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Hey Mofos! It’s TV review tiiiiiiiime!
I don’t normally watch true crime docuseries, but when I saw that Murder 101 was set at Elizabethton High School in Tennessee, I was curious. I went to college in Johnson City, which isn’t far from Elizabethton, so it was cool seeing parts of the area I had never seen before. And yes, I could understand those East Tennessee accents because chile, I used to have one and still have that mountain accent when I'm tired.
Here’s the synopsis:
“MURDER 101 follows a high school sociology class in rural Tennessee who help revive a decades-old case into a present-day hunt for a killer.”
The three-part Prime Video series follows teacher Alex Campbell and his sociology students as they investigate the Redhead Murders, a series of killings involving women whose bodies were found along highways decades ago. Some of the victims remained unidentified, and the possibility that their deaths were connected never received the attention it deserved.
The students (and me from my couch) may be doing the investigating, but for me, Mr. Campbell is the star of the show.
If I had a teacher like him, who knows how engaged I might have been in class instead of passing notes to my BFF all day. He doesn’t just hand his students a textbook and ask them to memorize information for a test. He gives them a real problem, trusts them to do meaningful work and makes them believe their ideas can matter outside the classroom.
That kind of teaching can change the direction of a young person’s life.
I also loved that the series took time to highlight the students individually and share some of their backgrounds. They weren’t treated like a random group of teenagers sitting behind desks. We got to see their personalities, their challenges and the different skills they brought to the investigation. I was also glad to see a Black student from one of Mr. Campbell’s previous classes included as the series showed how the work has been passed from one group of students to the next. Pause.. WHY DIDN'T THAT SCHOOL HAVE WINDOWS?!
Ok back to the program. As a journalist, I especially enjoyed watching one student tap into his own journalism skills by picking up a camera and filming what was happening. He wasn’t just participating in the story. He was learning how to document it and deciding which moments needed to be captured. I really hope he continues down that path and turns it into a career.
The investigative process was fascinating, too. The students examined records, looked for connections between cases and worked to help identify women who had gone without their names for far too long. Watching teenagers put that much care into restoring the identities of women they had never met was one of the most powerful parts of the series.
Then there was Linda Schacke, the known survivor connected to the case. She was willing to speak with the students while setting boundaries around how she appeared and told them about surviving an attack that could have ended her life. Her story was creepy, heartbreaking and an important reminder that these cases were not simply material for a classroom project. Real women lived through unimaginable violence, and real families were left without answers.
What made me angry was learning how easily the victims were dismissed. Because some of the women were vulnerable, transient or believed to be involved in sex work, there did not appear to be enough urgency around finding out who they were or what happened to them.
And chile, the media wasn't about shit either during that time.
I say that as a journalist. If a classroom full of high school students could revisit old information, identify patterns and ask questions decades later, why didn’t more reporters dig deeper when these women were being found? Why weren’t their deaths treated like a story that deserved sustained attention? Were skills just lacking back then or was it that the fair was more important to them at the time?
Murder 101 quietly raises an uncomfortable question about which victims society decides are worthy of headlines, resources and public concern. These women deserved people who cared enough to keep asking questions. It is sad that teenagers had to come along years later and help give them the attention they should have received from the beginning.
Without giving away the outcome, this is not a neatly wrapped true crime story where every question is answered by the final episode. That actually makes the students’ work feel more authentic. Real investigations take time, leads do not always produce immediate results and justice does not arrive according to a television schedule.
What kept me watching was not the darkness of the crimes. It was Mr. Campbell’s belief in his students and the way they rose to meet his expectations. Murder 101 is as much about education, empathy, journalism and the potential of young people as it is about solving murders. I do hope there's another season so we can see what the next group of students uncover.
So, even if true crime is not normally your thing, I recommend giving this one a chance. Murder 101 is streaming now on Prime Video.
Let me know if you watch!
~Meik
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