Creepy Planet

I love getting creeped out. That's pretty much the reason why I love shows like Ghost Hunters. Another show, on the same Sci-Fi Network, is Destination Truth, another documentary/reality show in the vein of Ghost Hunters (in fact, the host of DT has appeared as a guest on GH). Whereas Ghost Hunters concentrates on the adventures of The Atlantic Paranormal Society as they investigate various locales in the United States purported to be haunted or beset by paranormal goings-on, Destination Truth is all about mysterious phenomenon, monsters and local legends from all over the world.

This pretty much entails having imposingly tall but amiable host Josh Gates running around the globe with his team of investigators, visiting various countries and looking for a rumored boogeyman. Pretty much invariably, this boils down to the show's host and company (awkwardly or hilariously) interfacing with the locals, meeting up with 'witnesses' or specialists on the monster-of-the-show, and then trekking to the remote location where the creature/object of their hunt is said to lurk. What follows in the last third of the episodes is usually a hodgepodge of night-vision footage as the team encounter eerie sounds, blurry dark shadows and creepy atmosphere.

For the most part, footage and evidence found is inconclusive and vague, and suspense often occurring not due to a face-to-face meeting with any monster but due to someone slipping on a log, seeing a big bug or normal, non-supernatural animal. Still, the atmosphere is usually always creepy in that Blair Witch sort of way. In other words... very similar to Ghost Hunters, just all about monsters and more world-spanning. In the end, it's all a little bit Globe Trekker/Lonely Planet travelog, but with a creepy twist, which I thoroughly enjoy, despite the overall light tone, campiness and fact that it's all in a tongue-in-cheek way, non-committal but intriguing. Just good, clean creepy fun. I'll probably have a Destination Truth marathon along with a Ghost Hunters marathon this Halloween... Heh...