There’s a very good chance you’ve seen this video of a grizzly bear chasing a man on a mountain bike. Since its posting to YouTube more than 8 years ago, Â its managed to garner 41.7 million views, and that’s just YouTube. There are probably massively popular reposts on every from of social media, from Facebook to TikTok. Something about the video, however, has always seemed a little off.
There’s always been something about the shading, or lack thereof, that made me think it was fake. There are definitely plenty of people have noticed the same thing, but scrolling through the video’s comment section shows hundreds of people fully convinced that the video is 100% real. Fortunately, for whatever reason, the original poster decided to share a new video to their channel a little more than a month ago, showing the original clip before the fake bear was added in.
Why, after so many years, they decided to reveal the truth is beyond me, but they did. In fact, in the comment section of the new video, someone asked that exact question, to which the original poster replied “I was a little busy.”
So yeah, it’s definitely fake. Now you don’t have to get incredibly frustrated trying to explain to your gullible friends that there’s no way someone could’ve outrun a bear like that or that bears, like us, create shadows, so why wouldn’t that bear have a shadow? You can just show them this video, and if they still don’t believe you, they probably aren’t worth your time.
That said, kudos to the creator, MrGregor, for the pretty solid CGI job. I wish I understood video editing to that level. But still, maybe don’t go around posting fake videos just to reveal the truth 8 years later. Kinda weird man.
Image Credit: MrGregor via YouTube