Review: 'Expedition Files' Season Two

If the conspiracy/exploration television cinematic universe has a Marlon Brando, it would have to be Josh Gates.

Since his first series premiered in 2007, Gates has consistently been the go-to host when producers need a host who can be entertaining while delivering info to viewers that they likely have heard previously on a dozen other television shows. He walks through an archaeological dig or remote location and talks about some mystery that isn't actually all that mysterious. Or promises to provide new insight on some conspiracy theory. Which generally just involves repeating the theory and capping it off with the phrase "but we may never the real answer to this question which has stumped historians for centuries."

When you look at his resume, Gates has hosted an impressive number of shows in the genre: Destination Truth, Expedition Unknown: Hunt For ExtraTerrestrials, Ghost Nation, Josh Gates Tonight, Tales From The Explorers Club, Expedition Unknown, Expedition X and now Expedition Files.

Season two of Expedition Files premieres tonight and while the material might be familiar, the biggest difference between this show and its predecessors appears to be the budget. Even for the world of cheap unscripted television, the show is filled with an unsettling number of tacky green screen shots and stock footage that appears to have been licensed from the least expensive source.

The trio of stories will likely be familiar to anyone who has watched a couple of dozen hours of other unscripted TV shows. Was an iceberg really the cause of the sinking of the Titanic? Was there a conspiracy behind the death of Harry Houdini? And another recounting of the infamous alleged discovery of lost Civil War gold in Pennsylvania.

Gates does his typically solid job of making the tired material appear fresh and groundbreaking, even though even he seems to struggle at times to sound as if he believes what he is saying.

But what really sinks the show for me are the low budget visuals. Aside from high school AV club-level green screen effects, producers apparently decided to make the green screen shots look a bit more realistic by adding a random actor or two into scenes. Although in what I suspect is another cost-cutting move, most of the extras don't have a speaking role. 

So there is Gates, standing in front of a slightly out-of-focus green screen of the Titanic's wheelhouse, while someone who looks vaguely like the real life captain of the Titanic walks across the shot behind him and begins turning what appears to be the world's flimsiest ship's wheel. The entire effect prompted me to laugh out loud, and I had the same experience each time a similar shot appeared during the rest of the episode.

I won't argue you shouldn't watch Expedition Files. But I will suggest that if this type of show is your thing, you should watch one of the half-dozen shows hosted by Gates in which he has previously told the same stories. And without all of the low-rent green screens.