A lot of comparisons have been made between Survivorman and Man Vs Wild. And I prefer Man Vs. Wild.
Everybody knows Les Stroud from Survivorman is really out there, in it, on his own and what you see is what you get, while occasionally Bear Grylls stays in hotels after he pretends to sleep in a cold uncomfortable tent all night. And you know what? I don't care.
Les Stroud is a scientist and he travels around with his one camera teaching anthropology with static camera moves and natural light and an even toned way of explaining things. "Oh, look," he might say. "Here's a bear. I wonder if he will eat me."
Meanwhile Bear Grylls takes off his shirt a lot and has lots of crazy camera angles because his camera man is badass, and he makes everything sound like an adventure. "If I can't get this bottlecap off, I might starve to death and a dragon will eat me!"
Bear understands that this is a TV show and his job is to entertain while educating. And I respect Les Stroud ever so much because he is clearly a badass dude who knows lots and can hang in the wilderness all alone, I don't spend his shows on the edge of my seat. He doesn't get naked and jump into a frozen lake just to show me how to get out of it. Bear does. I'm sorry but you just can't compete with that, gentle Canadian dude.
So if Bear has to stay in a hotel one night, eh, it doesn't bother me so much. He knows how to survive in the wilderness and he's showing me techniques for doing the same and he does it in an entertaining way. As far as I know, he really did sleep in that tree all night with a big old fatty knife in his hand while bears swatted at his toes. And then in the morning he ate their testicles.
Just comparing Man vs. Wild and Survivorman on desert survival. Bear makes much better points about surviving than Les. Bear does it in the summer, Les in the winter. They both make some good points. But I'd say Bear is ahead of Les; Les assumes you've brought resources, Bear less so.
ReplyDeleteA substantial amount of Bear's advice is horrible.
ReplyDeleteMan vs. Wild is more about "Look at what Bear can do!" then it is about actual survival. It's literally about a man conquering the wild, which is fine. Survivorman is about what to do if you're in a survival situation.
Not saying Bear couldn't survive -- the man's highly trained -- but if people actually use all of his advice in a survival situation, they're going to lose their life a lot of the time.
The real question is...who would win in a fight?
ReplyDeleteOh that one's easy: Bear. I mean come on, his name is Bear.
ReplyDelete