Sins of Our Mother is about as Netflix True Crime as it gets. It is bombastic, tells a grimly fascinating, awful story, is expertly structured and full of twists and turns, and leaves that slightly grubby feeling of getting sucked into other people’s suffering for the purposes of entertainment. Over three episodes, each more shocking than the last, it tells the story of Lori Vallow, who became known as the “Doomsday mom” in the US media, after an astonishing series of events involving numerous deaths, religious fanaticism, light and dark spirits and “zombies”.
Along with her fifth husband, Chad Daybell, Vallow is awaiting trial for first degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder, in connection with the deaths of her fourth husband, Daybell’s former wife and two of Vallow’s children, Tylee Ryan and JJ Vallow, aged 16 and seven when they died. Both Vallow and Daybell have pleaded not guilty. The length and complexity of even the explanation of what Vallow and Daybell stand accused of goes some way towards indicating how twisty and convoluted this documentary becomes.
