Video summary
The reviewer begins by recounting their decision to watch the three-part Netflix docuseries, "Death of a Pastor's Wife," after escaping a cycle of terrible movies. Although they entered the story with no prior knowledge and pleaded for the protagonist, Micah, to survive, the documentary inevitably revealed her tragic death. The reviewer notes that while the series was split into three episodes rather than a single film, likely due to streaming algorithms, the pacing remained engaging without feeling bloated. Despite the heavy subject matter involving a true crime story about manipulation and abuse, the reviewer stayed highly invested throughout the runtime, finding the narrative compelling enough to make them reflect on their own mundane life compared to the dramatic events unfolding on screen.
The documentary chronicles the relationship between Micah and her husband, John Paul Miller, detailing how he manipulated her into leaving her previous marriage and entering an unholy union with him. The second act focuses on his alleged role in driving her into a deep depression, utilizing her mental health issues to isolate her from friends and family while positioning himself as the victim in the eyes of the church community. The reviewer criticizes Miller's behavior, describing him as a manipulative antagonist who whined constantly and used guilt trips to control Micah. Production-wise, the documentary is praised for its high-quality visuals and lighting, though the reviewer expresses discomfort with specific camera angles that captured an interviewee in an unflattering manner, wishing they had chosen better shots.
The narrative concludes with a somber reflection on the lack of justice for Micah, who took her own life after being driven to despair by Miller's stalking, hacking, and emotional abuse. The reviewer points out suspicious details that were glossed over, such as the sale of the church for millions of dollars which seemingly benefited Miller, and his subsequent marriage to another woman shortly after Micah's death, whose husband had also died by suicide under similar circumstances. Although Miller was found guilty on charges like cyberstalking, he continues to evade full accountability through legal extensions, leaving the reviewer frustrated by the ongoing injustice. Ultimately, the documentary serves as a cautionary tale about toxic relationships and the ease with which sleazy individuals can exploit vulnerable people, leaving the audience with a sense of sadness rather than closure.
Read the full video transcript
After what felt like being waterboarded
with terrible Netflix movies week after
week, I decided to switch things up. And
so I put on a three-part docu series
focusing on a crazy pastor and his
terrible relationship with his wife. And
since I am basically just an android now
that watches movies and reviews them, I
have very little social life, nor do I
spend much time on social media looking
at all the crazy [ __ ] going on. So I
knew nothing about this story going in.
And after every episode I was pleading
to the gods I don't believe in that this
beautiful misguided Micah would survive
to the end credits. Not really putting
together the fact that the documentary
is titled Death of a Pastor's Wife. So
imagine my disappointment when
inevitably the worst thing happened and
she did die. Not a spoiler unless you're
an idiot like myself. That said, I would
like to talk about this trilogy for a
little while. Uh, it's been out for a
week or so. I know it's still trending
number one on Netflix, but I think most
people that are here have probably seen
it and want to just hear someone's take.
So, let's get into it.
First things first, I'm the realist.
Drop this and let the whole world feel
this. Each one of these episodes is
around 45 minutes in length. You shave
off a little bit for credits. Then
you're kind of thinking to yourself, or
at least I was thinking, why wasn't this
just a movie? Well, why did we need to
do the three-part thing? I don't I don't
know what goes on with the algorithm on
Netflix if they think that maybe this is
better for watch time or to get people
coming back dayto day instead of just
one sitting. I'm sure that's probably
it. Regardless, this thankfully did not
feel bloated to the point of annoyance.
There was some stuff you could have
shaved off or you you definitely could
have, you know, maybe knocked it out in
a little less time, but for the most
part, I was highly engaged. I was not
bored. I was very much invested in this
story, which is obviously a true event
and a very sad, sick, tragic one at
that. And then it kind of makes you take
stock of your own life and what a what
an absolute bore it is. I mean, I'm
married with kids. Uh I I don't have any
like homeless people coming over for a
bang session. I'm certainly not doing
sermons from the mountaintop saying some
of the most wild [ __ ] ever to a bunch of
followers who are either a not paying
attention, b too stupid to understand
what the person's saying, or c awful and
on board. And that's going to bring us
to the antagonist of this story, John
Paul Miller, or JP for short, or as I
call him, [ __ ] douchebag. This
three-act play is going to take place
chronologically through time. We're
gonna start with the the buildup of the
relationship, how he won her over. Uh,
keep in mind she is much younger than
him. That's usually how these types of
things go. And how he convinced her to
get out of her marriage that she already
was in and join him in an unholy
matrimony. The second act is going to go
into how he got her into a deep
depression. Talked about her bipolar
issues, if she really even had them.
She's medicated regardless. She was put
away for a while in an institution and
JP piece of [ __ ] was making sure that
everyone in her life, including the
church that she sang at with him, was on
his side or at least he was setting up
the pieces so that later when the wheels
came off, he could go, "Well, look, I I
was telling you guys about these issues.
I was was right there." Oh, wait. I got
to do it in the JP manner of speaking.
This guy whines like a [ __ ] I just I
was trying to tell her how to stop
acting. There's a point in this
documentary where his voice gets to a
decel I didn't even think was possible.
It reminded me of that episode of Family
Guy where Stewie and Brian were talking
about the novel he was writing. Oh, you
working on that novel? You going to get
that novel done anytime soon? And he
keeps getting higher and higher. That
that's truly how this guy was, but
without the humor associated with it.
And unfortunately, there's nothing funny
about this documentary outside of some
of the bizarre camera shots they would
do, specifically to this uh poor older
woman in the first uh the first section
more so than the later ones. They're
interviewing her. I don't remember her
name. She's one of the church ladies.
She's got the big cross to let you know
that. And they have the camera like down
here at baby crowning levels. And it's
just shot out of a cannon up at her. So
you see this like her big gut sticking
out. It's like, you know, if you put the
camera up here and aim it down more,
it's a much more pleasant look for
everyone involved. I felt really bad for
the woman. If I had final cut of that, I
would have said, "Yeah, maybe use angle
B or or Z over this." Just like pretty
much every documentary I've ever seen,
you are going to hear from the family
members. You're going to hear from some
of the friends. You are not going to
hear from the villain of this because he
opted out. And as far as the production
goes, this is a very wellput together
documentary outside again of some of the
weird camera choices, not just on that
woman, but some of the other people too.
Uh, but everything visually pleasantl
looking. It's all lit very nicely. And
even some of the glamour shot stuff they
do where they're showing Micah, but it's
not actually her. It's a it's a standin.
And they just show the hands with some
of the cross tattoos and the coffee cup
with that steam coming on. captured in
beautiful 8K. It looks really good and I
like the attention to details on the
tats. Very, very nicely done. As far as
whether or not to watch this thing, I
mean, if you're a fan of these, I think
you're you're probably going to be right
at home here. It's another one of these
miserable situations for where where a
woman marries young. She's naive. She
hangs on to her faith, letting Jesus
take the wheel. But it turns out JC
didn't have his hand on the wheel. It
was this JP fellow and he drove that
thing straight off of a cliff. Now,
there are two sides to every story, of
course, uh, innocent until proven guilty
and and all that. And he's currently
fighting court battles right now. This
doesn't have a happy ending. It has an
ending and and that consists of him
still to this day kicking the ball down
the curb. He's supposed to have court
dates. his attorneys keep filing for
extensions and apparently there is no
law on the books as to how many times
you can do this so they can just extend
extend extend wi with no end in sight.
And so what we the collective sad
miserable people that like to watch
these terrible documentaries about
people getting taken advantage of by a
bunch of sleaz [ __ ] is another
feather to put in our crap as the
expression goes. Innocent until proven
guilty. Sure. Uh but I know people like
this JP and I can see these people from
afar and how they are shaping
relationships and managing everything in
the house and making life [ __ ]
miserable for their significant other.
So why do we why do we do it? Why do we
why do we hate ourselves? Why do we
continue to watch other people in pain
and misery? It's just a depressing
cycle. And I suppose you could say,
well, it's educational. Don't get
yourself in that situation. Ladies,
don't get yourself in that situation.
There's a lot of douchebags out there
that they're just ready to pounce on
you. And I'm not. And it goes the other
way, too. There there's plenty of women
out there as well that will take
advantage of men or other women. The
great news is there's terrible people
across the board. And it turns out some
of the best of the best, horrible people
really know how to take advantage of the
system, game it for their own benefit,
and then they can really get to work.
Micah Miller is sadly just one more
naive innocent victim who fell for the
shtick, fell for the sherrod. And then
because of the previous divorce, because
of the guilt she felt, and because of
that strong faith she had, it weighed
her down. It kept her linked to this guy
who was going out finding his own ass if
she wasn't in the mood four or five
times a day. He's loading her up with
testosterone so she can keep up. What?
What? What is this guy? And this jackass
even had the audacity, the nerve to just
give these simple awful texts to her
family members blaming them for when she
inevitably took her own life. Hey, this
is on you. If you would have let me
treat her like I was doing, none of this
would have happened. You have to be
truly a special piece of [ __ ] to do
something like that. Which brings us to
the sad ending of Micah. Uh she did take
her own life. She purchased a gun at a
pawn shop as one can do. just day of she
she got some gas. She drove to North
Carolina. They're in South Carolina at
the time. So, she drove like an hour and
a half away and then she took her own
life down by a creek. Now, there was
like a small little side project where a
guy was looking into this, an
investigator, and he said it was weird
that her body was 100 ft from the shell
casings and the stream would have moved
her. I don't know if it's that deep. I
think John Paul Miller didn't have
anything to do with shooting her
outright or her death. Like he wasn't
off camera telling her to do it. It
sounded like he was working that day.
And I'm sure there's plenty of people
that would back up that story. However,
that doesn't mean he's off the hook.
Quite the contrary, it's his actions
that drove her to this place. He was
stalking her for years, bugging her car,
leaving her disturbing text messages,
hacking into her social accounts, and
posting nude photos of her. You know,
just a real man of the cloth. I'm all
amped up. So, I guess the documentary
did its job. It pissed me off. I hate
people like this. I hate those that pry
on the innocence of others or or on the
frailty or the the thing is like Michael
wasn't even a weak individual, you know?
At least that's not how she's presented.
She was strong. She had this powerful
voice. She would leave inspirational
messages online, which makes this even
more disgusting. How badly he broke her,
how badly he beat her down. Now, there
are a couple parts of this documentary
that I did find a little suspect. And I
I don't mean suspect like I'm
questioning the the legitimacy of it. I
just found it strange how they glossed
over some pretty big details. And I
suppose I could go online and Google it
if I want to be more pissed off, but it
was stated very quickly that the church
that JP uh did his sermons at, which I
believe was called Solid Rock, and it
always made me think of Arrested
Development, Solid as a Rock, or some it
was called like Rock Solid, maybe Rock
Lobster, Black Rock, I don't know, some
some sort of a weirdass church. It was
sold for $2.5 million. Well, I went
online and it sounds like that money or
some of that money went to JP. He made a
bunch of money off of that and he's
still doing the pastor thing. He's still
in these like weird rinky dink little
[ __ ] hole places with this little cult
of people spreading the good word of
himself. The other thing that was oddly
mentioned, but then like grazed over in
less than a minute, was the fact that he
ended up marrying one year after Micah's
death, this other woman that he'd been
sleeping with while he was with Micah.
He he was a real great stand-up
individual this whole time. She was
already in a marriage to a guy in a
wheelchair. And when he found out,
allegedly allegedly that this affair was
taking place, he rolled himself into a
pool and drowned.
What? That's pretty much all we're given
to go on with that whole thing. So, this
woman who conveniently loses her husband
to a suicide marries the pastor who
conveniently lost his wife to a suicide.
Funny how that works out. Just would
have been nice to get a little bit more
detail. And since we're playing with the
series and we're not stuck to kind of a
a two-hour movie, would have been kind
of interesting to get more information
on that. But I I get that maybe that
story is not the one they're telling.
Still though, it all it all leads
together. It all comes back to JP. All
roads lead here. Little hang-ups aside,
I will just say this was a very engaging
watch. It's a very sad watch. Uh there
was no real justice at the end of the
day. He was found guilty on a a couple
things like cyber stalking and and
something else, but at the end of the
day, he's just going to keep kicking the
can down the road. Those attorneys keep
coming up with different ways to to
cheat the court out of a date, out of a
hearing by saying, "Oh, yeah, we got
subpoenas out. Uh, you know, we're going
to investigate this a little bit more.
We really want to make sure that JP is
comes off as clean as a whistle as
possibly can be." All I know at the end
of the day is this. I was happy to watch
something on Netflix that didn't suck
ass like most their movie exclusive. So,
I guess maybe I should stick more to the
documentary side of things and I should
just maybe ignore the Last House type of
films. All right, that's all I got. Let
me know if you saw this thing, if maybe
I piqu your interest. Feel free to sub
to the show. Adam does movies. I, you
know, it's mainly movies here, but
sometimes I do dip my pen in the
documentaries, and by pen, of course, I
mean my penis, and it's all very serious
here all the time, obviously. Would love
to have you stick around. All right,
that's all I got. Hope to see you next
time. Take care. I don't know why I did
the guns.
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