TV Show: The Unit

[oldsoldier]

Well, I dont normally watch alot of TV outside of either the discovery channel or history channel here, but, I am addicted to a show here in America called "The Unit". It is a fictionalized show about US Army Delta Force soldiers, and its split between them doing stuff, and what their famileis go through while they are off having fun. Anyway, tonight, they had one of the soldiers in a helicopter accident somewhere over Russia. He used several techniques (albeit a little fictionalized, but, pretty good for TV) such as using a fire bow (although, where he got the wood from, I dont know, he was in what looked like a high steppe plateau), water from digging under a rcok (ok, it FLOWED up, but, the technique was there), setting a snare to catch wildlife (right next to his shelter...), he ate grubs though, and even made an attempt at signalling with his watch crystal. He used what was left of the helicopter, and even made a statement how, normally, you WOULD stay with the wreckage, but, in his instance, he simply couldnt. Overall, for TV, I was fairly impressed. Even if it was a little Hollywood.

[charlie]

they should make a tv series following some guy that is realy in a survival situation, a bit like realiy tv but for bushcrafters

[Scotty]

There are already shows like that, such as Survivorman and Bear Grylls

[oldsoldier]

Seeing a survival can be mostly a "sit & wait" game, it'd be kinda like watching paint dry .
The survival shows we have now should, IMHO, be 1/2 hr long, no more. Show one skill, or a small set of related skills, and leave it at that. I think that the History Channel should pick up something along those lines.
But, for what I watched last night, they did a decent job. It wasnt over-dramatized, he didnt have a huge knife, and he didnt do anything super human. Granted, it took all of 5 seconds to get a fire, BUT, they did show him putting the ember into the tinder, blowing it into a flame, THEN adding that to kindling. And, they even showed a decent figure 4 deadfall, and a rabbit snare. Granted, we all here know these things, but, it wasnt like he McGuyvered any of it.

[Sticks-N-Stones]

• The Unit is one of my favorite shows. Often highly fictionalized, but still fun to watch. I personally was rather disappointed in the particular survival episode mentioned above (no shelter was built by the guy, leaving the injured woman to crawl into the wreckage to escape the freezing rain and wind. Bag juju), but on the whole the show is well done. You definatly have to suspend disbelief for some of the things they do, but then again, some of the things they do are absolutely brilliant bits of writing.
• Survivorman is all about following one guy while he survives in various situations. He is totally self supported and all alone. He does all of his own camera work. He has no one to bail him out and must wait for extraction if he cant move to safety. He has actually had to destroy some of his cameras before to get to potential survival equipment before (i.e, break out the lens to use for fire starting). Hes done some bone head things before - like setting his shelter on fire, or cutting himself, but he owns up to it when he does them and he almost always walks out - but not always. Hes been rescued once or twice.
• I have been deeply disappointed in Man Vs Wild (the Bear Grylls show). He IS supported by a camera crew in the event of trouble, he does A LOT of bone headed things (******* all over himself to "keep cool", drinking raw jungle water and being surprised he was shooting from both ends all night, jumping from pool to pool in a creek where he cant see where his feet will land and burning hundreds of calories he might need later, trying to ride a "wild" horse, squeezing elephant droppings into his mouth for the liquid content, etc) and on numerous occasions, if you pay attention, you can see how he cheats his audience... he hid a life vest under his jacket when "escaping" from a grizzly. Tents can be seen hidden behind brush piles. He has been accompanied by local experts who have had to keep him out of trouble. And that 'wild horse'? It was shod and you could see saddle marks on it. One of the situations he PARACHUTED into (cuz, ya know, most survival situations occur when you parachute into your location) was identified as being about 1km from a significant road, and being connected to a fairly popular camping area outside a California lake.
• When The Unit screws up, its Hollyweird. When Les Stroud (Survivorman) screws up, he owns his mistake and carries on. When Bear Grylls screws up, they put it on the commercial to show how 'hard core' he is. Bah!

I cant get paragraph breaks to form, so I made a list out of the paragraphs so thats its not one huge blog of text.