‘The Tiger King and I’ Review: Episode 8 Reveals Chilling Joe Exotic Stories

Netflix

Joe Exotic may not have been present in the new episode of Tiger King that just dropped on Netflix, but he didn’t need to be — the specter of Joe Exotic still haunted the people who spoke candidly in their interviews. Even without the glitz and fancy music of the previous seven episodes, Joel McHale’s after-show (technically Episode 8) was a hit. It brought some laugh-out-loud moments that we would expect from McHale, but it included a few jaw-dropping moments too.

This is a review of Tiger King‘s eighth episode, an after-show called “The Tiger King and I.” This article will have spoilers. If you’re just wondering if the episode is worth watching, the answer is yes. It’s enlightening, funny, entertaining, and heartbreaking.

The rest of this article will have spoilers. 

During the episode, McHale interviewed John Reinke, Joshua Dial, John Finlay, Saff, Erik Cowie, Rick Kirkham, and Jeff and Lauren Lowe. The interviews were short and concise, but each had a gem in it that illuminated something the documentary left out. The interviews were just quick enough to keep your attention, but long enough to answer some intriguing questions we’ve been asking since the series ended.

More than anything, the short new episode highlighted the dark side of Joe Exotic. Although Carole Baskin was mentioned a couple of times, Joe Exotic was really the focus, along with how each person has moved forward with his or her life since the series was filmed.

The first interview, with Erik Cowie, had a chilling moment when he talked again about putting the big cats down, admitting that it wasn’t always for medical reasons. Cowie and others insisted in the new episode that Joe Exotic sometimes killed animals, including tigers, for no reason other than to make more room at the zoo. And that was just the beginning.

Jeff and Lauren Lowe’s interview had quite a few comedic moments in it, but the Lowes clearly felt like they were not portrayed accurately in the first seven episodes. Joshua Dial, meanwhile, insisted that they were.

“I think it’s a wonderful production,” he said about the documentary series. He admitted that he knew Joe Exotic was “batsh** crazy” when he joined his campaign, but this was his one and only chance to run a campaign for someone who wanted to be governor. Still, Dial walked away with some serious scars. He needs counseling from seeing Travis Maldonado kill himself.

Dial’s description of what happened when Maldonado killed himself was chilling. It was an accident — a point that the documentary was a bit vague about. When he talked about seeing the look in Maldonado’s eyes at the end… Well that moment will stick with you.

In fact, a great deal of the new episode was about the scars that some of the people are going to carry with them for quite a while. Saffe, however, seemed to be among the most well adjusted of them all. He’s come to terms with what happened to him and has already healed. He trusts the tiger who bit off his arm more than Joe, Saffe commented.

John Reinke’s interview focused a lot on how he felt that Joe Exotic was always belittling someone — a sentiment that others shared.

John Finlay’s interview was surprising because of how much he’s changed. He looks like a completely different man now that he is on his own, engaged, and living his best life. He hinted about a big reveal coming soon for his tattoo, which he said was not finished in the documentary.

But one of the most chilling moments of the new episode (aside from Dial’s terrifying recounting of Maldonado’s death), was in Rick Kirkham’s interview. It started out quite lighthearted, when he talked about how he lives in Norway now and he’s in love.

But then he told a story about an old woman who brought her old horse to Joe’s zoo. She loved the horse and just wanted it to live on a nice big pasture in its golden years because she couldn’t take care of her beloved animal anymore. Kirkham told McHale that Joe Exotic promised to take care of the horse and then shot and killed it as soon as she drove away.

My jaw dropped in that part. Sure, there was enough evidence in the first seven episodes that this story should not have surprised me. But thinking about the woman and that horse just broke my heart.

“I regret ever meeting Joe,” Kirkham said, after describing that Joe Exotic was terrified of the tigers in the series and didn’t have the close relationship with them that was portrayed.

“I still have nightmares to this day,” Kirkham admitted. Dial said something similar. It seems that the people who were close to Joe Exotic still have a lot of healing to do.