Untamed & Uncut is a collection of four episodes from the new show of the same name that launched on Animal Planet. While it’s referred to as a documentary series, I regret to inform you that Untamed & Uncut is kind of like watching the Real Stories Of The Highway Patrol, only with critters instead of drunk and/or cracked-out drivers.
At first, I didn’t seem to object to the show — until I popped the DVD in, that is. For starters, the episode titles reflect very little of the episode material itself. Example: “Double Great White Attack” builds up your adrenaline by promising to deliver raw and uncensored footage of a surfer being attacked by two of the ocean’s most infamous carnivores. Now, while anyone with a little common sense can imagine, this isn’t something that could be filmed up close and personal without staging the entire thing (and who would really want to risk something like that?), so I wasn’t disappointed to see the footage (which filmed from the shore). What I was disappointed with, however, was the fact that the whole “Double Great White Attack” bit occurs briefly somewhere in the middle of an hour-long episode that is padded with other non-related “Animals Gone Wild” segments.
Okay, so far, not all that enthralling for me. But that wasn’t the kicker. Not even the fairly decent CGI animation used to show you what just happened in a more exploitive way could top that. No, for me, the kicker was the painful realization that Untamed & Uncut is not educational material like it claims to be — instead, this series is nothing more than cheap exploitation. How did I find this out? It’s quite hilarious, actually. First off, allow me to give you a bit of personal information here: I work in a radio station. At that radio station, we make a lot of commercials — and one a key ingredient to any commercial (well, sometimes) is an impressive sound effect. Sound effects can be purchased on CD, like this really cheapo three-CD set we have entitled 300 Spectacular Sound Effects, which features some of the lousiest sounds ever pressed on plastic.
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