What is Bad Vegan's IQ Score?

Bad Vegan has an IQ Score of 126/200 on TV Intelligentsia's Intelligence Quotient framework, placing it in the Competent tier. The score breaks down to 42/50 Cognitive Stimulation, 8/50 Educational Value, and 48/50 Craft & Quality.

Is Bad Vegan educational?

Bad Vegan is low on educational value, 8/50 on TVI's rubric. Watch for entertainment, not for learning.

How does TV Intelligentsia calculate IQ Score?

TV Intelligentsia's current published formula is round((Cognitive Stimulation × 0.4 + Educational Value × 0.35 + Craft & Quality × 0.25) × 4), scoring titles from 0 to 200 across five tiers. TVI publishes a three-dimension breakdown only when those values reproduce the displayed composite. The framework is published at tvintelligentsia.com/methodology/.

Bad Vegan IQ Score 126/200

Name: Bad Vegan
Genre: documentary, true crime
Rating: 126
Cast: Sarma Melngailis

Bad Vegan has an IQ Score of 126/200 on TV Intelligentsia's Intelligence Quotient rubric, placing it in the Competent tier.

By Jordan Robinson, MD, MPH·Updated 2026-08-19·Methodology

documentarytrue crime

126/ 200

Competent

Engages without demanding much, watchable and reasonably crafted

Score Breakdown

Cognitive Stimulation/50

Educational Value/50

Craft & Quality/50

IQ = round((Cognitive × 0.4 + Educational × 0.35 + Craft × 0.25) × 4) · How we score →

What these dimensions mean

Cognitive Stimulation: observable narrative complexity, conceptual density, ambiguity, inference, and sustained intellectual demands in the work.
Educational Value: the density and integration of substantive academic, historical, scientific, cultural, ethical, or practical information in the work.
Craft & Quality: production excellence in service of the work, its direction, writing, performance, and aesthetic intent.

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Why you should trust this score

Scored under Jordan Robinson, MD, MPH

Physician and founding editor. Maintains the adult catalog against the published rubric and reviews the rubric application.

Methodology

Published rubric, v1.3.1

Formula

round((C × 0.40 + E × 0.35 + Q × 0.25) × 4)

Database scale

2,605 titles, version-controlled

How we stay independent. Editorial scores are not for sale. TVI may take on paid advisory or research work, but no commercial relationship buys coverage, advance access to scores, favorable treatment, or a change to a published finding. We pay for our own streaming subscriptions, and no reviewer sees sponsor data or affiliate revenue tied to a score. More about how we work →

The TVI Take

Chris Smith's 2022 Netflix four-part documentary about Sarma Melngailis, the celebrity raw-vegan-restaurant owner whose marriage to Anthony Strangis turned into a sustained financial-and-emotional con. The structural commitment to letting the timeline play out as Sarma experienced it, without prematurely revealing Strangis's deceit, is what gives the documentary its anthropological weight about coercive control mechanics.

People & Production Chris Smith · Netflix · United States 6 connections