughout the series, journalist Sarah Koenig revisits a murder trial she covered in 1999, in which 18-year-old Adnan Syed was convicted for the murder of his ex-girlfriend, Hae Min Lee. Each episode examined a question or case evidence in a detailed analysis, punctuated with playful musical interludes and 90s pop music to set the scene of the late 90s — Serial was intelligent true crime. Listeners with smartphone devices or even with friends attending a ‘listening party’ (The Village Voice Campbell 2014). Koenig also encouraged listeners to view case evidence discussed on a website created for the podcast, making sources and statements available for them to examine themselves. In stark contrast to the current ‘hot’ medium of mainstream true-crime storytelling, like ID’s Wives With Knives, Frenemies: BFFs Gone Bad or Alaska: Ice Cold Killers, Serial was ‘cool’.
For Millennials and Gen X listeners who have grown up with internet access, the unresolved and ambiguous nature of the Serial finale was likely a rare cultural media experience for many within this generation. The content revolved around a barely known cold case involving two teenagers with diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds living in small-town America reflected their cultural interests in ways that mainstream media never did. Pew Research on Gen X and Millennial generations have found that only 19% said that they ‘found others to be trustworthy’ and half of the respondents said they ‘didn’t expect to receive social security payments in retirement age’ (PewSocialTrends 2018).
This new demographic was raised within a Western culture shaped by the events of 9/11, terrorism, questionable Government justifications for war in foreign countries, and, in 2013, was exposed as conducting unlawful surveillance on citizens by none other than a fellow-Millennial, Edward Snowden. Considering this as the cultural context of a Millennial generation not used to questions being left unanswered by Google, Millennial (and some of Gen X) consumers were well-positioned to be most impacted by Serial’s open-ended, minimalist storytelling.
As a generation not used to questions left unanswered by Google, Millennial consumers were well-positioned to be most impacted by Serial’s open-ended, minimalist storytelling.
Millennial listeners with a cultural predisposition for institutional authority resonated with the podcasts’ exploration of flawed justice, and many would continue the discussion online throughout forums such as Reddit in order to engage further in their personally-driven investigation. In this way, many podcasts were marketed one the next to be consumed: “Just Finished Serial? Here Are 12 Podcasts…” would title a range of marketing blogs signifying the cultural phenomena of Serial’s unprecedentedly consumer-hungry new demographic. The idea of ‘participation’ with content “IRL” added to the newness of the podcasting experience, and it would cause new media coverage of the podcasts’ main subject Adnan Syed and his attempts to appeal his conviction. Serial contains all the elements all consumers of true crime media enjoy — a sense of control through gathering information, finding case errors and revealing truths and the appeal of discovery. The formation of the ‘true-crime community’ amongst those who attend true crime-themed conventions and live podcast recordings of Serial-inspired creators in their own right.
Attempts to recreate the Serial phenomena by following a similar theme, as was seen the following year with the 2015 Netflix documentary series, Making a Murderer. Exonerated after serving a wrongful conviction for 18 years, Steven Avery is once again arrested by Manitowoc County — but this time for murder. Within its first 35 days of airing, Making a Murderer was streamed 19 million times, clearly generating buzz amongst the target post-serial audiences. But what might have been a runaway success with consumers of Serial, would be revealed later as biased true crime media designed deliberately to emulate Serial’s buzz. Unlike Serial, the selection of evidence played a narrative role in attempts to portray the films’ subject as a victim of a similar miscarriage of justice to possibly that of Adnan Syed. In response to the public reaction, Manitowoc Country would over time release evidence exposing the documentary’s bias that would discredit Making a Murderer. Unfortunately for the victims’ families, millions of strangers watching their loved one’s killer receive such widespread support in the wake of the documentary release is one way the power of the medium can be so easily exploited for entertainment in true crime media.
True crime content resonated with Millennial and Get X consumers, and through the impact of the internet and digital technology, the true crime genre has been reintroduced to a new generation. No longer considered to be a ‘niche interest’ held by a narrow demographic of female consumers, true crime had been reinvented with a renewed sense of cultural relevance to a highly engaged, socially conscious new demographic.
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