My Octopus Teacher on Netflix

[Soloist]

Very interesting encounter. However, this particular octopus appears to be simply curious and incapable of providing “emotional support” like the little octopus in the documentary.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

 

[mathematics]

The documentary was 10% super cool diving and 90% some dude who wouldn’t shut the hell up about his feelings. He wouldn’t quit pulling on the kelp either. I’m a little less bothered by touching things than other divers, perhaps, but that goes far beyond “What does this feel like?”. He pulls on the kelp constantly. It’s abhorrent.


If he’d just shut up for a second, perhaps we could have engaged in some self-insertion into the narrative, deciding for ourselves how being friends with an octopus might feel. Instead, we had to look at his stupid face, when we could have been looking at the octopus. He told us how to feel. I understand that diving can be emotionally powerful and that we can feel moved by what we see on a dive. I also think that focusing on that is narcissistic. That’s personal to me, anyway.


It’s incredibly self-absorbed to make a documentary about an animal about oneself. I still don’t care about his stupid feelings. The diving footage was awesome, though.

 

[tridacna]

The documentary was 10% super cool diving and 90% some dude who wouldn’t shut the hell up about his feelings. He wouldn’t quit pulling on the kelp either. I’m a little less bothered by touching things than other divers, perhaps, but that goes far beyond “What does this feel like?”. He pulls on the kelp constantly. It’s abhorrent.


If he’d just shut up for a second, perhaps we could have engaged in some self-insertion into the narrative, deciding for ourselves how being friends with an octopus might feel. Instead, we had to look at his stupid face, when we could have been looking at the octopus. He told us how to feel. I understand that diving can be emotionally powerful and that we can feel moved by what we see on a dive. I also think that focusing on that is narcissistic. That’s personal to me, anyway.


It’s incredibly self-absorbed to make a documentary about an animal about oneself. I still don’t care about his stupid feelings. The diving footage was awesome, though.

I dived those same waters for years. Oftentimes there was no way to hold a stop without holding onto the kelp. Currents can be brutal there. We never damaged the kelp and it grows like a weed any way. We called it seaweed - never kelp.

Agree with you regarding the cameratography - superb. Story was soupy and contrived.

 

[chillyinCanada]

My nondiving friends loved it.

 

[lowwall]

I also think his story was a pointless intrusion into a beautiful wildlife documentary.

The need to insert unnecessary drama is the problem with pretty much every documentary-style thing I've seen on TV. Why can't they leave the interpersonal drama for Real Housewives of Wherever and let Bering Sea Gold be about divers trying to dredge gold out of the Being Sea.

I've pretty much given up on regular TV other than sports and the occasional Wheeler Dealers.

 

[StefinSB]

The documentary was 10% super cool diving and 90% some dude who wouldn’t shut the hell up about his feelings. He wouldn’t quit pulling on the kelp either. I’m a little less bothered by touching things than other divers, perhaps, but that goes far beyond “What does this feel like?”. He pulls on the kelp constantly. It’s abhorrent.


If he’d just shut up for a second, perhaps we could have engaged in some self-insertion into the narrative, deciding for ourselves how being friends with an octopus might feel. Instead, we had to look at his stupid face, when we could have been looking at the octopus. He told us how to feel. I understand that diving can be emotionally powerful and that we can feel moved by what we see on a dive. I also think that focusing on that is narcissistic. That’s personal to me, anyway.


It’s incredibly self-absorbed to make a documentary about an animal about oneself. I still don’t care about his stupid feelings. The diving footage was awesome, though.

You never touched a tree in the wild? Never walked on grass? Never plugged a weed? SB is funny in it's hypocrisy sometimes.

 

[chillyinCanada]

You never touched a tree in the wild? Never walked on grass? Never plugged a weed? SB is funny in it's hypocrisy sometimes.

Well, ya, he did, we did, we have but we didn't make a documentary about our feelings being healed by the tree or the weed we, uh, plugged?

In any event, I haven't seen the movie/show/documentary or whatever it is. Regardless, the show is about a man who has a problem and by fluke he meets an octopus and is able to create some sort of relationship with the creature. The man heals and believes it is because of his "relationship" with the octopus.

Is this so terribly different from having a cat or a dog or a gerbil? Oh, I suppose a bit different since the octopus is still a free creature in the wild, as it were. But I'm told that having pets is good for us.

Frankly, I once had a relationship with a tiny octopus in the Maldives. Of course, it only lasted 20 minutes or so but was significantly more satisfying to me than watching the sharks swim by again for my nth time.

Perhaps that makes me more empathetic to the man in the documentary. Or perhaps I'm full of it. I feel healed though having told my story.