Finding Bigfoot in NC’s Uwharrie Mountains

I was very excited to learn that Animal Planet had decided to send Matt Moneymaker and his team of Bigfoot finders from Finding Bigfoot to the Uwharrie National Forest to find Bigfoot.  The important thing about the Uwharrie National Forest is it’s near me, which is exactly where I want Bigfoot to be found so I can go look at him.  I was a little surprised to hear that Bigfoot was so close to me, since nobody I know has mentioned that Bigfoot is right down the road, but I’m relatively new in town.  Maybe I’m just not in on all of the local secrets.

Matt and his team traveled to NC, where they met up with Mr. Greene, an older man who has been looking for Bigfoot for years.  Mr. Greene solemnly informed us that he has finally found Bigfoot and here is his Amazing Video Evidence, which I later found out is two years old.  Mr. Greene’s Amazing Video Evidence was also thermal, which kind of doesn’t count, as far as I’m concerned.  White blobs don’t prove much.  Flat-out daylight Bigfoot videos don’t prove much, what with costumes and computer generated images and all.  I don’t know why we are looking at a white blob, but we are.

Mr. Greene shows us his Amazing Thermal Video Evidence and tells us the story that goes with it.  Something In The Forest menaced Mr. Greene in his tent when he was camping.  He got out, set up his thermal camera, baited a tree stump with a candy bar, then pretended to leave in his vehicle.  The Amazing Thermal Video Evidence is a white blob snatching something (we assume it’s Mr. Greene’s candy bar) from something (we assume it’s Mr. Greene’s stump).

The Finding Bigfoot team immediately springs into action, setting up an experiment of their own, and that experiment aims to duplicate Mr. Greene’s Amazing Thermal Video Evidence.  Matt Moneymaker poo-poos the experiment.  He says the video is obviously real.  The subject obviously isn’t wearing clothes.  Clothes would be dark spots on the video, and this video shows an obviously naked pure white blob.  I get a little nervous, here.  Bobo of team Finding Bigfoot is normally the Bigfoot stand-in, and I don’t want Bobo to be naked, at least not where I can see him.  Thankfully, Bobo proceeds to crawl around without disrobing.

Matt seems annoyed as the experiment commences.  Matt seems to think it’s a waste of time.  If “waste of time” is defined as producing an exact match, then, yes, the experiment is a waste of time.  The white blob created by Bobo heat is an exact match for the white blob created by Supposed Bigfoot heat, right down to the size.  You have to wonder if Bobo was creeping around in these woods two years ago, looking for candy bars.

We wait to see what Matt is going to say about this exact match business, because Matt doesn’t like to be crossed and will not tolerate being proved wrong.  After a moment of suspense, Matt gives his opinion, which is that the video is real because Bigfoot loves peanut butter.  We are treated to a photo montage of empty jars of peanut butter in the woods.  Apparently many Bigfoot hunters use peanut butter as bait. 

I eye my little dogs, who are sleeping through the show.  They like peanut butter.  Hell, I like peanut butter.  I imagine that bears like peanut butter.  Even allergic people who can be killed by peanut butter like peanut butter.  I somehow missed what kind of candy bar Mr. Greene left out for Bigfoot, but it must have included peanut butter, unless it didn’t and Matt is just trying to baffle us with bullshit.  Honestly, it could go either way because Matt goes on to tell us that the Bigfoot White Blob in the video is the same size as the Bobo Man-Sized White Blob in the re-enactment video because it’s a man-sized juvenile Bigfoot in Mr. Greene’s white blob footage.

The team then proceeds to do what they do, which is run around in the woods with their own thermal cameras, trying to find Bigfoot.  At one point, they see a bipedal white blob on their thermal cameras.  It looks like Elmer Fudd would look as a white blob, so I figure it’s a hunter, but maybe it’s Bigfoot, I don’t know.  Matt’s team doesn’t know, either, but Matt is going to find out.  Matt breaks into a run, which I assume can’t be a really fast run because Matt doesn’t appear to be in any kind of middle-aged shape and he’s carrying crap, to boot.  Naturally, he catches nothing.

Matt running off into the woods after Bigfoot really ticks off Matt’s team.  They declare that he did exactly the wrong thing, and I think they are probably right.  Chasing something you have no chance of catching achieves the result of chasing it away unless it turns around and eats you.  The team declares that Matt would kick their asses if they pulled such a stunt, and that is what they tell Matt when he gets back, minus Bigfoot.

Matt puffs up in disbelief and informs his team and us that HE IS THE LEADER.  He makes informed leader decisions that nobody else can make.  If he wants to chase away Bigfoot, that’s his damned business, and everybody needs to shut up and watch and learn. 

The team seems to accept Matt’s theory of leadership.  They also accept the next decision, which is to leave the area where they think they saw something on their thermal imager to search ANOTHER area where they haven’t seen anything.  This is just like last week, where they left a place that seemed promising to look somewhere else.  I don’t get it.

So they go somewhere else, to a town meeting where townspeople tell their own Bigfoot encounter stories.  Matt and Team pick out three stories to investigate.  One of the stories involves something that was on all fours chasing an ATV. 

The ATV story and the Bigfoot hunters’ interest in it confuses me.  Isn’t Bigfoot a bipedal creature?  This story is about something fourpedal (I know, I know, “fourpedal” isn’t a word).  The woman who was on the back of the ATV describes, basically, Cerberus the three-headed hell dog minus two heads.  Bobo crawls around in the woods for her with his ass up in the air, and she says that what she saw was a lot bigger than Bobo.  Then I’m thinking Hogzilla.  Big, wild pig.  The Finding Bigfoot people must be worried that we are going to think it was a bear, because they tell us that sometimes Bigfoot PRETENDS to be a bear to confuse people.

I want to believe.  I really want to believe in Bigfoot.  This show isn’t helping.  I have to confess…I joined my dogs and fell asleep before the end of this episode.  We dreamed of peanut butter.