My Guilty Pleasure: Mantracker

Oh, my. For years I’ve turned up my nose at reality TV shows. How could anyone ever waste their time on such silliness?

Well, now I know. Now I’m hooked. Now I’m a faithful devotee of the Canadian reality show:

Mantracker. (Warning: Has auto-play video but you can halt it)

And it all began so innocently. I recently upgraded from barebones basic cable to a wider range of FiOS channels, and among them found all sorts of good stuff on the Discovery collection of channels. Between Discovery Channel, Science Channel, and Animal Planet, there were lots of fascinating shows to watch, shows that I could tell myself were educational – yes, truly! There’s How It’s Made, How Do They Do It, instructive stuff like that.

There’s Mythbusters and Dirty Jobs -- definitely fun to watch, and also instructive, yes, they are too!

There’s Fatal Attractions – um, okay, so stories of how exotic pet owners get offed by their beloved critters IS a bit creepy....

Then of course, there are shows like Hoarders (on A&E) and Hoarding: Buried Alive – ah, well, yes, that’s kinda sicko voyeurism, I admit it; but hey! Every time I watch one of those shows, I clean out some clutter, so it can’t be all bad, right?

But then there’s Mantracker. There is no way I can defend that as educational, instructive, or in any way useful. But dammit, what a blast it is to watch! And I adore Terry Grant, the Mantracker himself. The Wikipedia article on the show has lots of information, if you, my Gentle Reader (assuming there's anyone out there), are inclined to learn more.

Well, yes. Yes, one does get to see magnificent scenic vistas amid the wilder areas of our friendly neighbor to the north. Also to see two guys on horseback hunt two people on foot through said scenic wonders. And no one eats bugs. So at least there’s that.