Alaska News

Reality Check: The Hillstrands go hunting for monsters

What's the deal with monsters? (Said like mid-'90s Jerry Seinfeld). There are a lot of shows about finding Bigfoot, or the weird otter-like creatures of the little-known "Alaska Triangle." Several shows are specifically about monsters that live in rivers -- "River Monsters," "Monster Croc Invasion" and "Monster Island" -- and Animal Planet has a "Monster Week."

The monster-hunting show craze within the Discovery Channel empire has bled* into strange cross-promotion shows like "Alaskan Monster Hunt: Hillstranded."

Anyone who has dabbled in reality TV over the past few years knows the Hillstrands from the "Deadliest Catch," or from their stores in Homer, or you've run into them at the Salty Dawg. These guys are the closest thing Alaska has to the Kardashians, and apparently they really believe in sea monsters.

They are great for TV, because you can tell they don't care at allllll. They wander around fishing and hunting stores being followed by cameras buying silly equipment and loving that somehow they found a way to be famous for being themselves.

They do ridiculous things like spin their boat around Kachemak Bay after drinking at the Salty Dawg to "turn back time" since it's bad luck to head out fishing on Friday.

In this particular show they are heading to Bristol Bay to look for sea monsters. They are hyper aware of the cameras and say things like:

Brother 1: "We're gonna get this monster in. Then what are we gonna do?"

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Brother 2: "We're gonna need a bigger boat."

Then they giggle at each other.

Maybe they are being facetious, maybe they are being drunk, but either way it works.

They also encounter of a cast of local characters who point them in the direction of a giant lake monster hiding out in Iliamna. One guys says he's seen the monsters but never told anyone because "people might think I'm crazy, or 'what I've been smoking?' or something like that."

The greatest part of the show occurs when they borrow a boat to find said giant lake monster, reassuring the boat's owner that they've been around boats their entire lives and to trust them. However, they end up spinning around in circles right next to the dock, and right in front of the owner.

There are a few stunts for the cameras, like when the salmon they are using as bait come up completely chewed up, likely from a production assistant with a fillet knife. And at one point they have something fierce on the line, but of course they lose it after a few minutes of yelling at each other. But unlike shows that take themselves seriously, after they lose the monster the Hillstrands just start laughing and go back to their interviews, drinking whiskey.

This is what reality TV should be: a marginally entertaining glimpse into strange people's lives as they do stupid things for the cameras {stamp of approval}.

Emily Fehrenbacher lives in Anchorage, where she reviews Alaska reality TV. You can reach her at realitycheck@alaskadispatch.com or on Twitter @ETFBacher.

*Editor's note: We've been informed that "Alaskan Monster Hunt: Hillstranded" originally aired in 2011. Apparently reality TV's monster craze goes back further than we'd thought.

Emily Fehrenbacher

Emily Fehrenbacher lives in Anchorage and writes "Reality Check," a regular look at reality television set in Alaska.

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