Review: 'Alaska: The Last Frontier'

In television, as in most things, there's something to be said for simplicity. TV audiences are fickle and sometimes easily bored and as a producer and/or network the temptation is to try and edit a show to be so tight and slick that it might as well as well be scripted. As much I appreciate parts of "Duck Dynasty" and "Gold Rush," both shows are so carefully assembled that the end result often seems soulless and predictable.

Which is why I've become such a fan of Discovery's "Alaska: The Last Frontier." Unlike many other of the other observational reality shows currently on television, this isn't a show that's trying to manipulate events into a more compelling story arc. There aren't any artificial blood feuds or random outbursts that seem to exist only to create tension between participants. This is a show that simply and efficiently follows the struggles of several generations of the Kilcher family homesteading in an isolated community outside Homer, Alaska. The story arcs of this show don't include a mad search for wealth or struggling to become a celebrity. This is a show about simple tasks like repairing a bridge or hunting enough game to tide your family over the long winter. It's a show about survival and the sparse lifestyle of the families and their lives make the show one of my favorites.

I can't imagine living a life that is so physically challenging. It's a non-stop workday and particularly during the brief summer months the families frantically try and get everything ready for the upcoming snow. But that hard lifestyle is also the charm of the show. It's refreshing to see people so happy living a simple life, dreaming dreams that are more about building a new stable than hanging out with Andy Cohen.

This week the show wraps up the season with a two-hour episode and that event prompted to think about the season so far. My favorite moment might have been a discussion about replacing an outhouse. Eve Kilcher is pregnant and much of the episode centered on her husband Eivin finally adding running water to the house. But after that was accomplished, the couple opted not to add running water and simply build a new outhouse because that was how they grew up and they were perfectly fine continuing to live that way.

Granted, the Kilcher's lives aren't quite as rustic as you might believe if all you know about the family is what you've learned from the show. Singer Jewel is the daughter of Atz Kilcher and despite the way it sometimes appears, it is possible to drive into nearby Homer in the winter. So it's unlikely any of the Kilcher clan will actually starve if they don't snag that last bear.

But the show seems to reflect the spirit of the Kilcher family and from interviewing Jewel a couple of times in the past her description of her upbringing seems to match what is shown on the screen. The families do live a restrained and spiritually fulfilling life and that's the real charm of the show. Even before the cameras arrived the Kilchers were apparently thought of a quirky, albeit brilliant bunch of people and that chemistry has been effectively captured on camera.

I don't know that I could like the life of the Kilcher family but I do know I've enjoyed getting to know them via "Alaska: The Last Frontier."