These Netflix documentaries explore how seemingly ordinary people can fall in with the wrong crowd — or guru.

14 chilling cult documentaries streaming on Netflix

These Netflix documentaries explore how seemingly ordinary people can fall in with the wrong crowd — or guru.

and Britt Hayes

August 18, 2026 7:23 p.m. ET

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‘Wild Wild Country’; ‘Trust Me: The False Prophet’; ‘Dancing For the Devil’. Credit:

Netflix’s vast catalog of documentaries includes an entire subgenre of titles devoted to one of documentary filmmaking’s most fascinating subjects: cults.

Whether they’re built around apocalyptic beliefs, aliens, religion, or even romance, cults and the people who fall under their spell tend to make for irresistible subject matter. The average viewer might think of themselves as immune to the wacky rhetoric of a cult leader, but as these documentaries demonstrate, people from all walks of life can be drawn into groups that promise to provide whatever they feel is lacking in their lives. Cults rarely seem cultish at first glance.

From extreme religious offshoots and self-styled prophets to niche groups obsessed with soulmates and aliens, these are the best cult documentaries streaming on Netflix.

Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator (2019)

‘Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator’.

Courtesy of Netflix

It’s hard enough to find a yoga instructor you like, let alone one you want to stick with for the long haul. That may help explain how hot-yoga founder Bikram Choudhury built an empire and remained at the top of his game for two decades. By the 2010s, however, his unorthodox training style and allegations of sexual harassment and assault had made him the subject of a very different kind of headline. Choudhury later fled the U.S. after being ordered to pay roughly $7 million in a civil judgment to his former legal adviser.

Using unsettling footage of Choudhury’s hot yoga sessions, *Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator* delves into how he became so popular while interrogating the immense power and influence he wielded over his followers.

**Director:** Eva Orner

CHAOS: The Manson Murders (2025)

Charles Manson.

Courtesy of Netflix

Over half a century after Charles Manson’s followers committed a series of grisly murders across Los Angeles, it’s hard to believe that there are still any stones left unturned. Enter acclaimed documentary filmmaker Errol Morris, who uses Tom O’Neill and Dan Piepenbring’s 2019 nonfiction book *CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties* as a basis to consider — though not endorse — an alternate theory about the motives behind the killings. Challenging the long-dominant “race war” motive put forward by prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi, *CHAOS* suggests a larger conspiracy involving the CIA, mind control, and LSD. Morris explored similar territory in the 2017 docudrama *Wormwood*, which investigates the death of a CIA scientist with ties to Project MKUltra.

**Director: **Errol Morris

Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult (2024)

‘Dancing For the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult’.

Courtesy of Netflix

Sisters Melanie and Miranda Wilking started their online careers together, finding fame through dance routines they shared on social media. Flash-forward a couple years later and Miranda has become affiliated with 7M Films — a management company run by Shekinah Church past Robert Shinn — and increasingly estranged from her family. Turns out this is an all-too-familiar story for those involved with Shinn and his organizations, and one that predates TikTok entirely. What makes this docuseries work so well is the space it allows those who left Shinn’s church and other former associates to tell their stories — and help viewers understand their experiences.

**Director:** Derek Doneen

The Doomsday Cult of Antares de la Luz (2024)

‘The Doomsday Cult of Antares de la Luz’.

Courtesy of Netflix

If you’re claiming to be the second coming of Jesus Christ, but you become convinced that the child you conceived with one of your followers is the Antichrist, you might be a cult leader. Enter Antares de la Luz. Once a musician, de la Luz pivoted in 2009, founding a cult defined by sex, drugs, animal sacrifices, and... well, let’s just say that when Natalia Guerra gave birth to de la Luz’s son, things took a darker turn.

*The Doomsday Cult of Antares de la Luz* is not for the faint of heart. The film takes a sober approach to a story that might otherwise have remained a fringe curiosity but became a genuine true crime scandal.

**Director:** Santiago Correa

Escaping Twin Flames (2023)

‘Escaping Twin Flames’.

Courtesy of Netflix

The notion of finding your soulmate is inherently romantic, but Jeff and Shaleia Divine managed to sour a whole lot of people on the concept. Their online community, Twin Flames Universe, sold followers a curriculum that ostensibly promised a forever union with their destined partner. Instead, former members allege that it led to exploitation and manipulation, with followers encouraged to distance themselves from their families and devote themselves more fully to the group.

One of two docs about Twin Flames released around the same time, *Escaping Twin Flames* is distinctive in the way it documents the struggle of getting *out*. It’s a human approach to the type of story often too sensationalized for its own good.

**Director:** Cecilia Peck

How to Become a Cult Leader (2023)

‘How to Become a Cult Leader’.

Courtesy of Netflix

This is arguably the only entry with the potential to make you laugh, which you can chalk up to two things: the delivery of narrator Peter Dinklage and the writing and production team behind the series, including Jake Laufer, Jonas Bell Pasht, and Jonah Bekhor, who also worked on *How to Become a Tyrant*. Over six episodes, *How to Become a Cult Leader* explores the histories of Charles Manson, Jim Jones, Jaime Gomez (Buddhafield), Marshall Applewhite (Heaven’s Gate), Shoko Asahara (Aum Shinrikyo), and Rev. Sun Myung Moon (Unification Church).

**Directors:** Ron Myrick, Tim Rauch, Greg Franklin

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In the Name of God: A Holy Betrayal (2023)

‘In the Name of God: A Holy Betrayal’.

This eight-part series takes a look at the history of four Korean leaders who claimed to be prophets. If there’s any question of whether it struck a nerve, consider that one of its subjects — the Christian Gospel Mission, a.k.a. Jesus Morning Star — sought an injunction to block *In the Name of God: A Holy Betrayal* from being released. (The attempt failed.) *Psychology Today* writer Paul Youngbin Kim, who watched it with his wife, opened his review with this succinct description: “We gasp in horror, or let out a loaded, grieved sigh, every few minutes.”** **Yes, it’s that startling.

**Director:** Jo Seong-Hyeon

Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey (2022)

‘Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey’.

Courtesy of Netflix

This four-part docuseries explores the rise of Warren Jeffs, the self-proclaimed prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, A splinter sect of the Mormon church, and the sexual, physical, and psychological abuse he committed and enabled within the church. *Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey* uses never-before-seen footage to paint a portrait of an organization in which young women and girls were treated as entitlements, prizes, and property. The filmmakers wisely choose not to treat Jeffs’ capture as a triumphant finale, acknowledging instead that the survivors are, in the words of EW’s review, “serving a different kind of life sentence.”

**EW grade:** A- (read the review)

**Directors:** Rachel Dretzin and Grace McNally

The Program: Cons, Cults & Kidnapping (2024)

Courtesy of Netflix

Located in Ogdensburg, N.Y., the Academy at Ivy Ridge marketed itself as a boarding school for troubled teens. Four years after its founding, in 2005, students started a riot, resulting in more than four dozen expulsions and a dozen arrests. In subsequent years, it became evident why the Academy’s denizens were so desperate to escape — they were subjected to strict rules that severely limited their freedom, including the ability to communicate freely with their families and the outside world.

*The Program* offers a unique perspective: Director Katherine Kubler is herself an Ivy Ridge survivor; she’s essentially telling the story from the inside. What results is an intimate yet devastating experience.

**Director:** Katherine Kubler

Raël: The Alien Prophet (2024)

‘Raël: The Alien Prophet’.

Some call it a religion, others call it a movement, but when you’re talking about a collective of individuals who believe an extraterrestrial race called the Elohim created humanity... yeah, that qualifies as a cult. But that’s what* *Claude Vorilhon, otherwise known as Raël, believes, calling his belief system — what else? — Raëlism. Featuring interviews with his followers, critics, and Raël himself, this docuseries traces the movement’s evolution. *Raël: The Alien Prophet *is easily the most NSFW entry in this list, but also among the most enthralling — in part because it allows us to see him for ourselves on screen, digging his own grave.

**Director:** Antoine Baldassari and Manuel Guillon

Sins of Our Mother (2022)

‘Sins of Our Mother’.

Courtesy of Netflix

Lori Vallow appeared to be a loving mother and devoted wife, albeit one who wasn’t great at maintaining marriages for the long haul. As viewers learn during this three-part series, Vallow had been through a lot by the time she crossed paths with apocalyptic “prophet” Chad Daybell. It only got worse from there. Vallow is currently serving multiple life sentences for murdering her two youngest children and conspiring to kill several others, including her fourth husband and her first husband’s previous wife. It’s a tragic and wildly complicated saga, and one that *Sins of Our Mother* tells with discipline and care.

**Director:** Skye Borgman

Trust Me: The False Prophet (2026)

Samuel Bateman, as seen on ‘Trust Me: The False Prophet’.

*Trust Me: The False Prophet* returns viewers to Short Creek, the fundamentalist Mormon community straddling the Utah-Arizona border that was once controlled by FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. Picking up where *Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey* left off, director Rachel Dretzin documents the community years after Jeffs’ conviction and the rise of his self-proclaimed successor, Samuel Bateman.

This time, Dretzin has people on the inside: Christine Marie, a cult expert and former fundamentalist, and her videographer husband, Tolga Katas. Marie and Katas immersed themselves in the community for years, eventually gaining unprecedented access to Bateman and his followers and capturing footage that helped authorities build a case against him.

**Director:** Rachel Dretzin

Waco: American Apocalypse (2023)

David Koresh, as seen in ‘Waco: American Apocalypse’.

Courtesy of Netflix

The story of cult leader David Koresh and the Branch Davidians has been documented many times, but to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the 51-day siege on their compound, Tiller Russell offered an unusually immersive account of the story. The filmmaker uses recently unearthed videotapes filmed inside the FBI Crisis Negotiation Unit, raw news footage from the time, and interviews with people who were both inside and outside the compound during the infamous siege. You may already know the broad strokes, but *American Apocalypse *offers perspectives from multiple sides of a story that remains fiercely debated decades later.

**Director:** Tiller Russell

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Wild Wild Country (2018)

‘Wild Wild Country’.

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh — best known as Rajneesh or “Osho” — was already a controversial figure in 1981. But when the guru shifted his movement to Wasco County, Ore., things started to get dodgy. What was ostensibly meant to be a utopian city soon became home to an enormous legal wiretapping operation — and the first modern bioterrorism attack on U.S. soil. In *Wild Wild Country*, the filmmakers apply striking breadth to this slice of history and the contrasting experiences of those who lived it. This is a documentary with wildly cinematic twists *and *a genuine curiosity about the group’s philosophical ideas.

**Director:** Chapman and Maclain Way

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Source: “EW TV”