You Vs Wild is the latest in the long line of terrible Bear Grylls catastrophes, the most famous of which is his first show, Man Vs Wild, which got cancelled following a scandal involving Bear checking into a hotel and eating blueberry pancakes when he was supposedly surviving in the wild instead.
You Vs Wild is Bear's first foray into interactive media. Yes, this is a Netflix Interactive series, hence the title YOU Vs Wild.
I've hated Bear Grylls for a long time, and allow me to explain why by way of pointing out a few of the dumber moments in the first episode. (Click on any of the screenshots for a larger version.)
There was absolutely no reason for Bear to jump out of this plane. On Man Vs Wild it was often presented as a dynamic entry from a crashing plane or something to explain why he was there with limited supplies, but the story here has no such thing. He's looking for a "Dr. Ramos" who has some medicines she needs to deliver to a village. There's a bit of a time factor, but nothing to explain why he had to jump out of a moving vehicle into crocodile infested waters instead of coming to a stop and taxiing to shore.
I almost didn't complain about this choice. Look, one of these choices is obviously wrong and I shouldn't need to explain to you which one that is. Since I do have to explain... bushwhacking is an obviously terrible choice. Follow the river. Don't go whacking through snakes and jaguars, expending massive amounts of energy, in a damn wilderness survival situation. In a survival situation where you may not have easy access to food and clean water, the path of least resistance is always best.
That's not necessarily a bad thing. Present two choices, and afterward explain which of the two was best and why... but that's not what Bear does. Neither option is presented as being wrong. Neither option is really even explained all that adequately. How is this supposed to be teaching me anything?
In case you can't see it clearly, yes, that is a crocodile that Bear is choosing to piss off for no reason. This isn't even a choice I made, he just decided to do it because Bear Grylls enjoys living life on Hard Mode.
But seriously, I could see having the slingshot ready just in case, but there was no reason to shoot the crocodile when it wasn't doing anything. It could have just as easily turned and went for the person antagonizing it instead of crawling away, and there'd be nothing you could do. Leave the crocodiles alone!
Yes, you can make Bear Grylls eat a giant bug in the first episode. (There's a later episode where you can make him eat bear poop too.) His reaction when you pick for him to eat the grub (shown above) is also the only intentionally funny moment in the episode.
Here we see another one of the many choices in the series where both answers are wrong and terrible. If bushwhacking through the jungle is a stupid idea, then taking stupid risks at a ravine is an even worse idea. If it seems even a little questionable, GO AROUND. Do not try to balance-beam your way across a two-inch wide log. Do not Tarzan-swing on a vine. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
The thing is, Bear Grylls is a professional adventurer. He was trained in survival tactics by the SAS, he climbed Mount Everest... he clearly does know what he's supposed to be doing, but you'd never know it from watching any of his TV shows, where he shows all the survival instinct of a sheltered city kid whose only experience with nature is climbing a tree in the city park.
Then again, he was also born into money as the fortunate son of a politician, he was only a reserve member of the SAS who never received a deployment, and he climbed Mt. Everest as part of a large expedition with lots of help. He's also one of those people who readily self-identifies as a "philanthropist" though apparently that doesn't mean much to anyone but me.
Even if you ignore all the dumb stuff and just take the show on entertainment value, it's still very short, not particularly interesting, and has a bare minimum of story to it. It's not nearly the best Netflix Interactive series there is. Just ignore this awful show.
HORRIBLE
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