“Jer-ry! Jer-ry! Jer-ry!” Most ’90s kids will remember the chants from days spent home sick from school browsing daytime television, landing on the wild, often controversial Jerry Springer Show. Hosted by the late former Cincinnati mayor and local news anchor Jerry Springer, the daytime talk show ran for 27 seasons, a televised circus tent where every act was an over-the-top melodrama featuring love triangles, secret siblings, and the occasional flying chair.

But how did “the worst TV show of all time,” as Springer himself introduced it, become one of the biggest and most outrageous hits of the ’90s? Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action is a new two-part documentary series that explores the show’s origins and meteoric rise. The jaw-dropping series tells the story of the show as it’s never been told before, with extraordinary firsthand testimony and revelations from show insiders who lay bare the dark truths behind its entertaining facade. The show’s producers and ex-guests paint a murkier picture of the destruction it caused, raising renewed questions about who was responsible and how far things should go in the name of entertainment.

Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action was produced by Minnow Films and directed by Luke Sewell (Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King); executive produced by Sophie Jones, Alicia Kerr, Sophie Leonard; and produced by Catherine Murnane. 

The series will premiere on Netflix on Jan. 7. Until then, “Take care of yourselves and each other.”