Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders S2: still the most poisonous series on Netflix

Netflix has just dropped the second season of America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, a documentary about the professional dance group that performs to support the iconic NFL football team. However, there is a sinister undertone present in this show.

Every year the team is renewed, with a number of recurring group members (veterans) and new cheerleaders (Rookies) who all compete for a place on the team. Although technology, performance skills and the ability to remember choreography are taken into account, other archaic factors are also being investigated.

Trigger warning for discussions about weight, body image and eating disorders below.

I tuned last year, naive for how these things at surface level were painfully enlarged by the bosses, and unfortunately that is not something that has been tackled in the latest episode of one of the most popular documentaries series from Netflix.

This is the most striking during the uniform fittings. As discussed in season 1, those cut blouses and small small shorts are exactly for every dancer there and then, without wobble space for changes throughout the year. So I assume that this does not take into account things such as changes in muscle mass, or blown up after meals or during the period of a dancer.

After season 1, director Kelli Finglass claimed to E! That the company “really moved” from discussing the body types of women in the team, but episode 2 of the second season is not added, with her comments about Rookie Abby, “she … she has … shoulders”.

Abby then reveals that she realized that she “no longer needed the weight space”, so she decided to stop lifting. The cameraman then wondered if anyone had told her that or if she decided it herself. She initially claimed the latter, but when he pushed nervously and replied that she “didn’t want to say”, nodded when he asked again if anyone told her.

Kelli later commented on someone else that “small shoulders and small torsos always look good”, and although yes, that was intended as a compliment, it certainly seemed a excavation at Abby from the past – who had undoubtedly started to exercise with weights to help her fitness as a athlete.

These comments are not as Egregious as the uniform fittings of season 1, where dancers were criticized for body relationships outside of their control, as their toros were too long, or that their “thighs look a bit angular” (what – what does that mean?).

© 2025 Netflix, Inc.

During the Talking Heads segment, one of the contenders for the team, Dayton, openly discusses how her problems started with the body image after high school when she started thinking about audition for the cowboys. Earlier in the episode she regretted her earlier eating disorder, which was also discussed in detail by a prominent dancer from season 1, Victoria.

Earlier in her DCC career, Victoria was called in by the bosses about her weight, which would have been when the earlier reality show, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: making the team, broadcast (from 2006-2021). Many of the comments from Kelli to numerous cheerleaders are terrible to watch. Victoria told the camera in season 1: “I think it is harder for girls not just to starve.”

During the final round of auditions we see how each competitor is assessed by a panel of judges, but not all from dance or styling backgrounds. So this year’s group includes a country music singer and a temporary meteorologist.

© 2025 Netflix, Inc.

Some comments from these men made my skin crawl because they are unable to record beauty advice based on their own questionable fashion choices. Moreover, some of them are at least twice the age of the dancers, those comments make them ‘so cute’ lusty and creepy.

At one point the meteorologist reveals that he has written that a girl “needs a makeover”, and the male singer follows that “the rear part of the head was too big”.

And really, are they satisfied with themselves for taking the performances of these women apart, no less on a global streaming site? It is more than cruel and solidifies why so much of the cheerleaders are stressed, depressed or worse, and will undoubtedly have an impact on viewers at home.

Admittedly, season 2 is praised because he finally received a well -deserved wage increase of 400% to actually have a livable wage … but even that cost almost the entire team together to demand it.

None of the negative press to the salaries of season 1 was sufficient to shift the opinions of the director, and that also seems to be the case for the body image within the Cowboys Cheerleading Squad.

It feels all the more gloomy if you take into account how trends of ‘thinness’ are again normalized, with the rise of things such as skinnytok. The discourse around performances on America’s sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders only adds fuel to the fire.

View season 2 at your own discretion, but the first pair of episodes have left a bad taste in my mouth.

America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders is now available for streaming on Netflix.