Review of Conor McGregor: Notorious (2017) by Thequietgamer — 20 Dec 2020

A very surface-level account of Conor McGregor's pre-double champ UFC career. It's a great highlight reel of everything he did before knocking out Eddie Alvarez and boxing Floyd Mayweather Jr. Both of those events do get mentioned here, but the big crescendo this goes out on is his rematch with Nate Diaz.

Those hoping for real insight into who McGregor is as a person and what his life was like outside of the cage are going to be disappointed as you'd get more on that front from watching old interviews. There are behind-the-scenes style looks into what the days leading up to his biggest fights were like, but even here the man himself gets glossed over in favor of emphasizing his accomplishments. Essentially the picture is more interested in telling you who McGregor is as an athlete, rather than who he is as an individual.

Which kind of begs the question of what the point of this whole thing was? It's not giving his fans anything they didn't already know and those interested in learning about the star for the first time are missing out on what REALLY made McGregor so special. That being his personality, mentality, and the honest, human truth of his rags-to-riches story. I suppose it can serve as a nice, quick history lesson. Which might give it some extra value now that the Irish phenom is getting ready to come out of retirement to face Dustin Porier a second time. However, I can't help but feel like it's a missed opportunity that doesn't even truthfully deliver on its promise of being an "all-access" recounting of the McGregor story, which leaves it feeling kind of hollow when all is said and done.