Every ABC Show Needs a Smoke-Monster, or Anna Reviews 'The River'

If you haven't watched ABC's newest show, 'The River', you should watch it before you read this or actually maybe you should read this first before you watch it; maybe you'll save yourself from the mind-numbing idiocy of the people in this show.

'The River' opens with this sad tale of woe about an explorer, Emmet Cole, who is lost in the jungle and pronounced dead. He had a wildly popular TV show that was on for 22 years and somehow he and his boat, the bastardized Magus (think 'mag' from magazine and add- us to it), just up and disappear into the Amazonian Jungle. Now it's up to Mama bear and Baby bear to go find dear old dad.

Here's the kicker, they all hate each other. Mom's is screwing the TV producer that is accompanying them on said journey who was miraculously left out of the last, final voyage of Emmet Cole and his boat for some unknown reason. Actually it seems as if everyone on the new expedition was somehow left off this last, final journey and they're all supremely pissed about it. God only knows why? You know your life has to suck when you'd rather be in some deep, dark jungle having your head shrunk by the locals than in civilization dealing with your daddy issues. 

We'll skip to about the middle of the episode when they actually find the Magus and go aboard.

Of course they get there and it's almost dark. Of course. It wouldn't be fun if you couldn't traipse around the river in the daylight. Noooooooooooooooooo. Let's go in the dark! So they're standing on the deck of the boat and all of a sudden they hear this banging noise from inside the boat. Do they do the sane thing and say 'Welp, we found the boat and asked if anyone was here and no one showed themselves so let's be on our merry little way. I'm sure there is a Marriott down the river a ways.' No. They go inside the boat to find the source of the noise, which happens to be the panic room. The door is welded shut from the outside.

Aaaaaaand they decide to open the door because whenever they bang on the door twice, whatever is inside the panic room bangs back twice. I'm sorry but I'm gonna need a whole lot more evidence of intelligent life than some banging on some pipes. You better damn well know some mother-fucking Morse code and bang out your full name, occupation and blood type before I go opening a door that is WELDED SHUT FROM THE OUTSIDE. Meaning, obviously, that whatever is in the panic room needs to stay in the panic room. But these people are stupid and Mom is all like 'But it could be Emmet!' so out comes the grinder.

In the mean time the engine mechanic has managed to get the electrical systems on board and all of the cameras on the boat are working again. Why in the world they couldn't just look in the panic room with said cameras I don't know. The engine mechanic's daughter also happens to talk to ghosts and she's all like 'Dude, don't open the door. No bueno.' No one listens to her because they're all racist fucks and figure a 16 year old Brazilian girl can't know what the fuck she's talking about when they should be saying to themselves 'You know, we've been on TV for 40 minutes now and she is the only person on this boat that makes any damn sense, maybe she's right?' But they don't and they open the door and this thing flies out and cuts Baby bear's girlfriend on the leg. I'm not sure how the thing cut her because it doesn't really have a body so to speak, but it does manage to cut her and now the thing is hungry because it has tasted blood. Homegirl who talks to ghosts is essentially like 'I fuckin' told you so.' Oh and guess who is not in the panic room? That would be Emmet.

Now this demon critter is flying around the jungle and the crew is straight up panicking to get off the boat (Finally.) and their rafts have been sank. Imagine that. So now they have no choice but to get the boat running and get the fuck out of dodge. To do this they need to clear the propeller of debris. So baby bear and his girlfriend jump right on in the river, in the dark mind you. I have several problems with this: 1. No sane person jumps in an Amazonian river in the dark unless you're on fucking fire and you would rather be eaten by a 12 foot anaconda than be burnt to death. 2. Homegirl was just stitched up 5 minutes previous and she is in the river. Any sane person would have enough sense to stay out of the river with an open wound because I don't know, YOU DON'T WANT TO LOSE YOUR LEG? Who knows what kind of bacteria and parasites are swimming around in the stagnant water beside that boat. 3. PIRANHAS anyone? But they do manage to get the debris cleared and the engine working and they're moseying on down the river.

They've still got the thing from the panic room to deal with though and ghost girl explains how they can trap it. The two cameramen that are on this 3-hour tour go out onto to the deck to try and get footage of the thing and this the point at which 'The River' becomes very much an episode of 'Lost'. The trees are snapping back and forth and there is this weird mechanical sound and you never really see anything; you just see the one cameraman eat it. I've often thought that the smoke-monster from Lost was really under-utilized and I have to admit I was more than a little excited when I thought that maybe, just maybe, he was making a comeback. Think about it. How much better would every show, ever made, be if it had a smoke monster?

Grey's Anatomy - The smoke monster could eat Meredith and we'd all be happier for it.
True Blood - What would bring the vamps, wolves and witches together better than a common enemy?
Law & Order: SVU - It would be a rape without evidence! That story arc would last at least 3 episodes.
The Housewives of Orange County - Oh come on, you know you'd like to see those tramps eviscerated by a smoke monster too.

Anyways, back to The River. They manage to trap the thing, which would be better as a smoke-monster, in a large pecan shell and it tells the Mom that Emmet is still alive by scratching her twice on the belly. (Yeah, I don't know either.) At this point Baby bear is convinced too and he and Mama bear decide they need to go deeper into the unexplored wilderness to find dear old dad. Baby bear, Lincoln, decides that whoever does not want to go should have the opportunity to get off the boat and not go. I don't mean to be critical but I'm not exactly sure what he was going to do with them if they in fact did decide they didn't want to go on this wild goose chase as they are in the middle OF NOWHERE. 'Oh you don't want to go with us? Well I'll just pull the boat on over to the river bank here and you can hop off. The nearest highway is only about 500 miles that way through the uninhabited jungle fulls of poisonous snakes and God knows what but here's a sandwich!'

Lo and behold they all decide to stay on the boat and go on further down the river to the next episode which involves some creepy ass dolls, ghost girl swallows a possessed dragonfly, and once again, they're all traipsing through the jungle in the dark.

*On a technical note, I'm not sure exactly how they plan to stay alive on Emmet's boat as they didn't bring any supplies from their original boat on the rafts nor do they stop for supplies? Also, where do they poop?