(Un)well

Netflix documentary series January 2020 January 2020 Documentary series United States English 1 6 Ken Druckerman Banks Tarver Anneka Jones Erica SashinDec Left/Right Productions Netflix 2020 08 12 fringe (Un)well is an American documentary series about the wellness industry. The series was produced by Left/Right Productions and premiered on August 12, 2020, on Netflix.Dec Reviewers point out the episodes tend to give more weight to enthusiastic testimonials than to expert advice, painting a positive picture of treatments that are often ineffective or dangerous. Summary Through interviews with practitioners, consumers and experts, the series questions the efficacy and safety of six treatments offered by the "wellness" industry. Presented without a narrator, the audience is left to make up their own minds about the information presented.GuardFCInsid Episodes #A5C0D3 (Un)well – Listings http://www.thefutoncritic.com/showatch/unwell/listings/ The Futon Critic August 8, 2020 U.S. 1 Essential oils 2020 08 12 Are essential oils a remedy, or just a billion-dollar multilevel marketing scheme? A5C0D3 2 Tantric sex 2020 08 12 Can tantric sex live up to the hype, despite the potential for abuse? A5C0D3 3 Bulking up with breast milk 2020 08 12 The safety and ethics of breast milk for bodybuilding A5C0D3 4 Fasting 2020 08 12 The risks of fasting as a weight-loss technique A5C0D3 5 Ayahuasca 2020 08 12 Using a shamanic hallucinogen as therapy A5C0D3 6 Bee sting therapy 2020 08 12 Therapeutic considerations of bee venom A5C0D3 Reception Reviewers give credit to the series for exposing some of the worst abuse of the wellness industry. However, the series suffers from false balance, drowning the advice of experts in lengthy testimonies by sympathetic practitioners of alternative medicine and their clients. At CNN, Brian Lowry points to the interviews with scientists and journalists sprinkled through the episodes as an explanation of how people can be manipulated by those who seek to sell treatments "more rooted in faith than science". It's also a commentary on the poor state of the healthcare system, with people looking for quick fixes elsewhere. Lowry quotes Steven Novella's warning that the promises of the wellness industry are often nothing more than false hopes.CNN Writing for Science-Based Medicine, Harriet Hall gives the series "two thumbs down". She believes it fails in its attempt to present a balanced view of the issues discussed: "The people who made (Un)well seem to believe testimonials and hearsay are good evidence and are just as credible as scientific studies, perhaps even more so." Hall worries that viewers, seduced by slickly-produced testimonials, will be motivated to try the treatment presented, even though it is likely ineffective and possibly dangerous.SBM Jonathan Jarry of the Office for Science and Society says the series "observes but never judges, and this impartial approach causes it to commit the sin of false balance." The advice of experts presented throughout the episodes tends to be drowned out by anecdotes of enthusiastic patients. The show does present people who were severely harmed by pseudoscientific treatments, but always goes back to a practitioner who appears to adopt a more benign approach. In the end, for Jarry, (Un)Well "warns against extremes in the search for health but allows so many pseudoscientific claims to stand unchecked, it practically endorses many of the practices it aims to denounce."OSS Writing for The Daily Beast, Laura Bradley worried that despite using interviews with genuine experts, the series risks promoting the conspiracy theorists and health gurus it also presents: "As much as (Un)Well clearly wants to serve as an even-handed guide into the strange world of wellness, the show's insistence on letting each side speak for itself without tipping its hand means all it's really doing is providing a platform for quackery and false hope." While the show clearly identifies problems with some companies (Young Living gets the harsh treatment), others are let off easy. She also thought the material presented would fit better into a 30-minute format rather than the 50 minutes per episode used.Brad Writing for Culture Whisper, Sarah Joan Ross gave the series three stars out of five. The series "does effectively expose a few of the darker sides of the wellness industry", but the scientific analysis does not go very deep. The testimonies of clients who tried the various treatments gives energy to the episodes, but they don't have the humor and production value of a series like The Goop Lab.CW References 30 Keller Joel 1 August 2020 10 Best New Shows on Netflix: August 2020's Top Upcoming Series to Watch https://decider.com/2020/08/01/10-best-new-shows-on-netflix-august-2020s-series-to-watch/ Decider Bradley Laura 11 August 2020 Netflix's latest wellness docuseries is a little better than Gwyneth Paltrow's "Goop Lab"—but it also provides a platform to conspiracy theorists. The Daily Beast https://www.thedailybeast.com/netflixs-unwell-signal-boosts-dangerous-coronavirus-truthers live https://web.archive.org/web/20200811202323/https://www.thedailybeast.com/netflixs-unwell-signal-boosts-dangerous-coronavirus-truthers 11 August 2020 11 August 2020 Jones Ross Sarah 10 August 2020 (Un)Well, Netflix review https://www.culturewhisper.com/r/netflix/unwell_netflix_review/15780 live https://web.archive.org/web/20200811204000/https://www.culturewhisper.com/r/netflix/unwell_netflix_review/15780 11 August 2020 11 August 2020 Culture Whisper Horton Adrian 12 August 2020 The dark side of wellness: behind a Netflix series on a murky industry The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/aug/12/unwell-netflix-series-dark-side-of-wellness-industry live 12 August 2020 https://web.archive.org/web/20200812151046/https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/aug/12/unwell-netflix-series-dark-side-of-wellness-industry 12 August 2020 Ifeanyi KC 12 August 2020 Netflix docuseries '(Un)Well' takes on the $4.5 trillion wellness industry https://www.fastcompany.com/90538578/netflix-docu-series-unwell-takes-on-the-4-5-trillion-wellness-industry 12 August 2020 Fast Company Landsverk Gabby 11 August 2020 Netflix's '(Un)Well' delves into the dark side of fasting, essential oils, tantric sex, and other popular 'wellness' trends https://www.insider.com/netflix-unwell-looks-at-trends-like-fasting-tantric-sex-ayahuasca-2020-8 12 August 2020 Insider Jarry Jonathan 21 August 2020 The Frustrating Rorschach Test of Netflix's (Un)Well https://mcgill.ca/oss/article/health-pseudoscience/frustrating-rorschach-test-netflixs-unwell live https://web.archive.org/web/20200822230025/https://mcgill.ca/oss/article/health-pseudoscience/frustrating-rorschach-test-netflixs-unwell 22 August 2020 22 August 2020 McGill Office for Science and Society Lowry Brian 12 August 2020 '(Un)Well' offers a sense of how searching for miracle cures might be killing us https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/12/entertainment/unwell-review/index.html live https://web.archive.org/web/20200821171327/https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/12/entertainment/unwell-review/index.html 21 August 2020 22 August 2020 CNN Hall Harriet Harriet Hall 25 August 2020 "(Un)Well:" Netflix's Documentary Series Is Poor Journalism That Neglects Science https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/unwell-netflixs-documentary-series-is-poor-journalism-that-neglects-science/ live https://web.archive.org/web/20200825215330/https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/unwell-netflixs-documentary-series-is-poor-journalism-that-neglects-science/ 25 August 2020 25 August 2020 Science-Based Medicine External links 12759384 Category:2020 American television series debuts Category:2020 English-language television series debuts Category:2020s American documentary television series Category:English-language American television shows Category:Netflix original documentary television series Category:Alternative medicine