"I Survived"

Fumbling through the American TV lineup for the first time in 15 months, I found a cup of purple splashed across my face as I drove by Biography HD.

"I Survived," is strictly composed of raw interview footage with people who have been severely scraped and lived to tell about it. The aesthetic of the show is notable for its minimal approach. the visual is simply the interviewee's shoulders and face in stunning 1080i against a black backdrop.

There is no verbal narration, only intervals with situational subtitles layed over scenery. Typical subtitles look something like this: "Michael, Jean's ex-boyfriend, has entered the house with a loaded gun. Jean is asleep with her 8 year old son."

Here are a few glimpses from the stories I've seen in two episodes:

• Young woman held hostage for 20 hours in a convenience store at gunpoint while husband and 4 children wait with police and S.W.A.T outside
• middle aged couple suffering mountain lion attack - "I knew I needed to get the mountain lion to release my skull, because [the mountain lion] was trying to crush it and move down further on my neck, so I jammed my hand into his mouth and grabbed his tongue... when I was running away, I felt something snapping and tapping against the back of my neck -- it was chunks of my skull."
• women who was sexually assaulted and kidnapped along with her cousin in the deep south before convincing the killer to let her call 911 after he suffered amnesia. she still has shotgun pellets lodged in her neck and abdomen
• dude driving 40 ton truck full of swimming pool chemicals who drives straight into a forest fire and gets THIZZED
• subtitle: "fire moves 17 times faster uphill than it does on flat land."
• "maria and her 16 year old daughter were asleep one night when Peter came to the house... 'his face was right there when I woke up, and he just kept on pounding and yelling.'"
• Perhaps one of the most astounding stories, from a 15 year old girl who was robbed at gunpoint, covered in tape, shot in the leg and raped before she jumped over a balcony and escaped into a neighbor's house. "The gunshot passed through the back of my leg and exited through my kneecap... the sheriff asked me, "How did you get over the balcony and move yourself over to your neighbors? How did you do that?"

The question, "How did we do that?" emerges as the Kern of the show.