The Liver King Documentary: A Giant PR Stunt Disguised as Redemption
When a $100M physique comes clean... sort of.
After watching the new Liver King documentary, I walked away with one overwhelming thought: this was not an exposé, it was a PR stunt. It wasn’t produced by a third party with objectivity and investigative experience. Liver King himself was in the documentary, heavily featured, clearly involved, and the bias was obvious.
From start to finish, it felt like a calculated attempt to save face. The narrative was designed to soften the blow of his past deception and reframe him as a misunderstood man rather than someone who knowingly lied for profit. Let’s not forget: Liver King built an empire by claiming that his massive physique, vitality, and even the health of his family were thanks to his “nine ancestral tenets.” But the truth is, he was secretly using steroids the entire time.
When people asked him directly if he was using steroids, repeatedly, he lied. It wasn’t until a leaked email surfaced and exposed him that he finally admitted the truth. But even then, his apology video felt deeply manipulative. He didn’t own up in a straightforward way. Instead, he claimed his steroid use stemmed from lifelong self-esteem issues. While that may be true to some extent, the reality is clear IMO: steroids made him big, and being big made him money. His body was his brand. It was the image that sold his supplements, which now generate over $100 million a year.
To me, the apology wasn’t sincere. It was gaslighting. It shifted the blame from his choices to his emotional wounds, as if that made the deception more palatable. But lying to millions while selling them supplements under the guise of ancestral health is more than just a personal struggle, it’s calculated dishonesty.
What made the documentary even more off-putting was how much of it was dedicated to showcasing his excessive lifestyle. Gold toilet seats. Gold guns lining his walls. Thrones. Crowns. A private sweat lodge and built-in cold plunge pool. His own cow pasture. A luxury fruit farm. It was a non-stop parade of “look how rich I still am.” Rather than humility, there was arrogance. He gloated. He praised himself. And the documentary gave him the perfect stage to do it.
The final scene felt like the ultimate slap in the face to anyone who ever trusted him. His wife sits out in their field, flashing a diamond ring bigger than a quarter, casually saying that he just bought it for her. The message couldn’t have been clearer:
“We’re still rich. You can’t cancel us. We’re untouchable.”
It was grotesque.
Another part that didn’t sit right with me? How he treated his kids. It came off as if their worth was tied to how many push-ups they could do or how much raw liver they ate. It was unsettling to watch. The affection and approval seemed performance-based measured by physical feats, not who they are as people.
At the end of the day, this documentary wasn’t about accountability. It was damage control wrapped in ego.
A bad look on the wellness industry. And if you ask me, it didn’t redeem anything.
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