Tiger King

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the series holds an approval rating of 89% based on 75 reviews, with an average rating of 7.88/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "A bizarre true crime story you have to see to believe, Tiger King is a messy and captivating portrait of obsession gone terribly wrong."[5] On Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score to reviews from mainstream publications, the series has an average score of 75 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[6]

Variety magazine's Caroline Framke called the series "messy yet compelling" and that for "those who love Netflix's particular flavor of true crime and docuseries, [...] Tiger King will undoubtedly scratch a particular itch."[7] Joshua Rivera at The Verge said that "[e]very minute of Tiger King yields some new surprise, an unbelievable turn or charismatic stranger with incredible stories to tell."[8]

According to Nielsen, the series was watched by 34.3 million people over its first 10 days of release, ranking as one of Netflix's most successful releases to date.[9] It has been suggested that its viewership success was aided by the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, which caused many global viewers to be restricted to their homes around the time of its release.[10] At an April press conference regarding the coronavirus, U.S. President Donald Trump was questioned about the possibility of pardoning the series' key subject, Joe Exotic.[11]

As a result of the show, multiple sportspeople who had previously owned exotic pets were questioned about their actions.[12] Retired boxer Mike Tyson said that he was "foolish" and "wrong" to have kept two tigers in his home in the 1990s.[13] Retired professional basketball player Shaquille O'Neal, who appears in the show saying he bought two tigers from Joe Exotic, said in an interview after the show's release that he had "never had any business dealings with him".[14]

As a result of Tiger King, several Internet memes targeted Carole Baskin for her speculated involvement in the disappearance of Don Lewis, her second husband.[15]

Carole Baskin and her husband felt betrayed by filmmakers, stating she was told the discussion of Joe Exotic and Baskin's missing husband were just for context.[16] In a post on the Big Cat Rescue website, Baskin said that the show "has a segment [in the third episode] devoted to suggesting, with lies and innuendos from people who are not credible, that I had a role in the disappearance of my husband Don 21 years ago" and that the series "presents this without any regard for the truth".[17] Baskin has never been charged with anything related to Don's disappearance and has always denied anything to do with it.[18] In partial response to Baskin, director Goode stated while he felt Baskin had the right intention, he questioned if "it was fair to keep these tigers in cages", adding that the tigers "pace neurotically" and that "Sometimes you wonder whether or not one should humanely euthanize these cats instead of [letting them] suffer in cages".[19] Baskin preemptively answered that "... our goal is to end having them in cages and have no need for a sanctuary like ours. Our federal bill, the Big Cat Public Safety Act, would stop the cub petting that drives the breeding and end ownership as pets in back yards."[19] Goode and Chaiklin said that Baskin "wasn't coerced" to answer questions about her husband.[20]

The Independent's Kathleen Walsh posited that the show’s treatment of, and the public reaction to, Baskin has been misogynistic: "The series provides example after example of Exotic's violence, cruelty, and narcissism, while the evidence against Baskin (compelling enough as it is framed in the series) is circumstantial. Maybe Baskin did kill her husband—and the third episode of the series is devoted to the evidence pointing to this conclusion—but so far there is little more than speculation to say that she did. Meanwhile, the series shows clips from Exotic's erstwhile YouTube series in which he poses alongside a blow-up doll, Baskin in effigy, shoving a dildo into its mouth and shooting it in the head."[21] Elle noted that Baskin was portrayed as hypocritical for keeping the tigers in captivity instead of releasing them without explaining that doing so was not an option—being captive-bred from mixed stock, as well as in-effect domesticated, meant they were unsuited to either survive in the wild or rebuild regional populations. Elle also noted that Baskin was the only source in the series explaining why keeping the wild animals was abusive.[22]

"Goode brings to Tiger King the intellectual rigor and social responsibility of ... a nightclub and hotel developer", Peter Frick-Wright, who had produced Cat People, a podcast series covering the American big-cat industry, wrote in Outside. He found the series particularly unfair to Baskin, pointing that in focusing on her husband's disappearance so much it failed to distinguish her from Exotic and Antle, barely mentioning that Big Cat Rescue only accepts tigers confiscated by law enforcement or from owners who could no longer handle them, owners who had to sign a contract with heavy financial penalties if they owned another big cat or were even photographed with one, a proviso not mentioned in the series. Baskin also forbids volunteers or staff from touching the animals; they are fired for doing so, Frick-Wright wrote. The series also minimized Baskin's efforts to lobby Congress for stricter legislation on animal trafficking.[23]

Hawaii-born Saffery, a veteran who served in both the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, worked as a manager for Joe Exotic's Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park for almost ten years. In 2013, the then-27 year old was bitten by one of the tigers as he mistakenly put his arm into its cage, and opted to have an amputation of his left forearm and return to work within a week, instead of undergoing a two-year series of surgeries. He is hoping to get a prosthetic, as of March 2020.[24] In 2018, Saffery disconnected from the zoo and everyone involved.[25]

Following the release of the Netflix series, Robert Moor, the creator of an earlier podcast about Joe Exotic, posted a tweet stating "Saff, the person who got mauled by the tiger, told me repeatedly that he is trans, prefers to be called Saff, and uses he/him pronouns. So please do likewise."[26] Media outlets criticized the series for misgendering and deadnaming Saffery.[27][22][28] LGBTQ Nation contrasted Netflix's treatment of Saffery with their recent collaboration with GLAAD, an LGBTQ media watchdog group, on a campaign raising "transgender visibility in the entertainment industry".[29] Saffery clarified to Esquire,

On a daily basis, I am called 17 different things. I never really took it to heart. [...] [F]or context, my conversation with Rob was that he asked me, 'What do you prefer? Saff or Kelci?' And of course, I said Saff because that’s what I've been called for the past 20 years. I was in the Army prior to the park and they always use last names. So, Saff was my preferred name. And I've always gone by him since I could say that out loud. My family was always very supportive—it was never an issue.[26]

Regarding whether he identified as a trans man, Saffery stated to Out magazine, "I don't know that that describes me. You know, nothing was done. I really just have lived this lifestyle. And, you know, my family knows this. And obviously, people closest to me know. This is how I've lived my entire life. I don't know anything else."[27]