Finding Bigfoot Season 2: The Reviews Are In!

The reviews for season 2 of Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot are trickling in this week and we have a couple of good ones from various mainstream sources. Here are a few excerpts, including one review by a surfer dude who wrote:

The characters in the show are all pretty cool and once I knew Bobo was from Humboldt County aka “Pot Heaven USA”, I knew Bigfoot, Bobo and this show were going to be a hit!

Reality TV Review Finding Bigfoot Has Made Me a Believer on Animal Planet
Reality TV Reviews by "Ken Rogers"

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“Matt Moneymaker” – the main character and The founder and president of the Bigfoot Field Researchers

This guy is super cool and I am sure he and Bobo take a few tokes and hit the night trails making howls but he is also a super professional field researcher who is fact driven and a major “squatch lover”. -

Hey Matt – dude I felt your pain when you got yelled at trying to “chase the squatch”. You see it and go after it and “get in trouble”, even though I know Bobo was probably giggling thinking he could just hang and not run in thick woods at night. Also Matt I am just curious but can you smoke weed around the camera guys from Animal Planet when they film you guys in the woods or do you eat brownies???

I am sure “squatch” is smart enough to know what plants are good for eating and which are not so maybe you could leave the old guy some “POT BROWNIES” and skip doing any more rabbit tricks or bringing out baboons ???- (although I liked those episodes)

James “Bobo” Fay “Bobo” has been searching for Bigfoot since the early 1980s and has many interesting theories

Okay now Bobo I think I covered you dude but you are the overgrown kid who has grown up in Bigfoot Land in Northern California assembling “Sasquatch” stories like I do photos on the coast – Dude you can come hang here at the “Celebrity Beach House” here in Mission Beach anytime. You would fit right in here!
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Unlike “Storage Wars” and other shows that start off hot and then fade in interest I think this show has some long term potential and hopefully will see a good run.

I give “Finding Bigfoot” a BIG thumbs up and invite others to watch these scientific Squatch junkies hit the woods and see what happens when you are tracking a 800 lb gorilla all over the USA at night!

So, they say they're "Finding Bigfoot...."
Daytonward.livejournal.com by Dayton Ward

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As for the "hunts" and other evidence scrutiny, there are times when I either laugh out loud or else shake my head in disbelief as someone--usually Moneymaker--leaping to the conclusion that a lack of explanation for something must mean that "a squatch" is responsible. Blurry figure taken with shitty camera at a distance? Must be Bigfoot. Hear something moving around in the woods at night? Squatch is checking you out. An obviously artificially-constructed deer blind near a small creek? The Big Guy must have built it so that he/she could hunt for food...as though humans don't hunt or build deer blinds in that part of the country. There also are more than a small share of "scientific" explanations for supposed Bigfoot behavior that come off as though somebody's just making up shit as they talk.

I also have to question some of Moneymaker's decisions. During one memorable bit during the first season, he takes off running into the dark forest after hearing something moving around in the woods, in defiance of the team's own rules about setting off alone for any reason. He defends his decision to dropkick protocol, including really going off on Holland, who called him out for his bullshit (I assume they kissed and made up at some point, as she's still part of the show...or maybe it's a contract thing and she's biding her time.). On more than one occasion, Moneymaker comes off as arrogant and/or condescending. I imagine he takes a lot of flak from all directions because of his choice to devote so much of his life to this pursuit. While I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, there's just a right way and a wrong way to lead people.

Now, I will say this: An interview with Moneymaker between the first and second seasons suggested that editing decisions were being made with which he and the team took issue, so far as altering the context of a scene or even something one of the team members says (or is purported to have said). If that's true, then that sucks. While I don't expect the team to bag Bigfoot in every episode (or, frankly...any episode), I would still like to see an actual, rigorous process by which evidence and accounts are examined. Instead, we're left with yet another flavor of "paranormal reality TV" such as what Syfy has been giving us the past few years (Of course, there are allegations of behind-the-scenes shenanigans on Ghost Hunters, too, in a bid to make the show more "exciting" and all that.).

Just a few suggestions from a casual observer to the BFRO team on Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot to help them actually find a squatch.
huliq.com by Mechele R. Dillard

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When you find a “squatchy” area, hunt it. You know, while watching last night, and hearing Bobo and the others talk about how incredibly “squatchy” the area was, I found myself wondering, “Why are you leaving?” Bobo even said, after staying out there for three days, that if someone would spend a week or so in the area, that he was sure they could get some real squatch evidence, maybe even run across a squatch or two. If that is so, why are you leaving? I mean, sure, I realize this is a television show, and it is necessary to film in various areas. However, these people—well, some of them—have spent 20+ years hunting this creature—do they not have time to devote a week, even more, to a “squatchy” area?

Use a female or two in the hunt. Yes, Ranae is there, but all she ever seems to do, really, is point out what is wrong with the group’s conclusions. Granted, that keeps her pretty busy. However, the team has repeatedly said that squatches respond better and more readily to females, so why don’t they take advantage of having a female teammate, and have her doing calls more frequently? When in a squatchy area, why not, instead of setting up a immobile deer decoy, set up a female human mannequin? Obviously, if a sasquatch doesn’t know the difference between a live deer and a decoy, the same could work with a female human decoy. And, on last night’s show, the team established that female sasquatches may just be looking for female companions, maybe even having interest in setting up a play date or two. Why not add a jungle gym along with the female decoy, maybe even some kid-size human decoys, to lure them into an open area?

Bacon. Use bacon. Bobo, in his alone time in the woods, established the fact that sasquatches are big on bacon, even tossing a few yummy, charred slices into the woods from his campsite to bring them around (not before, of course, eating a piece or two himself, to let watching bigfoots know that it was good, not contaminated with anything). Now, this being the case—and I happen to recall from some well-executed commercials that bigfoots also enjoy a good jerky, as well—why not just set up a meat trail? Scatter some bacon, deer jerky, maybe a few hot dogs, throughout the woods. Assuming an uninvited predator doesn’t find its way to camp first, a hungry sasquatch is bound to appear in due time.

Don’t overlook any potential DNA sources. Rocks, the team appears to have established in recent episodes, are key sources of bigfoot DNA. Bigfoots, as we all realize by now, have a penchant for rock-throwing. In fact, Cliff gave a inexperienced sasquatch hunter a dressing down last week for missing a prime opportunity for retrieving bigfoot DNA when she did not properly collect sasquatch-thrown rocks for lab analysis. And, last night, the group looked around in a field for any rocks that a presumed sasquatch may have thrown during Bobo’s solo campout. So, why not do a bit more intensive rock-gathering during squatching treks? Anything large enough to be a potential sasquatch missle, gather it, bag it, tag it and have it analyzed, particularly if the rock in question is laying somewhere known for not having such rocks—a field, for example. With enough rock analysis, I believe it is inevitable that bigfoot DNA will be found in the near future.