10 Best True Crime Documentaries Of 2021 (So Far)

'Once Upon A Crime' has a neat twist. Namely, the killer (Elize Matsunaga herself) comes along for the ride and freely answers questions about her crimes. In 2016, Elize confessed to murdering her husband Marcos four years prior. She then cut his body into pieces.

Matsunaga cuts a calm figure as she recalls Marcos' adultery and the breakdown of their relationship. It's all quite harrowing stuff, but Elize seems like a normal-enough person throughout, and her dysfunctional marriage to her husband is almost as gripping as the grisly murder details. That's the hook here; Matsunaga still isn't quite sure what caused her to go so far. Adultery is cited as one reason, but never an excuse for what happened.

Elize now resides in a maximum security prison close to where she lived with Marcos in São Paulo. There's something altogether chilling about that fact alone, and the series doesn't shy away from the length (19 years) of her sentence.