A disturbing new three-part docuseries, Get Huge: Looksmaxxing to Death, offers an unvarnished look at the online subculture of looksmaxxing. This movement pushes young men to pursue extreme aesthetic beauty through potentially lethal methods, including steroid use, peptide injections, cosmetic surgery, and intense physical transformation. At the center of the series is the evolution of a fringe philosophy that views the human body as a series of constant, risky science experiments. Peptides, cosmetic surgery and total commitment – you probably know the name Clavicular, i f you’ve heard the term looksmaxxing – the manospheric pursuit of male aesthetic beauty via steroids. But the docuseries in question, Get Huge: Looksmaxxing to Death, was never actually about Clavicular, who appears only in publicly available snippets. On the infamous influencer’s influences: the so-called “biohacking” scene that inspired the youths’ fixation on extreme body modification, it instead trains its focus upstream of the bone-smashing. A prolific user of steroids and experimenter with substances from the dubious to illicit, Hughes projected brawny confidence at a time when, as he puts it in the first episode, “Society doesn’t have a place for masculine. According to to not be biohacking was to be “beta and controllable”, missing the opportunity to be bigger and better. “They’re just live experiments,”, Lee of the mindset. “Every day is another science experiment to see what I ca. According to to skirt US regulatory scrutiny – and, as later episodes explore, civil lawsuits and criminal investigations – Hughes relocated to Pattaya, Thailand, in 2017, where he gathered a clique of “passport bros” for content and a self-proclaimed “harem” of paid women. (“A man should only have as many girlfriends as he can leg press,” he, While holding up a pyramid of Thai women.). From the ridiculous (Elon Muscular’s attempt to brand Hughes “the Hugh Hefner of biohacking”) to the sinister (Hughes requesting his “girlfriends” always be na, get Huge certainly contains many disconcerting observations. For young men, “these guys are projecting this blueprint for how to live their lives. We wanted to puncture that and get beneath it.”.
Director Stacey Lee began filming in 2024, noting that while the movement was once marginal, it has expanded rapidly alongside the influencers who promote it. Among the key figures featured is 20-year-old streamer Braden Peters, known online as Clavicular. With over 2 million followers, Peters has become the public face of an aesthetic pursuit characterized by blunt, nihilistic terminology like “hardmaxxing” and “bone smashing,” all aimed at increasing one’s “sexual market value” (SMV). The 20-year-old streamer born Braden Peters has become the chiseled face of a once fringe movement to achieve algorithmically defined good looks by any means necessary, from daily methamphetamines to breaking your jaw with a hammer, with more than 2 million followers and a cluster of mainstream media profiles. Baffling, horrifying or grimly compelling, depending on your view, Clavicular would be a fascinating documentary subject. But its influence seemed to expand as rapidly as the subjects’ roided muscles once filming commenced in 2024. “Clavicular grew up on Leo Longevity,” Lee said. “These kids are growing up on that. Neck, arm, rear is “the world, ubiquitous daily injections in the face.
The series investigates the origins of this trend by focusing on “biohacking” guru Tony Hughes, a former bankruptcy attorney who transitioned into a bodybuilder. Hughes, who has 250,000 followers, famously claimed that “a day natty is a day wasted,” encouraging his audience to reject a “beta” lifestyle in favor of aggressive chemical and physical augmentation. Hughes famously experimented on camera with the toxic fat-burning substance DNP, a chemical that can prove fatal even in small doses.
Lee secured access to Hughes in 2024, describing his philosophy as one of “radical transparency.” The camera crew documented Hughes and his associates, including Laith Abdullah Algaz, known as “Leo Longevity.” Algaz, who marketed himself as a penis enlargement expert, was found dead in a house shared with Hughes in January 2023. Authorities determined his death was caused by blunt force trauma, though the specific circumstances remain unclear. Lee, a mother of a nine-year-old son concerned by the far – rightward lurch of male influencers, caught up with Hughes there in 2024, “and immediately it was just doors wide open”, she recalled. “Tony’s whole philosophy is radical transparency – ‘come on in, nothing to hide here’. As Get Huge gets deeper, Lee learns that four other close Hughes associates have either died or disappeared under questionable circumstances since 2018, ranging from overdoses to house fire to hanging. And the character for the internet projects radical transparency.
The documentary also chronicles the tragic decline of another associate, Connor Murphy. Over 18 months of filming, Lee observed Murphy’s behavior becoming increasingly unstable. In July, two months after production wrapped, the 32-year-old drowned in a lake behind his home. Reports suggest Murphy was experiencing a psychotic break at the time, having documented his attempt to inject himself with pure gold. His death deeply impacted the film crew, who were forced to document the consequences of these extreme lifestyles in real time while noting that those surrounding these men often expressed little concern. And we are watching it in real time, they are feeding on these projections of masculinity. As Hughes, Elon Muscular and Murphy, each surely surpassing the daily injectables limit – Murphy claims to be taking anywhere from a dozen to 100 “compound, and the camera pans out to the making of the documentary itself.
Throughout the series, Lee emphasizes that she did not set out to judge the subjects, but rather to document the emotional void many of these men seek to fill through external validation. She hopes the footage reveals the multidimensional people behind the online personas, rather than merely pointing fingers at the individuals involved. However, the film stops short of offering clear solutions to the nihilistic cycles promoted by the looksmaxxing community.
The production, which previously involved a legal dispute after Peters filed a cease and desist against Disney/Hulu for filming him at a fashion show, remains a stark examination of the pressures facing young men today. Get Huge: Looksmaxxing to Death is scheduled for release on Hulu in the US on November 10 and on Disney+ in other regions. Lee concludes that while the docuseries provides no easy answers, it invites audiences to approach these complex, often tragic online cultures with skepticism and compassion. Indeed, news of a possible Clavicular documentary has percolated all year, after the influencer filed a cease and desist letter against Disney/Hulu for allegedly filming him backstage at a New York fashion show in February. (It’s far from his most serious legal matter this year – last month, he pleaded guilty to charges that he raped a 17-year-old girl at his family’s Massachusetts home in May 2025. Faster, far more extreme forms.”, what Tony was putting online 10 years ago is being recreated in shorter.
