Alexandra Lacey previously worked as a producer of documentaries, like one about Anna Nicole Smith, but she also directs. For her second stint sitting on the director’s chair she gives A Toxic Love Story to us Netflix subscribers. It starts with an Anaheim police car driving around, responding to a distraught woman, Angela Connell Diaz. She’s calling because of a rape. As it turns out, she was faking those rape threats, which makes sense as the doc interviews people from Angela’s past. The documentary interviews Connell’s then husband’s ex, the woman whom she allegedly frames, Michelle Hadley. It seems like a closed case of a ‘crazy’ woman painting someone else as that, but who is the real perpetrator?

Connell Diaz and Hadley’s story is fascinating in a pulpy way because of these two who are each other’s opposites. Toxic Love tells their story through the usual Netflix true crime style of archive footage and sit down interviews. But at least in Hadley’s case, there are some glossy reenactments where actors play a past version of her. This of course reinforces what seems like the truth about an innocent woman under the thumb of a manipulative man. This piece may get to that man later, but there are also some fascinating supporting subjects in this documentary. One of these people include one of Connell Diaz’s former victims, Mary Buskovskis, the latter being a surprise icon.

Again, there’s something intriguing about A Toxic Love Story, Netflix’ true crime of the week involving complex women. There’s a salacious element to all of this, necessary for the genre, but there’s also compassion here as well. That aspect is more necessary than the salaciousness about two women, one of whom is more innocent than the other. There’s always an underlying gender war aspect to this genre, although there are different archetypes of women present here. There’s the manipulator, the victim, the woman unafraid to call out bad women, and a woman standing by her friend. The fourth kind of woman is Leslie, who agrees about Connell Diaz’s part in the crime but is adamant of someone’s innocence.

The innocent party, according to Leslie, is Ian Diaz, Connell Diaz and Hedley’s ex, but of course, he’s not. That is, at least, according to A Toxic Love Story, which presents its truth in ways that are credible enough. It presents that credibility through two interviews, the first is through Hadley’s and the second is from Jason Higley. Higley is a DOJ Special Agent who carries investigations when people within his department get accusations of serious crimes. The angles during these interviews are peculiar, as it puts Hadley under a spotlight but Higley’s angles seem more conversational. Despite those odd choices though, it lets Hadley tell her truth about a man who almost locked her up.

A Toxic Love Story is available to stream on Netflix.