Duck Season

I don’t watch much television during the day or evening. Not for any sanctimonious reason. It’s just that my interest in any particular show dwindles pretty quickly. I might find a show to be engaging, but after a couple of weeks, I find I’m no longer interested. Although I found “Mad Men,” “Nurse Jackie” or “Dr. Oz” absorbing to begin with, I didn’t make it past season one.

Anyway, sometimes in the middle of night, I wake and have trouble falling back asleep.  I will then pick up the remote and flip channels until I find something of interest. And that’s how I found this show on the Animal Planet network, called “North Woods Law.” It’s follows the exploits of an elite group of game wardens in the backwoods of the state of Maine during hunting season. I’m not certain why, but I found it riveting.

Perhaps it interests me because I now know more about hunting since moving to rural America. If you enjoy walking or hiking out here, it behooves you to be aware of the various hunting seasons. For instance, even here in our private community, bow hunting of deer and turkey is allowed during an appropriate time in late fall or early winter. This method of thinning out the herd is beneficial to the remaining animals, or so I am told by hunters. Anyway for that reason, during the season, it’s best to stay out of the wooded areas and/or to wear some day-glo orange wherever you are when out walking.

So, late one sleepless night or early morning, while looking for the “North Woods Law” show, I came across a program with some guys who looked like hunters. It was on A&E. I paused to watch...

It was a shot of three or four guys, all with flowing shoulder-length hair, full ZZ Top-like beards and they were wearing typical hunting gear, camouflage hunting jacket or vests, their heads topped off with either a tight knit cap, a bandana, or a camouflage hat. With the aid of a hunting dog they were chasing wild hogs. And I do mean running-full-out chasing, leaping-over-logs chasing, through the briar and the brambles chasing. Interspersed with the shots of them running, seemingly amok, are “talking head” shots featuring three of the group as they tell the viewer of the merits of catching your own meat, as opposed to buying it in a grocery store. There is not a bit of uppityness or pretense about them as they dispense their information and insights. No, they joke easily about themselves in a self-effacing manner. In this episode, a hunter laughingly recalls, “Last time I ran this hard was from a game warden. Back when I was about 20. You know what I’m sayin’?” I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had taken the bait and the hook was set, captivated by the Robertson clan on “The Duck Dynasty.”

If you haven’t seen the show, let me give you a brief overview. The Robertsons are Phil and Kay Robertson, Phil’s younger brother, Si, and three of Phil and Kay’s four sons, Willie, Jace and Jeb, plus the sons’ wives and the couples children. They all live not too far from one another in West Monroe, Louisiana and Phil, Si, Willie, Jace and Jeb all work for their company, “Duck Commander,” in which they hand craft duck and other game calls.  According to the A&E website: “The show features a Louisiana bayou family living the American dream as they operate a thriving business while staying true to their family values and lifestyle.”

Now I get that so called “reality tv” is as scripted and contrived and thus as carefully edited as any sitcom. What I like about this show is that A&E has somehow happened across the perfect cast to produce a clean, mostly wholesome, family show. It’s an endearing look at a beautiful American family, who have, as A&E says achieved the “American Dream” of fortune and fame, yet are adamant in their desire to retain their core values, the heart of which is FAMILY.

They love, accept and loyally support one another. They accept the chaff with the wheat. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say, they appear to embrace each others idiosyncrasies. Instead of becoming irritated, they celebrate their differences. 

For me, clearly, two of the family stand out a bit, and again it’s for their differences, which are encouraged, embraced, emboldened, and enlivened on this show. The first is “Jace” the younger brother of the CEO, Willie Robertson. Jason Robertson has a deadpan look and a wry, George Burns-like comedic timing that serves him well as one of the main “talking head” narrators.

The second character is “Uncle Si,” who always carries a cup of iced tea in his hand. Si is, to me, somewhat reminiscent of a cross between Barney Fife and Kramer. In an unabashed manner Si will dish out his philosophies, sometimes with malapropisms or spoonerisms, that who cares if they’re scripted, they’re hilarious.

Each of the show's episodes ends with a shot of Phil and Kay’s family, their sons and wives and grandchildren, gathered around the Sunday dinner table, with patriarch, Phil offering a prayer of thankfulness that includes some reflection on the theme of that show, and as the prayer ends there is a fade-out of the family beginning to converse and dine, with a voice-over by Willie, the company’s CEO, offering his practical take on the whole situation.

On an episode that featured a bifocal look at Willie’s teenage son, John Luke, choosing to bring his father’s truck home, gas tank on empty, rather that risk being late for curfew; and on adult son, Jace, borrowing Phil’s boat and accidentally sinking it, Phil offers this prayer: “Lord, we thank you for another good day on planet earth. I do pray for ol’ John Luke as he ? his driving skills...”

Voice-over by Willie: “Parenting is a constant struggle between making your kids life better and ruining your own.... Life is full of detours...”

Me (as Jace): Will I soon lose interest in this show’s charm? Possibly. Have I DVR’d every episode? Absolutely.