Some former Ashley Madison employees are interviewed, including a bespectacled Evan Back, who was vice president of sales and an old friend of then-CEO Noel Biderman. They talk about the founding of the site in 2001, and then how the site took off when the shameless Biderman came aboard; He appeared on news shows and defended the site as something that “saves” marriages by giving “bored” people an outlet for their sexual desires. His most famous advertising slogan was quite simple: “Life is short. Have an affair."
Series director Toby Paton also speaks to three people who used the site, two of whom used it as part of an open marriage, and one who... well, her marriage certainly wasn't open, that's for sure. In fact, he considers signing up for the site "the worst decision of my life," something he probably made after hackers leaked his information in 2015. That man's (we hope) ex-wife is also interviewed, while speaks. her about how hopeful she was in her relationship, how her ex projected himself as a family man and a good Christian, and how they were in a good place right before the leak happened.
Stars: Katie Bignell, Samuel Greco, Perry Mavrides
Seriously, if you want a more detailed summary of what Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies, and Scandal is all about, go back and read our review of The Ashley Madison Affair. The two docuseries differ only marginally from each other in how they tell the story of Ashley Madison's rise, the hacking scandal, and Biederman's downfall. This series doesn't use reenactments or actors reading testimonials from anonymous users, so it has that going for it, which is good. But this is certainly a case where two documentary series on the same topic cover pretty much the same topic.
That said, if you haven't seen The Ashley Madison Affair (and, let's face it, most people who watch Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies & Scandal haven't), you'll definitely have the same icky feeling we had when people talked about signing up for the site to have affairs, as well as footage of Biederman defending the site in interviews. The former employees interviewed are fairly accepting that they were working for a morally ambiguous website, but they make no secret of how much fun it was to grow the site through the improvised marketing methods they were forced into. to use because of what they were trying to promote.
We don't think Paton is trying to position the "victims" of the hack as people viewers should feel sad for, given the fact that they were cheating on their spouses and the leak exposed him to the very people they were cheating on. . But when Sam, one of the exposed cheaters, says things like "no one ever taught me about love" and cites the Big Fish romantic scene as his inspiration for finding Nia, who eventually became his wife, it seems like that's it. the angle. that Paton is taking.
He does a little pretending with the other couple, which bothered us a little. But it also talks about how difficult it was to find couples who were separated by the leak of information. Who wants to admit on camera that their spouse cheated on them? It's probably why the other Ashley Madison docuseries recreated anonymous testimonies. Still, as we explain below, half of that pairing was very entertaining to listen to.
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