The Disney+ miniseries “The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox” delves into the case of British student Meredith Kercher and the involvement of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito in her murder. Despite Knox’s cooperation, the series lacks a dramatic twist and deeper reflection. The portrayal of Knox as innocent and naive seems calculated, with inconsistencies in narrative perspective and character development. The series struggles to find a cohesive tone, shifting between genres without coherence and leaving a gap in depicting the victim. Despite its feminist undertones and aim for enlightenment, the series employs problematic True-Crime genre tools.

Things spiraled out of control at some point: misjudgments, wrong decisions, negligence, chaos – rarely does anything good come out of it. This rings true for the Amanda Knox case and the eight-part miniseries “The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox” on Disney+, attempting to narrate this case but struggling to define how and why.

In 2007, British student Meredith Kercher was murdered in Perugia, Italy. Amanda Knox, her American roommate, and Knox’s then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito immediately became suspects. The prosecution painted a picture of a sexual game gone wrong involving Ivorian acquaintance Rudy Guede. Guede was swiftly sentenced to 16 years in prison. Knox and Sollecito were initially found guilty in 2009, acquitted in 2011, reconvicted in 2014, then finally acquitted in 2015 – though Knox faced another conviction for slander in 2024 for falsely accusing an innocent bartender of the crime. From the start, this case was a global media frenzy due to Amanda Knox being portrayed as “Foxy Knoxy” and the “Angel Face Killer”: a heartless, sex-crazed 20-year-old.