seriosbrad First season was intriguing. But immediately starting the second season you clue in to how scripted and funded the teams are.At the end of the first season, they didn't mine enough gold to pay their own wages, break even, or even purchase new equipment.Season 2, they mysteriously had gobs of money to re-locate, lease and mine a new plot, and purchase new equipment.

huxley edwards All the bad reviews and reflections of reality, are on point here.This is a representation of the American Dream gone horribly wrong as Peka mentions. But the American Dream trudges on with the FRANCHISE death lease on life and business. That's what this show props up as what 'you can have' as well. Land owners holding huge plots of land.. leasing out to silly Jewish boys who know a TV opportunity come a callin.. probably some cousin or uncle in the buisness (outside of his legit father) to wrangle him into a 'career' holding onto an oversized wheel that has new power steering fluid so he can maintain his pipe cleaner status of weaklingness.I have ZERO experience with gold prospecting. But I have experience in agriculture, farming, and other types of co-operative business practices. This dilutes any chance of (other than land holder) anyone to get OUT OF THE DEBT CYCLE. That's where this could indeed be real.. these people are desperate.. minus a few 'key characters' in the show.. desperate to keep out of debt..and that pesky human quality..desperate to be noticed.Tony Beets is the clear winner here and his family. It was a great concept for hollywood to jump on his coattails. It gave him obvious opportunity to play around in his older age. Good for Tony. Bad for reality. What exactly is / was the role of Cigar man Chris Doumitt.. he's kissing the rim hole of a 20 year old every single week. Even Parkers grunt pig beer swilling buddy.. does not kiss his arse. Is Doumitt an uncle or cousin? He's obviously one of the few Jews on the show as well..maybe even a handler / body guard type thing. He handles the gold at the end of the show all the time, .. that's quite the prestigious position for a guy that stands around smoking and telling off color jokes. Yes there is always one of these guys at the job site. They are the definition of the a** kisser. But why is a 70 year old doing the kissing.. Even Parkers girlfriend "LOVES" Doumitt.. but she looks like a washed up party girl looking for the hook... like from Australia? I wonder what her father was in prison for. Ok enough of my conjecture.. it's not fair but I'm not playing with a fair industry .. the industry of deceit. Gold is very real..but c'mon people.. do you really believe modern alchemy cannot replicate gold.... food for thought. That's another can of worms for another day.

gil-roitto Feeling slightly stupid to be a sucker for this show. Not much new in the 5th season, but still like the elements of people struggling, being assholes, taking senseless stupid chances and so on. How much is real and how much is played or scripted, I don't know, but seems real enough for me to not turn the program off.From the first season the Hoffman crew has been running on too small budgets and knowledge, I don't know if effort, luck or help from the TV- production has made them still succeed sometimes. Parker is developing a A-class asshole attitude, if some of this is real it is interesting to ponder why - ambition, expectations, camera fever, narcissism or something else?What makes me believe in the show is that too much operation, equipment and costs are involved for it all to be fake. One annoying fake element of this show is the drama build-ups and the speaker voice - "If they can't manage to ... this will be the end of the season!". Showing more of what actually happens including the boring stuff, and scrap the forced drama would have made the show better.

firefly900 A bunch of incompetent Yahoos go out digging in the woods. Its really as simple as that. Aload of twerps get some money together, decide to go to alaska and try to mine Gold..... Very Unsuccessfully. If there was a competition between The sea shepherd crew of WHALE WARS and the Hoffman crew on GOLD RUSH over which bunch of morons were the most incompetent ,the Hoffmans would win by miles. It was cringe worthy to watch, especially the patriarch of the group , the father.... There's a Certified asshole if ever there was one.We all know there's bears in alaska don't we, so if we were setting up camp we'd take a gun or two for protection.... But 47! What are they thinking??? Complete and utter Yahoos..... And why the hell did they bring their kids up there.... Watch it... Even just one episode, it will make you happy to know that even on your worst day you will be more intelligent than any of these guys on their best day.