The BEST episodes of HBO Documentary Film Series season 2017

#1 - Beware The Slenderman

Season 2017 - Episode 2 - Aired 1/23/2017

The true story of 12-year-olds Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier, who lured their best friend into the woods, stabbed her 19 times and confessed they did it to appease a tall and faceless man known online as Slenderman. Featuring heart-wrenching access to the girls’ families, the haunting documentary plunges deep down the rabbit hole of their actions, exploring how the dark corners of the Internet can influence society’s most impressionable young consumers of media.

#2 - 32 Pills: My Sister's Suicide

Season 2017 - Episode 16 - Aired 11/29/2017

She's beautiful, artistic, loved and can't stand to be alive. 32 PILLS traces the fascinating life and mental illness of my sister, New York artist and photographer Ruth Litoff, and my struggle to come to terms with her tragic suicide.

#3 - Baltimore Rising

Season 2017 - Episode 15 - Aired 11/20/2017

n the wake of the 2015 death of Freddie Gray in police custody, Baltimore was a city on the edge. Peaceful protests and destructive riots erupted in the immediate aftermath of Gray’s death, while the city waited to hear the fate of the six police officers involved in the incident, reflecting the deep divisions between authorities and the community -- and underscoring the urgent need for reconciliation.

#4 - Abortion: Stories Women Tell

Season 2017 - Episode 9 - Aired 4/3/2017

Since 2011, over half the states in the nation have significantly restricted access to abortions. In 2016, abortion remains one of the most divisive issues in America, especially in Missouri, where only one abortion clinic remains open, patients and their doctors must navigate a 72-hour waiting period, and each year seTracy Droz Tragoses more restrictions.

#5 - Cries From Syria

Season 2017 - Episode 8 - Aired 3/13/2017

A searing account of the Syrian civil war from the inside out, the film draws on hundreds of hours of war footage from Syrian activists and citizen journalists, as well as testimony from child protesters, revolution leaders, human rights defenders, ordinary citizens and high-ranking army generals who have defected from the government.

#6 - The Tickle King

Season 2017 - Episode 7 - Aired 2/27/2017

The Tickle King features new, previously unseen footage documenting the bizarre and unsettling things that happened to filmmakers David Farrier and Dylan Reeve as Tickled premiered at film festivals and theaters in 2016. Lawsuits, private investigators, disrupted screenings and surprise appearances are just part of what they encounter along the way. Amidst new threats, the duo begins to answer questions that remained once the credits rolled on Tickled, including whether the disturbing behavior they uncovered will ever come to an end.

#7 - Solitary: Inside Red Onion State Prison

Season 2017 - Episode 4 - Aired 2/6/2017

An unflinching exploration of the lives of inmates and corrections officers in one of America’s most notorious “supermax” prisons, built to hold inmates in 8’x10’ cells 23 hours a day, for months, years and sometimes decades. With unprecedented access, the film paints a complex, unexpected and deeply moving portrait of life inside a world rarely seen

#8 - Unlocking The Cage

Season 2017 - Episode 6 - Aired 2/20/2017

Unloclking The Cage explores animal rights lawyer Steven Wise’s unprecedented challenge to break down the legal wall that separates animals from humans. After 30 years of struggling with ineffective animal welfare laws, Wise and his legal team, the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP), are making history by filing the first lawsuits that seek to transform an animal from a “thing” with no rights to a “person” with legal protections.

#9 - Warning: This Drug May Kill You

Season 2017 - Episode 10 - Aired 5/1/2017

Warning: This Drug May Kill You takes an unflinching look at the devastating effects of opioid addiction in the U.S., profiling four families whose lives have been decimated by addictions that all began with legitimate prescriptions to dangerous painkillers. Through the personal and emotional stories of people on the front lines of this epidemic, the film sheds light on the struggles of ordinary people who were prescribed highly addictive opioid pain medications, which are often the gateway to a very similar opioid, heroin.

#10 - Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds

Season 2017 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/8/2017

An intimate portrait of Hollywood royalty featuring Debbie Reynolds, Todd Fisher, and Carrie Fisher.

#11 - Spielberg

Season 2017 - Episode 14 - Aired 10/7/2017

Filmmaker Steven Spielberg and his colleagues discuss the classic movies that made him famous, including "Jaws," "Raiders of the Lost Ark," "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," "Jurassic Park," "Schindler's List" and "Saving Private Ryan."

#12 - Agnelli

Season 2017 - Episode 18 - Aired 12/18/2017

Chronicling the dramatic life of the charismatic head of FIAT, this compelling portrait features intimate interviews with nearly 40 family members, friends, professional confidantes and rivals, including: his sisters and other relatives; former lovers; current and former FIAT employees and executives; his butler and cook; and journalists, historians and friends, among them Henry Kissinger, Valentino, Jackie Rogers, Sally Bedell Smith, Roger Cohen, Jas Gawronski, Lee Radziwill and his niece, Diane von Furstenberg.

#13 - The Newspaperman: The Life and Times of Ben Bradlee

Season 2017 - Episode 17 - Aired 12/4/2017

Sometimes referred to as the country’s “most dangerous editor,” Washington Post executive editor Ben Bradlee was largely credited with taking down President Richard Nixon in 1974 after the Post broke the Watergate story, exposing the largest political scandal in American history. Told primarily in his own words, The Newspaperman: The Life and Times of Ben Bradlee is an intimate portrait of this formidable man, tracing his remarkable ascent from a young Boston boy stricken with polio to the one of the most pioneering and consequential journalistic figures of the 20th century.

#14 - Brillo Box (3¢ Off)

Season 2017 - Episode 13 - Aired 8/7/2017

Follow the journey of the iconic Andy Warhol "Brillo Box” sculpture, once owned by filmmaker Lisanne Skyler's parents, who bought it for $1,000 in 1969, traded it two years later only to see it auctioned off in 2010 for over $3 million.

#15 - Diana, Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy

Season 2017 - Episode 12 - Aired 7/24/2017

The film offers a fresh and revealing insight into Princess Diana through the personal and intimate reflections of her two sons and her friends and family.

#16 - Mommy Dead And Dearest

Season 2017 - Episode 11 - Aired 5/16/2017

Child abuse, mental illness and forbidden love converge in this true crime mystery of a mother and daughter who were thought to be living a fairy tale life.

#17 - Eagles of Death Metal: Nos Amis

Season 2017 - Episode 5 - Aired 2/13/2017

Examining the November 2015 Paris terrorist attacks from the perspective of the American rock band whose performance was cut short by the unspeakable violence, this emotional documentary chronicles the band's return to Paris to finish the show, both for their fans and themselves

#18 - Becoming Warren Buffett

Season 2017 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/30/2017