There’s something undoubtedly enthralling about survival TV shows. Though not all of them are as interesting as their premise, the ones we find ourselves invested in are usually just too eye-catching.
It’s sure that audiences find it fascinating to see people competing against each other while overcoming difficulties at the same time, but what makes Discovery’s show “100 Days Wild” so special is that there’s no competition. Instead, the cast’s biggest rivals to defeat in order to survive are themselves.
Of course, living by their own means in an isolated community in Alaska sounds too difficult in itself. However, it’s the group’s co-existence and their participants’ will to live which makes the show’s concept so thrilling.
So what are the secrets behind “100 Days Wild”? Who are the cast and what did they do before the show? Plus what or where are they hiding when cameras are off? This and more we will tell you, so get ready to discover the untold truth about “100 Days Wild”.
Jennifer And Andrew Have Been There For A While
Despite the complex situations its cast faced along the way, “100 Days Wild” concept is actually very simple. In order to endure 100 days out in the Alaskan wilderness before the harsh winter comes, five people put their skills into action, to provide food for themselves and build a suitable shelter.
The initiative to enrol in this adventure comes from Jennifer and Andrew, who were looking for adventurers to join their community. However, less known is that long before the show became a reality, the couple had been hosting people in their camp for quite some time.
A testimony to this is on the Diabetes Warrior website run by Steve Cooksey, whose mission is to show how to deal with said disease while living an alternative lifestyle.
To make his dream come true, back in 2016 Steve moved to Jennifer and Andrew’s camp near the Tanana River. As stated, eating once a day and working at least eight hours a day, digging stumps and helping out in the camp seemed a good idea at first. Nonetheless, his adventure in the wild came to an end too soon, for not being able to afford a $1,000 gear to build a shelter, in addition to the emotional distress it caused him and personal conflicts with his hosts.
Though the negative and short-cut outcome of Steve’s adventure might have put the couple’s outpost in a bad light, it proves that building their community has been an ongoing years-long project for Jennifer and Andrew.
The Show Is Compared To Others
Everyone knows that reality survival series are not a novel concept anymore. For years, shows of this type have been premiering with seemingly different premises, but almost always with many similarities in common.
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For its part, “100 Days Wild” has been strongly compared to MTV’s “The Real World” series, though in a noticeably more nature-filled setting. Premiered in 2014, every season of “The Real World” was centered on a group of people living together in the same house in a new city, putting a strong focus on its cast dynamics, relationships and mature or immature situations they often faced.
In these regards the series was too similar to what “100 Days Wild” came to be years later, though it’s undeniable how the drama is severely toned-down in the latter’s case, especially for the sake of keeping its focus on the survival theme.
Other similitudes could be found in previous projects done by Talos Films, the production company in charge of “100 Days Wild”. Talos has worked on a handful of documentaries and reality series, such as “Ice Road Truckers” and “Life Below Zero”, both of which were also set in Alaska, making it clear that they weren’t inexperienced at all when it came to producing series in harsh environments and weathers.
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Who Was Oliver Before The Show
One of the most notable cast members of “100 Days Wild” first season was definitely Oliver, a leather-loving man who stood out from the others due to his impressive survival skills and knowledge of the environment.
Though judging someone for their looks doesn’t go well most of the time, in Oliver’s case his character and personality fit well with his seemingly-intimidating appearance, which is just as interesting as his life background.
As it’s obvious just by looking at his many accomplishments in the show, Oliver is not new to living outdoors. In fact, he’s apparently been on his own in Utah’s mountains since his early teens.
In his path to self-reliance and guided by a strong reluctance to pay bills, Oliver has learned to hunt almost every type of animal, and even built a dugout, his rustic home-shelter mistakenly described as ‘a hole’ by the media.
As stated by some of his fans in an online forum, Oliver’s last 25 years has been spent both traveling the world as a sort of modern cowboy, and achieving impossible-looking feats, such as horse-riding the entirety of the Oregon Trail.
Off-Camera Cautious Plans
One of the many questions that comes to mind about “100 Days Wild”, is how safe it is for the cast to volunteer for such an adventure.
Though the show’s production team hasn’t actually specified what happens behind cameras during emergencies, it’s not too far-fetched to think that there’s medical staff accompanying the cast in case their well-being should be jeopardized, as the website The Cinemaholic affirms. As well, the show’s filming location in the Tanana River is supposedly near to a base set up by the production staff, which provides help in extreme situations and emergencies.
Of course, being in the middle of Alaska’s nowhere means that certain factors such as wild animals and physically risky places are most-likely to affect the cast sooner or later. Though not even the best laid-out plans could prevent these potentially-endangering situations from happening, “100 Days Wild” production is surely saving more than a couple of lives, just by taking the right contingency measures for the show.
What We Didn’t See On Camera
No matter how enjoyable reality series are, it’s known that many people distrust the reality TV genre for many reasons, including the uncountable allegations of staged scenes and graphically exaggerated events.
While “100 Days Wild” is also the subject of criticism in this regard, there’s no actual proof that what we see in the show isn’t real.
Nonetheless, for those who are still curious of what we’re not getting to see on screen, the show’s star Adam Frye took it upon himself to shed some light on what it was like to spend three months in the camp.
As he describes it, one of the most dangerous factors he had to face was undoubtedly the weather, especially at night, when temperatures could drop to a minimum -30F°, making the whole thing a ‘near-death experience’, in his words.
However, when it comes to specific incidents which actually almost put an end to life in an horrific way, it would be the time his shelter caught on fire. Though he fortunately got out of it unharmed, it was later found that the fire started when a stack of moss fell down over the small bonfire, making the incident more terrifying for its unexpectedness.
Are Frye’s affirmations enough proof that the show is 100% real? Not exactly, but we trust him enough to believe his words are true.
Gerrid’s Illegal Hunting Scapades
Every reality star has some type of scandal on their record, which is no different when it comes to “100 Days Wild” cast member Gerrid. In an investigation by the website Medium, it was shown that Gerrid was apparently convicted for violating hunting regulations in Alaska.
As seen in the show, Gerrid shot a moose during hunting season, and though the scene has been dismissed by viewers on online forums as most-likely staged, there’s more to it. As court papers show, in 2020 a non-resident by the name of Gerrid Greenwood was found guilty of a Class A Misdemeanor in September 2019, coinciding with the show’s filming.
The incident occurred in the Manley Hot Springs area, where it’s prohibited to hunt down bulls with less than 50-inches antlers, a description that the moose killed by Gerrid was just too small to fit into.
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The Alaska Fish and Game department’s verdict wasn’t enough to turn off the staging rumors about the aforementioned show’s scene, as the most meticulous fans argue that the animal’s muscles and eyes were just too stiff-looking to be considered a fresh hunt, which leaves open the possibility of Gerrid killing the moose overnight, leaving it untouched until the morning filming time. However, while these observations make sense, they remain unproven fan theories. Meanwhile, the only thing we know for sure is that it was Gerrid who did it.
The Weird Rumors About The Show
While “100 Days Wild”s supposed scene-staging strategy is still a debatable topic, there are many other instances in which the show has been accused of similar TV sins.
Firstly, one of the biggest scandals surrounding the series is the rumor of Oliver staying in an inn for two weeks, a timing which coincides with the period he apparently lived out in the wild after being asked to leave the camp. Moreover, the cabin discovered in the show is considered somewhat shady for its location and status. Reports show that not only has the rusty house been listed and ultimately sold only a couple of months prior to the start of the show’s filming, but also it was barely three miles away from the camp, instead of the 10 miles of distance said on screen.
Though the latter rumors aren’t easily ascertained by ourselves, an investigation made by the website Medium shows that the area surrounding the Birch Camp is often visited by trappers and locals, who can supposedly assert the veracity of these claims.
Adam’s Background Is Somewhat Amazing
Since we first saw Adam Frye in the show, we knew he was up to something. His extensive knowledge and skills to survive in the wild could be as a result of his military training, but there’s actually more to him than that.
Coming from the lowly-populated town of Grottoes in Virginia, Adam’s early years were spent in the woods. As affirmed, his family’s financially-unprivileged situation put his creativity to the test, leading him to use environmental resources the best way possible.
Later in life, he would join the Army’s National Guard, which allowed him to visit different parts of the world during his service, as he was stationed in places such as Guantanamo Bay, Kosovo and North Dakota. The latter experience was especially meaningful, as it prepared him for the harsh low temperatures he had to face during his adventure in “100 Days Wild”.
With his blog The Mountain King Survival, Adam had been trying to pass his knowledge in survivalism to as many people as possible. However, it was appearing in “100 Days Wild” that gained him the huge popularity he has nowadays, a step in the right direction to make his decades-long dream come true.
People’s Opinions On Jennifer and Andrew Are Not Always Good
As any other show, “100 Days Wild” has its own fair share of drama and conflicts. While this has obviously gained the series a lot of criticism, both Jennifer and Andrew are notably on the receiving end of the most negative comments.
As the founders of the outpost showcased in “100 Days Wild”, Jennifer and Andrew are often the show’s main focus of attention in many situations.
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This wouldn’t seem to be a problem in any other case, but as the audience has noted on popular sites like Reddit, the couple’s protagonism apparently hinders the group’s performance.
Though the show’s premise advertises the fact that Jennifer and Andrew aren’t the camp’s leaders, their role as self-imposed managers of their group’s resources is a notable contradiction. However, what’s even worse is how badly the couple is perceived by viewers, who usually fault them for the communication issues between the outpost’s members.
Could Andrew and Jennifer be responsible for their community’s failures, or is this just a matter of a biased audience which misjudges them? The answer is debatable, but if there’s something for sure it’s that if “100 Days Wild” ever gets renewed in the future, the production staff would probably tweak more than a couple of details for the show to be more easily accepted by the audience.
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