This post is about the show Finding Bigfoot on the Animal Planet. I like to think of this show as the smart man's Jersey Shore. It is a show that you know is going to be awful. And then you, for some reason, turn it on just to see how horrible it is. And while, yes, your expectations are confirmed and the show is laughably bad, you find that you can't look away.
Four adults, who consider themselves professionals of something, go all over the country trying to find evidence of the sasquatch. And even though, season after season, episode after episode, they find absolutely nothing, they are all convinced that everywhere they go, sasquatches are close by. Their methods for discovery include: 1) listening to hillbillies and young children describe easily contrived stories about seeing giant hairy monsters in the woods, 2) going into the woods at night and screaming at the top of their lungs (because they honestly believe that this attracts bigfoots) while often mistaking each other for sasquatches on an infrared camera, and 3) sidestepping every remotely scientific approach to each situation. And yet at the end of each episode, the lead member of the team sums up the episode by saying that after all that, there is definitive evidence that sasquatches exist in that area.
My favorite part of the show is how they use the made-up word 'squatch' -- as a noun, verb, and adjective -- to evade actual observations. For example, they often say an area is 'squatchy', which apparently means that a sasquatch COULD live there. But they do not give guidelines for what makes something 'squatchy'; it seems like the only requirement is trees. When they walk around in the woods, it is called 'squatching', and when they see anything at all, it is usually a 'squatch'.
But while watching this show, I had an epiphany. There is so much more to this show than four lonely idiots getting paid to yell at trees in the dark. It is actually about THREE lonely idiots...and the smartest bigfoot ever. You see, the fourth member of the sasquatch team is a guy named Bobo. Yes, Bobo (no last name). He is a giant, hairy buffoon who hulks around and says little, and yet mysteriously seems to have the most first-hand experience when it comes to sasquatches. And why is this? Well, the answer is obvious. Bobo himself is a sasquatch, and the show documents him infiltrating the world's leading bigfoot research team (probably) and sabotaging their "research" in order to keep the trail cold on the search for his enigmatic brethren.
This show is a real-life Breaking Bad. Bobo is the elusive Heisenburg, hiding his true identity in plain sight. Just as Walter stays close to his brother-in-law in the DEA to throw them off his trail, but occasionally remind them that he is still out there, Bobo, on the surface, is a hardcore sasquatch fanatic, but behind the scenes, he is manipulating his teammates and destroying any evidence before the team gets too close. Whereas Walter is hiding the fact that he cooks meth, Bobo is hiding the fact that he is actually the missing link.
When viewed this way, the show becomes so much more prolific. At every turn, you see the gears turning behind Bobo's blank drool-covered stare, as he choreographs an elaborate waltz around the obvious truth. And the fascinating part is that, unlike shows like Breaking Bad and Dexter where the character with the second life is the (anti)hero, here this revelation is not made clear; the audience is as in the dark as the rest of the team. I wonder how long until one of the team members gets too close; will Bobo cook up some ricin poison, or, more simply, will he just eat them?
me heartz bobo <3
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