Film and TV

‘Alaskan Bush People’ winds down season in Colorado

After watching two more hours of "Alaskan Bush People," it seems the Browns are moving to Colorado for real.

Instead of discussing Ami's cancer treatment options, talking about the sadness of the kids' reactions to the terrible news about their mom, or any of the other depressing facts, let's just break down the ways in which human man-child Bear decided to spend his time during this episode.

First, Bear decides to try to feel more at home (meaning "extreme" and "wild") in Los Angeles by creating a rope swing. This rope swing is actually just a rope tied with the very technical "awesome knot." The "awesome knot" is just Bear tying several knots on top of one another until you can stand on it to swing.

Next, he helps a family friend out in the kitchen. First, they make a mixture of what appears to be Chex Mix and Goldfish crackers. Bear goes on and on about the amazing cooking, but I think they literally opened some boxes and poured the ingredients onto a foil tray. They then make a berry tart that Bear says "belongs in a museum" and tell his mom that he made it with "powdery things you cook with."

[More ADN coverage of 'Alaskan Bush People']

The family sets off in an RV on their adventure to see the land in Colorado where they can build Browntown 2.0. It is 122 degrees in Nevada or Arizona on their trip, and Bear cannot hang in those temperatures. So he decides to go swimming at their hotel in his jeans, a belt and his signature red tank top. More egregious is that he then instantly gets into the family's RV in soaking wet jeans. The only thing worse than being the guy in soaking wet jeans is sharing a cushioned bench with the guy in soaking wet jeans.

Finally, they make it to Colorado, and the majority of the children instantly feel at home. Bear wants to feel even more at home so he rubs all sorts of plants on himself so he can "smell like the forest" to disguise himself from predators. While walking the perimeter of the property, Noah and human Bear stumble upon an animal bear. Human Bear decides to run toward the animal bear, which alarms the production staff.

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The production staff asks Noah, "Does he have a gun?" No. "Does he have any weapon whatsoever?" No. Human Bear finally stops chasing the animal bear, after it shows no interest in running at all — toward or away from him.

Which leads to the last and final weird thing that human Bear did this episode. As they were driving around Colorado, he begged his dad to ride standing on the roof of the RV. He finally gets atop the RV and a producer says, "You shouldn't be up there."

In this episode you see that being the producer assigned to follow Bear Brown is the most stressful job in television. I would watch a TV show where production has equal screen time trying to stop Bear from doing dumb, dangerous things.

The show ends with what seems to be a signoff from the Browns thanking viewers for the well wishes. Noah says he's going to leave the family to become a small-town sheriff (finally his outfit choices make sense), Gabe is nowhere to be found because he doesn't want to be on TV anymore, and Rain — the most adult of all the children despite being 14 years old — is going to build her own cabin on the property.

And with that, another season of "Alaskan Bush People" is in the books.

Emily Fehrenbacher

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

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