Hulu Views: Dopesick

Dopesick intrigued me, but I knew I needed to be in the right frame of mind to start watching it.

I was the news director of a small radio station in Appalachia and reported on the increase in overdose deaths, crime, child abuse and everything else that went along with the opioid crisis. There were more drug store break-ins and robberies during that time than in the two other decades I was a journalist combined. And all they took was Oxycontin. The incidents in which toddlers were found wandering the streets alone in just diapers became common. Domestic violence incidents rose dramatically. And if you think reporting on these things daily doesn't do a number on you, you'd be wrong,

More important and impactful that any of that, however, was the death of a friend and co-worker at the age of 30. I still think of him every time I hear a Beatles song.

The Sackler Family – who ran Purdue Pharma, creators of Oxycontin – is the villain in this story, as in real life, and their real names are used. Most of the other characters – lawyers, doctors, sales reps, victims – are composites.

Michael Keaton is phenomenal as Dr. Samuel Finnix, a rural Virginia doctor who believes the hype from the pharmaceutical sales rep about Oxy being a wonder drug. Spoiler alert: After traffic accident in which he is injured, he gets addicted to Oxycontin. Some of the scenes after he get addicted brought me to tears. As did some of the scenes with one of the best actors of her generation, Mare Winningham, who plays the mother of a young mine worker who gets addicted after suffering a back injury.

Rosario Dawson is excellent as the DEA agent fighting against Purdue and the FDA, although her fight destroys her marriage (the wonderful Raul Esparza plays her husband). Phillipa Soo does a great job playing an overzealous, ambitious Purdue sales rep.

The eight-episode series brought back some bad memories, but also helped me understand why it took so long to get a handle on the opioid epidemic. Not surprisingly: Bureaucracy and money.

I would recommend this series to anyone who wants to understand the opioid epidemic better, and especially those who blame addicted people for getting addicted.