Ronda Rousey Uncaged Plot Summary:
Legendary UFC fighter, and WWE Superstar Ronda Rousey takes on her biggest “opponent” ever — a mako shark. The fighter must learn how to stand her ground against the “apex predator” by going through a series of tests before floating in open water with a mako.
Remember last year when the Discovery Channel promised Michael Phelps was going to race a shark? Remember when he actually didn’t race a shark?
This year, for the 30th anniversary of Shark Week, Discovery hyped up that Ronda Rousey would “take on” a Mako shark.
So immediately the premise is more ludicrous than Phelp racing a shark. How the hell is Ronda Rousey going to “take on a shark?” Is she going to slap it in a chokehold? Do sharks even have throats? She can’t armbar a fin, because it just seems way too slippery. So, basically is she going to punch a shark in the face? That is literally the only logical thing Ronda could do to “take it on.”
So, did Ronda Rousey punch a shark in the face?
No.
What Ronda actually did was go free diving in the ocean, and believe it or not she actually did “take on” a Mako. Well, if you call push it away from her with a metal rod “taking it on” — then yeah she owned that shark.
Jokes aside, Ronda Rousey did what probably 98% of us would never do — be in the open water with a deadly shark. There was no shark cage…just Ronda, her team (mostly camera people), and sharks. No matter how ludicrous and slapped together this special was, you have to commend Rousey on being absolutely insanely courageous. She literally stared down a shark, and fended it off. Guts personified.
Now, praise aside — Ronda Rousey Uncaged was pretty terrible. The premise was muddled until half-way through the special. They kept making it seem like Ronda would fight the shark. Hell, they asked her to show a shark her fighting pose. REALLY? Is a shark going to be like, “Oh damn, Ronda’s ready to throw down? I should leave.”
Ronda’s team trains her by having her feeding bull sharks, which one shark expert says could easily murder Ronda in a second. They then have a her swim through an underwater cavern at night, which is also filled with sharks. Then she swims with a blue shark. Then boom, mako time. The training is so random, and the explanations from the “experts” on why all of this is going to help her face a mako is boiled down to, “Listen, it doesn’t make sense, but trust us, this’ll work.”
Another issue is Ronda herself. If you’ve followed her career you know Ronda’s not the most evocative subject. She doesn’t say a lot, and there’s few times, if any, that we hear about her fear. She pretty much dives in (literally) head first into shark infested waters. Brave, for sure. Good television, not so much.
Despite how bad this special is, and trust me it is worse than my description — you wanna see how this all ends. Like the Phelps special, it’s a matter of “Well, I invested this much time into the damn thing, I have to see how it ends.”
Shark Week always has these silly specials. In fact there’s a number of specials just like Ronda’s (less dangerous of course) featuring Lindsey Vonn, Aaron Rodgers, and Rob Gronkowski. Hell, even Shaq got in there with sharks. So, just accept that Shark Week does really bad celebrity-driven specials. They’re a decent time killer, but ultimately very forgettable.
Rating: 2 out of 10
