Wormwood Episodes 1-3

I’m back readers and it has been awhile. I’ve been away as my fiancée and I recently moved from NYC to Philly chasing better jobs, more space, and cheaper rent. But I still have watched many shows since then and wanted to let you know my thoughts about one in particular, Wormwood.

A Netflix docu-drama that stars Peter Saarsgard, Tim Blake Nelson, Molly Parker, Jimmi Simpson, Christian Camargo and Bob Balaban tells the story of Frank Olson a government scientist who was secretly given LSD in a study known as MKUltra which was commissioned by the CIA in partnership with the Army. The purpose of which was to determine the extent of the “truth serum” potentials of LSD. The docu-drama created and written by Errol Morris is fantastically original in that it intercuts interviews with Frank Olson’s actual son, who is incredibly eloquent when it comes to storytelling, with dramatic re-enactments of the scenes he’s describing. But this isn’t Unsolved Mysteries folks, it shot with versatility, ingenuity, and passion. Scenes are cut when Eric Olson bangs his hand on the table, often times the viewer sees a scene split into four different screens resembling a comic book, it had me hooked from the jump. I was enthralled by not only this story but how they were telling this story because it was unlike anything else I’ve seen before.

The fascinating part about this show is how it is a drama and a documentary all mixed into one, it isn’t straight forward with just interviews cut with actual footage, Morris also throws in the acting chops of Saarsgard and Camargo who although given very little to work with, a critique of this show that I will discuss later, do quite well. It’s unique in that it will draw people in for different reasons, people who like documentaries and people who like dramas and it is something that I really haven’t seen discussed a lot.

Like I’ve mentioned at the top, I’m only 3 episodes in, but I do feel it begin to drag a little. I also need to mention the run time of each episode is fantastic, a solid 40 minutes which allows you to binge 2-3 episodes without soaking up hours of television watching. The thing that is both great and a hinderance to this show is there isn’t a lot of script for the dramatic scenes, which I believe occurred because they didn’t want to stray too far from the truth, so there is a lot left unsaid but in episode 3 I felt that the show began to lean on the documentary aspects of it a bit more than the drama side of it. My fiancée who was drawn in at first admitted that she became bored with it as the story tended to linger and it felt like we were running out of runway.

But I will say this one final thing I truly enjoyed about this show, was the hallucinatory scenes were not over the top, he didn’t witness individuals with bugs crawling out their ears. Such experiences are often depicted as such on television and in movies but actual hallucinations aren’t that extraordinary, rather they are just eerie and quietly terrifying. I won’t spoil it for you but there are a few hallucinatory experiences that we witness through Olson’s eyes that are done with real expertise.

So I enjoy the show enough to keep on trucking and I think my fiancée is interested enough that she will do so as well, but what did you think of the show?