Bring ’em Back Alive 395 They [American viewers] wanted to see a lot of animals chasing other animals and killing them, but without any actual bloodshed . . . a program packed full of drama, comedy, suspenseful cliff-hangers, and happy endings . . . . They wanted to see more babies barely escape the jaws of villainous predators while the mother risked her life to rescue her young. (2004: 80-81)11 Bousé contends that the slower-paced British television wildlife programming evolved differently from both its natural history roots and radio broadcasting: The British tradition of natural history documentation, which tends to place more emphasis on research and scientific inquiry . . . than on entertaining narrative; more attention to the revealing close-up than to the action- packed long-shot-although, again, these are anything but absolute rules. (2000: 126) Bousé maintains that the American style relies on sensationalized lowbrow entertainment based on suspense and physical conflict. The British wildlife film provides greater educational content in its exposition of animal-environment ecology. British viewers seem less inclined to enjoy the American penchant for extremes—ecophobia toward dangerous creatures and sentimentality toward cute ones— perhaps because their own indigenous wildlife is less dramatic and dangerous (and much diminished), and the country has a long amateur naturalist tradition rather than the hunter-trapper tales that prevailed in North America. Buck and Durrell somewhat conform to these national 11 Cottle quotes an independent producer who points out the two strains within American television programing: “Discovery is much bloodier. Animal Planet is gentler. Animal Planet reckons to have a different audience profile from the Discovery Channel in that they have more women and kids. They don’t go for the sort of same blood and guts things . . . . Discovery certainly likes more kills per acre. I mean, Animal Planet is quite likely to either tell you to take a shot out because it’s too gory, whereas Discovery will put it the other way” (2004: 93-94).
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