The 10-part ESPN documentary makes the case that sports aren’t just about players. They’re about all of us.
Now that it’s over, I can say for sure that ESPN’s 10-episode docuseries The Last Dance, which aired its final two episodes on May 17, is both incredibly watchable and kind of mediocre. (As editor and documentarian Robert Greene put it on Twitter, “Best tv show of the year/worst documentary of the year. I loved it, of course.”)
It had a lot to recommend it, to be sure. The series toggles between two timelines: the Chicago Bulls’ 1997-’98 season — during which the team won its sixth NBA title — and major moments in all of the years leading up to that season, mostly in Michael Jordan’s career. I found that structure effective, though I talked to people who didn’t like it very much. The footage is fascinating, the research goes deep, and the truly wide array of interviews is impressive. The music, particularly needle drops in the earlier episodes, slaps.
But some of the music and camerawork (especially in the last few episodes) is ploddingly melodramatic, the pacing can be erratic, and the repetition of points that might be of interest to superfans (Jordan’s frequent stories about slights and perceived slights by various players that became “personal” for him included) take away from the series’ overall punch. And the evident authorial hand of Jordan throughout made me wonder often what wasn’t being said — about people like Bulls manager Jerry Krause, or various players with whom Jordan had some beef, or things like (as in the ninth episode) the “poisoned pizza” that Jordan says led to the infamous “flu game.” Documentaries aren’t obliged to journalistic objectivity or required togive air to every side of every issue, but because The Last Dance sometimes does attempt to let multiple people voice their sides of the story, the places where it doesn’t stand out starkly.
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Still, it’s an enormously fun series to watch. I retread some old memories and learned more about why Michael Jordan — whom I, a clueless child through most of his career, still knew was important — was such a revolutionary figure, both to pro sports and to the way athletes market themselves today. I understood better why the Bulls dominated pro basketball in the 1990s, and why relationships between players and managers and coaches matter, and the factors that can lead to victory or thwart championship hopes.
But that’s not what I was thinking about while watching The Last Dance.
Instead, I was fixated on two other matters related to the series. The first was something I hadn’t anticipated about the experience of watching the game of basketball itself. And the second was a matter with more immediate implications.
The series’ title is drawn from the name that the Bulls and its coach, Phil Jackson, gave to the 1997-’98 season, which everyone knew would most likely be Jackson’s and Jordan’s last with the team.
But maybe there’s another parallel. I’ve watched basketball throughout my life, but not habitually. Watching the snippets of games included in The Last Dance, I was struck by the athleticism of the players. The leaping! The deft dodging and turning! The sinewy arms! It was extraordinary, and it made me think of nothing so much as… ballet.
In the ninth episode, which is filled with players making unlikely shots, I watched them move with precision and grace and, when they made the shot and celebrated, virtually pirouette on the court, spinning in place as they leapt again and again.
