Episode #73 | The Last Dance Review EP01 and EP02
StatMan Sports Podcast
English - April 22, 2020 15:00 - 29 minutes - 20.1 MB - ★★★★★ - 20 ratingsBasketball Sports Football nba nfl ncaa basketball football sports professional college soccer la liga Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Everyone in “The Last Dance” has a Michael Story. Maybe it’s one they’ve told enough times at dinner parties or family gatherings that the timing has been workshopped to perfection. In some cases, the story might have drifted so far from the truth that it exists as its own self-perpetuating myth. Over the course of 10 episodes of “The Last Dance,” the ESPN documentary series examining the singular stardom of Michael Jordan through the lens of the legendary Chicago Bulls 1997-98 title run, the breadth of subjects and timelines almost makes the veracity of those stories irrelevant.
Directed by Jason Hehir, whose previous projects include multiple editions of ESPN’s long-running “30 for 30” series, “The Last Dance” is less an investigation of a sports dynasty’s last flames and more the chronicle of how improbable its survival always was. The goal seems to be to make a definitive account of what that season meant for all involved, regardless of how some of the empirical facts may have changed in the two decades since.
Structurally, “The Last Dance” is a marvel, finding thematic parallels between the drama unfolding in the “present” of that ‘97-’98 season and the foundational framework that made that final Finals run possible. Out of a swirling mess of personnel moves, family tragedies, and international showcases, Hehir and a team of editors — led by Chad Beck, Devin Concannon, Abhay Sofsky, and Ben Sozanski — manage to craft a smooth, coherent pair of forward-moving tracks. “The Last Dance” shows how, by the fall of 1997, the Bulls had already cemented themselves as basketball royalty, amassing a trophy case filled with championships and individual accolades. The promise of one more ring takes on a mythic quality nonetheless. Even if some flashbacks do leave the Last Dance season’s action at a tantalizing crossroads, there’s never a sense of whiplash as the narrative seesaws across the years.
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