Bryan Johnson, The Meme-Prone Millionaire Who Wants to Live Forever, With Netflix Closely Watching

Aging is the natural and gradual process of physical, mental, and cellular changes that occur in living organisms over time.

It typically involves deterioration of cells, visible signs like wrinkles, slower cognitive functions, changes in social roles, and increased emotional resilience. In all, aging happens to any living things, and it's a natural way of the living to show that it lives.

However, despite being inevitable, the pace and experience of aging can vary widely among individuals.

This is because aging is heavily influenced by genetics, lifestyle, environment, and health.

Bryan Johnson wants to defy aging, live forever, and tell the story. But to do that, he is sacrificing a lot, and Netflix is documenting it.

According to the documentary called Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever:

Born in August 1977, Johnson is a very wealthy man.

He is the entrepreneur and founder of Kernel, a company focused on brain-machine interfaces, and OS Fund, a venture capital firm that invests in scientific advancements. But what what he is best known for, is how he uses his wealth to fund ambitious projects aimed at improving human longevity and health.

His wealth primarily comes from his entrepreneurial ventures, particularly the sale of his previous company, Braintree, which developed mobile payment systems and was sold to PayPal for $800 million in 2013.

This sale significantly boosted his net worth, providing him with the resources to fund his ventures in neuroscience and longevity.

As part of his radical pursuit of anti-aging and longevity, he invests in cutting-edge technologies and personal health regimens to slow the aging process, often sharing his progress and goals publicly.

He wants to live to 100, or perhaps to 150, or maybe 200. And if possibly, he wishes to extend human lifespan to indefinite.

But before that can happen, Johnson is putting his own body as part of the experiment.

He is making himself the guinea pig of his own experiment.

While Johnson isn't the richest man around, and that unlike most wealthy individuals who wish the extravagant things life can provide, Johnson pursues eternal youth, by going against all the norms people do.

To go back in time, Johnson spent a total of of $4 million of his own fortune to develop a life-extension system called Blueprint.

The man who positioned himself as the program’s test subject, with the goal of reducing the biological age of his vital organs to that of an 18-year-old, is already spending a hefty $2 million per year to pursue his immortality quest.

Johnson has literally transformed his home into a laboratory, and with his singleminded obsession, he redefines self-discipline.

From daily exercise to sleep optimization and meditation, Johnson also takes cold showers and ice baths to reduce inflammation and improve circulation. He consumes only plant-based diets, focusing on whole food, consisting of 1,977 calories a day. He also does intermittent fasting.

He also takes various supplements, vitamins and collagen, as well as minerals and fish oil. In total, he ingests more than 100 pills, per day

He regularly undergoes weight, body fat, muscle mass, body water, BMI, blood glucose, MRI scans and ultrasounds to screen for any issues.

He also doesn’t drink alcohol, and also bathes his body in LED light, and sits on a high-intensity electromagnetic device that he believes will strengthen his pelvic floor.

He wakes up at 4.30 a.m., eats all his meals before 11 a.m., and goes to bed alone at 8.30 p.m., without exception.

And these only scratch the surface.

Johnson also undergoes advanced medical treatments, like having monitor health markers that are tailored to only his regimen, hormone optimization, cryotherapy, stem cell treatments, and more.

Besides the regular health monitoring, genetic testing, and age reversal monitoring, Johnson also avoids sun exposure, unless it's only for the necessity of his health.

At one point, he organized a transfusion of blood plasma from his 18-year-old son Talmage. He also gave his own blood plasma to his 70-year-old father. But this project was halted when he realized it didn’t yield results.

He also reportedly took a human growth hormone for a while, but also stopped as it had negative side effects.

Johnson has his own personal health team of about 30 doctors and experts who continuously monitor his organs and bodily functions.

Johnson has also made public all of his health data, leveraging that open-book documentation for commercial purposes.

Long story short, on his quest to extend his life for as long as possible, Johnson is “biohacking" his body.

The documentary also introduces Talmage, who has reconnected with his father following a divorce.

While Johnson has a life that blends wealth, innovation, and personal ambition, his focus on exploring the boundaries of human health and lifespan has been considered a joke to many people on the internet.

The more he shared his progresses and advancements, the more haters he gained.

More or less to the internet, Johnson entertains them by being an oft-memed rich man who wish to fight nature by depraving his body of the many things people are actually after.

On paper, Johnson do get older, but as he races to bring down his biological age and his pace of aging, which is considered crucial markers for longevity, he claims to have successfully reversed his biological age by 5.1 years.

What this means, in 2025, Johnson is 47 years old, but his body is about 42.

And during the course of the documentary, his pace of aging dropped from 0.69 to 0.64, meaning that for every year that goes by, he'll age only by about two-thirds of that year.

He also claims that his muscle oxygen saturation in the 75th percentile for elite athletes, or the 99th percentile for the general population.

Netflix is detailing just how far the tech evangelist can go, is willing to go.

Netflix wants to help people witness how the millionaire can be what he claims to be.

With the millions he spent, Johnson also claimed in an interview that his "health biomarkers are in the top 1%. And not just the top 1% of 46 year olds, but on some of my markers, such as my cardiovascular fitness, I’m in the top 1% of 18 year olds” for fields such as speed of aging, muscle mass function and bone mass."

He also said that he had "the bones of a 30-year-old, and the heart of a 37-year-old."

Johnson in literally obsessed with his goal.

However, his own doctor, Oliver Zolman, said that he and his team didn't achieve remarkable results.

In Johnson's case, they did achieve reasonable results, but "it’s to be expected,” since he is the guinea pig after all.

In another interview, Johnson once said about the notion of having to do all this, to only get hit by a bus.

"Whenever I get in my car, I say to myself: ‘This is the most dangerous thing I’ll do today,’” Johnson said.

Johnson has three children with his ex-wife, but seems to struggle romantically because of the strict discipline he’s under. In 2023, he went onto X to put out his list of expectations for potential partners.

"Unsure why I'm single," he added at the end.

Regardless, the documentary is more on the entertainment side.

It's not that technical or creative, and a bit more about Johnson's amiable curio, which details the philosophical part of Johnson many people may not know.

As for the director, Chris Smith, he first garnered attention with his 1996 debut, and through an indie hit he made a few years later.

But then, Smith entered the nonfiction realm, directing high-profile multi-episodic nonfiction projects for Netflix, Apple TV+ and Max.