Hunting Sense

I’m a big fan of the CBS show Criminal Minds, but I was a little disappointed with the newest episode which originally aired on May 2. The episode was titled Open Season, and yes, it was about hunting and hunters. The blurb for the episode says it all.

The BAU is called to investigate after the bodies of missing people are discovered in a remote region of the Idaho wilderness. The gruesome find also leads the team to determine the unsubs have been hunting humans for sport.

The idea of hunters getting bored and hunting other humans isn’t a new idea by any means. In fact, this episode is a homage to the Richard Connell short story “The Most Dangerous Game”, published in 1924. In this episode, two brothers abduct people and hunt them with bows and arrows, passing up easy shots to wait for ones while their prey is running from them, and even goes so far as to reference getting their first ‘buck’ when the younger ones shoots a male.

What stood out the most for me, though, were some of the lines used by the BAU team. They did very little to stray away from the same old tired stereotyping of hunters as evil and some sort of monsters because they choose to hunt.

A few examples:
• Prentiss: Hunting is their sport, humans are their target.
• Lizzie Evans: No animal did this.
  Prentiss: Well, that depends on your definition of “animal.”
• Prentiss: The British historian James Anthony Froud once said, “Wild animals never kill for sport. Man is the only one to whom the torture and death of his fellow creatures is amusing in itself.”
• Gideon: Most hunters put animals out of their misery. The men we’re looking for - they don’t show any mercy.

The last quote by Gideon is the only one that even half-heartedly tries to show hunters in a less negative light and even it falls short of doing it properly. And the one about wild animals never killing for sport is not only wrong, it’s crazy that they would use it without even checking for the accuracy of it. Just because some historian said it doesn’t mean it’s true.

I would have expected a more original approach from such a great show, but I guess that is too much to ask for. Like I’ve said before, I’m waiting for the day a show or movie like this portrays a hunter in a positive light, but I’m not holding my breath. I’d say it’s rather apparent it isn’t going to happen anytime soon.

hunting, Criminal Minds, bow hunting, killers, hunters, stereotypes