Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Takedown: American Aryans' on MAX, A Docuseries About Fighting A White Supremacist Gang And Finding Justice For Its Victims
The four-episode MAX docuseries The Takedown: American Aryans recounts a 2008 investigation led by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives into an organized criminal group known as the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas. Operating inside and outside of state and federal prisons in Texas, and driven by their violent white supremacist ideology, the ABT were well-known to authorities for their long list of crimes. But it was the torture and murder of a woman in suburban Dallas – 'slaughtering innocent people at will,' a federal agent says in The Takedown – that brought the six-year investigation to bear.
Opening Shot: 'Little did I know, when I was assigned to Houston, Texas,' says retired ATF agent Rich Boehning, 'that I would be targeting one of the most violent extremist groups in the country.'
The Gist: 'She was a naive 19-year-old, and didn't see that the people she was around could be evil.' For the family of Brianna Taylor, their concern over her use of methamphetamines turned to dismay in 2006, when she stopped returning their phone calls. Taylor had been dating a man named Jason Hankins, who as an Aryan Brotherhood of Texas 'general' coordinated the group's drug-selling and gun-running activities. But as authorities circled the ABT for a series of crimes, they discovered another shocking truth: Hankins' associate, Dale 'Tiger' Jameton, had murdered Brianna over the unfounded suspicion that she was a snitch to the cops.
In The Takedown: American Aryans, Rich Boehning describes how the ATF's investigation unfolded, and how it involved numerous other agencies as well as infiltration of the ABT at significant risk to life and limb. Whether inside a prison or out on the streets, these guys were indiscriminate killers, to the point that Boehning describes their torture and murder of someone just to steal his pickup truck. As is usual for true crime stuff, The Takedown often relies on reenactments for its visuals. But it also has access to police interrogation tapes, footage from inside the prison system, the account of a former ABT 'captain,' and a collection of still photos from inside the brotherhood, where tatted-up men strike menacing poses with weapons in front of flags emblazoned with Nazi imagery.
The access goes even further. Armed with a series of lingering questions about the senseless murder from Brianna Taylor's sister Kate, investigative journalist Caroyln Canville interviews Dale Jameton inside the Texas prison where he is serving a life sentence. Why did he feel the need to abduct and hurt Brianna, to kill her and dump her body in a Dallas lake? (Taylor's body has never been recovered.) But while Jameton admits he did it, his allegiance to the brotherhood is unshakeable. Takedown makes it clear that there is no credence to the ABT's suspicion that Brianna was working with law enforcement. But incredibly, Jameton, completely unmoved by the questions from her family, still says she had it coming.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Once it gets into its jailhouse interview sessions with Dale Jameton, The Takedown begins to feel like a mirror on the Netflix series I Am A Killer. Takedown director/producer Neil Rawles has also helmed numerous episodes of Locked Up Abroad, and in the Apple TV+ docuseries Cowboy Cartel, a Texas-based FBI agent leads an investigation into a Mexican criminal organization's infiltration of the American quarter horse industry.
Our Take: The crimes and investigations detailed in The Takedown: American Aryans are by now years-old. But they still resonate, especially as white supremacist beliefs and apparent Sieg Heil salutes are now part of the daily news cycle. And while the juggernaut of true crime content doesn't seem like it will ever stop populating the world of streaming, and which creates an open window for a docuseries about violent Nazi-worshipping gangs, for Brianna Taylor's family, it's the resonance of her murder that provides The Takedown with its most effective emotional peg.
Documentary-style material like this series can also benefit from a strong personality at its center, and The Takedown has one in former ATF agent Rich Boehning, whose Queens New York accent and deeply-felt descriptions of how crucial the case against the ABT became – 'I realized the Brianna Taylor murder was just the tip of the iceberg' – lend it a strident sense of urgency
Sex and Skin: None, but be aware that in addition to its lead disclaimer about the mayhem and racism of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, The Takedown also describes incidents of torture and sexual violence toward women.
Parting Shot: We're back with Rich Boehning, who says his investigation of the supremacist gang took another significant turn when it hit even closer to home. 'I discovered one of the ABT generals was living in my neighborhood…'
Sleeper Star: Interviews with Michael Bianculli, aka 'Crash,' who describes himself as a former captain in the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, provide firsthand insight into the group's command structure. The rigid hierarchy Bianculli describes supports Rich Boehning's statement about the ATF's investigation of the ABT: 'They were built like an army, so we had to build our own army.'
Most Pilot-y Line: 'Tiger treated her with the kind of violence that you can't imagine,' journalist Carolyn Canville says in The Takedown. 'Violence that you can't imagine any human being could feel against another human being, no matter what.'
Our Call: STREAM IT. True crime fans should have a lot to chew on with The Takedown: American Aryans, as the docuseries details not only the broad federal response to the violence perpetrated by a criminal group of white supremacists, but the emotions felt by the loved ones their victims left behind.
Johnny Loftus (@johnnyloftus.bsky.social) is a Chicago-based writer. A veteran of the alternative weekly trenches, his work has also appeared in Entertainment Weekly, Pitchfork, The All Music Guide, and The Village Voice.
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Her housekeeper, Eunice Murray, who was there all day and night and was the one to find her dead, later claimed Robert had visited and they'd fought. When Murray found Marilyn dead around 3:30 a.m., she was reportedly holding her phone, and then-LA chief of detectives Thad Brown reportedly claimed she was found with a crumpled-up piece of paper with the number for the White House on it. Besides her connections to the Kennedys, there were other suspicious details around Monroe's death. Murray initially called Monroe's psychiatrist, Dr. Greenson, who called the doctor who had prescribed the pills, Dr. Engelberg, before calling the police. The police did not arrive for close to an hour after Murray first saw Monroe's body. Lawford later claimed that he'd heard about her death at 1:30 a.m. The wife of Monroe's press relations manager Arthur Jacobs also later claimed that her husband had received the call that Marilyn was dead at 10:30. Natalie Wood, who starred in a number of films including West Side Story, Rebel Without a Cause, and Gypsy, also died under extremely mysterious circumstances. The 43-year-old was with her husband Robert Wagner on his boat on a weekend vacation from filming Brainstorm when she drowned. According to Wagner himself (though he initially denied this), he and Wood argued, and then he went to bed without her. The next morning, her body was found a mile away. Wood had been drinking, and it's possible her death was an accident, but she was found with bruises that could mean she was attacked. Nearby witnesses had heard a woman scream. The captain of the boat, Dennis Davern, allegedly drunkenly confessed to Wood's sister years later that he'd seen Wagner push Wood, who then fell overboard, and that Wagner refused to rescue this is unconfirmed. Wagner has denied he had anything to do with Wood's death. But I mention this one specifically for a wild Hollywood fact that not many people seem to know — Christopher Walken, Wood's Brainstorm costar, had also been on the boat that night. He had reportedly also argued with Wagner, and Wagner was (according to Davern) angry Natalie had invited him. Walken has not said much about the night beyond affirming it was an accident and that he had nothing to do with it. "I don't know what happened. She slipped and fell in the water. I was in bed then. It was a terrible thing." He also said, "The people who are convinced that there was something more to it than what came out in the investigation will never be satisfied with the truth. Because the truth is, there is nothing more to it." One of the wildest Hollywood secrets involves Loretta Young and Clark Gable. For years, there were rumors Young's adopted daughter Judy was actually her biological daughter, conceived with Clake Gable. The rumors wouldn't be proven true until Young admitted to them in her posthumous memoirs. It turned out Young had conducted an elaborate cover-up to make it seem like she had adopted the child. Loretta even reportedly had Judy's ears pinned back in an operation because they so resembled Gable's. Gable never had any role in her daughter Judy's life. Young refused to tell Judy the truth, and according to Judy's memoir, when Judy confronted her about the rumors, Young ran into the house and Young never spoke publicly about the circumstances of Judy's conception, according to her daughter-in-law, Linda Lewis, in the '90s, Young had asked her what date rape meant after hearing the term on Larry King Live. After Lewis explained, Young replied, "That's what happened between me and Clark.' On the train ride back from shooting Call of the Wild on location, Gable had allegedly snuck into Young's compartment. According to Lewis, Young didn't want Judy to know, so Lewis kept quiet until both Young and Judy were dead. Finally, we'll end with a few last examples featuring Errol Flynn, because the man had a wild life and allegedly did some wild things. First of all, he wrote in his autobiography that he once had a job castrating young sheep with his teeth. Second, Flynn once apparently showed up on the doorstep of Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper, angry about something she had written about him, and began masturbating. "I began laughing, and continued laughing until he finished with a dramatic flourish all over my doorstep," Hopper reportedly told Paul Newman. "I'll say one thing for Errol. He's the only man I know who can ejaculate in front of a fully dressed woman who's laughing derisively during the entire process." And finally, David Niven claims that Flynn once brought him along to view 'the best-looking girls in L.A.'...which, as it turned out, meant parking by Hollywood High to watch the girls get out of school. He then allegedly told a police officer who questioned why they were there that he was "enjoying the scenery." What shocking old Hollywood facts do you know? Let us know in the comments!
