Tyra Banks then-and-now during her time on ANTM

She revealed in the trailer: “I haven’t really said much, but now it’s time.”

Tyra recalled that her personal “why” for starting the show was because she “wanted to fight against the fashion industry,” and its outdated beauty standards.

The trailer featured contestants who were given medical procedures as part of their makeovers, were allegedly advised to lose more weight, and some who were allegedly uncomfortable during a photoshoot. 

The series’ former judge Nigel Barker referenced a contestant’s photoshoot and commented: “It was wrong and nobody really seemed to see it.”

The other important figures involved in the docu-series include the series’ former creative director Jay Manuel who noted: “I realized Tyra would do anything for the success of her show.”

The model acknowledged: “I knew I went too far [when it came to the series].” Tyra explained that she took it up a notch on her show due to supply and demand from viewers. 

She continued: “It was very, very intense, but you guys were demanding it, so we kept pushing.”

This isn’t the first time that Tyra has gotten candid about the TV competition. In February 2025, she was honored at the ESSENCE Black Women in Hollywood Awards in the category, Luminary Spotlight.

While accepting her award onstage she recalled: “Over 20 years ago I created a show called America’s Next Top Model. And you guys have no idea how hard we fought to bring the diversity to that television show at a time when it didn’t exist; to show different beauties at a time when the world was like, ‘What? You casting that?'”

Tyra added: “[During] a time when people in the fashion industry were telling me, ‘You putting the girls from the hood on your show?’ I was like, ‘Why can the girl from the trailer park become a supermodel, but the girl that’s chilin’ in the park in the hood can’t’ and we fought, and we struggled, and we made it happen.”

The entertainer took credibility for previous mistakes that she’s made on the show, while celebrating the other ways that the series made a huge difference in the fashion industry, by democratizing who can become a model and what a model looks like.

She expressed: “Did we get it right? [Expletive] no! I said some dumb [expletive]. But I refuse to have my legacy be about some stuff linked together on the Internet, when there were 24 cycles of changing the world. And I am so excited that I, and so many of us, have opened that door for others to follow.”

The model concluded: “And now my 51-year-old, dimpled, cellulite-covered bigger tummy, and 10 million times bigger titties, is walking through that door that I opened with all of us behind us on that runway saying, ‘Baby, it’s just the beginning.'”

In 2020 when clips from the show began surfacing on social media, Tyra shared online: “Been seeing the posts about the insensitivity of some past ANTM moments and I agree with you. Looking back, those were some really off choices. Appreciate your honest feedback and am sending so much love and virtual hugs.”