Whatever you think about the show Alaskan Bush People, and there are a lot of comments to be heard on the internet, it’s still interesting enough to some people as to what happened to Matt Brown and how his absence has been handled by the rest of the cast. Allison Cacich of Distractify has provided an update of just what went on when the family moved from Alaska to Washington and a bit about Matt’s addiction issues that sent him to rehab for a while. his addiction was a sore point among the family as you can imagine and drove a wedge between them in a big way since it created a great deal of struggle. Thankfully though Matt did manage to get himself straightened out and after creating a rift in his family he sorted things out with his father, which was a big deal, and might even be coming back to the show for season 11. Apparently his father is stating that he has to remain completely sober to take part in the show again, and Matt is in full agreement, but only time will tell what’s going to happen since as a lot of people know and have seen in the past, reality TV sometimes gets a little too real for the liking of the cast. Plus, the issues that fans have had with the show in the past don’t seem likely to just go away given that the show was exposed a while back.
It’s hard to think that anyone is buying into the reality TV scheme these days since few if any people ever act out their real life when there’s a camera in their face at all times. For many people the allure of ‘reality’ TV is that it’s entertaining and gives them a chance to think of what they might do in the same situation. But in terms of being ‘real’ a lot of these shows have lost their glamour and the veneer that once made them seem so genuine. It doesn’t help that social media is involved as well since when Ami Brown had to undergo chemotherapy the Brown’s made their way to California where they were shacked up in a rather posh mansion that was nothing like the Alaskan wilderness where it would appear that they ‘lived off the land’ and fended for themselves more often than not. Tiffany White of in Touch made it clear that in-between episodes the family would actually spend a lot of time in a cushy lodge instead of living out in the wild as the show depicted. In a big sense it’s almost as though the Browns were on an extended camping trip and would return home now and again when the show wasn’t taping. Yeah, ‘living off the land’ indeed. Plus, the fact that Ami apparently contracted cancer from smoking kind of stamps the lie even harder into the minds of the fans that were a bit put off by this revelation.
At this point Alaskan Bush People is more or less a show that people will watch because they became emotionally invested in it at one point and therefore feel the need to see how things turn out. But if they show the family on their 400+ acre estate in Washington it almost feels as though the whole idea of the show might as well just give up the ghost and call it quits. Also, if the family can afford to send Matt to rehab for a year, even if it was on the show’s dime, it says that they’re not really a family that’s so bad off that they have to live out in the woods or would do so as a matter of choice. The hypocrisy of the show is something that, amazingly, a lot of people are still willing to ignore since again, they’re invested in it and don’t want to think that they’re following something that’s just flat out wrong and should be cancelled. The idea that Matt is coming back after a year spent finding himself and going on an important journey of self-discovery is one that some people can get on board with but really it does sound as though a lot of people are still wondering why the show’s even being given a chance. Michael Hein of PopCulture has a few things to say about this.
Right now it’s a wonder why reality TV is being lauded as reality since all it really is any longer is a chance for people act goofy on TV and pass it off as their real lives. In some cases what they say and do is real, but in such instances the material is either extremely commonplace and boring or enjoyed by only a select number of people that can somehow relate to what they’re seeing, or those that think they can in some way.
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