It is easy to understand why someone, upon being told they’re sick with a frightening disease like cancer, might be lured by the song of natural “cures,” essential oils, and all those one tricks doctors hate. It’s terrifying to face one’s mortality so presently. The idea of a cure that somehow others have missed is unendingly appealing. It can be frustrating and scary to see a loved one slip down into those false promises and snake oil declarations. Nonetheless, someone can empathize. However, when a person tips over into spreading this “gospel,” as Milla Blake (Alycia Debnam-Carey) does in Apple Cider Vinegar? It becomes harder to holster one’s anger.

When someone only feigns illness to sell others on these imaginary panaceas, though? Hatred rapidly becomes a possibility. So Netflix is taking quite the risk in centering their new drama on Belle Gibson (Kaitlyn Dever), a real-life influencer (as opposed to Blake, a fictional composite character). Belle faked brain cancer. It began as a way to get attention and support. Before long though, she used it to build a massive social media following and “wellness” business. How can one stand to watch such a person lie, rationalize, self-mythologize, and manipulate for an hour, never find a for a full six episodes?

A big part of what makes creator Samantha Strauss’s Apple Cider Vinegar, despite Belle’s deplorableness, is Dever’s performance. Even as the series steadily shrinks its gaze from the alternate health influencer industry to its anti-hero, Dever keeps the audience’s attention. Even more miraculously, she occasionally wins its sympathies. Julia Garner (in an equally compelling performance) made Anna Delvey an almost folk tale-style person in Inventing Anna. She was nearly too big and over the top to be believed. Dever, by contrast, authors Belle as a figure of tragedy. She’s a bottomless pit of need who can never satiate her hunger for love or adoration. As a result, she loses both almost immediately as she gains them.

As a result, Apple Cider Vinegar feels in conversation with that earlier series. Anna gives viewers the larger-than-life depiction of a scam artist, while Vinegar reveals the grimmer side of things. The newer show still has a dark humor streak that runs throughout, but its central figure never achieves a state of glamor, no matter how high she ascends.

The series’ visual language frequently mirrors its singular focus, holding Dever’s face in tight closeups as she struggles and plots. Even when it pulls back, other characters are frequently “upstaged” by her presence, pushed to the background, or held on the sides of the frame. When the camera breaks away from her, the characters cut to keep their eyeline trained on where she would be. Another effective visual choice is how the series depicts when Belle receives likes or follows on social media. A cascade of red hearts and a warm light surround the character while Dever flashes looks that range from giddy to blissed out.

It isn’t truly a one-woman show. There are strong supporting turns by Debnam-Carey, Ashley Zukerman as Clive, Belle’s romantic partner, and Phoenix Raei’s PR/crisis manager Hek. Even more affecting are the brief glimpses into the lives of cancer patients who fall for the hustle. Apple Cider Vinegar is also wise to make it clear Belle is hardly the only one in the racket. A scene early in the season at a retreat that mostly peddles juicing and coffee enemas points out this racket has been running before Belle Gibson was a glimmer in her self-centered mom’s eye. Instagram adds a new outlet, certainly. However, the audience can see how Blake and her mom are quickly seduced through old-fashioned one-on-one badgering and “I feel your pain”-isms. Our lead con artist is just the sun the series revolves around.

There is a downside to that focus, though. It reduces Belle’s victims to mere supporting players in her drama. That’s like a compounding insult, taken advantage of in real life, made to fill the background in the dramatic re-enactment. In the same way that some say war movies always glamorize war regardless of their intent, one can level a similar argument about this subgenre. By centering criminals and con artists, the works often make them seem somehow admirable or attention-worthy. Yes, Dever makes Belle Gibson a fascinating, aggravating, and, at times, frightening figure. But does she really deserve yet another time in the spotlight, even if it is one detailing her crimes?

Apple Cider Vinegar starts talking on Netflix about this MLM they’re doing that you’d be great for beginning February 6.

Apple Cider Vinegar Trailer: