Review: Elvis ‘Return of the King’ Netflix documentary: Not what you’d expect
The new Netflix documentary, Return of the King: The Fall and Rise of Elvis Presley, released on November 13 is not what you expect. From the trailer and promotional graphic, you think this film is mainly about Presley’s ’68 Comeback Special. But the truth is that the bulk of the film covers the years that lead up to that moment.
The first 60 out of the 90 minutes of the film is about Presley’s life and career before the ’68 special. Return of the King is actually a refreshing look at The King of Rock and Roll’s career. It features great interviews with entertainers and musicians who have never been interviewed before on film about Elvis, including Bruce Springsteen, Robbie Robertson, Billy Corgan, Darlene Love, and Conan O’Brien, which I feel make this a unique and special documentary. However, Return of the King is not without its factual errors and hyperboles.
For example, just take the opening text statement on the screen: “He hadn’t recorded a top 10 hit in 5 years.” This statement implies that Elvis’ records had basically flopped since 1963. However, an often ignored fact is that Elvis had a number one album with his movie soundtrack, Roustabout, in January 1965.
The next text statement on screen said: “His career as an entertainer was in jeopardy.” My response to that is a big flat-out NO! In my book, ELVIS Behind The Legend, I explain in detail that the “story” presented around Elvis Presley’s ’68 “Comeback” special that has been created over the years was not as dramatic as it is presented in this new Netflix documentary, as well as many other previous films. Don’t believe all the histrionics about the ’68 special. That hype was created over the last 5 decades to dramatize Elvis’ career.
And in truth, with the 2022 ELVIS movie from Baz Luhrmann; Steve Binder’s 2023 documentary, Reinventing Elvis; and now this 2024 Netflix documentary directed by Jason Hehir, the drama has worked. It has brought to life again the excitement of the ’68 special over 50 years later.
However, contrary to what is stated in the film, Elvis’ career was not in jeopardy to the extent that the talking heads say. When Jerry Schilling says, “Everything for his future depended on this special,” this is far from the truth.
Most people who state this have never bothered to go back and look at the timeline in Presley’s career. In fact, at the time when Elvis was filming the TV special in June 1968, his film Speedway co-starring Nancy Sinatra was pulling in box office earnings that rivaled many of his earlier movies. Speedway ranks 14th in box office earnings of all 31 Elvis Presley feature films. Therefore, the perception that all of Presley’s films at this time were box-office failures is a myth.
And also the belief that Elvis’ career would have vanished without the ’68 special is ridiculous. The Colonel would no doubt have been able to get Elvis back into performing whenever he wanted because the Elvis fans never left. As George Klein used to say on his Sirius XM show on Elvis radio [paraphrasing], Elvis didn’t need a so-called ‘comeback’ because Elvis hadn’t gone anywhere.
Two text statements at the end of the film also were factually incorrect. The statement that “Elvis dedicated himself to live performances after 1968” is not exactly true since he was still filming a movie in the spring of 1969.
Four months after the Elvis special aired, in April 1969, Presley was wrapping up his 31st movie, Change of Habit, although he had no idea or intention that Habit would be his last feature film.
In a press conference following the airing of his Elvis special, Presley talked about his hopes for his film career: “I would like to do more [movies], but only if the script is good. I don’t want to sing in them anymore. I’d still like to develop into a serious actor, while there is still time.”
Although Elvis wanted to return to live performing, his movie career was not perceived as washed up or a failure. Each year from 1960 to 1966, Presley was among the top ten most popular stars at the box office. Overall, Elvis was ranked as the 6th top box office star of the 1960s.
When Elvis returned to the stage in Las Vegas in July 1969, his final two films had not yet even been released. As far as Presley was concerned, in the future, his time would alternate between making more films and live performing. What the ’68 special did do was give Elvis confidence that he could return to the stage.
In an interview which took place during the last week of shooting for Change of Habit, Elvis talked about his future plans: “I don’t plan too far ahead, but I’m real busy for a while now. I’ve got a date in Vegas, and maybe another film after that. Then I’m going to try to get to Europe, because I’ve always promised I would and I’ve got some good, faithful fans over there.”
The 30 minutes of the documentary spent on the actual TV special is also not what you would expect. It focuses specifically on the acoustic informal jam session. As one commentator noted: “It’s the most real thing anyone had ever seen Elvis Presley do. It might be the first time that anyone had ever actually seen the actual human being, Elvis Aaron Presley, child of Tupelo and Memphis.”
One of the final text statements in the film: “He played 361 more concerts before his death in 1977” has been raising alerts by fans on social media. Every fan knows that Elvis played over 600 shows in Las Vegas alone. It is puzzling how the filmmakers came up with this 361 number.
Return of the King features great historical footage of Elvis and rare home movies. The film also features interviews with people forever associated with the Elvis world including Jerry Schilling, Priscilla Presley, director Baz Lurhmann and historian Ernst Jorgensen.
The film provides great insights into Elvis’ career which have seldom been explored, especially with fellow musicians. The insights especially from Billy Corgan, who was good friends with Lisa Marie Presley, and of course, Bruce Springsteen, a self-proclaimed lifelong Elvis fan, provide great perspectives on Elvis.
With all that being said about the good and also questionable parts of the film, Return of the King brings an even greater appreciation for Elvis in his ’68 special, if that is even possible. As Billy Corgan declares: “The ’68 special is just a master at work, but that’s Elvis everyday! Nobody had the foresight to get more of Elvis everyday. If they had any brains… they would have done 50 more of those, because we’d be talking about those too!… He’s not just having a good day. That’s [Elvis] every goddamned day!”
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Fun fact: The Elvis tribute artist who portrays Presley in the recreated scenes of Elvis dressed in his leather outfit getting ready to go on stage is Cody Ray Slaughter. Check out Cody’s own ’68 Comeback Medley performance here!
This review was written by the Elvis News Examiner, Trina Young. She is the author of 4 Elvis books, including ELVIS: The Army Years Uncovered. Read a free excerpt at ElvisBiography.net.
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I loved it – am a life long fan of his (age 82)- what I really want to know is if that was his voice or someone else?
Yes, that was Elvis’s voice. Some of it was from rare interviews that he did in the 1970s with the producers of his documentaries – either for That’s The Way It Is, or Elvis on Tour.
Your review is spot on. I fully agree. However, I thought the post-credits text said “1,141 live performances” by the time he died in 1977. Also, why so much profanity? It keeps me from watching it with my grandkids. Thanks for your honest review.
extremely tired of seeing and hearing his X wife and shilling cling to their 15sec of fame.
Appreciate the artist thoughts and input.