[imagesource: YouTube / Pilgrim Media Group]

It has, and I cannot stress this enough, been a long week.

If you caught our story on Tuesday about Jackass actor Sean McInerney being bitten by a shark during the filming of Jackass Shark Week Special, you would have seen what comes below already.

But with Discovery’s Shark Week having kicked off Sunday, July 11, and running through to this Sunday, July 18, it’s worth revisiting.

Much like a WhatsApp message that has been forwarded many times, you shouldn’t believe everything you see on the telly, because Discovery has no qualms about taking you for a ride.

Remember that time a megalodon shark attacked and sunk a ship off the coast of Cape Town?

No, because it didn’t happen, but Shark Week ran a ‘documentary’ about it in 2013 anyway, titled Megalodon: The Monster Shark That Lives.

This from TIME:

It sounds like a great premise. With a maximum length of 60 feet and teeth the size of butchers’ knives, the megalodon…is one of history’s most fearsome predators. There’s only one problem: Despite what the show’s title may claim, this “monster shark” has been extinct for more than one million years.

Those watching the “documentary,” however, were not burdened with such inconvenient truths. Instead, Discovery hired actors to play marine biologists on a hunt for the megalodon around the coast of South Africa. Their expedition is mounted following the release of (faked) footage showing a fishing vessel taken down by a massive sea-dwelling predator (nicknamed “submarine”).

More fabricated “evidence” supporting the creature’s existence is presented, including a whale whose tail has been bitten off by an unknown animal, and a Coast Guard video showing a giant, shark-like shape moving through the water.

No awards will be given for this acting:

Oh, and as for that megalodon boat attack:

In order to cover itself, Discovery popped a little disclaimer in the final few seconds of the ‘doccie’, stating that “none of the institutions or agencies that appear in the film are affiliated with it in any way, nor have approved its contents.”

The disclaimer goes on:

Though certain events and characters in this film have been dramatized, sightings of “Submarine” continue to this day.

Megalodon was a real shark. Legends of giant sharks persist all over the world. There is still a debate about what they may be.

They don’t exist. There is no debate.

Despite a massive backlash, the following year, the same bogus story of Submarine the shark was once more trotted out, in a Discovery show titled Shark of Darkness: Wrath of Submarine.

Watch from the start for more awful acting, featuring a whale-watching boat setting sail from Hout Bay:

We don’t need to pick this apart, but we will, courtesy of Southern Fried Science:

The fake-u-mentary is supposedly based in Hout Bay, but continually shows a map of Dyer Island and Geyser Rock and refers to Shark Alley that are all in Gansbaai, ~100km to the east.

So why would they say Hout Bay?  If you google “boat capsized in Hout Bay”, you will find that there was a boat which capsized outside of Hout Bay in 2012, killing 2 passengers onboard.

This boat was capsized by heavy swell in the middle of the day and had nothing to do with a shark, let alone a mythical one. So I can only assume that Discovery Channel chose to include this very real tragedy in order to somehow legitimize their fake-u-mentary. This is horribly insensitive.

Shameless.

If you’re tuning in to Shark Week at any stage over the next while, remember that Discovery has a history of tall tales, and sharks are from the beasts these shows will have you believe.

[sources:time&southernfriedscience]