Fans of Murder Mountain on Netflix will want to watch Sasquatch on Hulu.
The two documentary series have a similar focus: cannabis growing in Northern California. Both zero in on the Emerald Triangle that encompasses Humboldt, Mendocino and Trinity counties, where outdoor farms have long been plentiful. But due to the high value of the crops and the illegal nature of the black market, violence remains particularly common there.
The three-part Sasquatch series investigates the deaths of three Mexican laborers who were killed on a weed farm in northern Mendocino County in 1993. Some people think a Big Foot or Sasquatch was responsible.
David Holthouse is the reporter/unofficial investigator on the case. Holthouse learned of the murders while he actually worked at the farm where they happened. Years later he decided to attempt to solve the crime.
Joshua Rofé directs and the Duplass brothers produce this engaging travelogue that finds Holthouse traversing the state looking for leads. Via shakey camera live footage and animation, we learn about the history of cannabis in the Triangle along with reports of BIg Foot sightings in the area. One famous clip is from 1967.
Chris Dienslag, who starred in The Moneytree, a low-budget grower flick set in Northern California in 1992, provides a running commentary from the point of view of the locals. He's seen in a clip from the film then and in the series now nearly 30 years later.
"Those guys in the backwoods get isolated," Dienslag explains. "You get kind of desocialized. You become like an undomesticated animal. You come into town and it's loud and it's bright and there are rules. I have friends that have literally disppeared into the woods who became feral. In that kind of environment when you're very isolated it's very easy to enter another kind of mental realm."
Fans of "Murder Mountain" on Netflix will want to watch "Sasquatch" on Hulu.
Other drugs such as meth and coke play a role in the mental state of the people who live on Split Rock Rd., where the farm in question was in 1993. These days it remains an isloated area dotted with clandestine cannabis farms, as Holthouse tells it.
By the end, you realize Sasquatch is just a wild goose chase that could easily have been squeezed into one episode.
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