Alex Honnold's Life or Death Free Solo to Air on LIVE on Netflix

Jan twenty-third humming like a date circled in pencil, Alex Honnold standing at the base of Taipei 101, all that glass and steel stacked into the sky like a dare written in a language nobody ever meant to read by hand. Sixteen hundred sixty-seven feet, a clean vertical thought, and he’s going to walk it upward, no ropes, no apologies, live to the whole wired world through Netflix, two hours of people holding their breath while he keeps his loose.

This isn’t Yosemite granite singing back at him, not the old cathedral stone. This is sharper, shinier, repetitive like a mantra that doesn’t change even when your arms start asking questions. Skyscrapers don’t forgive with cracks and textures; they just repeat themselves, floor after floor, asking if you really meant yes the first time. Alex did. He always does.

Even the bamboo boxes, sixty-four floors of boxed-in rhythm, feel less like obstacles and more like verses he’s already practiced in his head. He talks about fear the way mechanics talk about engines, listening, adjusting, never dramatizing.

Older now, slower in the good way, a dad, thinking about success as coming home calm. The building rises, the cameras blink, and Alex steps on, climbing not to conquer but to understand how far quiet attention can carry a human body into the sky.

How long have you been preparing for this climbing project?

Honnold: I’ve been climbing full-time for 30 years, so if you count all that as preparation, that’s quite a lot.

The direct, physical training for the building specifically is only maybe two and a half months ahead of time. I’ve been really excited about the building, and I’ve wanted to start training, but basically you don’t want to over-sharpen your sword — you just can’t start training too soon because you burn yourself out, you get injured.

I first saw this building more than 10 years ago, and I’ve hoped to have the opportunity to climb it since then.

How does this climb in Taiwan differ from your previous climbs around the world — or even previous attempts to climb Taipei 101?

Honnold: Taipei 101, as part of its opening ceremony, was climbed by a French climber named Alain Robert with ropes, and he climbed it over four hours — he had just broken his arm or something crazy. He was a great climber in his time; he’s really a skilled soloist, and he’s climbed a lot of buildings around the world.

I think, if I do this, it’ll be the biggest urban free solo ever. I think it’s the tallest building that’s been climbed. I’m not 100% sure, but I think so. I don’t know. But other buildings have been climbed — I think this is just gonna be well documented, well broadcast on Netflix, and I think potentially bigger and a little harder.

Also, I’m hoping to climb it a little better — just to go up on the top, smoothly climb well, and feel great on it. And that’s a subtle distinction that a viewer might not be able to see, but to me it’s important to climb it well. You want to feel good doing it.

You are in a different place than you were when you filmed Free Solo — now a husband and father. Do you approach climbs differently now?

Honnold: Honestly, I’m not in as different a place as people might think. I’m still basically climbing all the time, and it’s more complicated having a wife and kids, and I’m spending more time at home and less time abroad and things like that. But I’m still climbing all the time, so it’s not that different.

But I think my approach is probably more thoughtful than it used to be. I’m preparing more. Part of that is also just being a 40-year-old man now versus being a 23-year-old living alone in my van.

Because when you’re 23, you just go for it — you don’t really care. As a 40-year-old, you’re like, “I’ll just spend the extra day, I’ll do some prep work, I’ll be careful, and it’s fine.”

How will you celebrate once the climb is over?

Honnold: I’ll take the elevator down, I’ll see my wife, we’ll be psyched. We’ll eat at the buffet that night — it’s a really nice buffet — it’ll be great, and that will be the day.

Then I’ll go home, and I’ll go back to my climbing practice.