Dancing for the Devil Blurs the Line Between True Crime and Reality TV

While Netflix’s true-crime catalog continues to grow, its 2024 titles have been a mixed bag so far. There’s been some gems like An American Nightmare, which cleverly subverts viewer expectations and goes against the grain by actually holding law enforcement accountable. Others, like What Jennifer Did (which has drawn controversy for its alleged use of AI-manipulated imagery), merely rehash the facts of clear-cut cases and ultimately fail to bring anything revelatory to the table.

Regardless, streamers continue to show a vested interest in true crime. Warner Bros.’ merger with Discovery brought countless ID Discovery titles over to Max, like the massively successful Quiet on Set: The Dark Side Of Kids TV. HBO continues to maintain a steady stream of true crime with releases like The Jinx — Part 2. Paramount+ has also dipped its toes in the pool with recent titles such as Ctrl+Alt+Desire and the upcoming Pillowcase Murders. In other words, the genre’s popularity isn’t fizzling out any time soon.

True crime isn’t a new phenomenon in itself, but popular podcasts like My Favorite Murder and streaming hits such as Making a Murderer opened the doors for the genre’s move into the mainstream. In recent years, so-called “cybersleuths” have even used TikTok and YouTube to try and solve cases like the Idaho Murders and Gabby Petito’s disappearance, sometimes escalating into doxxing innocent people and interfering with actual investigations. The distinction between crime and entertainment has become increasingly blurry, to say the least.

Netflix’s Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult is the latest docuseries to toe that line. Directed by Derek Doneen (who’s also behind Netflix’s Heist), it delves into the world of 7M, a management company that represents dancers, including high-profile TikTok influencers. The group’s founder, Robert Shinn, also runs the controversial Shekinah Church — the organizations are separate but closely linked, with many 7M dancers also attending the church. In 2022, allegations of 7M fostering a “cult”-like environment surfaced; the following year, three former 7M dancers sued Shinn and accused Shekinah of being “a cult operating under the guise of a religious institution.” 

The series primarily focuses on the families of dancers Miranda Derrick (née Wilking) and Nick Raiano, former Shekinah members and sisters Melanie and Priscylla Lee, and former 7M/Shekinah members Kevin “Konkrete” Davis, Kylie Douglas, and Kailea Gray. While Dancing for the Devil presents itself as a standard cult doc, it also relies heavily on family drama and interpersonal issues to fill in the gaps. As a result, it often feels like a strange blend of true crime and reality TV.

Dancing for the Devil kicks off with a deep dive into the life of Miranda, a TikTok influencer who used to make “The Wilking Sisters” dance videos with her younger sister, Melanie W. Although Miranda is a big focus of the series, she doesn’t directly participate in it — the end of Part III states that she and her husband James (also a 7M dancer) did not respond to requests for comment. Since Miranda isn’t there to participate in interviews, producers instead spend a lot of time chatting with her sister and their parents Kelly and Dean Wilking. “I literally feel like my sister died,” Melanie W. says. “She’s everywhere, but nowhere. Haunting me.”

Dedicating time to Miranda’s family makes sense, considering how impacted they are by the situation. Melanie W., who was extremely close to her sister up until 7M, offers some valuable insights — she also briefly attended Shekinah, but left the organization when she felt like something was off. She recounts a dinner where she and other members reportedly sat in a circle and held hands with Shinn in the middle, all of them speaking in tongues. “I remember thinking it was weird, but then I’d never been exposed to anything like it,” she recalls. “I’m like, ‘Maybe this is normal.’ You know, my sister is there, her boyfriend’s there.” 

However, Dancing for the Devil starts to feel like it’s venturing into reality TV territory when it becomes more about the Wilking family trying to rekindle their relationship with Miranda than 7M itself. It is somewhat understandable that the lines between family drama and crime could get blurred here — to Miranda’s parents, her refusal to fly out to her grandfather’s funeral is an obvious sign that something is wrong; to law enforcement, it’s simply a case of an adult distancing herself from her family. Plus, as a journalist points out, running a cult isn’t actually illegal in itself.

Without a ton of new information to work with, the series leans so hard into the family drama that it almost resembles something on Bravo. At one point, the Wilking family spends a very uncomfortable Christmas together (wearing matching pajamas), everyone tiptoeing around the elephant in the room as they try to look polished for Miranda’s livestreams. Melanie W. also brings up her wedding several times, agonizing over whether or not she should still ask her sister to be her maid of honor. What genre is this again?

The series also focuses on the strained relationship between the Lee sisters, both of whom have escaped Shekinah — notably, neither of them were 7M dancers — but are at different stages of healing. “I’ve been focused on moving on and creating a life I’ve always wanted,” Melanie L. says, although she also acknowledges that “certain damages can’t be undone.” In comparison, her sister Priscylla struggles to move on, even still listening to recordings of Shinn’s sermons. While the contrast between the sisters is interesting, their scenes also quickly devolve into reality TV territory, like when they get into an argument over Priscylla being late for a family birthday party. 

In Part III, Priscylla flies to South Korea to confront their estranged father, who abandoned them when they were children. She says that it’s a necessary part of her healing journey because, in her eyes, she wouldn’t have joined Shekinah in the first place if he hadn’t left their family in a vulnerable position.While it’s worth examining what drives young people to join organizations like Shekinah in the first place, Doneen didn’t need to dive this deeply into the Lee sisters’ family issues to accomplish that. 

This isn’t the first Netflix true crime doc to feel like a reality show. Tiger King, which exploded in popularity during the pandemic, was meant to shed light on Joe Exotic’s alleged abuse of wild animals and dive into the twisted world of big cat collectors. Instead, viewers were more interested in the popular internet theory that conservationist Carole Baskin “fed her husband to the tigers.” For many, cold hard facts are no match for eccentric characters like Baskin, The Jinx’s Belcher twins, or estranged TikTok dancer sisters.

Ultimately, true crime and reality TV can both be exploitative in different ways. Although true crime docs can be used to give victims voices (like The Program) or shine light on cases involving underrepresented communities (such as Last Call: When a Serial Killer Stalked Queer New York), they can also just as easily amount to cheap attempts to milk tragedy and violence for entertainment. Similarly, reality TV can range from harmless comfort fare like The Great British Baking Show to the trashiest, most bizarre shows you can possibly imagine (see: Lifetime’s Born in the Wild). 

Dancing for the Devil often feels less like a cult doc and more like a collection of dramatic moments and personal conversations that probably didn’t need to be televised in the first place — and that’s what makes it nearly indistinguishable from the latest reality hit.

Dancing for the Devil: The 7M Tik Tok Cult is streaming on Netflix. 

Kelly Martinez is a TV Reporter based in Los Angeles. Her previous work can be found at BuzzFeed and People Magazine, among other outlets. She enjoys reading, spending time with her cat, and explaining the plot of Riverdale to people.