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Attempting to kill time I went through my ON Demand and stumbled upon this show.

It's about Paul Watson and his staff aboard the ship the Sea Shepherd. Aboard the ship they circle Antarctica to chase off the Japanese whale hunters. Paul Watson is the co-founder to Greenpeace, and was later voted out for being too aggressive in his fight against whaling, poaching, shark finning and habitat destruction.

For several years, Watson's group of staff and volunteers have engaged in a campaign almost every winter to find and stop Japanese ships that hunt whales in the name of research, attempting to stop them by any non-violent means necessary. The eclectic group — labeled activists, heroes and/or eco-pirates — leave port in Melbourne, Australia for a two-month campaign that is dangerous, controversial and has garnered international media attention. Sea Shepherd's dedicated, international crew have spent their holiday the last several years and risked their lives at the bottom of the Earth to save whales. -Source

This show is really compelling. Compelling enough that my sister and I looked at each other with the opening sequence and contemplated going vegetarian, after seeing the inhumane manner in which these majestic creatures are being slaughtered for monetary... err.. "scientific" purposes.

The Japanese have used the loophole that whales can be hunted under the restrictions that only a certain number are killed for the purposes of scientific research. Each of their ships have "RESEARCH" painted on the side as to make it okay. As they kill them they hold up signs for the helicopters that say things like "We are collecting samples for DNA". Really? You need the whole body for DNA?

Okay, enough with the ranting, back to the show.

My only complaint about the crew is that well... they're not the best decision makers in the world. It's frustrating to watch them stand around and have the passion to do what they want, but not really have the structure or guidance. For example:

The captain is nuts, and the boat is filled with the worst decision makers... EVER. I'll give him credit for being gutsy and going out and doing what he does but he takes the term of standing what he believes in to the core. They find the location of a whale hunting ship and after several attempts to make contact with them, he comes up with the plan to send two of his crew members aboard the ship so they can be held captive, then he can call the media and say the Japanese ship has two of his crew members kidnapped. Great marketing strategy but otherwise extremely risky.

It did work. But the two guys were held on the Japanese ship for about 2½ days. During those days negotiations reached diplomatic proportions. The government got involved when an agreement couldn't be made on how to return the hostages. The Australian Coast Guard stepped in to pick up the hostages and return them to their home ship. The captain decides to get some shut-eye because he's been up for 56 hours.

While he's asleep they see in the horizon the Japanese ship. They feel it's taunting them and vote whether they should make an attack. A crew member advises they just got done negotiating to get their fellow crew members back, to make an attack against them before the dropoff would be counter-productive. They vote against her, and she suggests they ask the captain what to do. The captain says it's up to the first mate, and goes back to the sleep. The attack goes into action.

They send their little boat after the ship, and the helicopter hovers over keeping watch. He notices they are going in the opposite direction. He lets the ship know, and they try getting radio contact. No response. After repeatedly trying to get their attention the helicopter has no choice but to turn back. The boat is missing for about 2 hours. The first mate doesn't wake up the captain. The communications officer comes in the midst of all this and organizes a search and rescue, also suggesting they call the coast guard. The first mate is furious that he even organized such a thing without going through the chain of command.

The boat does come back. They forgot they had the SAT phone. SERIOUSLY?!?!? Anyway the communications officer gets demoted in the morning when the captain hears what happened.

The whole feel of this operation feels like a bunch of college students who are naively pursuing a cause. Great, but it just doesn't feel well thought out most of the time.