Deadliest Warrior

We've talked about experimental archaeology in our class a few times and, unless I'm going crazy, the Spike TV show "Deadliest Warrior" was mentioned at some point during our discussion. I had only seen little bits and pieces of the show before, but since experimental archaeology seems like a topic that is especially relevant for TV I decided to take a closer look at this simulation show. Does the future look promising for this brand of archaeological television?

Calm down, man. Unless that loincloth stops bullets, I dunno how you're gonna beat a navy seal.

Each episode of "Deadliest Warrior" pits two classes of warrior against each other to see who would win in a fight. After collecting "battle data" mainly consisting of weapons tests on dummies, pigs and other targets, the hosts of the show (supposedly) input the data into a computer program which calculates which warrior would win. The episodes span from modern day bouts to more ancient ones, but the processes of the show seem to stay the same. The bulk of each episode consists of the hosts of the show sitting around and talking about how badass each of the combatants were and then watching movie stuntmen or "weapons experts" come in to beat up some gelatin dummies (and sometimes pigs) before they're analyzed by a medical professional. Between the weapons tests and talking heads, there is a wealth of reenactments of the different warriors fighting.

G...guys? I think he's dead. 

Since this blog is about ancient worlds on TV, I  tried to watch episodes that had ancient warriors fight against each other. I thought maybe the hosts of the show would have some historians (or archaeologists) talk about the way these warriors lived and how that affected their combat prowess, or at the vary least have the historians come in to talk about the weapons being used. For the most part I was disappointed. Though the show does give you a quick background as to who the fighters were, it's not the main focus of the show at all. The show will discuss historical context for five minutes at the most. Here's an example of some of this background information in an episode about Ivan the Terrible and Hernan Cortez:
Ivan the Terrible

Here you get to see just how short the historical context is, as well as the quality of the recreations: pretty, pretty bad. So the focus of the show really isn't on teaching the cultural context of the warriors, but that's okay. When you see a show called "Deadliest Warrior", that's not really what you're expecting. But the brevity of the context that is there is a little worrying. For an hour long show that has so much filler, they could have focused on the cultural bits a little more.

So what is the focus of the show? The weapons. Here's an example of the show testing a sword.

Look at that javelin. That is a nice javelin.

There is no doubt in my mind that this constitutes some form of archaeology: weapons experts are using exact replicas of ancient weaponry to show what kind of damage the weapons can inflict. These parts are entertaining to a degree, but they really don't teach you a whole lot. Sure, they show you how much damage specific swords, spears and axes do to a dummy (which may be fun to see for some people), but what do these tests say about the past? That there were lots of nice, sharp, damaging weapons. That's about it.

Show that dummy what for!

The main problem I have with this show is the ratio of filler material to experimental archaeology. But even if there was more testing, the show doesn't really teach you a lot about the ancient past. It seems that the main objective of the show is pure entertainment with almost no educational value. That's okay, but I personally got a little bored of watching big guys swing stuff at pigs. Besides the tests, the reenactments are not good at all. There is a lot of repetition, a lot of really bad blood effects, and a lot of laughable acting.

Is it entertaining? For a little while sure. Is it educational? Hardly. Overall the show just doesn't do it for me, and it's definitely sad that this is one of (if not the most) popular experimental archaeology show to date.

What's Right? 
Good general overviews in the beginning, interesting premise.
What's Wrong?
For the most popular experimental archaeology show in history, it really doesn't teach as much as it could. Wasted potential. 
Grade: B-