An Intimate Portrait of the Real Michael Jordan: Gambler, Winner, Tyrant
Michael Jordan is the best basketball player that’s ever lived, period. For those foolish enough to debate that incontrovertible fact, ESPN’s The Last Dance puts any lingering doubts to rest. A 10-part documentary about Jordan’s final 1997-1998 season with the Chicago Bulls, which also functions as a biopic of the legendary guard and his tenure with the franchise, it’s a definitive portrait of greatness, recounted by Jordan and the many, many people who crossed his path along his journey from North Carolina phenom to NBA superstar and pop-culture icon.
To borrow Bob Costas’ comment before the Bulls’ 1996 Finals appearance (after a then-record 72-10 regular season), director Jason Hehir’s non-fiction opus is less an argument in some who’s-the-GOAT competition than it is a rightful coronation.
Jordan’s career with the Chicago Bulls resulted in two championship threepeats, first from 1991-1993 and then from 1996-1998, along with five MVP awards, six Finals MVP trophies, three All-Star Game MVPs, and countless other accolades. Premiering on Sunday, April 19 (with its initial two episodes), The Last Dance covers almost all of those honors, while using the team’s 1997-1998 season—Jordan’s last with the Bulls, ending with his sixth title—as its narrative spine. To tell that swan-song saga, Hehir uses footage shot by a film crew that was granted unprecedented access to the Bulls during that crusade—an absolute treasure-trove of material that draws one inside the squad’s climactic pursuit of the Larry O’Brien trophy. Also bolstered by every archival game clip and behind-the-scenes snippet imaginable, as well as talking-head participation from Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Horace Grant, Dennis Rodman, Phil Jackson, Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf and dozens of teammates, friends, family members, journalists and opponents (including the late Kobe Bryant), the resultant 10-hour work is, without question, as comprehensive as they come.