Inside the World's Toughest Prisons

Inside the World's Toughest Prisons
GenreDocumentary
Presented byPaul Connolly (season 1), Raphael Rowe (season 2–present)
Country of originUnited Kingdom
Original languagesEnglish (presenter), local languages of countries whose prison systems were visited (Spanish, Portuguese, German, Greek, Norwegian, Ukrainian, Russian, Romanian, Polish, Tagalog, Tok Pisin, Greenlandic, Sabela, Mauritian Creole, Afrikaans, Finnish, Indonesian, Czech)
No. of seasons7
No. of episodes27
Production
Executive producers
  • Emma Read (Emporium)
  • Gabe Solomon (Emporium)
  • Olivia LaRoche for season 2 onward (commissioned the show for Netflix)
[1]
Original release
Network
ReleaseApril 12, 2016 (2016-04-12) –
present
Infobox instructions (only shown in preview)

Inside the World's Toughest Prisons is a television documentary series produced by London-based Emporium Productions[1] and available on Netflix.[2] The documentary shows life in various prisons around the world, mostly from the prisoner perspective but also including the perspective of prison guards and others interacting with the prison system. Season 1 was hosted by Irish journalist Paul Connolly and originally aired on Channel 5.[3][4] Since the second season, the series has been commissioned by Netflix and hosted by UK journalist Raphael Rowe, who had himself served 12 years in prison for a crime he was eventually acquitted of.[1][5][6][7] The series's seventh season was released on 15 September 2023.

  1. ^ a b c Clarke, Stewart (June 19, 2018). "Netflix Locks Up Deal for 'Inside the World's Toughest Prisons'". Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  2. ^ "Inside the World's Toughest Prisons". Netflix. Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  3. ^ "Inside the World's Toughest Prisons". Channel 5. Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  4. ^ Harding, Nick (February 10, 2016). "Inside The World's Toughest Prisons: Paul Connolly spent time in Poland's Piotrkow for Channel 5 series". The Independent. Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  5. ^ White, Peter (June 19, 2018). "Netflix Goes 'Inside The World's Toughest Prisons' With Latest Factual Original". Deadline. Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  6. ^ Lease, Lawrence; Flowers, Jane (June 20, 2018). "Netflix brings a new four-part series of 'Inside the World's Toughest Prisons' next month". BlastingNews. Retrieved June 2, 2019.
  7. ^ Cobb, Kayla (July 12, 2018). "'Inside the World's Toughest Prisons' Looks at Prison Life From an Insider's Perspective". Decider. Retrieved June 2, 2019.