This is a different kind of doc than the first one. This time, our conspiracy theorist "researcher" is essentially our host, as he goes to disappearance hotspots to "research" three disappearances and spread a little bit on paranormal nonsense along the way. The first one was kind of cute with how he dropped little bread crumb trails to lead us to his theory that Big Foot stole all the missing people. That one actually felt like a documentary though, as it was decently structured and let the people who were a part of the event tell their stories, all of which matched a similar profile. This time, David Paulides is the main character, not the cases, and he gives real crackpot energy. He continuously shows us his map of the US with big red dots where there have been multiple cases of disappearances and he vists three. He leads very guided interviews and asks dumb ass questions as we (for some reason) fly around in a helicopter. This time, he changes his approach to his theory and provides us with a list of like twelve vague similarities between all the disappearances (shit like "by water", "by boulders", "elderly/disabled/sick") and for each case he highlights which ones apply. The problem is, none of these cases have all of the similarities. He'll harp for twenty minutes about how they all happen by a water source and then cut to one that doesn't. It's almost if his list is bullshit and just really a list of "things in national park forests". Sort of hilariously, he tells us He spent a week camping in one of the hotspots and found/saw/heard absolutely nothing. He does still try and lead us to Big Foot (ignoring any reasonable doubt or possible alternatives) but he also introduces aliens into the mix. Like last time, he never goes as far as to say "Aliens did it", but he clearly has a theory to sell. This really becomes a problem with the last case he presents us, which is totally unrelated to the rest of the doc, as it is about a "strange occurrence" in some small Ohio town. Some lady claims to have been hunting deer in her backyard when she saw something weird, which she describes to be almost exactly like the Predator" you know, from the fucking movie. She perfectly describes the Predator's camouflage and the recreation shows the exact same thing. She has zero proof that any of the happened (minus a shitty pre-smart phone era cell phone picture that they are claiming is too small to be taken by natural means and has to have been effected by aliens. Of all the bullshit, I think this is my favorite nugget. If you choose not to watch the whole thing, at least watch the last fifteen minutes to hear them try and explain this shit). Honestly, I think Paulides just wanted an excuse to feature the guy who he calls "the smartest man I've ever met", which is a dubious claim at best as the guy acts like an old Nokia phone is some amazing technology and spends a good five minutes trying to explain to us, the clearly mentally deficient audience, how a camera phone works, while implying that today's smart phones have front and back cameras that he thinks record simultaneously. He keeps saying that when you're recording something, it's also recording your face, but these old cell phones only had the one camera, so they only could record forwards. I mean, yeah, the phones with only the front facing camera could only record what was in front of them, but phones with an additional camera on the front of the phone don't record from both cameras at the same time. He comes off as "old man yells at sky" and I don't know if we should be putting too much stock into his thoughts on his wife's claim when he doesn't thinks when he acts like today's cell phones are brand new tech that the average person needs to be told about (very badly). Missing 411: The Hunted is a big step down in very way. The first one was a creepy little compilation of first hand stories with a sprinkling of Paulides dropping some Big Foot hints. This one is Paulides leading us on his "investigation" where he conducts bad interviews and muddies the waters of his already tenuous grasp of what is plausible. This one just wasn't any fun. I missed how creepy the first one was and this one felt like a very bad Discovery show. This belongs in 23 minute chunks between Ancient Aliens and Zack Baggins.
This is a different kind of doc than the first one. This time, our conspiracy theorist "researcher" is essentially our host, as he goes to disappearance hotspots to "research" three disappearances and spread a little bit on paranormal nonsense along the way. The first one was kind of cute with how he dropped little bread crumb trails to lead us to his theory that Big Foot stole all the missing people. That one actually felt like a documentary though, as it was decently structured and let the people who were a part of the event tell their stories, all of which matched a similar profile. This time, David Paulides is the main character, not the cases, and he gives real crackpot energy. He continuously shows us his map of the US with big red dots where there have been multiple cases of disappearances and he vists three. He leads very guided interviews and asks dumb ass questions as we (for some reason) fly around in a helicopter. This time, he changes his approach to his theory and provides us with a list of like twelve vague similarities between all the disappearances (shit like "by water", "by boulders", "elderly/disabled/sick") and for each case he highlights which ones apply. The problem is, none of these cases have all of the similarities. He'll harp for twenty minutes about how they all happen by a water source and then cut to one that doesn't. It's almost if his list is bullshit and just really a list of "things in national park forests". Sort of hilariously, he tells us He spent a week camping in one of the hotspots and found/saw/heard absolutely nothing. He does still try and lead us to Big Foot (ignoring any reasonable doubt or possible alternatives) but he also introduces aliens into the mix. Like last time, he never goes as far as to say "Aliens did it", but he clearly has a theory to sell. This really becomes a problem with the last case he presents us, which is totally unrelated to the rest of the doc, as it is about a "strange occurrence" in some small Ohio town. Some lady claims to have been hunting deer in her backyard when she saw something weird, which she describes to be almost exactly like the Predator" you know, from the fucking movie. She perfectly describes the Predator's camouflage and the recreation shows the exact same thing. She has zero proof that any of the happened (minus a shitty pre-smart phone era cell phone picture that they are claiming is too small to be taken by natural means and has to have been effected by aliens. Of all the bullshit, I think this is my favorite nugget. If you choose not to watch the whole thing, at least watch the last fifteen minutes to hear them try and explain this shit). Honestly, I think Paulides just wanted an excuse to feature the guy who he calls "the smartest man I've ever met", which is a dubious claim at best as the guy acts like an old Nokia phone is some amazing technology and spends a good five minutes trying to explain to us, the clearly mentally deficient audience, how a camera phone works, while implying that today's smart phones have front and back cameras that he thinks record simultaneously. He keeps saying that when you're recording something, it's also recording your face, but these old cell phones only had the one camera, so they only could record forwards. I mean, yeah, the phones with only the front facing camera could only record what was in front of them, but phones with an additional camera on the front of the phone don't record from both cameras at the same time. He comes off as "old man yells at sky" and I don't know if we should be putting too much stock into his thoughts on his wife's claim when he doesn't thinks when he acts like today's cell phones are brand new tech that the average person needs to be told about (very badly). Missing 411: The Hunted is a big step down in very way. The first one was a creepy little compilation of first hand stories with a sprinkling of Paulides dropping some Big Foot hints. This one is Paulides leading us on his "investigation" where he conducts bad interviews and muddies the waters of his already tenuous grasp of what is plausible. This one just wasn't any fun. I missed how creepy the first one was and this one felt like a very bad Discovery show. This belongs in 23 minute chunks between Ancient Aliens and Zack Baggins.
