This is another Oxygen crime show with the usual hook - this one being a person has went out and will be murdered by morning.
It's basically the same format as Oxygen's main show "Snapped," relying heavily on slow motion reenactments. Interestingly the show has some of the principals from the crime speaking, lots of photos and videos from the original crime, which the show should focus on more - rather than the reenactments which usually have bad acting or a lot of the time miscast actors.
The show is well produced but still has cheap "effects" like a car was caught on fire with a body - the reinactment shows what is clearly a new, clean car with zero fire damage. If you're not going to something to show a burned car in the reinactment, don't do the scene. It just looks cheesy and cheap to show a non-burned car and just expect us to pretend. There's a lot of this type of stuff in the show.
One of the worst aspects of shows like this on Oxygen are some of the people talking about the case - the "forensic psychiatrist" who literally has zero to do with the original case, talking about the case as if he did and giving us the stupid "he was mad she spurned him, that's why he killed her" type comments for all the dumb people who can't figure this out themselves. It's not just annoying, it's insulting. They seem to have someone like this on every episode, a person, many times who wasn't even born when the crime occurred, talking about the case along with the other people who were apart of the incident, as if this person was too, when in fact it's just someone who was given the facts of the case just before they started shooting - yet talks as if they were part of it. It's super annoying. Stop doing this. They already have a host for the show who speaks here and there throughout the episode. Don't need a phoney extra person telling us the facts of the case who literally has zero to do with it.
A personal pet peeve for me is when people who were friends or relatives of the victim speak and dress like they're going to clean out their garage, not be on national TV. One overweight lady is slouched over on her couch, wearing jeans with giant ripped holes and a sloppy t-shirt looking like she just sat through a "Honey-Boo" marathon on TV. You're on national TV, not your friend's video show on youtube that six people watch. At least present yourself in a somewhat respectable manner. This is the producers fault. They should have people at least be presentable, not look like slobs.
There is also the standard padding for these shows where they stretch what would be a solid half hour show to an hour (42 minutes actually) spending a lot of time on the victim's background and lots of time on suspects who ended up having nothing to do with the case. It's why shows like Forensic Files are so great and shows like this are average. Could be so much better if they cut out the fat. Like the one episode where a guy was killed by his friends at a bar, as was his sisters. Cops new who did it within 48 hours. But to pad the episode they have to spend 20 minutes on stuff that could be covered in a minute - to make it appear like there was more of a "case" here rather than an easy "we figured it out in an hour" case. Stop with this.
The worst thing is the shots of the victim's parents or siblilngs - where they're talking and then the camera holds on them as they say nothing, shedding a tear or just out and out crying. It's dishonest editing and unethical. I hate it so much. If I was one of those people I'd be pissed. I wonder if they're telling them to not say anything for a moment, we just want to get a shot of you looking sad.
Oxygen is filled with shows like this now - some hook - killed by morning or killed by a friend or caught on video or whatever. All basically the same format, lots of fat to stretch the episode to an hour. Good if you're on the treadmill like me, just watching something while working out - probably wouldn't watch this just if I was sitting around watching TV. As far as these crime shows go, overall this is one of the more watchable ones - would be so much better without the extra nonsense.
