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And I don’t even like seafood.

But I was hooked on the Discovery Channel’s reality show “Deadliest Catch,” where they followed crews of brave, crazy crab fishermen  up near the Artic Circle.  The reason for the  fascination is obvious.  These men worked literally day and night for several weeks, if they filled the storage tanks with crab and got them to the port in time, they could make tons of money.  If the fishing was bad or they guessed wrong, they went home broke.

I finally understand why seafood is so expensive.

I found myself cheering when the crab traps were full and my heart sank when they came up empty.  I got to witness what appeared to be real life drama when the men did not get along, or when the stress was too much for them.

And drama is what the networks are looking for.  Drama equals ratings. 

Then came the ultimate drama.

A few times, I watched breathlessly as men fell overboard and were rescued against all odds.  Men would slip and fall or get hit in the head with heavy equipment, risking serious injury, hours away from any kind of medical treatment.  Yeah, exciting.  Like watching Star Trek, only this was real.  In Star Trek, the heroes always made it back.

Then, one episode– mayday.  One of the ships had gone down and the other crews searched desperately and listened helplessly to the radio during while the Coast Guard scoured the seas.  But there was no rescue this time.  Men died.  Only a few survived.  Although this was not one of the crews that the series followed,  they had, ironically, shot some video of these men before they had left on the fateful voyage,  joking with each other about not making it back.  For weeks they re-ran that episode, along with one where one of the survivors told the terrible story of how he watched his friends and fellow crewmen die when he could not help them.

I’m sure the ratings soared.

For me, it was no longer fun after that.  I watched it less and less.

The problem with reality TV is that it won’t let you go.  One of the dramas that unfolded while I was watching surrounded one of the captains, a loveable curmudgeon named Phil Harris.  He got extremely ill during one of the voyages.  When they got back they got him to the hospital where he discovered that he had nearly died.  His days of a crab boat captain was over.

Well, it hit the news this week that Capt. Phil passed away.  I look at the photos and the video with that same spooky feeling I get when I look at pictures and video of loved ones who have passed on.  Even though I stopped watching the show, it still got to me this week.

Now many will say that reality TV is what it’s all about.  Yes, I still watch Ghost Hunters, and exciting shows like “Destroyed in Seconds” or the ones about the wild police chases, but even when you see an accident where someone dies, well, it’s all at a distance;  you don’t know the person.  You feel bad, but you can still sleep at night.  When a major character on your favorite fictional drama is killed off, you may be a little saddened, even grieve a little bit, but you know that the person was not real, and that the actor is likely to turn up in another series in a few months.

But Capt. Phil is gone for real.  Reality TV is real.  Too real.  And, as bad as I may feel, I cannot imagine what his friends and family are going through, seeing him in the news and on TV in the countless re-runs will certainly be aired.

Sometimes, that’s not entertainment.

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