Review: 'Dateline: Secrets Uncovered'

One of the more memorable true crime documentaries from the past year was the three-part American Nightmare, which laid out the complex and surprising story of Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn, a Southern California couple who claimed they had been the target of a kidnapping and assault.

If you watched that compelling Netflix take on their story and thought to yourself, "I wonder what that investigation would look like in an episode that only lasted an hour, included primarily interviews with reporters who covered the case and police, then you'll be thrilled by the latest episode of Dateline: Secrets Uncovered.

Dateline: Secrets Uncovered is a show that repackages old episodes of Dateline, complete with a new wrap-round from NBC reporter and anchor Craig Melvin.

The episode "Twisted Tale" originally aired on NBC in 2015 and its hard to watch the episode and not be infuriated by how little effort the production team seems to have put into looking at the facts of the case.

While American Nightmare spends a lot of time dissecting the many ways local law enforcement failed to properly investigate the case, Dateline's Josh Mankiewicz allows local police to provide their recap in a way that makes them sound only slightly less skillful than Sherlock Holmes at his peak. Even interviews with several of the local reporters who covered the story focus on the premise of "hey, ANYBODY would have thought the couple was lying."

Once the accused kidnapper is identified, the episode spends the bulk of the final 15 minutes of the episode focusing on how his background didn't seem to match the expected profile of someone capable of multiple home invasions and kidnapping.

If you don't know the full story of this case and how much police laziness and misconduct led to the very public ruin of Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn's reputation, this slapdash episode of true crime television might be a slight bit compelling.

But it's hard to watch this hour of television without seeing the gaps in the reporting and Dateline's eagerness to spoon feed the police's side of the story to the public.

Maybe Dateline producers didn't have the information they needed back in 2015 when this episode was new. But given what we know now, lightly repackaging and then premiering the new version this week just feels like a really bad idea.

Dateline: Secrets Uncovered airs weekly on Oxygen.