Netflix's 'Simone Biles Rising' is essential Paris 2024 viewing
If you're watching Simone Biles at the 2024 Paris Olympics, you need to watch this Netflix documentary.
Let's be real, we're damn lucky to live in a time when Simone Biles is competing on our screens. The most decorated gymnast in history and an undisputed embodiment of the term GOAT, the 27-year old athlete has owned the world stage and the medal podium for over a decade now. She's swimming in Olympic medals. Five gymnastic skills have been named after her. And with her return to gymnastics topped with the Paris 2024 Olympics, Biles is writing her next glorious chapter.
But it hasn't been an easy cartwheel down the balance beam by any means for Biles — a challenging, compelling road you can join her on in Netflix's excellent docuseries Simone Biles Rising. It's cleverly directed by Katie Walsh with gorgeous cinematography from Jessica Young, both of whom worked on the 2021 Facebook Watch documentary Simone vs Herself. Two episodes of the four-part series have been released on Netflix, with more coming in autumn, and it's the quintessential watch for Olympic enthusiasts, sports fans, and documentary lovers alike.
Simone Biles Rising covers a lot of ground
Simone Biles Rising always has Biles' path to Paris on the horizon, but it begins at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics, with the first episode mostly focusing on Biles' most challenging career moment to date: her decision to withdraw from the artistic gymnastics women's team final. Biles had the world's eyes firmly fixed on her, navigating intense pressure to bring home the gold. In the final, Biles lost her way midair during a vault, experiencing a disconnection with her spatial awareness — an indication of "the twisties". Biles describes the feeling in her interview as "in jail with my brain and body," and the series digs further into just how dangerous and heartbreaking it can be for a gymnast, as well as the intense psychological stress related to it.
But Biles' decision would redefine the term GOAT and publicly champion the need to take care of oneself. Walsh's documentary examines how much pressure that term actually puts on an athlete, with perfection expected at every turn amid press and social media noise — admirably, Biles is tough enough to read some mean tweets right into the camera.
Some of the most impressive parts of the documentary are the sections in which you're allowed to join Biles back in the gym post-Tokyo, starting her years of training to rebuild, with the 2021 World Championships on the horizon — yep, the one where she landed the never-seen-before Yurchenko double pike. Honestly, watching these training sections, if you're a gymnastics noob like me, you won't see anything wrong — the jaw-dropping skills are out, people. But for Biles, this was a long road to recovery. The word "inspiring" gets thrown around a lot, especially with sports documentaries, but watching Biles keep at it with the support of her teammates and coaches, you can't really put it any other way.
Simone Biles is frank, courageous, and real about her personal experiences
Ever a powerful speaker, Biles is generously candid about her experiences in her interviews in the documentary, reflecting on caring for her mental health and the impact of trauma on one's mind and body. Notably, Walsh gives Biles the space to reflect on recovery after sexual abuse. In 2018, among the #MeToo movement, Biles came forward with hundreds of women against USA Gymnastics team physician Larry Nassar, who was charged for decades of abuse against over 500 girls and young women — including Olympians Gabby Douglas, Aly Raisman, and McKayla Maroney. Biles showed incredible courage revisiting her trauma and testifying before the Senate with a powerful statement, and in the documentary, she's generous again in speaking to it alongside her teammates (I can also highly recommend watching Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk's outstanding and enraging documentary Athlete A on Netflix, which specifically centres the survivors and sheds light on the corrupt systems created by USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic Committee that failed to protect athletes.)
Biles also gives viewers a personal insight into private elements of her life, speaking about her childhood and foster care over photo albums, sharing her personal video diaries following her Tokyo exit, and letting viewers into her "forbidden Olympic closet" — a genuine treasure trove fit for a future museum. Watching Biles suddenly confront her Tokyo leotard, the uniform she was wearing during her vault, is deeply moving — and seemingly cathartic for the athlete. But there's plenty of joy too; watching Biles celebrate her successes is a delight to watch. The athlete taking you through all the moves named after her — including "The Biles" — with footage of each staggering skill is the most satisfying flex, and seeing Biles herself ask Siri "how many Olympic medals does Simone Biles have" is pure squeal.
Importantly, the series also takes a broader look at gymnastics itself, diving into the unethical pressure put on young athletes. This includes the impact of a lack of proper support for athletes through injuries, namely citing U.S. gymnast Kerri Strug who vaulted with a broken ankle in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. The series also covers problematic beauty standards and centred whiteness within gymnastics and the experiences of Black women gymnasts like champions Betty Okino and Dominique Dawes, both of whom are interviewed in the series. Here, Biles also reflects on her epic "Black girl magic" moment sharing the World Championship podium with Brazil's Rebeca Andrade and America's Shilese Jones in 2023, and it rules.
A quintessential and comprehensive portrait of one of the greats — and she's only 27.
In fact, Biles' personal and professional story is told and supported by an impressive array of talking heads like these, including Biles' mother Nellie, father Ron, and sister Adria, coaches Cécile Canqueteau-Landi and Laurent Landi, teammates including Aly Raisman and Joscelyn Roberson, NCAA gymnastics champion and psychology professor Onnie Willis Rogers, journalists Alice Park and Céline Nony, sports commentator Olly Hogben, and many more. Plus, there's some very sweet moments with her husband, NFL player Jonathan Owens, whom Biles married in 2023.
Ultimately, the first two episodes of Simone Biles Rising are a quintessential and comprehensive portrait of one of the greats — and she's only 27 — amid a broad brush consideration of the state of gymnastics itself by those in it. With two more chapters on the way, the series has already offered a compelling look at Biles' athletic career that will perfectly pair with your Olympic viewing, while giving you an understanding of what it means to rebuild, work hard, and challenge yourself to overcome life's curveballs — whatever form they may take.
How to watch: Simone Biles Rising is now streaming on Netflix.