Season 1 • Episode 4
LatestThough Rio de Janeiro will host the Summer Olympics in 2016, the city currently remains crippled by a war raging between police and powerful drug gangs. Over 2,000 Brazilian military have taken to the streets in a largest offensive in decades. They are taking on the Red Command and Amigos de Amigos, two powerful gangs, in an attempt to regain control of the city's hilltop favelas before the world's eyes focus on Brazil as it hosts the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Summer Olympics. The powerful drug gangs have fought back with a series of urban terror attacks on cars, buses and police stations. Several journalists have been murdered. Photographer Eros Hoagland is one of only a few willing to venture into the dangerous favelas like Mangueira, which overlooks the Olympic stadium. Mysteries are revealed: In some areas of "pacification," Red Command have been warned in advance and have already left for more remote parts.
Drug trafficking, poverty, gang violence, corruption and ethnic warfare have created some of the most dangerous hot spots on Earth. Follow our current generation of photojournalists into these conflict zones, see what compels them and experience why, when everyone else seeks cover, the photojournalist stands and moves closer.
Direction
Frankham embeds you so deep you forget you're safe on your couch
Cinematography
The photojournalists' own footage—raw, shaky, unforgivable beauty
Editing
Seamless blend of present danger with quiet aftermath
Creator
David Frankham
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Several subjects later criticized the show for flattening their complex relationships with subjects into 'war photographer' tropes.
Premiered as HBO pivoted from prestige fiction to 'dangerous lives' docs—part of a mid-2010s trend that critics called 'trauma tourism television.'
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