The Deadly Race To The South Pole • Puppet History 

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Can we give some praise to the animators of the visuals?! They are STUNNING each video!

Petition for you guys to have Brennan Lee Mulligan on as a guest for the next season

I’m kind of sad there was no mention of Amundsen going to learn polar travel and survival from the Inuit. For the time, the idea that any Native group could have anything to teach a European was extremely radical, and what they taught him served him well.

I like to imagine Ryan and Shane going into a baby clothing store with the Professor to try on jackets until they found one that fit perfectly. Lmao

im absolutely loving the sub-lore of stanley and dorothy ruth and the fact that he may be alive despite drowning in mollases 2 seasons ago

I know you don't record it this way, but I just love the idea of Shane crouched down behind the set with a microphone just singing his heart out. 😂

To his credit, as he was dying Scott refused to abandon the fossil plants he'd found, which IIRC were the first fossils ever found in Antarctica and showed that the continent had once been tropical.

There's another incredible part of Scott's expedition story not mentioned here that definitely deserved to. The final support team of three men splintered off from Scott 150 miles from the pole, but they very almost didn't make it back alive either. They had gotten lost, were running short on supplies and Scott's second in command Edward Evans had fallen very ill. They had to dump even more of their supplies to carry Evans on their sled even though he had ordered the other two men to leave him behind, they refused saying they would never even consider it. They dragged him on the sled for days, but being still five days from base camp they realised they weren't going to make it. They set up camp and Irishman Tom Crean ventured ahead alone to find the main camp and raise a rescue team. Crean left with no rations, no navigational or survival equipment, not even a sleeping bag as he didn't intend to sleep. He went solo by himself and somehow made it to the other men, literally collapsing through the door. They had to tell Crean to stay put inside as he insisted on making the journey back to rescue the men himself too. Evans and Bill Lashly were eventually rescued, returned safely and treated by the doctor. Tom Crean, along with Lashly were awarded the Albert Medal for Bravery by King George V for this act. Tom Crean is still to this day regarded as one of Ireland's heroes and explorers, virtually anyone from the country knows Tom Crean's story in some detail. He's often overlooked as he was a lower class Irish man living in a British world, while typical members of parties such as these were middle class, trained naval officers, Tom Crean was a boy who ran away from home at 15 just about able to read or write and found his way on more antarctic explorations than Scott or Shackleton. He wasn't writing memoirs like the rest, but we try our best to remember him.

A lot of credit for the Norwegian success actually belongs to the indigenous Inuit peoples!! They developed many of the methods for surviving in extreme cold, and the expedition learned from them

"Born a falcon, died a frozen turkey." - The professor's best diss in a season finale.

Captain Oates ABSOLUTELY knew he was going to die. His final words were "I'm just stepping out for a while. I may be some time." He had hoped his sacrifice would allow his comrades to survive.

Y'know, Amundsen really did do almost everything he could've to help Scott out. Leaving behind food and supplies was especially kind. And those boots and gloves were probably better suited for the environment than the gear the English had. Short of literally waiting a few days for Scott's crew to show up, and then escorting them out, there was nothing else he could really do to help increase Scott's survival odds.

On the subject of Lawrence Oates (38:00), the guy who walked out barefoot into the snow: He was suffering from gangrene and frostbite, and taking him with them would have made survival less likely for the other remaining 3 men. He is known for his last words to the other men, as recorded by Scott in his journal, "I am just going outside and may be some time." He knowingly sacrificed himself so that the others wouldn't be held back and had a chance to get back alive. I grew up in the city where both the Discovery (Scott's ship for the first expidition) and the Terra Nova (ship for the second expidition) were built, and the Discovery is still maintained and docked here in Dundee, so I grew up hearing these stories a lot Just wanted to clear that up because he very much *did not* just forget to put his shoes on while going for a piss haha

Thank you Watcher crew for another fantastic season of Puppet History!!!

I appreciate that Amundsen really didn’t have any negative feelings towards Scott; he left some supplies, seemed to view it more as a friendly competition between rival explorers, and based on what he said after learning, felt genuine remorse and guilt over Scott’s death. It’s kind of a sad story, honestly.

I think it’s hilarious that the whole time they were talking about Roald (a 25 year old) they kept showing pictures of an old man 😂

Lets also give a shout out to sami people for helping Roald Amundsen! If it weren't for indigenous people, his trip would not have gone as well as it did

Shane goes so goofy when Sarah is around, it is the most adorable thing in the world ❤

“Get a little blanket, a little tea, and watch Wall-E.” Best words of wisdom on this show.

Oates' feet were so frostbitten that in the days before, it took him an hour to put on his shoes. That's why he didn’t have his shoes on. He knew he was walking to his death. His last words when he left were "I am just going outside and may be some time." He's seen as a hero of self sacrifice in the U.K.

An important part of the story is that Amundsen had learned how to work with dogs and best survive in harsh cold environments from indigenous peoples of the Americas! With that experience he was much better equipped than Scott at the get-go. Really fun episode, looking forward to next season.

A race across the Antarctic was the perfect way to end such a CHILL season of _Puppet History._ And I have to say, it was a great one. The Professor's parents were great comic relief, and I really got sucked into the Boston Horse lore. I can't wait to see what's in store next time.

fun fact: I am a direct descendant of roald and also a big watcher fan! such a fun surprise to click on the video w/o really looking and realize it was about someone in my family :)

This episode's song was the best in the season! Knew this story before the episode, and it never failed to move me to near tears. This song also did just that. "Send my regards to Captain Robert Falcon Scott", "I hope he found what he was looking for", voice recordings... Man, that all is really moving and makes a perfect note to end such a story on.

I'm glad Ryan is getting a little more respect this season and that Ryan, in turn, isn't murdering people anymore.

Yeah yeah silly puppet youtube series but the idea of Antarctica the continent saying "give my regards to captain Scott" is so touching and beautiful in a way that is hard to describe. Even with all his mistakes and fuck ups, he was a man who lived and who had passion. And yet it was that very passion that lead him and several others to their doom. The land he rests upon acknowledging his efforts. That's so poetry right there.

How is it we got Sarah twice but not Shane Madej once? :c Sarah and all the other guests were great, but Shane needs to meet the professor! They seem like they would get along great!

This story is (or was for me at least) a really big history topic in primary school in Ireland because Tom Crean, one of the men who survived both of Scott’s trips, was from Kerry. They have a statue there of him holding two puppies that were born during his third Antarctic expedition!

I’d love to see next season if Shane teaches Ryan and Sara about Tarrare the man who couldn’t stop eating(edit: I can’t spell)

Fun fact! You can actually visit and walk through the same exact ship that went to the South Pole (and the North Pole!) at the Fram museum in Oslo, Norway. It’s very well preserved and there’s a ton of artifacts from the expeditions.

The most painful part about Watcher leaving is losing Puppet History. It’s genuinely a wonderful little show that always cheers me up. But I won’t pay for six shows I don’t care about for it.

Trained sled dogs, fur worn like how people who actually live in cold environments do, an actual game plan and the curiosity of a LEGEND I love this story

to answer ryan's question: because the eyes are directly connected to the body, like any organ, they retain whatever internal body temperature your body is at. now if someone were to lose an eye in those cold of temperatures and it fell out of the socket and somehow disconnected, that'd be a different story. considering that water freezes in an instant at -44 Fahrenheit (-42 celcius), your eye would freeze likely at the same rate. that kind of cold would burn the eye as it freezes, meaning you wouldn't be able to save it and it'd likely be rendered blind even if you were somehow able to. yes, i absolutely took the time to look this information up because it got me curious too.

I will never cease to be amazed by Shanes talent. This is a masterpiece

as much as I love the dramatic season finales, I'm so glad that we finally got a chill one. I'm not sure I could survive another heart attack like the season 4 finale

I would love to see the professor’s hat back next season and the return of Kate peterman! She was my favorite guest every season!

The Professor changing his wardrobe should happen more often! The pink jacket looks surprisingly good on him (and this is coming from someone who has a vendetta against that shade of pink!).

I always miss this show when the season ends. I hope for plenty more Puppet History in the future (maybe a Christmas special this year?)!

I love Shane's evolution in songs from a comedic parody focus to creating actual bangers.

Can't believe we had a whole season without special guest Kate Peterman :(

Orcas is one of my life long hyperfixations and I've heard that they had somehow eaten horses but I never figured out how they got access to horses so thank you for this information

the inherent comedy of the british people living through like, a disaster movie, living their worst life, absolutely losing interspersed with cuts to the norvegians just having a fun trip listening to music presumably drinking tea smokign cigars being bros, even the dogs have a good time 10/10

i feel extremely unsettled after this finale and pray for the wellbeing of everyone involved because i KNOW the estranged producer of this show Shane Madej would never let our beloved cast of characters go without at least SOME bit of lore...

My great great great grandfather was one of the few who went with Amundsen to be the first to the south pole. I know shitloads on this 🤭 Am so excited for this one! He also designed Fram who Amundsen went to the south pole with and Droning Maud(another known ship), plus Amundsen's own house. I been to the Fram museum, and if anyone get the chance, please go too! 🥰

I'm surprised a certain fact was never pointed out: There are no polar bears on Antarctica - they only live in the Arctic! Conversly, there are no penguins in the Artic - they only live in (and around) Antarctica (by "around" I'm refering to the landmasses relatively near Antarctica, ie Australia, South America etc). Would've been funny though if training polar bears had been Scotts plan until he came down just to further hammer on the point of him being poorly prepared.

I was OBSESSED with this story as a child, I read up about it in every way an8 year old could and I’m SO HAPPY this is an episode 🥰🥰

That final song was really sweet. Contemplative and with quiet awe at the mystery of life, nestled warmly in a blanket of colorful dorkiness. This is the vibe I've come to associate with Shane's creative mind. Never stop being you

It’s adorable that at @35:40 that you think ‘trifles’ refers to the dessert and not what it actually would have been, which would be some small trifling items that were not worth carrying back with them ❤

I absolutely adore this show. I never grew out of loving edutainment and it's really fun to have a show that you can watch as an adult and learn cool stuff that you may not have covered in school. Also Shane's singing voice is criminally underrated and the songs are always fantastic. I'm really glad Watcher exists.

The horse marriage at this point may as well be my favorite soap opera

12:15 Ryan is apparently exactly the type of person that would be impaled through the eyeball after looking up at an icicle

One of the men on Amundsen's crew was my fourth cousin twice removed: Olav Bjaaland. He was a Norwegian Ski champion and one of the many reasons Amundsen finally made it to the South Pole. Bjaaland was a carpenter who helped reduce the weight of the pre-fabricated sheds bought from Oslo. Later in 1952, Bjaaland would get to light the torch at the Winter Olympics in Morgedal.

Thank you for such an amazing season of puppet history! Can’t believe we’re at the finale already 🥲

The Professor looking into the camera during Dorothy Ruth's story like he's Jim from The Office 😂

From the 8-bit animations in this episode, it looks like an Oregon Trail: Antarctica Edition game would be incredible.

There is actually a fairly obscure tale of a Polynesian navigator named Ui-te-Rangiora who was said to have traveled to a "sea covered with foam" which interpreters argued means ices. Lots of historians argued if the Polynesian reached the Antarctic or not but since these are the same guys who traveled from Taiwan to Madagascar all the way to Easter Island I'd like to think some of them made it far south enough to spot it.

I'm always excited and saddened by each season finale. Thank you guys for making great content I can always come back to and teaches me cool stuff

Honestly I wasn’t expecting the end to be this soon, but I enjoy it. Love the new changes and additions as it brings a new era of Puppet History PS: Love the new horse lore during the ad plugs, please sponsor them more because I’m in my seats of what’s happening next 😅

I would love to have a CD of all the songs that have been on Puppet History. Some of them, like this one, were so emotional they really hit me. Amazing work.

My dad went to Antarctica, he went there for two winters and when he came back a part of him was left there and he always talked about his time there and took an interest in Scott and Shackleton’s story which in turn became my favorite stories. So seeing puppet history cover this story makes me so happy.

Sara’s retainer lisp is super cute and makes me feel better about wearing mine ^^

During that song I felt like I should be pulling out a lighter to wave in air, I think this is the best one yet

I love polar expeditions! The norwegians were way more adapted to the climate, and used inuit and sami methods successfully. The brits and americans were often too confident and unwilling to learn, which affected their decisions, and usually led to failure. Shackleton is my favorite south pole-explorer! He worked with Scott before going on his own expedition, holding the farthest south for some time. And our swedish explorer Andrée was fascinating as well, but stupid.. he flew a balloon to the Arctic...

I do like how you guys, in-universe went "yeah, the wild storyline stuff is fun, but... we're taking a break. We deserve it", and you do! This season was great! Can't wait for the next one!

Just a friendly reminder that Dorothy-Ruth canonically died during the molasses flood...

I love all the comments shouting out the various crew who added all the great small touches, I want to give a special mention to the sound design! I'm listening to this on my fancy headphones and it's really highlighting all the incredible little details bringing this episode to life 😊

yall should call Shane to be a special guest, im sure he and the professor would have a blast with eachother...

Every time he mentions the teams having to move all their food and supplies, I think about the Donner Party episode. "I assume Slim Jim's and M&Ms."

I can absolutely understand the professors instinct to do an "I am de captain now" impression everytime he says a similar sentence

Omg i have a core memory attached to this topic!!! I went through a museum exhibit dedicated to this that framed it as though I was along for the ride to see who would win the race, and I learned more and more about what each team chose to bring and how they approached the antarctic. SUPER EXCITED

This last performer, Antarctica really got to me. It was such an emotional performance and brought me to tears.

I’d kill for a behind the scenes episode of this show, I’m always so damn impressed

How did no-one call out the professor for claiming that polar bears eat penguins when they live on opposite ends of the world?

I can't believe it's already the finale 😭😭😭 Already looking forward to next season! 🧡

What a calm, pleasant season (lore wise). Thank you Shane, the animators, producers, et al for another great season

Honestly, Amundsen's death and the drama around the Italia's failed expedition to the North Pole could have been another episode in and of itself. If I remember the details correctly (and please chime in if I'm wrong), he was actually flying out to go save another polar adventuer whom he had bad blood with. Umberto Nobile was an Italian explorer whom he had attempted a pervious expedition with to fly over the North Pole with. The two disagreed over which country should recieve the most credit (and if I recall, I think Amundsen kind of thought Nobile was an idiot) so they had a falling out. Nobile would later head another air expedition to the North Pole with the airship Italia, but the ship disintegrated midflight on route. Some of the crew was swept off with the ship, but Nobile and few others escaped and survived for a time on the ice. Amundsen heard about it and got a crew together then went out in a seaplane to go find them, but the plane went missing on the way and his body and crash site have never been found to this day. Nobile would actually survive the whole ordeal and be rescued, but the rescue pilot insisted on taking him and only him first despite him wanting to send their most injured man instead because he was too heavy. Unfortunately, the plane would then crash on the way back to get more people and left the pilot stranded with the other crew 🤷🏾‍♀️ The men on the ice were eventually rescued after like, a month, but Mussolini's government threw Nobile under the bus and painted him a coward for leaving first (though he had actually planned their evacutaion order based on triage and not rank, but couldn’t get the pilot to listen). It's always struck me as such a tragic irony that Amundsen beat out Scott to the South Pole, who then died, and what would later kill him was going out to try and save someone he knew. He had to known that Scott wasn't prepared and I would hope that the fact that he didn’t do much to help must have bothered him. Some people spin the rescue as Amundsen wanting to one-up Nobile, but I'd like to think that he put his dislike for the guy aside and just wanted to help a fellow explorer he'd flown with before instead of letting him die in the ice.

Full disclosure: when I first saw you guys create your own channel and I saw the puppet history thumbnail for the first time I was kinda thinking: okay, they've gone cookoo now. But damn, this is such a good show (along with everything else you put out) that I am just baffled at how good your creativity and your team is. You guys rock!😊

When Mysetery Files returns please do episodes on the following: -The death of Ark Gilkey -The Kentucky Alien invasion in the 1950's -The myesterious birds of Audubon's "Birds of America" book -The Montana Hyena -The mysterious abandonment of Portlock Alaska -The theories of what is behind the Missing 411 cases in the US. -Kasperov vs Deep Blue computer -Beast of Bladenboro ( I especially want Shane to do this one).

it truly was a loreless season, i never could have guessed- well, other then the "horse lore" as i like to call it, we need more of that!! thank you to the entire watcher team and especially shane for this masterpiece of a show!!

I really appreciate the echo on Sara's audio because it gives her an otherworldly aura that truly she deserves.

Aw... It's over already? 😭 Well, I can't wait to see the next season of Puppet History 😊

i’m in love with sara’s jacket omg

My college owns the last physical remains of roald! he got his teeth pulled right before his fatal expedition and the dentist kept them and eventually donated them to my college's archives... they're creepy as hell just teeth mounted in a box

This makes me wanna see a Puppet History about Ada Blackjack, the Inuit Woman who survived two years stranded alone in the Arctic.

I'm honestly deeply saddened that its the season finale so soon. I look forward to this show every week and my professor plushie just arrived a week ago. This must have been a really short season.

"I would eat a penguin" says Ryan in an episode last season when America debated hippo meat "I wouldn't eat a penguin" Ryan now

When the episode first came out I saw there weren't any captions that weren't auto-generated, so unfortunately I couldn't watch it at the time. I had hoped that waiting a week or so would mean they'd be added, the way every other episode of puppet history has them, but I'm disappointed to see that they aren't. I'll try and make do with auto-generated ones, but they're almost always inaccurate and I know I'll be missing out on key parts of the episode because of it. I'm not sure why this episode specifically doesn't have them, but I'd appreciate if they're added in the future so people like me can enjoy this the way everyone else gets to. It's one of the things I appreciate the most about puppet history and Watcher - they're one of the few youtube channels I can trust to do their best for the disabled community, and I hope this is something they'll fix soon!

Dorothea Ruth's "I DUNNO MAN!" and "it was sus as hell" had me forcefully exhaling like a mad woman 🤣🤣🤣

unfortunate that there are no CC options on this episode. hopefully the team at watcher will add them soon!!

We just need Eugene and the try guys are complete, and have been special guests

wasn't expecting to cry at a puppet history but the song at the end was so moving...

How are Shane's silly songs about extremely specific subjects so unironically good?

This season was so great and I loved that sara was back for the finale!

Waiting for the other Irish People to pop off about no mention of Tom Crean. One of the few of Scotts men to survive and in an absolutely spectacular fashion

The audio clips in the song add a truly emotional element to it. Possibly the best Puppet History song yet.

The finale’s song almost brought me to tears 😭😭😭😭😭 & the frozen statue edit 🔥 this is a PRODUCTION

truly one of the best musical endings i think.. I wonder what Dorothy Ruth is up to

this might be one of my favorite puppet history songs ngl. its so somber and the recordings added to that desolate feeling. love it!

Bravo! Puppet History will be missed until next season. The amount of creativity is astounding.