Cheer (2020)

Genre

documentary television program

Country

United States

Length

2 seasons, 15 episodes

Rated

12

Rating

7.3 of 10 from 146 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

This docuseries follows the Navarro College cheerleading team as they train for a national championship. It focuses on the team's athletes and their coach, showing their personal struggles and the physical demands of competitive cheer.

inspiringhigh-stakesintensefocusedemotionalupbeatstressfulgrounded

What happens

Cheer is an American sport television docuseries airing on Netflix starting in January 2020. The six-part series follows the nationally ranked forty-member Navarro College Bulldogs Cheer Team from Corsicana, Texas, under the direction of coach Monica Aldama, as they prepare to compete in the National Cheerleading Championship held annually in Daytona Beach, Florida. The episodes focus especially on five individual Cheer Team members and include elements of the history of cheerleading, including the formation of the National Cheerleaders Association (NCA). As the series begins, the Cheer Team has won fourteen NCA National Championships in the "advanced large coed" junior college division, as well as five "Grand Nationals" for the highest score of all teams in the competition. Their only rival in the division is Trinity Valley Community College in Athens, Texas, roughly forty miles away. The final episode of the first season discusses the outsized influence of Varsity Brands—just acquired by Bain Capital—that seems to control most aspects of the billion-dollar competitive cheerleading industry, including broadcast rights of the Daytona finals. The second season premiered on January 12, 2022. Some of its episodes address the charges of child sexual exploitation levied against first season star Jerry Harris, who was later sentenced to 12 years in prison in July 2022. The case also prompted broader discussion about the ethical implications of media exposure and representation in documentary storytelling. The series has also prompted discussion about the ethical implications of media exposure, commercialization, and the portrayal of athletes’ personal experiences. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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