TV Weekend: These Shows Bite*

Tory Belleci confronts a robo-shark for MythBusters. / Don Feria/Discovery Channel

One more item of mine in the print TIME I forgot to mention. Discovery's Shark Week begins Sunday, and I reviewed the first two installments:

MythBusters: Shark Special and Surviving Sharks Discovery, 9 p.m. E.T., July 27 & 28

MythBusters uses its second Shark Week special to test tips on how to survive a sea-critter attack. Then Survivorman's Les Stroud makes himself into human chum to explore ... exactly the same thing! Edge to MythBusters, which builds a cool mechanical great white. MythBusters: B- Surviving: C

Not even reviews really, more like descriptions plus grades. So I'll elaborate a smidge.

I'll be the first to admit that MythBusters is not exactly my cup of applied science, but I can appreciate the geek appeal of a typical episode. Watching this one, though, it really seemed like they were scraping the bottom of the fish barrel to come up with shark myths, since they'd already done the subject on the show at least once. (Besides the Jaws special, I think they've covered a shark myth or two on other episodes, though I may be wrong.) Has anyone even heard the "myth" that chili powder repels sharks?

Still, at least MythBusters has its typical light touch, and, again, you get to see a guy attacked by a mechanical shark. And a segment on whether dogs attract sharks contained what may be my favorite line of television for 2008: "We're going to release the urine and anal secretion!" Can I get that on a T-shirt?

The Stroud special, I'm sorry to say, just reminds me of every other Shark Week special I've ever seen, with cages and chumsicles and guys getting into chainmail suits to dive and dare the fishies. Every year I expect viewers to tire of Shark Week and the ratings to trail off, but every year, seemingly, it surprises me and hits even bigger. We'll see.

*OK, a really stale pun. But I didn't use it for the vampires post! I went with "suckers" for that one!