truTV Goes for ‘Gold’

By LillyKat
PTR Senior Staff Writer

50 days.

Three holes to drill.

An oil payload awaits.

Hopefully.

Welcome to the world of actuality television, and specifically, truTV’s new actuality series Black Gold, which chronicles the lives of West Texas oil drillers as they race to the center of the earth in the hopes of striking a rich payload. It premieres this Wednesday, June 18th at 10 p.m. on truTV.

Now, I’ve come to the conclusion that “actuality” television seems to be a step beyond (or above?) “reality” television whereby you feel like you’re watching more of a live-action documentary (and learning something) as opposed to wondering who is going to date whom on next week’s show (and not learning anything). Thus, most of us have already watched some sort of “actuality” series. We’ve recently welcomed Deadliest Catch to PTR; you may have also seen Ice Road Truckers on the History channel.

Black Gold is brought to us by the creator of both the Deadliest and the Ice Road series (Thom Beers), and the show revolves around the daily goings-on of the crews aboard three main oil rigs – the Adobe Longhorn, the Viking and the Big Dog – who, similar to the Deadliest gang, have got a lot riding on whether they can win the who-strikes-oil first race.

So do their multi-million dollar owners.

But the kick is: these guys actually don’t know if they will hit oil.

As in, they only have a best guesstimate of where the oil might be based on various geo-thermal imaging-sensing-rig-a-ma-role (kinda like the Deadliest guys trying to find the crab). And whilst the Black Gold guys don’t beam themselves down into the center of the earth á la something out of Star Trek, they remain on an unrelenting schedule to drill 10,000 feet to find the goods.

It is, at the end of the day, one big giant multi-million dollar gamble.

Yet, I was having a bit of time truly getting into Black Gold.

Deadliest Catch has a certain shock and awe factor.

Ice Road Truckers has a certain you’ve-got-to-be-kidding me factor.

Black Gold did not seem to strike me one way or the other – no pun intended.

The first couple of eps seemed a little slow. Then again, the drilling is a tedious process (and messy – someone call Mike Rowe and have him do an ep of Dirty Jobs just on these oil rig guys if one hasn’t been done already); thus, I’m not sure it’s going to be an edge-of-your-seat ride like the other two series. That said, I have to confess I am used to the pace of Deadliest, whereby nobody goes out, gets drunk at their birthday party and/or doesn’t show up for work the next day.

I also didn’t find myself terribly endeared toward any of the three crews aboard the rigs. Unusual, seeing as I instantly found the personalities of the Deadliest and Ice Road crews to be pretty interesting out the gate. The Black Gold guys seemed to be a little new to the have-the-camera-follow-me-around thing. That may get better as the series moves along.

But probably what surprised me the most was I could not help but view this series with what I'll call an economic hangover given the current climate (and constant barrage of bad news) regarding: a) the US economy; b) the US dollar; c) the outrageous price of oil.

As such, it was hard for me to get into the whole race-for-oil thing given the mere mention of oil these days makes people cringe (myself included). Even though it is timely subject, oil is also a big ol' sore spot for most folks right now.

This, of course, is truTV’s selling point – that with our foreign dependence on oil, we need to find the good stuff here at home. And thus, these crews put their lives on the line to do just that.

But I’m wondering if that strategy might backfire.

I’m not sure everyone will want to watch a constant reminder of just how much the price of oil is out of control and/or that we depend too much on foreign supplies. And whilst I dig (literally) that these guys are trying to tap into one of the nation’s last remaining oil reserves without destroying wildlife or a preserve (ahem, Alaska), Black Gold's over-arching premise can't help but pound home one more time how much money is made in the oil business – particularly how much money the US company oil men make in a day on all the rigs they own, which include the ones competing against each other in this series.

So, whether it intends to or not, Black Gold adds a little salt to an already seriously painful wound in our current economic climate. And no matter how much oil these guys find, it isn’t going to set global prices back to $35 a barrel.

Still, I think the series has potential. And I'm sure the personalities of the crews will eventually reveal themselves. It is a fascinating thing to see these guys constantly avoiding being slammed, crushed or whipped by various elements of the oil rig.

Makes me surely appreciate the safe confines of my work cubicle once again.

The series premiere of Black Gold starts this Wednesday, June 18th at 10 p.m. on truTV. To learn all about the crews, the show and the oil drilling business in general, head on over to the Black Gold Official Web Site.