Last Call: When A Serial Killer Stalked Queer New York

This four-part series is much more than mere true-crime documentary. As it widens its outlook to explore how such an atrocity could have occurred, its political savviness and thoughtful tenderness make it a masterclass in righteous, acutely relevant reporting.

Last Call‘s great act of service is conjuring them so vividly, and with so much care, that you can almost make out the outlines where their lives should be burning still. In the end, what we’re left with is not the shock of their brutal demises, but the ache of their absences — accompanied by a healthy frustration toward the institutions that failed them, and are failing people like them to this day.

Last Call is not a formally ambitious documentary. Like many true-crime docs, it’s woven together from talking-head interviews, archival B-roll, and vague, wordless reenactments. What distinguishes it, structurally, are Caronna’s concision and attention to detail. Yet its real innovation is its compassion, in the trust that it not only establishes among the people whose lives were irreparably harmed by these killings, but also honors with its humanistic storytelling.

Caronna creates a steady storytelling rhythm, mixing artful recreations with interviews, period media coverage, maps, and stills; Last Call never feels like it is almost four hours long. The pace is also aided by a vivid and impassioned grasp of the bigger picture.

An all-too-relevant story about persecution and violence, and the way in which public rhetoric—and inaction—fosters further hate.

A quietly-compelling four-part documentary.

The reason why Last Call: When A Serial Killer Stalked Queer New York is watchable is that it’s not just about a bunch of related murders, but about just how uphill of a climb the LGBTQIA+ community had in New York and elsewhere during a time that wasn’t all that long ago.