After Netflix's Tiger King documentary proved to be a worldwide phenomenon, a second season should focus primarily on Doc Antle. With most of the world currently in lockdown, entertainment has been provided courtesy of Joe Exotic and the insane story of his life as told via Tiger King. Although entirely centered around Exotic, a zoo owner and big cat breeder based in Oklahoma, Tiger King also explores the lives of Joe's business partners, rivals, employees and lovers, and ends with Exotic being sentenced to 22 years in jail for an array of animal rights offences and plotting the murder of Carole Baskin. Since attracting widespread acclaim, Netflix rushed out a Tiger King epilogue episode and those behind the original series are tentatively broaching the possibility of a second season in interviews.
Unless Joe is released from prison fairly soon, Tiger King season 2 won't be able to continue his narrative, but one figure seems primed to take Joe's place: Doc Antle. A recurring personality in Tiger King, Antle is described as Joe's mentor and owns the T.I.G.E.R.S. zoo in South Carolina. Since Netflix began streaming the Joe Exotic documentary, Antle has spoken out, claiming to be unhappy at his portrayal and refuting the various accusations made against him. While Antle may be hesitant to sign up for another series as a result, an opportunity to set the record straight (and earn a truck-load of Netflix cash) may prove tempting enough to ensure Antle agrees to become the primary focus of Tiger King's second season.
Many questions remain after watching Tiger King. Did Jeff Lowe set up Joe? Did Carole Baskin kill her ex-husband? But these are purely speculative and will remain so unless some earth-shattering evidence comes to light. However, there are a host of unanswered questions surrounding Doc Antle that warrant further discussion. In one of the documentary's most harrowing sequences, a former T.I.G.E.R.S. employee describes her experience, detailing an unwanted breast enlargement, squalid living conditions and a cult-like setup where young women would be brought in as workers and end up as Antle's lovers. By Tiger King's final episode, Joe Exotic is in prison serving time for his crimes, but the Antle accusations remain largely unexplored. Adding to the mystery, Antle's Tiger King story ends with a mere caption claiming the T.I.G.E.R.S park was raided, but there's no follow-up on this.
This leaves so much more to explore about Doc Antle's personal life, the accusations made by Barbara Fisher and the raid on his property. It's also no secret that Antle and Joe were frequent business partners, and even in the closing stages of the docuseries when Joe has decided to spill the beans on all his associates, documents pertaining to Antle are swiftly removed by Dillon from the glare of the camera. Evidently, there is more to Doc Antle than what Tiger King had time to reveal. A second season could look into any information PETA and the USDA have on Antle, while cross-examining Fisher's claims of abuse with other employees. And just as Joe's troubled background adds context to his misdeeds, what drives a man to call himself "Lord" and build a harem that no one quite knows the true size of?
Tiger King has been described by many as stranger than fiction, and just like any movie or TV series, a second season should aim to go "bigger." Doc Antle was not only a mentor to Joe Exotic, but he had a bigger park, a more active role in Hollywood, a slicker operation and, as impossible as it might seem, a larger ego. Given Barbara Fisher's accusations and Joe's claim that Antle was the worst of the entire big cat breeding network, exposing the truth about Antle feels like it could be an even more groundbreaking, sinister story than Joe Exotic's downfall and potentially turn up an even crazier, more disturbing set of allegations.
Tiger King is currently streaming on Netflix.
