Attack of the Cryptozoologists!

I was browsing the Netflix Instant library today, and I came across a terrible show about which I had entirely forgotten.  When we had cable for a few months a while back, I had a harrowing and mysterious encounter with the History Channel's "MonsterQuest" program.

In case you haven't seen it, it's like a terrible reality show version of the "X-Files."  At the beginning of the episode, various idiots across America describe that time they saw Bigfoot / the Jersey Devil / their grandmother naked.  Then, a camera crew sorely lacking in artistic vision, along with an expert whom you can only assume has a history of heavy drug use, embark on a quest to prove that said monstrosity exists, and poses a severe threat to the survival of vacationers everywhere.

I didn't remember how terrible the show was, so I decided to watch an episode.  I chose to educate myself about the Megalodon, an enormous shark that lived millions of years ago and may or may not still be crashing at his buddy's place in the Mariana Trench.

The MonsterQuest team headed to Mexico's Sea of Cortez, where fishermen had been reporting the presence of a large aquatic creature that would most likely be frightening if one were to encounter it personally.  Preparations for an exploratory dive were being put together by a Formerly Overconfident American Interloper who had a Mysterious Encounter immediately after the Wise Aged Local had given him a Cryptic Warning about That Which We Do Not Understand.

I was already losing patience when the dive team explained how they would be able to tell if they had chosen the right location to search for the Megalodon.  According to the Formerly Overconfident American Interloper, who was also apparently an expert in This Kind of Stuff, if the sea lions on the island they were exploring looked anxious, then that was a sign that there was surely a mega-predator somewhere nearby.

As soon as they started swimming around the breeding grounds, wielding enormous cameras and making a lot of noise, the team noticed that those sea lions sure seemed uncomfortable, and God knows those things only get nervous when gigantic dinosaur-sharks are approaching.  The divers got out of the water just in time to not snap a picture of the presumably coy beast.

That's when I turned off the computer so I could go make some lunch.