On the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, Netflix revisits one of the most polarizing conflicts in modern history with Turning Point: The Vietnam War, a five-part docuseries that dissects the Vietnam War’s tangled roots, catastrophic human cost, and its enduring political and cultural echoes.
Directed by acclaimed filmmaker Brian Knappenberger, the series blends rare archival footage with intimate interviews to offer a multi-dimensional portrait of a war that changed everything—from how the U.S. fights its battles to how it remembers them. What distinguishes this documentary is not just its historical rigor, but its commitment to humanizing both sides of the conflict, refusing to tell a one-dimensional tale.
The first episode sets the groundwork by unpacking America’s ideological involvement, tracing how Cold War paranoia and political ambition turned a Southeast Asian nationalist movement into a global flashpoint. We’re shown how the Gulf of Tonkin incident became a pivot point, pushing President Lyndon B. Johnson to escalate U.S. military presence under questionable pretenses. Viewers are left to weigh just how much of the war was rooted in misinformation.
As the series unfolds, the personal becomes political. Through the eyes of American veterans, Vietnamese civilians, photojournalists, and historians, the docuseries examines how the war shaped—and shattered—millions of lives. One standout thread is the story of Black U.S. soldiers, who faced a double war: one in Vietnam, and one against racism back home and within their own ranks. The series explores how these young men fought for a country that rarely fought for them.
What Turning Point does especially well is contextualizing trauma. The psychological scars carried by returning U.S. veterans—many of whom faced ostracization, PTSD, or poverty—are given ample attention. But just as deeply explored is the generational trauma left in Vietnam: land still littered with unexploded ordnance, families torn apart, and a nation still healing from both civil and foreign conflict.
Each episode is sharp in its critique of political maneuvering. Viewers are taken behind closed doors where American presidents weighed lives against public opinion and re-election hopes. The Pentagon Papers are discussed, shedding light on how government deception widened the credibility gap between citizens and leaders—a divide that echoes eerily in today’s political climate.
The final episode brings it all full circle. With the fall of Saigon in April 1975, the series doesn’t frame the moment as victory or defeat. Instead, it reflects on the war’s meaning—or lack thereof. Knappenberger leaves viewers with haunting questions about accountability, memory, and whether history has truly taught us anything.
Turning Point: The Vietnam War is not easy viewing, but it’s essential. For a generation raised on textbooks and pop-culture caricatures of Vietnam, this series offers depth, nuance, and a challenge: to reckon with the past so we stop repeating it.
