The Yorkshire Ripper (2019) User Reviews

Decent but subjective, selective and inefficient in its use of time

[sacha_brady · 7/10 · 9 June 2019]

Good:

--Interviews with very relevant people associated with the events. --Has a focus on the victims rather than the perpetrator. --Some exploration of the attitudes of society at the time. --Some archival footage.

Not good:

--A misleading title. It's as much about prejudice as it is about the cases. --There's a lot of blame to go round but the film makers mainly focus on male attitudes at the time, almost as if the attacks were part of a male conspiracy. It's perfectly right to address those but I felt it was wrong to make this become the major takeaway from the events in Yorkshire. --Too little time is given to taking us back in time to understand the broader context in which the events happened in. There's too much returning to and repetition of the same points. I think a great deal more could have been done with its 3-hour run time.

Structural sexism blinds people looking for a pattern

[antaldaniel · 8/10 · 26 February 2021]

I had no high expectations from this docu-series but it proved to be a far more valuable and interesting story than I thought. I do not want to go into spoiler details, so I just want to highlight the values of the series.

The Yorkshire Ripper case has been probably one of the largest crime investigations ever in history, with a staggering amount of paperwork, working hour input and routine policing put against a serial killer in the late 1970s.

Forty years later, investigators, survivors, eyewitnesses reflect on this procedure with a very critical mindset. It is no spoiler to state that the investigation drew so much futile energy because the police leadership was blind to sexism and patriarchy. Having sad this, do not expect all so obvious forms of sexism, like rebuked policewomen and disrespect for eyewitnesses, but a far more comprehensive, structural form of patriarchal thinking that disallowed the participants of this gigantic case to actually see a pattern. Patterns are of course very important in serial crimes, and this makes the entire story more fascinating than a lot of over-dramatized fiction series about serial killers.

An interesting look at a well known case

[c_gregory84 · 8/10 · 22 May 2019]

I really thought this was a very interesting angle to review the Yorkshire ripper case. Very little about Sutcliffe (which I appreciated) but seen through the eyes of the victims and families and other women involved, and how stereotypes and prejudice in the late 70's and 80's afftected the police and media handling of the murders.

Very well made and difficult and distressing topics well handled.

Some good, some bad

[igor-07491 · 6/10 · 19 December 2020]

I understand the producer wants to focus on the victims, the female victims in particular, for this docu. I personally like that innovative point of view and it would be awesome if they succeeded. We get very little information about the ripper himself though. We do get a lot of focus on mostly women with very personal opinions, not facts, about the investigations made leading up to the capture of said ripper. Most of those are non sequitur. A large part of this series is quite interesting, well produced, nicely cut but nothing new for me personally. What makes this a bit droll are all the influencer style clips cut in here and there. Very strong opinions...

this is a smasher of a docu

[ops-52535 · 10/10 · 12 April 2019]

This is a real brittish crime ducumentary work, it plays the opponents off the line, and digs far deeper than i ever expected bbc to allow.

its made on archive materal, victims families and survivors interviews at present and in the past, along with the law enforcements officers and journalists, tellinjg the story about the black plague of the black and misty industrial areas of northern englad from 1975-1982, caused by the person called the yorkshire ripper.

i remember reading about the yorkshire ripper in my mums norwegian weekly women magazines, and got the creeps about the stories as a young boy. then it has vanished into history, and now returs as a documentary 40 or so years later, in a prime and insightfilled way.

the grumpy old man thinks this is some of the best of true crime docus ever made.

Nothing really new

[Mst78 · 6/10 · 1 April 2019]

Had high hopes for this being 3 parts and BBC but although very well made, it doesn't really cover any ground that hasn't been covered before, at least for anyone reasonably familiar with the case. It's also slightly scattergun imo in coverage of the victims, doesn't really seek to look at Sutcliffe's real motivation and doesn't even mention the key reason he was found guilty of murder by the jury (not manslaughter by dimished responsibility). Which is too grim to go into detail in a review. Expected something a bit better.

Exciting (when you don't know the story)

[guenterfmang · 9/10 · 22 December 2020]

I am austrian and didn't know that a Yorkshire Ripper even existed. But as I watched recently the Ted Bundy docu I also gave this a try and wasn't disappointed. I was only a bit astonished that women demonstrated for the right to go out on the streets in the night - knowing that there is a murderer waiting for his oppurtunity. Reminded me of the Anti-Corona-rules-demos nowadays...

Strong start, weak finish

[lonecastle · 5/10 · 16 January 2020]

The first episode was absolutely brilliant. It showed information in such a way that you were never bombarded, and could draw your own conclusions. I found myself quickly researching the story afterwards as I couldn't get it out of my head. Second and third episodes were an absolute let down. Where before the viewer was left to have their own opinions on the facts, we were now being hammered over the head repeatedly with feminist whining. Found myself fast forwarding whenever a certain journalist was interviewed as she did my head in with her opinions. Such a pity it went into subjective gutter journalism after hitting the ground running.

Ripping through the facts

[ShadeGrenade · 5/10 · 8 March 2022]

As I write this, yet another ITV documentary about the Yorkshire Ripper has just gone out. So what was wrong with the 2019 one? Well, for one thing, instead of objectively setting out the facts and attempting to analyse them rationally, we got a condescending 21st century style rant in which Peter Sutcliffe's evil behaviour was excused as being only a small part of a terrifying anti-female conspiracy. It is an opinion of dubious merit presented as a solid fact. Ridiculous in the extreme, insulting to the memories of Sutcliffe's victims, and men who - like myself - lived through the 1970's and felt not the slightest inclination to murder or attack anyone, male or female. I kept expecting to see clips of Benny Hill being chased by Hill's Angels to appear to illustrate just how dreadful British men were at that time.

Perhaps, twenty years from now, ITV will allege that Raoul Moat and Wayne Couzens were innocent of their terrible crimes and that male attitudes at the time were to blame. If so, I wonder what the response will be?

they cant even get the city right

[gonzo-87175 · 5/10 · 31 March 2019]

The show was quite good but for when they showed a city and call it bradford it was halifax with is a town next over

I hoped for more

[hipsta_doll24 · 4/10 · 29 December 2020]

Following and studying this case i really really wished they detailed more! So much was left out which is unlike netflix, it felt rushed and not given the attention that was needed!

Meh

[waaz-30354 · 5/10 · 26 January 2021]

Started good but the feminist things ruined it for me.