River Monsters



River Monsters is a British and American wildlife documentary television programme produced for Animal Planet by Icon Films of Bristol, United Kingdom. It is hosted by extreme angler and biologist Jeremy Wade, who travels around the globe in search of the most fearsome freshwater killers, looking for clues, eyewitnesses, and stories about people who were dragged underwater by these vicious predators, he tries to catch the biggest specimens and then release them back into the wild. His aim is to save these rare creatures from extinction and to help people understand the truth behind the horrific attacks on humans.

River Monsters became one of the most-watched, most successful programmes in Animal Planet's history, and one of the most-viewed series on Discovery Channel too. In the US, only the shortened version is shown and some animals Jeremy shows are simply cut off. These missing scenes are shown only when it premieres on ITV (originally on Sundays on ITV1) in the UK.

Series preview
River Monsters travels worldwide with Suffolk-born British host, biologist, adventurer and extreme angler Jeremy Wade to explore rivers and lakes to uncover the creatures behind local folklore and harrowing tales of monster fish. The show has taken viewers to Canada, Germany, Spain, Italy, Scotland, Iceland, Norway, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, India, Japan, Russia, Suriname, Brazil, Ethiopia, Uganda, South Africa, the Republic of Congo, Mongolia, Guyana, and the American states of Alaska, Florida, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas and Vermont.

In the first season, Wade's weekly quest had him in search of piranha, goonch catfish (during his investigation of the Kali River goonch attacks), alligator gar, wels catfish, arapaima, piraíba, and a freshwater species of shark, the bull shark. All of them are supposedly deadly creatures shrouded with mystery. The show also focuses on explaining the creatures' feeding habits, behavior and conservation status. Rebroadcasts of the episodes with captions showing behind the scenes commentary from the host about the particular episode can also be seen on both Animal Planet and Discovery Channel. These episodes are going by the title River Monsters: Unhooked.

The second season of River Monsters began airing on 24 April 2010, although the first episode, titled "Demon Fish" first appeared on Discovery Channel on 28 March 2010. This season consists 7 episodes and takes viewers to the River Congo and other far-and-wide locations. In the episode, "Death Ray", Wade catches a pregnant female giant freshwater stingray, the largest fish he has ever caught. It later gives birth to two pups while it was being examined by Wade and a team of biologists. This season features the white sturgeon, Wade's another gigantic catch (although he said it's his biggest catch ever, the stingray he caught in an earlier episode was even bigger, so "Alaskan Horror" was probably filmed earlier).

Season Eight (2016)
Promoted as a special season under the title River Monsters: Mysteries of the Ocean, this season sees Jeremy Wade shift his focus from freshwater to oceanic fish.

Season Nine (2017)
On March 31, 2016, within Animal Planet 2016-2017 Upfront Programming Slate it was announced that "River Monsters" had been renewed for a ninth season, which is scheduled to debut on Animal Planet.

Season one
River Monsters had the best series premiere in Animal Planet's network history by delivering 1.3 million viewers. It was also its most watched regularly airing primetime telecast in over six years. The second episode of Animal Planet's River Monsters delivered a 39% boost in total viewers (1.866 million) compared to the series premiere. Those numbers made it the best performing regularly scheduled primetime telecast in Animal Planet's history. The first season of River Monsters made it the best performing show in Animal Planet's history with every episode averaging over 1 million households. The season finale delivered about 1.47 million households.

Season two
Its second season premiere episode became the network's best season premiere ever. It drew in 1.7 million total viewers.