The Americas with Simon Reeve

The problem I have with any Simon Reeve program is that he never stops talking. It's an hour of trying to experience the place Simon is visiting with a constant background noise of Simon chattering. And often he talks about things he can't be bothered to show us, so the only visuals are Simon talking in a car while he talks about poverty or climate change or whatever he read about online over breakfast. So people he meets are essentially reduced to sound bites, so that they won't interfere with Simon's talking time. So it's more of a podcast than a visual experience. So it's poorly made television with a mediocre host. He is the antithesis to "Don't tell it. Show it". Simon's programs are best watched with the volume off.

I must say that I only watched first episode and do not intend to watch this garbage further. First episode is about North-Alaska and Canada. It starts with ice melting in Alaska, which is OK but I noticed that the "Author" missed many other things/facts about Alaska. Than started part about Canada. There were 3 stories there. One is about oil companies which are "ruthless" and "evil". To prove this author showed us woman who lives in a shed without electricity and water for years. Because she is poor. And she is poor because big fat companies did not give her anything. I wander would she be poor if there were no companies. Of course she would. One is not poor because someone did not give you charity but because you did not earn what you need to live decently. Then we are told a story about hundreds or thousands of indigenous women in Canada-missing. I won't say it is not true but even if it is, it has nothing to do with the theme of the series. I have been in Canada so I can compare their social system and quality of living with other countries and so I can say it is the best and most humane of any in the world including the "author's" country. Then we are shown Vancouver, city which is in every list of most beautiful cities in the world and the one best for living. However we were not told that. We were shown the dirtiest street in it with homeless persons and drug users. So according to the "Author" Canada is the dirtiest country in the world, hell on earth, where people live in the worst living conditions without water and electricity, where thousands of women are missing for some reason, which no one investigates. And that is all from Canada, no National parks, no lakes no Toronto, Montreal, Niagara falls, Bannf, no best social and health system in the world. I have been there and I know everything is completely the opposite but what about people who know nothing about that country and believe what they see on TV? And one more thing, besides being biased and full of really bad journalism, it is also a low effort product and technically amateurish. Basically second largest country in the world (10 million square km) is presented with material shot in 100 square meters, (one shed in the woods and one street), with author's face on the screen 80% of the time. Michael Palin he is not.

I'm a big fan of British travel shows of the tradition started by Michael Palin. This is not one like that. Instead of Michael's in-depth, objective look at the geography, politics and culture, Simon Reeve pushes endlessly the narrative of "climate change", going a step further to iterate over and over that "the U.S. is to blame." That the climate is changing is not in question, it is. The causes are intertwined, global and complex. Instead of an upbeat story of beauty and culture at risk, and the heroic efforts - and there are many - of what people are doing about it in the Americas, Reeve teases with scenes of natural beauty but in the end leaves the viewer feeling depressed and powerless.

All about Simon Reeves full stop. Like many of these so called factual programmrs it is just a vehicle for Simon Reeves to show his face as often as possible. Just count how much of the footage has his face on camera..... Pretty well continuous.

His campaign is 99 percent negative and not useful in any way and is repetitive to the point of boredom.

Another irritating point is that he misses much of the best parts of the areas he visits scooting onto his next destination and then spending a huge amount of showing footage of drug issues that we all know are a worldwide issue but made to look uniquely Canadian

Rubbish.

Simon has that non threatening way about him a la Louis Theroux (the comparison to whom I'm sure he hates) but he gets about the America's cross long beautiful scenery and gets deep into the varying ways of life on the way. From extremes of wealth, weather, politics it has everything.