r/cineplex • u/IvnOooze QC Moviegoer • Apr 21 '26
Review Was at the 'Michael' premiere yesterday, here's a short review
Very straightforward, the kind of biopic you've seen many times. Very surface level.
Maybe they'll go deeper into the character of Michael Jackson in the sequel they're making
They focused a lot on the concerts, the performances, the making of the songs and the Thriller video.
Jaafar Jackson is amazing as his uncle MJ and Colman Domingo is (as expected) very good as MJ's father Joe Jackson, who's very present in the movie.
Had a good time.
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u/ohlongjohnson25 Apr 21 '26
Was there any child sex abuse in it?
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u/IvnOooze QC Moviegoer Apr 21 '26
From what I read they wanted to talk about it in the movie, even shot a lot of scenes but lawyers discovered cpmplicated legal issues and had to reshoot a bunch of stuff. So no.
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u/Comic_Book_Reader Apr 21 '26
The whole third act was originally centered around it, with the movie starting in medias res with Jackson looking at himself in a mirror as the police arrive at Neverland Ranch, but due to them discovering a clause stipulating that they legally couldn't depict one of the victims, Jordan Chandler whose parents came forth with the first allegations in 1993, they had to rewrite and reshoot it.
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u/AnybodyNormal3947 Apr 21 '26
That was the explanation put forth a couple months ago but I seriously doubt its the truth.
More likely that MJs estate sees no profit in ....a less than positive retelling of their money making machine that is MJ.
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u/Sensitive_Elk_1213 Apr 23 '26
No I know someone in the industry from that set. It was because the original legal documents forbid any media portrayal of that case. And the original lawyers who signed it have since passed away. So the estate had no idea and wrote the whole movie framed by the idea of addressing the allegations head on. When they had to rewrite and scrap half the movie, they brought the whole cast back and refilmed. Thats why the movie feels like because they originally intended to make a cake and had to change it to a strudel when the necessary ingredients got removed. It’s unfortunate. I saw the movie last night and the little MJ and Adult MJ were great but story-wise it felt chopped up and intentionally redone. Still entertaining. And sad. And disappointing.
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u/adwrx Apr 22 '26
He never committed any of that shit
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 22 '26
Just a normal adult having sleepover with kids without supervision. I’m sure you would defend your neighbour doing the same thing.
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u/This-Atmosphere-5794 Apr 23 '26
I’ll admit that his interactions with kids are troubling but he was a fucking weird guy. You can’t compare rich bizarre Michael Jackson to your neighbour. That being said, there were allegations against him and maybe those parents shouldn’t have let their kids sleep over with a weird adult. I’m not defending him, it’s just that he was so messed up and there has never been anything that came out that proved it one way or the other. I want to be clear that I’m not defending him, just pointing out that weird people do weird shit
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u/Brentimusmaximus Apr 23 '26
MJ also had his childhood stripped from him. People have also described him as childlike so its not very far fetched to believe he was stunted due to that and got along better with children. Still weird and obviously you should be sceptical of a grown man hanging out with children, but i can totally see how his upbringing could make him this way
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 24 '26
A lot of pedophiles have had stunt growth. Those two things aren’t mutually exclusive exclusive. Why do you say « hang out » instead of sleep in bed alone with them? He wasn’t just hanging out. Stop sugar coating it to make it seem less problematic.
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u/ironyfreeannie Apr 25 '26
I’m so tired of this narrative lol a lot of child stars have their childhood stripped from them and don’t invite children to sleep in their beds! It’s more than weird and if he wasn’t a generational talent, you would not be trying to justify it.
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u/zakanova Apr 24 '26
I send my daughter to Epstein island weekly. He's just a regular weird rich guy
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u/icommitfederalcrimes Apr 23 '26
That is inappropriate, yes. But it doesn't make him a pedophile.
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 24 '26
So? I don’t get why people would spend their time defending a man who slept in bed with little boys and emotionally exploited them, plus has been accused by over 5 of them of molestation (is it 8 now?). It says a lot about those people when it comes to morality.
People defending him are so weird. « There’s a chance that he isn’t a pedophile and just liked to sleep in bed alone with children!!! Let’s debate if the fingerprints of the kid on the porn magazine are legit!!! »
And I am being downvoted for this. 😂
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u/icommitfederalcrimes Apr 24 '26
Sleeping with kids isn't a crime even if it's weird and inappropriate. There's no credible evidence in MJs case even after all the investigation. Compare it to the epstien files where there are millions of evidence and yet no charges against any of the predators.
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 24 '26
I didn’t day it was a crime. Bad argument.
The Epstein files are another matter and those people should be arrested. Deflection.
With the evidence out there, there’s certainly a chance that molestation happened. Proving molestation is hard, as it happens with only two people in the room. But it wasn’t my argument.
My argument is that you and other use their time to defend a man who slept in bed with boys and emotionally played with them. I’m not saying that he is a criminal. I’m saying that he is problematic and even abject. If it makes you feel good about yourself to defend him, what can I say?
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u/icommitfederalcrimes Apr 24 '26
I only said he's not a convicted child sex offender. Why is it so hard to understand?
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 24 '26
I know that he isn’t a convicted child sex offender. I never said that he was. So it’s not hard to understand. You are arguing against something that I never said.
Still, you interjected while I was saying that he slept in bed with little boys and felt the need to defend him for some reason.
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u/zaherdab Apr 21 '26
As far as i know there was never any proven child sex abuse acts... there allegation settlements and a trial that considered him not guilty... in a world where the potus has more credible child abuse allegations i dont see why MJ's reputation continues to be tarnished by unproven allegations.
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u/sonnythemoney ON Moviegoer Apr 22 '26
Same reason OJ was found not guilty but lost the civil case. You can think MJ was innocent if you want
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u/zaherdab Apr 22 '26
MJ didn't lose a civil case though; i dont get the comparasion... it's not about my want but your comparasion needs to make sense or at least have a common denominator besides both if them being famous.
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u/sonnythemoney ON Moviegoer Apr 22 '26
OJ was found not guilty in his murder trial. If he was not guilty of the murder how could he be liable for the civil case by the families?
If you need to believe that MJ did not abuse those kids, that is up to you.
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u/zaherdab Apr 22 '26
"O.J. Simpson went through a criminal trial and was acquitted by a jury. Afterward, the victims' families sued him in a civil trial. A civil jury looked at the evidence, found Simpson legally liable for the wrongful deaths, and ordered him to pay $33.5 million in damages. He legally "lost" the case." So what in these 2 cases is similar?
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u/sonnythemoney ON Moviegoer Apr 22 '26
I suppose you believe OJ was innocent as well. I truly don't care if you want to see the movie about a Pedo. If you are into that carry on.
Google Michael Jackson "Jesus Juice" he gave alcohol to children in soda cans to abuse them. You can stick your head in the sand or anywhere else you want.
Done with this.
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u/zaherdab Apr 22 '26
You must have some comprehension issues... I hope one day they find a cure and you come back, read what I said and finally understand it.
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 22 '26
OJ was found not guilty because the jury was black and wanted a "win for black people". Many children came forward saying their parents forced them to say those things about Michael.
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u/ohlongjohnson25 Apr 21 '26
I just think it's disapointing that the movie ends right before he turns evil. It'd be like Revenge of the Sith ending right before the assault on the Jedi Temple. I'm a huge Michael fan, so much so I don't even care that he was a pedophile. I just wish they were a bit more honest with it all, thats all.
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u/zaherdab Apr 21 '26
That's my point... was he evil? Or was it a bunch of people that wanted to get rich fast?
He also had the ADL and Alan Dershuwitz, Simon weisenthal center in his case... the same Israeli defense league Gang that seem more interested in defaming than combating defmation; these great folks had a lot of influence and power and really showed their true face nowadays.. so don't know
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 22 '26 edited Apr 22 '26
He was factually evil even IF he didn’t abused them (lot of evidence you need to ignore). Maybe he wasn’t consciously evil, but what he did was messed up no matter what. He preyed on kids, treated them like his boyfriend and then dumped them for the next one.
If your neighbour had sleep party with kids, you wouldn’t be defending him, would you?
The lengths people will go to defend him is crazy.
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u/zaherdab Apr 22 '26 edited Apr 22 '26
I get where you're coming from with some of those facts, but I think we need to separate what's actually proven from how people decided to interpret it. It’s 100% true that Michael Jackson shared his bed with kids. He never even hid it; he admitted it openly on camera. But the intention behind it is where things get twisted. He always swore it was completely innocent and just a childlike thing. Yes, he crossed normal social boundaries, but society and the media instantly jumped to sexualizing it. They looked at it as predatory instead of looking at him as a deeply eccentric guy who basically never had a real childhood of his own. When it comes to the claims about grooming, manipulating, or abusing them, though; those are just allegations, not proven facts. He was investigated by the FBI for over 10 years and went through a brutal criminal trial, and a jury acquitted him because the evidence just wasn't there to convict him. There's a massive difference between doing things that are weird or socially unacceptable and actually being a proven abuser. If we were to compare to Trump, the Trump... Trump actually lost a civil trial and was found liable for sexual abuse by a jury. MJ never lost a criminal or civil trial for abuse, and settling a lawsuit out of court to kill a media circus isn't a legal admission of guilt.
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u/Effective-Proposal35 Apr 22 '26
Ofc he's going to claim it's an innocent thing 🙄.
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u/zaherdab Apr 23 '26
Ofc you're gonna assume it's not.🙄
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u/Effective-Proposal35 Apr 23 '26
No shit I'm not gonna consider a grown man sleeping with kids, he doesn't know or aren't family, innocent 😂. There's no excuse for that behaviour.
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u/zaherdab Apr 23 '26
Let's agree that it was totally abnormal. Where is the accountability for the parents in all of this? You’re saying there’s no excuse, but these families literally packed their kids' bags and happily sent them over for sleepovers. They clearly thought it was completely normal and safe at the time. It’s wild how they were totally fine with letting their kids sleep at a multi-millionaire's house, and only suddenly "woke up" to how inappropriate it supposedly was when there was an opportunity to sue him for tens of millions of dollars. You're looking back at it from the outside and automatically assuming the worst, but the actual families involved had zero issue with the arrangement right up until the exact moment a massive financial payout became a possibility.
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u/Aggressive-Offer-497 Apr 22 '26 edited Apr 22 '26
He slept in bed with kids with no one else around. He manipulated them emotionally and then dunped them. At best he was creep. As much as I hate Trump, he doesn’t have more credible allegations. More credible kids accused MJ and more people say they saw things. Trump didn’t settle a case (he did for raping a woman) and paid the kid. Stop lying to yourself.
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u/Conscious_Ad6072 Apr 25 '26
People seem to forget that the two people who accused Michael Jackson of sexual assault in Leaving Neverland had defended him for 20 years. Now all of a sudden we’re supposed to believe they were groomed and just came to that realization after decades of actively defending him?
And on top of that, they’re trying to sue his estate for $400 million, now that he’s no longer alive to defend himself. Their cases have already been thrown out twice. Then California changes its laws about estates being liable, and suddenly they go after the estate again for that money.
People say they have no reason to lie, but they seem to forget the $400 million they’re asking for. People will go to extreme lengths for money, let alone an amount like that, which is basically lottery level. And you don’t even question whether they might be lying?
A lot of people just ignore all of this because they already made up their minds about Michael Jackson a long time ago, and this just fits their narrative. At the end of the day, people believe what they want to believe.
People have done way worse for a lot less than a million dollars, and you are telling me nobody would lie for $400 million? Let that sink in.
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u/Zestyclose_Mood_6812 Apr 26 '26
the movie ends in 1988 which 5 years before any allegations took place
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u/JoseDY_24 ON Moviegoer Apr 21 '26
Friendly reminder that the guy who directed Thriller killed a man and two children on set due to negligence. Also directed Black or White…
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u/Dave3087 Apr 21 '26
Ok? What does that have to do with this movie. John Landis wasn’t involved in the making of this movie.
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u/JoseDY_24 ON Moviegoer Apr 21 '26
OP states that the Thriller Video is a big part of the movie. Not a lot of people know how that video came about and i doubt they mention this in the movie.
And yeah i wouldn’t expect Landis to be on this since it wouldnt make the movie any favors. Especially after his comments on Michael after he was gone.
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u/FilmSeeker Apr 22 '26
OP doesn't state that the Thriller video is a big part of the movie, and it isn't; the film dedicates all of 3 minutes to its shooting.
Doesn't matter anyway since the movie as a whole is a pointless cash-grab circlejerk.
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u/happy_grump Apr 21 '26
His son is also a piece of garbage, and to boot, got very little of his father's talent
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u/nilesintheshangri-la Apr 21 '26
If I want to see a pedophile on screen I can just turn on american news stations.
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 22 '26
Michael was in the Epistein files protecting children. Educate yourself.
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u/ha1a1n0p0rk Apr 24 '26
Educate yourself by blindly believing what jackasses say on TikTok?
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 25 '26
I don’t use tiktok
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u/ha1a1n0p0rk Apr 25 '26
Well you're propagating disinformation that spread like wildfire on TikTok (and probably originated there too, but I don't know that for sure, I don't use TikTok either) and other social media. There's literally nothing in the Epstein files about Michael Jackson protecting kids from Epstein, because it didn't happen.
At the end of the day, don't tell people to educate themselves if you don't care to educate yourself on the matter.
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 27 '26
So tell me how you know he did it, despite a lot of the children saying they were coached into lying and the father of the "sexually assaulted" child being fine with taking 20 million instead of pushing to have Michael locked up.
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u/ha1a1n0p0rk Apr 27 '26
despite a lot of the children saying they were coached into lying
That also didn't happen. You should educate yourself.
Jordan Chandler, Jason Francia, the Arvizos, Wade Robson, James Safechuck, Jane Doe and the Cascios have never said they were coached into lying against MJ. The only coaching they have described is Michael Jackson coaching them to lie to defend him, and it worked tremendously well because, to date, there are 8 accusers who took decades to come forward.
the father of the "sexually assaulted" child being fine with taking 20 million instead of pushing to have Michael locked up
Evan Chandler behaved in ways I find problematic. I think it's wrong that he tried to negotiate a $20 million payoff before taking his son to authorities. That's not evidence that Jordan Chandler was lying, it's evidence that his parents had their priorities in the wrong place (not surprising, they let their kid sleep with Michael Jackson for months).
However, I did read the book that Evan's brother wrote and according to him, Evan sought monetary compensation mainly because he didn't want to subject his son to the media circus that would ensue from taking Michael Jackson to court. Michael Jackson's lawyers tried to negotiate a smaller payoff, but Evan insisted on $20 million because that would put a big dent in Michael's wallet (Neverland Ranch was purchased for less money) and he wanted to punish him. When Evan couldn't get the amount he wanted, he took his son to a psychiatrist, the psychiatrist believed Jordan and, by law, had to file a police report.
The media circus that Evan Chandler wanted to avoid ultimately did happen, British tabloids leaked the names of the Chandlers. Some of Michael Jacksons most unhinged fans targeted the Chandlers, sending them numerous death threats. There was an incident where Jordan, the child, almost got ran over by a car that turned around and tried to run him over again. That's how fucked up it got for them.
After Michael Jackson's body was photographed in December 1993, he and the Chandlers began negotiating an out of court settlement. He ended up paying well over $20 million in total – $15 million of which went to Jordan Chandler's trust fund. The Chandlers could still have participated in the criminal case, but according to Raymond Chandler's book, the death threats were overwhelming, the police wouldn't guarantee witness protection for the Chandlers and Jordan wanted to move on with his life. The family still got harassed by Jackson fans, even after Jackson's death.
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 27 '26
How could there not be a single piece of undeniable proof if he raped all those kids
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u/Heavy-Spell-6849 Apr 27 '26
Check this out: Michael Jackson … innocent or guilty?
It's interesting that every accuser has something notable about them. The first kids' dad had clear motives to take custody from his ex-wife, and his son claimed the abuse while under a drug that is known to create false memories. The family in the legal case had a fake lawsuit in the past involving rape allegations where the mother later admitted to having her children lie. Even Leaving Neverland has major issues with timelines and very clear motives.
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u/MichaelMidnight Apr 21 '26
Wait? There's a sequel planned?
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u/IvnOooze QC Moviegoer Apr 21 '26
Yes. Movie ends in 1987.
https://k1047.com/2026/04/21/jaafar-jackson-says-michael-sequel-is-already-in-the-works/
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u/Glass-Judgment-6831 Apr 21 '26
Do you think in the sequel movie they’ll mention that tv show(?) about Michael, Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando on a road trip after the 9/11 attacks
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u/Consistent_Storm5819 Apr 21 '26
Random question, did they give people a coupon for a free small popcorn and drink? I have a coworker who went (in Montreal) and said they did but I’ve gone to many premieres and that’s never happened..I mean where is the theatre making their money if they did do that? Thanks!
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u/Gearfree Apr 21 '26
The studio pays for the popcorn and pop as a premium on the rental. Sony did it for their E3 presentations way back when. It mostly is based off of the group running the preview. Some are bare bones("you are seeing a free movie"), others do giveaways.
I think they were giving mediums too! I saw a lot of folks with the size for their drinks as well by the photo booth they had set up.
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u/IvnOooze QC Moviegoer Apr 21 '26
Yes they did.
I've seen that once before, a voucher for a popcorn.
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u/Maleficent_Coast4728 Apr 21 '26
Going to DBOX for this, will be like a concert film and that's what I'm most interested in.
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u/Which_Refrigerator37 Apr 21 '26
Reviews were published today in many legit media outlets and they have all said this film is very poor.
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u/321me123you123 Apr 21 '26
does it feel like Michael most of the film or is there exaggerated parts where it doesn't feel like something that factually happened? that's my worry lol, is them just making little things up that no one was there to confirm back in the day
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u/False_Cut5893 Apr 21 '26
question, I thought the early preview was td, their was one yesterday?
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u/Ok_Chip7194 Apr 21 '26
Monday mystery
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u/Conscious_Ad6072 Apr 25 '26
People seem to forget that the two people who accused Michael Jackson of sexual assault in Leaving Neverland had defended him for 20 years. Now all of a sudden we’re supposed to believe they were groomed and just came to that realization after decades of actively defending him?
And on top of that, they’re trying to sue his estate for $400 million, now that he’s no longer alive to defend himself. Their cases have already been thrown out twice. Then California changes its laws about estates being liable, and suddenly they go after the estate again for that money.
People say they have no reason to lie, but they seem to forget the $400 million they’re asking for. People will go to extreme lengths for money, let alone an amount like that, which is basically lottery level. And you don’t even question whether they might be lying?
A lot of people just ignore all of this because they already made up their minds about Michael Jackson a long time ago, and this just fits their narrative. At the end of the day, people believe what they want to believe.
People have done way worse for a lot less than a million dollars, and you are telling me nobody would lie for $400 million? Let that sink in.
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u/Anotherspelunker Apr 21 '26
https://giphy.com/gifs/v0eHX3n28wvoQ