Megalodon is 100,000 times bigger than A Great White shark this photo was taken of the Coast of Mexico
Discovery Responds to Shark Week 'Megalodon' Outcry
The network stands by its special and reiterates that three disclaimers aired with the faux-documentary that kicked off its most-watched Shark Week ever.
Discovery Channel
"Shark Week"
our editor recommends
"With a whole week of Shark Week programming ahead of us, we wanted to explore the possibilities of Megalodon," Sorensen said in a statement. "It's one of the most debated shark discussions of all time, can Megalodon exist today? It's Ultimate Shark Week fantasy. The stories have been out there for years and with 95 percent of the ocean unexplored, who really knows?"
PHOTOS: The 15 Most Insane Animal Attack Movies
The special, which registered Shark Week's highest-rated entry to date with 4.8 million viewers and a 2.6 rating among adults 25-54, also included three disclaimers:
"None of the institutions or agencies that appear in the film are affiliated with it in any way, nor have approved its contents."
"Though certain events and characters in this film have been dramatized, sightings of "Submarine" continue to this day."
"Megalodon was a real shark. Legends of giant sharks persist all over the world. There is still debate about what they may be."
Despite the repeated notes, many viewers took issue with Megalodon, considering the opening special to Discovery's biggest event of the year to be fact. Among them, actor Wil Wheaton posted a blog entry calling for an apology from Discovery for the special. He said the "found footage" was shot in a fashion that would come from a professional photographer and called the special a "bullshit 'documentary'" and ripped Discovery for lying to its audience and presenting Megalodon as real.
STORY: Shark Week Hits Record Highs With Fake 'Megalodon' Doc
"Discovery had a chance to get its audience thinking about what the oceans were like when megalodon roamed and hunted in them," he wrote. "It had a chance to even show what could possibly happen if there were something that large and predatory in the ocean today … but Discovery Channel did not do that. In a cynical ploy for ratings, the network deliberately lied to its audience and presented fiction as fact. Discovery Channel betrayed its audience."
"Discovery Channel betrayed that trust during its biggest viewing week of the year. Discovery Channel isn’t run by stupid people, and this was not some kind of mistake. Someone made a deliberate choice to present a work of fiction that is more suited for the SyFy channel as a truthful and factual documentary. That is disgusting, and whoever made that decision should be ashamed," he continued.
Wheaton called on Discovery to use its live Shark Week aftershow to apologize to viewers for "deliberately misleading" viewers and to "recommit" to providing "the highest-quality content this week, and every other week out of the year."
Shark Week continues this week on Discovery.
E-mail: Lesley.Goldberg@THR.com Twitter: @Snoodit
Jaw-dropping! Largest prehistoric Megalodon shark jaw ever assembled up for auction
By Daily Mail Reporter- The jaw measures 11ft across and is almost 9ft tall
- The Megalodon shark died out 1.5million years ago and was 16metres long
But this giant prehistoric shark jaw comes from the largest predator ever to have existed on Earth.
The 16-metre long Megalodon shark, which died out 1.5million years ago, was once the true king of the ocean, weighing an awesome 100 tons.
Big bite: It took famed fossil hunter Vito
Bertucci almost 20 years to reconstruct this Megalodon shark's jaw,
which measures 11ft across and is almost 9ft tall
The late Mr Bertucci found fragments of the ferocious species in the rivers of South Carolina.
The jaw set is composed of 182 fossil teeth, some over seven inches long and is expected to sell for $700,000 (£436,000) at a sale by Heritage Auctions in Dallas, Texas, on 12 June.
Megalodon ruled the temperate and warm waters of all the oceans between 25million and 1.5million years ago.
David Herskowitz, Director of Natural History Auctions at Heritage Auctions, said: 'The Megalodon was a shark that grew to the length of two city buses and preyed on whales and other sharks.
'With jaws that size, and a hugely voracious appetite, you or I would be no more than an hors d'oeuvre for this monster.'
Mouth of a monster: The jaw set is composed of 182 fossil
teeth, some over seven inches long and is expected to sell for $700,000
(£436,000) at auction in Dallas, Texas, in June
Vito Bertucci died in 2004 in Georgia while diving for prehistoric shark's teeth.
His brother Joey Bertucci, who is auctioning the jaws, said: 'This was Vito's legacy. He loved it. He dragged it around everywhere.
'This was something he just had a vision to do, and it took him a lifetime of collecting to be able to build it.'
The maximum size of the Megalodon has been of much debate - cartilage rarely fossilises and therefore no complete shark has ever been found.
However, near-complete sets of dentitions have been found, which allows for accurate reconstruction.
The Megalodon's colossal mouth would have produced a but force of 10.8 to 18.2 tons.
Megalodon ruled the temperate and warm waters of all the oceans between 25million and 1.5million years ago
LLC 501C- 4 UCC 1-308.ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WITHOUT PREJUDICE
Content and Programming Copyright 2014 By Patcnews The Patriot Conservative News Tea Party Network © LLC UCC 1-308.ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WITHOUT PREJUDICE All copyrights reserved By Patcnews The Patriot Conservative News Tea Party Network Copyright 2014 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content. © All Copyrights reserved By Patcnews The Patriot Conservative News Tea Party Network
